Save the Regent

On 8 November 2009, the Regent Theatre will celebrate 80 years of continuous use as an entertainment venue in Brisbane.
This is a record of unmatched service to the community, providing not only films but also live entertainment and music. Until QPAC was opened, the Regent, being larger than Her Majesty’s, served Brisbane as the premier theatre and was the largest proscenium theatre ever built in this city. Its prestige and opulence was unmatched, with almost unbelievable decor and luxurious surroundings inside.
The Regent was the first public building to have air conditioning in Brisbane and the first theatre in Australia to have aisle lighting. It had the biggest illuminated theatre sign in Australia at the time. It s proscenium was also the widest for a picture palace in Australia. It was also the last great picture palace built in Australia, opening just a week before the stock market crash in 1929 and was generally regarded as the best Regent that Hoyts built.It was designed by two Brisbane-born architects, Richard Gailey Jr and Charles Hollinshed. A J Dickenson built the auditorium part and J & E L Rees built the Regent building off Queen Street. Both were local builders. Materials used in its construction included fibrous plaster and stucco mouldings, gold leaf, marble, bronze light fittings, Belgian carpet, velvet curtains, cut glass mirrors etc.
The magnificent interior was all locally made and a credit to Brisbane tradesmen and interstate specialists who built it. What remains is an incredible snapshot of 1920s building techniques and materials used to create these splendid “cathedrals of the motion picture”. Even the Elizabeth Street rear façade is a rare example of 1920s-era commercial building brickwork still remaining today.

Welcome to the Save the Regent website. If you want to join us in protecting Brisbane's last remaining Hollywood-style picture palace as a public place we can all enjoy, all the time, please take the time to write to Premier and Arts Minister Anna Bligh (Premier@ministerial.qld.gov.au) and Infrastructure Minister Stirling Hinchliffe (infrastructure@ministerial.qld.gov.au) to tell them that you don't think the current, council-approved plan -- to save the foyer, but not the Showcase cinema, the original 1929 bar and its surrounds (formerly the mezzanine) and the original Elizabeth Street facade -- is good enough. With a heritage application for the Showcase (which comprises fabric from the original 1920s Regent auditorium) and the bar area under consideration, and a court appeal against the council's decision to allow a 40-floor office tower on the Regent site underway, the battle is not yet over. Please feel free to browse this site - especially the Views page, where famous (including Geoffrey Rush, Mike Walsh and Bille Brown) and not-so-famous people have had their say about why the Regent is important and why it should be truly saved for future generations of Queenslanders.

Media coverage on the issue includes an article in The Sunday Mail (pictured) and the following spot from John Knox, Laurel Edwards and Gary Clare on Radio 4KQ:

A report in The Australian reveals an office-space glut in Brisbane. Read it here and then ask: why demolish the Regent to make way for something that's not needed?

The Save the Regent Group urgently needs to make contact with any craftsmen involved in the re-fit of Regent Showcase and bar areas in 1979/1980. This may include plasterers or other tradesmen who removed the original plasterwork and fittings and/or those who carefully refitted and re-plastered the Showcase cinema and bar areas. If you can help, or you know of somebody who can help or who did this work, please contact STR via this site urgently. You can send an email by clicking here.

If you made a submission on the Heritage Application for the Showcase area and received the CEO's recommendation notice (which recommended against listing), please apply to make an oral presentation ASAP.
Closing date is this Friday, September 4. You can email in a scanned application form, fax it or post it so that it arrives at the EPA by this Friday. It is important that the EPA get as many oral presentation requests as possible so that it gets the heritage council's attention. You have to choose some good wording for the grounds for your request (item 3). It could address the actual recommendation detail concerning consistency and accuracy. It could include comparison to other heritage-listed buildings which have had modifications or exhibit even weaker criteria and have been listed regardless.