The Hindu (Tamil Nadu) ·
Anna Theatre: another cinema landmark in Chennai bites the dust
Anna was a standalone theatre with minimal seating, perhaps around 300, a contrast to the tent-poles that Alankar and Wellington obviously were
Mount Road for the nostalgic, and Anna Salai for those rooted in the present, is the spine that holds Chennai together. And as the metropolis evolved, the arterial road witnessed many changes.
Fresh edifices sprung up, old buildings became rubble, and in this churn, Anna Theatre too has recently bit the dust. In the Madras of the 1980s, there were many theatre complexes, as they were called then, unlike the multiplexes that roll off our tongues.
The Mount Road behemoths were Devi, Sathyam, Anand, Safire, to name a few. All of them had a blend of big screens and mini-versions like Devi Kala or Little Anand. There were standalone screens too, like Alankar and Wellington, but Anna was unique.