Abdulla Mohamed Thaver

"Egyptian films were shown during the 1930s at the Royal/Majestic, but subsequently became a speciality of the Empire and the Sultana, owing to the Zanzibar-based distribution company of A. M. Thaver. Abdulla M. Thaver, better known by his nickname Abdulla Masi, a joint partner of the Indo-African Theatres Ltd. and a managing director of the Empire Cinema, promoted the regular import of Egyptian films to British East Africa from the early 1940s [49] [49] Bulletin d’Information du Centre National de la Cinématographie….

These observations, however, should not lead to an underestimation of the preponderate market shares of influential North American or British production-cum-distribution companies, such as the South African-based “Schlesinger” company that operated in East Africa for Metro Goldwyn Meyer, 20 th Century Fox and Arthur Rank Corporation [50] [50] Ibid. See also R. Smyth (1989 : 391).. Cinema managers such as Abdulla Thaver were well aware of their dependence “upon the income derived from showing English films”. Aiming at “maintain[ing] the Cinema business as a paying concern” necessarily meant acknowledging that 28

“75 % of the income is derived from natives and the balance of 25 % from Indians and Europeans. It is therefore important that films appealing to the natives should be obtained by us. (…) Only those films containing light music, love stories and comedies, detective stories easy to understand containing excitement, thrills and stunts appeal to them [51]

[51] A.M. Thaver in a letter to the Chairman of the Stage Plays and….”

29In fact, Thaver had not reckoned with the rapid development of the Indian film entertainment industry, which was in the course of the 1950s to produce its own appealing versions of Hollywood jungle adventures, Rock n’ Roll musicals, love story melodramas, and the like.

“Tonight at the Empire” Cinema and urbanity in Zanzibar, 1920s to 1960s" Brigitte Reinwald: Dans Afrique & histoire 2006/1 (vol. 5), pages 81 à 109