A hot ticket: Youghal's revamped Regal Cinema on the market for €600k

Irish cinema on an all-time high — now you can own your own hot-ticket movie house for Oscar night

Lights, Camera, Action: Multi-screen Regal Cinema, Youghal has had a recent upgrade

Want to buy your way into the current wave of Irish movies and acting success, Irish Oscar hoopla and hype, and direct your very own ready-to-roll Irish cinema operation?

Main screen seats 137, with a 7M wide 4k digital screen and Dolby sound

If so, the perfect scene-setting move could be in the east Cork coastal town of Youghal where the fully-restored and successfully operating 1930s era Regal cinema with Art Deco touches, is up for a change of ownership.

Dating to 1936, Youghal’s Regal is the second cinema on the coastal town’s central site: the first, Hurst’s Picture Palace, dated to 1916 but in a foretaste nod to the subsequent classic movie Cinema Paradiso, it burned down in 1935.

Entertainment suite at Regal Cinema, Youghal

By local River Blackwater locale coincidence, the first movie to show in the ‘new’ Regal in 1936 was Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in Top Hat: actor and dancer Fred Astaire was a regular visitor and guest at Lismore Caste where his sister Adele Astaire had married Lord Charles Cavendish.

Adele Astaire and husband Charles Cavendish of Lismore Castle

Youghal’s Regal Cinema Mk 11 closed in 2010, but was taken firmly in hand and rescued after a decade ‘in the dark’ by active Irish property developers Redbarn Construction when they acquired it at a BidX1 auction at the same time as doing residential schemes in Youghal and in Leinster.

The c €500,000 (inc €90,000 of the vacant building’s purchase) spent on relaunching the Regal was overseen by Redbarn’s director David O’Rourke, and it now has two screens, a party room, and does up to three screenings a day.

Regal entrance

Movies come digitally from UK based distributors with ticket income divvied up on a 50/50 basis with the distributors rather than paying upfront, Mr O’Rourke notes, saying they did the refurbishment to demonstrate commitment to the town.

It gets business from a wide catchment of east Cork and west Waterford, despite the presence of cinemas in Midleton and Dungarvan, as well as being used as a wine bar for private parties, receptions, and other cultural events.

The property is just listed for sale as a going concern with estate agent Kevin O’Sullivan of Barry Auctioneers, who guides at €600,000.

That’s for a 4,725 sq ft (over two levels) refurbished building with 4k digital projectors, Dolby sound, and seating in the main auditorium for 137 and 7m wide screen; a second auditorium seating 62, and a party room for 40, for concerts, receptions, etc.

77 Main Street Youghal

• Meanwhile, on the other side of Youghal’s photogenic Clock Gate Tower building straddling Main Street the sale has come of the long-established Coffee Pot, owner-run as a café for over 40 year and leased more recently as Brunch & Deli.

Adjacent to the well-know Merricks building, No 77 Main Street is a three-storey building of 3,000 sq ft, with 85-seat restaurant, commercial kitchen, and overhead residential accommodation, inc three bedrooms, with outdoor space.

77 Main Street Youghal, centre of pic, navy building next to Merrick's store

No 77’s selling agent Kyle Kennedy of Hegarty Properties guides at €245,000 and says it coud suit a wide variety of uses, including co-working, restaurant/ café, and wellness centre.

Mr Kennedy adds: “This superb property previously operated as a highly successful restaurant for 42 years and is now ready for new owners to realise continued success.

“The Midleton-Youghal Greenway which is due to open this year is sure to increase the already high volume of passing trade.”

DETAILS:
Barry Auctioneers : 021-4279677
Hegarty Properties: 021-4639411