Beacon Bingo Hall (The Ritz) – A Haunted Landmark in Ilkeston

The Ritz Cinema was constructed for independent exhibitors of Ritz (Ilkeston) Ltd. and designed in a modern Art Deco style by Nottingham-based architect Reginald W.G. Cooper. This was Cooper’s seventh cinema design project. 

The cinema opened on May 20, 1938, with Barbara Stanwick’s “Stella Dallas” and British film star Victor McLaglen, invited by his nephew J.V. McLaglen, who was the Ritz Cinema’s first manager, as a guest of honor.

The cinema’s unique style

The cinema’s unique style closely resembled the Odeon theatres that were being built during that period. The main facade was adorned with light biscuit-coloured Doulton ‘carraway’ tiles and had a slender fin-tower feature. 

The auditorium accommodated 922 people in the stalls and 480 people in the circle. However, the narrow proscenium did not adapt well for screening CinemaScope films, and the top masking had to be lowered to create a widescreen effect in later years.

For most of its existence, the S. Graham Circuit of Nottingham ran the Ritz Cinema, which closed on June 8, 1958, with a re-issue presentation of Vincent Price’s “House of Wax.”

The Ritz Cinema is a Grade II Listed structure