Who opened the first multiple cinema?
The first MULTIPLE CINEMA was the Regal Twins, Manchester, opened in 1930. The present nationwide movement into multiples began with the twinning of the Odeon, Nottingham in July 1965. First in the USA was the Alhambra Twin at Alhambra, California in 1939.
A choice of films at the same cinema was not unknown even before the advent of the multiple. In 1926 the Spanish correspondent of the German film journal Lichtbildbithne reported that he had visited a cinema in Cairo with twin screens in one auditorium showing two different films at the same time.
The first triplex was the Burnaby Theatre in Burnaby, British Columbia, opened by Taylor Twentieth Century Theatres in 1965. Britain’s first triplex was the ABC Lothian Road in Edinburgh, opened on 29 November 1969. The first quadriplex was the Metro Plaza in Kansas City, Mo., opened by the Durwood family (forerunners of the present American Multi-Cinema chain) in 1966. This was followed by a six-plex in 1969. The cinema with the most auditoria is Kinepolis, opened in Brussels in 1988, which has 27.
