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How the Talkies Changed Bourke Street

The rise of the picture palaces, the introduction of talkies and the Depression,
began a hollowing-out of Melbourne’s traditional entertainment district.
by Bernie Halperin

For about fifty years Bourke Street thinking about film presentation was (south side) proclaimed that films were
was Melbourne’s artery to the theatre about to permanently change the theatre now a sophisticated entertainment. On
district. Every type of entertainment - mix. When the building boom started Collins Street, a prestige address in
high-minded and low - was either on again, the new generation of theatres itself, the Regent and Plaza beneath it
offer in Bourke Street, or just off it. and cinemas were all located away were also close to the Auditorium,
Between Elizabeth Street and Spring from Bourke Street. built as a concert hall in 1912. Across
Street, 12 theatres vied for public The boom was fuelled by the the road was the venerable Athenaeum
attention. In that same area were experience of America, where the Theatre and Library, an institution of
another six theatres, each one no more inducement of palatial surroundings was Melbourne, and one poised to astound
than half a block from Bourke Street. It selling more tickets than ever before. audiences with the talkie sequences of
was Melbourne’s equivalent of the In Melbourne the rival chains The Jazz Singer.
Great White Way. Hoyts, Union Theatres and JCW Films- An early, adventurous attempt to
Most of these theatre buildings Electric Theatres - the companies break out from the pack in Bourke
dated from the boom years of the 1880s which controlled the best theatres in Street had been Amalgamated Pictures’
and the first years of the new century. Bourke Street - were determined to be decision to build in Flinders Street, at
Moving pictures opened at St. Georges part of the new wave. Australian the transport entrance to the city. The
Hall in 1908, at the Star in 1911, evidence was promising: in 1925 a Majestic (1912) was the lone theatre in
quickly followed by the Melba (also population of six million was buying 80 this part of town for seventeen years,
1911), the first purpose-built picture million cinema tickets each year. until Union Theatres, which now
theatre to open in Bourke Street. By The locations of the new picture controlled the Majestic, opened their
1915 there were seven of them. palaces were as much about clustering palatial State almost next door, a step
World War One interrupted further at a prestige address as finding a bold that in a sense created another (mini)
expansion. After the Armistice, a pent- new vantage point. By building theatre precinct.
up urge to celebrate re-vitalised all the opposite the Town Hall, the Capitol Union’s decision to lease the
theatres. At the same time, bold (west side), and the Regent and Plaza Athenaeum for The Jazz Singer, which

Top: The early success of the Greater J. D. Williams Amusement Co. in Melbourne can be judged by the scale of the Britannia
(1912), built one year after their Melba

24 2005 CINEMARECORD