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into their daily advertising columns. Equally, Greater in by those waiting for the II am screening. Utter mayhem
Union were loathe to claim the Bercy as one of their own ruled, resulting in the police being called to the scene. By
while screening product from an opposition distributor. the time order bad been maintained, it was well past the
The solution was to have the Bercy advertised in a sepa- screening time, so the support programme and intermis-
rate small block adve1tisement, directly above the Hoyts sion were dropped in favour of a "feature only" session.
column. To all intents and purposes, this created the im- And this happened three months into the run of the film!
pression that the theatre was an Independent house.
Despite its continuing success, the days of
the single auditorium were under threat from
the emerging trend to "cinema complexes",
housing 3, 4 or even 6 cinemas under the one
roof. Hoyts had proved the success ofthis type
of operation as early as 1969, when their Cin-
ema Centre - a three theatre operation - had
opened in Bourke Street. By the mid 1970's,
Greater Union were faced with the reality that
a number of their city theatres, namely the
Chelsea, Forum and Rapallo, all of which
were situated in Flinders Street, were now
on the city fringe, so to speak, and unable to
attract the audiences away from the more cen-
tralised city area. The Odeon and Times thea-
tres, whilst situated in Bourke Street. were
being eagerly sought by developers, and so,
the decision was made to build a brand new
6 cinema complex on the sight of the Barclay
cinema in Russell Street.

In what must now be considered a tragic loss
to the city of Melbourne, Greater Union
quickly disposed of the Odeon and Times theatres to de-
Bercy Projection Room velopers, and the historically significant Barclay cinema-
formerly the Kings Theatre - was razed to the ground to
"Irma La Douce" finally ended in August 1966. Colum- accommodate the new Russell complex.
bia's "Born Free" was the next attraction, and played an
equally successful season. It is fair to say that Columbia Speculation on the fate of the relatively new Bercy theatre
programmed the Bercy almost exclusively for many years was rife. However, in a strange twist of fate, major delays
to come, with hit after hit. Embraced back into the G.U. on the consh·uction of the Russell, resulted in a flood of
display column, and holding pride of place with the first releases, originally destined to open the new complex,
listing- the flagship position - the Bercy was to continue breathing new life into the remaining G.U. houses, i.e.
with a string of long-running hit movies, including, The Bercy and the Forum and Rapallo.
amongst others, "Funny Girl", ''Mary Queen Of Scots, "A
Man For All Seasons", "The Taming Of The Shrew" and The new RusseU cinemas fmally opened in November 1978,
"Guess Who's Coming To Dinner?". but surprisingly, the Bercy continued to hold on with a
further string of popular movies. Films such as "Arthur"
A regular function of the Berey was to host 'Gala Pre- continued to see the House Full board dragged out on Fri-
miere'. It was not uncommon to see intermediate and day and Saturday nights, but still the rumours of immi-
evening sessions dropped of a Thursday to accommodate nent closure persisted.
the premiere of a new film, which, more often than not,
would open its season the following day at another G.U. In truth, however. G.U. were quite happy with the busi-
theatre. ness the Bercy continued to generate. Located in the heart
of the entertainment area of the city, and being a relatively
The Bercy remained the "dignified lady" of Bourke Street inexpensive theatre to operate, there was even talk of up-
year after year, until the late 1970's, when the theatre was grading and refurbishment of the Bercy. G.U. were plan-
nearly rocked to its foundations by the release of"Grease". ning to dispose of the Forum and Rapallo, which by now
A film that established an immediate cult status, the House were struggling to find an audience. But outside forces
Full sign was almost a permanent display fixture. It was were to send this idea into a tail spin. Following the death
during the run of this film that the Bercy attained the du- of Sir Norman Rydge, his estate provided a considerable
bious notoriety of being featured on the nightly television amount of money to allow extensive refurbishment of his
news, following a near stampede one morning by over- two favourite theatres - The State in Sydney, and the old
anxious fans. At I Oam, the front doors were nearly pushed State (Forum and Rapallo), in Melbourne.

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