Münstedt cinema palace
The Münstedt Kino Palast in Vienna's Prater emerged in 1902 from the "Singspielhalle" founded by Gustav Münstedt in 1877 . The cinema was one of the first cinemas in Vienna and Austria-Hungary . The capacity was 600 people.
Gustav Münstedt took over Praterhütte No. 142 in the 1870s to initially run a hippodrome and, from 1877, an amusement hall, where acrobats, folk singers, animal tamers and midgets performed. "Living Pictures" are shown for the first time in 1900.
In 1902, the director of the Singspielhalle Gustav Münstedt applied for a license to open a cinema instead of the Singspielhalle, which he also received. In addition to a small cinema, the new building also provided space for panoramas and a vending machine buffet. The now baroque facade of the building, completed in 1904, was decorated, like some of the other new cinema buildings, with zinc ornaments - fine figurative decorations made of zinc. In 1906 the film screenings were moved to the great hall and a little later the other attractions were given up. The cinema had 502 seats in the large hall, down from 468 around 1927.
Gustav Münstedt ran the cinema until his death in 1933, after which his heirs, Nikolaus and André Marcell, continued to run it. The two were midgets and until then had worked for Münstedt's multi-part entertainment establishment. In 1945 the cinema was - like all other Prater cinemas except for the comedy theater - destroyed in Allied bombing raids. However, it was rebuilt in a different location as a simple small cinema without a magnificent baroque facade, only to be finally closed on November 5, 1984.