TradeNames: Despite the slings and arrows of fortune, fashion and technology, the Savoy Cinema has survived and prospered, writes Rose Doyle

The capital's main thoroughfare has an obvious share of legendary buildings. It has the GPO and it has Clery's and, by virtue of its venerability, not a little style and the pleasure taken by countless citizens in its darkened seats, it has the Savoy Cinema.

Film maker Neil Jordan it was who admitted, standing at the back of the auditorium as one of his films premiered, that he doesn't "really realise I've made a movie until I see it on stage at the Savoy"!

It's an easily understood sentiment. The Savoy is the oldest remaining cinema in the city centre. It's independently Irish-owned too, by the Dublin Cinema Group; a rare distinction in these multinational days.

As a cinema it's changed, utterly. It had to; the Savoy is still showing pictures in O'Connell Street because it adapted. A recent revamp has returned it to the style of its early heyday, all Art Deco cool and with a larger foyer for hosting the premiers and glittering crowds with which it's become synonymous.

There was great glamour in the Savoy's beginnings too. Designed in the stripped, classical style of the Gresham Hotel, it was opened on November 29th, 1929 by president William T Cosgrave.

Inside was a wonderland. Vast and soaring (there was seating for 2,792), the Venetian theme decor had everything the "atmospheric" theatres of the time demanded: a painting of the Doge's Palace on the safety curtain, a proscenium arch in the shape of a Venetian bridge, decorative faux Venetian windows and balconies, all designed by WE Greenwood. The building's architect was FC Mitchell and more than 1,000 people (almost all "persons of Irish nationality") got jobs on its construction.

The opening set a precedent for glitter with "numerous prominent citizens in attendance". Talking and sound pictures had just come to Ireland and that first audience was treated to a programme which opened with a "news bulletin", continued with a showing of "Ireland" (promoting the wonders of the Free State), went on to enjoy Quentin Maclean (straight from The Regal Cinema, London) on the organ and, finally, a viewing of On with the Show, the first 100 per cent natural colour, talking, singing, dancing picture. A seat in the front stalls cost 1/-, one in the dress circle 3/-.

The Savoy's first owners were Associated British Cinemas Ltd. By 1984, when Paul Anderson entered the picture, it was owned and being sold by the Rank organisation.

Anderson is something of a legend himself in the world of Dublin cinemas. A director of the Dublin Cinema Group (DCG), along with his cousin, Paul Ward, and father Kevin Anderson, he lives, and gives a good impression of breathing, cinemas. "Not the films," he's adamant, "the cinema itself has always been my love. I love running cinemas!"

He digresses, gloriously, all the time. So many memories and so many cinemas to talk about. He'd been around a fair few of them too before taking on the Savoy in 1984.

"Rank," he explains, "were pulling out of Ireland and all they'd left to dispose of were the Odeon on Eden Quay, the New Metropole (now Screen) in Townsend Street, and the Savoy."

DCG bought what is now the Screen and on July 1st, 1984 the five-cinema complex that was the Savoy. "We were the only cinema people offering to take over, all the others were developers. If we hadn't bought it the Savoy would have gone the way of all cinemas in the city centre.

"We're cinema people and decided to celebrate the fact that the Savoy had come into Irish hands with a £1-day, charging £1 for all seats. We sold more than had been sold in the previous two weeks. We changed the pricing system too, to make it attractive for people to come in the afternoons. There was a lot of unemployment in 1984 and cinema was at a low point. If Paul Ward and myself hadn't put time into the monumental task of bringing the Savoy back to viability . . . "

He leaves the possibility unspoken but you get the picture.

Cinemas account for a large part of the story of his life. He can tell you almost anything about cinema in Ireland over the last 50 years, mostly because he's been there.

He was 18 in 1965 when he left school in Glenstal, 19 when he became manager of the Green Cinema on St Stephen's Green. "There was a staff of 36 and I was Mr Anderson because that's the way it was then. Only the page boy, who was 17, was younger than me. Jim Mulvaney, the chief usher, was the model for Mr Screen, the statue outside the Screen. On Sunday afternoons we were a crèche for the whole area, with 1,004 children under eight while their parents lunched or walked in the Green!" He had a way of keeping that particular audience quiet, but that's another digression and another story.

DCG first ventured into cinema ownership with The Premier, Lucan in 1955. The Andersons, parents and four children, ran things most Sundays. Paul Anderson's mother, Carmel, looked after the shop with his sister, Lorna. His brothers, Tom and David, took charge of tickets and seating and father Kevin filled in as projectionist. Paul, at nine, was the cashier. Sunday shows brought audiences of 700-800, except when the weather was good because then nobody came and they didn't open anyway.

By 1969 he was not only running the Green but seven suburban cinemas as well. He lists them, and their seating capacities, from the Star in Crumlin (1,600 seats) to the Gala in Ballyfermot (1,800 seats).

"Time was when there were 12 cinemas in and around the O'Connell Street area too," he says,listing The Plaza, Ambassador, Regent, Palace, Film Centre, Theatre Royal, Regal Rooms, Grafton, Green, Theatre De Luxe (Camden Street), Mary Street Cinema and, always, the Savoy.

The DCG went on acquiring and Paul Anderson went on managing; the Ambassador for 27 years, the Regent for eight. A specialist in cinema design (he began with the renovation of The Grove, Lucan in 1967) he was responsible, in 1971, for twinning the Green, in the 1980s for turning the Casino, Killarney into what was only the second three-cinema complex in the country. He recalls dates, film runs, staff and audience numbers with terrifying precision and clear passion.

From 1929 until 1995 the Savoy had "priority on product play", meaning it got new films before other cinemas. Since 1995, when competition monopoly regulations removed this advantage, the Savoy, Paul Anderson says, "has had to survive as everyone else. We've done five different renovations in 22 years. The 2003 job, on the foyer, staircases, upper foyer and cash desks, cost €2 million."

He really wants the Savoy to continue as a cinema but worries about the threat to cinemas from a movie industry "controlled by people with no history in or knowledge of cinemas. They've lost sight of their most valuable asset. A main threat is the closeness of DVD and cinema release but digitalised movies are a threat too. They're being made so available people can show in home cinemas and elsewhere."

Audience profile has changed from 14-24 years to 14-35 as the marrying age gets older. "Once people get married and have a family it's more difficult for them to get out," Anderson explains. "In the Savoy we're pretty close to the national average of five visits per head of population each year. The UK figure is two-and-a-half. We more than punch our weight here when it comes to supporting cinema and the reason is the Ward-Anderson group. We started buying cinemas when cinemas began getting into difficulties, running them way beyond their economic life. We kept them open all over the country when they were closing down wholesale in the UK."

He's met everyone, including Tom Hanks at the Savoy's first premier, Splash! in 1984 when he "thought it would be the last picture he'd make. It was terrible!" Casablanca is his favourite film, "a stunning experience on the Savoy screen".

And he's off again, digressions and stories galore. There's a film in Paul Anderson, somewhere.