Ceylon Cinema and House. Thorpe Road Newton Heath

Moston and Lightbowne are to have yet another super-cinema next year with the first steps taken this week in the scheme to provide a cinema in Thorpe-road, Lightbowne to replace the nearby Ceylon. The scheme has been in the air for several years, but residents are now seeing the first concrete steps for workmen have begun to demolish the old Congregational Church which was closed following the removal of the LMS Carriage Shop. The cinema will only be a small one, seating 800, but will be as comfortable and homely as it is possible to make it. “Apparently people thought that we would just alter the interior, but it is a more difficult job than that, for  we have to demolish the whole lot and pull it down right to the ground,” Mr MacDonald, head of Messrs Donald MacDonald of Trafford Bar, the builders, told a NEWS reporter.  The building itself will have nothing extraordinary about it, but will be exceedingly comfortable and totally different from the atmosphere of the building that now stands on the site. Demolition will be completed in a few weeks and it will the take about five or six months to erect the new building which will be opened early next year. [Manchester City News 13 August 1938 Page 8]

Closed to film 30th June 1960. Bingo. Closed 1992. Furniture factory.

Reference    Builder 1 October 1937 Page 616 -  “preparing plans”
Reference    Manchester City News Friday 8 October 1937 Page 5. Proposed sale of Congregational Church for cinema. Lightbowne Road
Reference    Builder 1 July 1938 Page 35  “preparing plans”
Reference    Builder 23 September 1938 Page 621
Reference    Manchester City News 13 August 1938 Page 8