Reference: https://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/nation/2023/01/27/iconic-rex-cinema-building-in-penang-to-be-torn-down/

The old Rex Cinema before it was taken over by a furniture shop in the 2000s. (Gregory Hooqe from Abandoned Places website pic)

Built at a cost of 70,000 Straits dollars in 1938, the cinema was dubbed by newspapers in the region at the time as being one of the best, replete with chairs imported from America and centralised air-conditioning for 1,000 persons. This was unheard of at the time.

The Pinang Gazette and Straits Chronicle in 1939 had reported it to be the largest cinema of its kind in Malaya, and “a first-class cinema and theatre combined”.

Records show the building was designed by Charles Boucher, the man behind the Zahir Mosque in Alor Setar and the Kedah House on Northam Road