Rex @ Kathimerini

Research on the “Rex” cinema and theater complex in Athens for Fabric, the documentary film screened at the “Old Library” space of the Athens School of Fine Arts in the framework of documenta 14 in Athens from April to July 2017.

Article Rex, Nikos Vatopoulos @ Kathimerini Newspaper, Greece, 18 May 2017
Article Rex, Nikos Vatopoulos @ ekathimerini Newspaper, Greece, Website, 11 June 2017

Rex
the most
New York-style
building of
Athens

“In the early 1930s, the Sikiaridis brothers, Simos, Filaretos and Alekos, traveled to New York. They returned full of ideas about the world of show business and the new, state-of-the-art entertainment mansions that in America was radically altering the cityscape. These new ideas and the vision of the Sikiaridis brothers are behind the creation of “Rex” in the heart of Athens.

It was proudly greeted as a “building in Athens”, for the New York spirit it brought to the Greek capital. Eighty years after its inauguration (January 22, 1937), “Rex” is interwoven with memories of past generations and the contemporary artistic production, as the National Theater keeps it alive and flourishing. However, 80 years ago, it was not self-evident to build such a state-of-the-art multiplex building, with a cinema on the ground floor (Rex, “the most luxurious and the finest of Europe”), a theater (the “Kotopouli” scene with 1,400 seats) just above, and “Cineak”, the children’s cinema with 700 seats in the basement. The ads were then exclaiming: “The Athenians are proud and the foreigners jealous of it”.…

“The decision to invest (with capital that Simos, Filaretos and Alekos Sikiaridis brought from Beirut, which was the center of their international textile trade company) was, among other, influenced by the entrepreneur Spyros Skouras (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spyros_Skouras )”. Skouras was then a leading motion picture pioneer and movie executive in the US and was looking for viewing venues in Athens. “The Sikiaridis brothers then assigned the exploitation of the “Rex” to Skouras,” says Elizabeth Sikiaridis.

…There is always a risk mind that looks forward, behind every great project.”
Kathimerini

Rex
the venue

that brought
a slice
of the
Big Apple
to
Athens

“Simos, Filaertos and Alekos Sikiaridis returned to Athens from a trip to New York back in the early 1930s full of new ideas about show business and the new, ultra-modern palaces of entertainment that were rapidly changing American cities. These ideas – and the brothers’ entrepreneurial spirit – eventually resulted in the Rex venue in downtown Athens, a building hailed as a slice of New York in the Greek capital.

Now, 80 years after its January 22, 1937 inauguration, the Rex is indelibly linked to the country’s entertainment history and is still an active force thanks to the Greek National Theater. Back in the day, the construction of such a large venue raised eyebrows: It had the Rex cinema on the ground floor, the 1,400-seat Kotopouli Theater right above it and, at the basement level, the 700-seat Sineak movie theater.

For architecture duo Vassilis Kassandras and Leonidas Bonis – who had earlier worked together on a huge complex for the military fund on Panepistimiou Street that is now home to the Attica department store, among other businesses – being assigned the Rex project represented a windfall.

The project cost a lot of money for the time and, according to Elizabeth Sikiaridi, an architect who has studied her family’s history extensively, the brothers were able to raise the cash from their textile import-export business in Beirut. She says that their decision to go ahead with the investment was probably also influenced by Spyros Skouras, a Greek who was a major film producer in the United States and was looking for new venues to show films. “The Sikiaridis brothers later turned the Rex cinema over to Skouras,” says the architect.

The Sikiaridis family was known for its innovative ideas (it had founded a co-ed school in Beirut in 1950) and the Rex was something completely new for the Greek capital – even the mere fact that smoking was not allowed inside the theaters was controversial.

The family also established a medical clinic at 5 Feidiou Street at the back of the Rex. “The two buildings have always been joined by an internal door. Even now, the Feidiou building serves as the entrance for the National Theater’s cast and crew,” says Sikiaridi. Back in the day, the clinic was used to test children suspected of having tuberculosis and seeking treatment at a foundation created by the family in the northern suburb of Maroussi.”
Kathimerini

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