Working in Northampton
Northampton is another of the places where I worked briefly during my long career managing cinemas and theatres.
In the early 1980s, I had been out of the business for a while, and was managing a scheme to find work for unemployed people living in Rugby.
Thorn-EMI, who ran the famous ABC Cinemas, got in touch and asked if I could turn around the business for their Empire Cinema at Havant. Under normal commercial considerations, the cinema would have closed, but the company had a factory nearby and did not want to lose face with thir local employees.
The upshot was that I accepted the challenge.
However, although I had many years experience, I had not worked for that company before, so spent two or three days at the ABC at Northampton, not too far from where I was living at Rugby, getting to know the company paperwork before actually taking over at Havant.
The Northampton cinema is still there, but now operates as a church.
Posted by colin on Tuesday 2nd March, 2010 at 9:15am