Odeon cinema is a well known cinema group that you can find in Britain, and is also the largest in Europe. There are over 100 cinemas in the UK and the cinema group accounts to nearly a third of cinema tickets sold in the UK.
The group was founded in 1930 by Oscar Deutsch and it is said by Odeon publicists that the name is derived by the motto "Oscar Deutsch Entertains Our Nation" but that isn't true, the word Odeon actually originates in France and Italy well before the group existed and actually is derived from Ancient Greece.
The first cinema to open was located in Perry Barr, Birmingham, it was designed by Harry Weedon and had to be remodelled after the it received heavy damage in World War II. The place was originally a bingo hall but was converted to a conference venue. You may have noticed that the style of Odeon cinema’s have art-deco themes, this is because Deutsch loved the original so much that he had hired the architect to design his future buildings.
He loved the company so much that he hired a professional photographer he went by the name John Maltby to take photos of every cinema in the Odeon chain. He took lots of photos that not only showed the exterior of the buildings, but also the interior. These photos are held in the National Monuments Record, in the public archive of English Heritage and can also be seen online.
Their main and largest cinema where they hold premières is the Odeon Leicester Square. It was built in 1937 on the site of a large music hall that dates back to the 1850's and boasts the first widescreen in Great Britain, which was fitted in 1953.
The company was later purchased from J. Arthur Rank who was a person who was interested in film production and distribution. This is a man who's name is synonymous with Odeon group as he owned the company for the longest period in its history.
With recent acquisitions of Italian cinemas they have become the third largest cinema group in the world. Florence has one of the oldest movie theatres in the city that was set up in 1920 to 1922. It was located in the wing in a Pallazzo dello Strozzino. Before it was called Odeon it was called the Cinema Teatro Savoia. It is still there and being that it is located in Florence you will find some brilliant Tuscany villas near to the cinemas.
Over the years Odeon has been sold quite a few times recently and a few of their cinemas have been sold to various other companies even rivals - for example, cinemas in Newcastle have all been sold to Empire cinemas and many smaller cinemas have been closed in order to keep with market share limits. In 2003, though, the company was purchased by Terra Firma and merged with United Cinemas International which is what made it the largest cinema chain Europe.
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