What's the latest theatre to close or open you have heard about?

[Leo Enticknap]

I wonder what will happen to the Samsung LED cinema wall at Pacific Winnetka. If another company doesn't take over the theater as a going concern, I guess Decurion will be looking for someone to buy it and relocate it, and that Samsung will also be keen for that to happen.

[Don Furr]

https://variety.com/2021/film/news/a...aF7GLVhXe6hGAc


Arclight Cinemas and Pacific Theatres will close down, a victim of the coronavirus pandemic that brought movie going to a standstill. The news comes as things were beginning to look up for the hard-hit exhibition industry and serves as a reminder of the economic devastation wrought by a public health crisis that upended cultural life.
“After shutting our doors more than a year ago, today we must share the difficult and sad news that Pacific will not be reopening its Arclight Cinemas and Pacific Theatres locations,” the company said in a statement. “This was not the outcome anyone wanted, but despite a huge effort that exhausted all potential options, the company does not have a viable way forward.”
The closure means that some of the most prominent and popular movie theaters in the heart of the film industry will be shuttered, including the iconic Cinerama Dome, which has hosted movie premieres and had cameos in everything from “Melrose Place” to “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.” The announcement resulted in paroxysms of grief across social media, as film fans weighed in on Twitter and other platforms to express their dismay that these marquees may remain dark even after COVID-19 abates.
“To all the Pacific and Arclight employees who have devoted their professional lives to making our theaters the very best places in the world to see movies: we are grateful for your service and your dedication to our customers,” the company continued. “To our guests and members of the film industry who have made going to the movies such a magical experience over the years: our deepest thanks. It has been an honor and a pleasure to serve you.”
It is possible, of course, that another company could assume these leases and reopen the theaters. That might involve some tough conversations with landlords. A recent report on IndieWire stated that Pacific Theaters Exhibition had not paid $181,900.40
in March 2021 rent for its Culver City Arclight location and could owe on the order of $2.2 million for a full year. Other theaters have had a difficult time of surviving the past year of closures and movie delays. Alamo Drafthouse has filed for Chapter 11, while major chains such as AMC Theatres reported some $4.4 billion in losses related to the COVID era.
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[Bill Brandenstein]

Hello everyone (late to the party but first post at the new site - finally!).

I'm delighted to announce that the local monopoly by Regal in the Santa Clarita Valley is officially broken. After several months of COVID-related delays, small independent exhibitor Laemmle is opening a modest 7-screen facility today, April 9, in Newhall, CA. Our local city government has done a great job of revitalizing the historic commercial district in this area, and this theater is yet another step in the direction of freshening things up and giving people something worth getting out of the house for.

As a film lover, I have mixed feelings about an all-digital, boothless facility. At least it exists! The "booth" is behind the concessions counter and is visible before you even enter the door. (pictured) The smallest auditorium, at 31 seats, is smaller than some of my largest backyard 16mm shows.

They're opening at greatly reduced capacity, of course.

IMG_9185 reduced.jpg

IMG_9189 crop rdcd.jpg


Our local paper did a nice writeup yesterday at https://signalscv.com/2021/04/laemml...-doors-friday/:

Cassie Gratton knows how to open a Laemmle theater. The general manager of the Newhall Laemmle, which will open its doors with a ribbon-cutting this Friday, also helped to open Laemmle’s Glendale and Claremont locations.

“I feel pretty privileged that they asked me to open this theater,” said Gratton, a 20-year Laemmle employee who worked her way up the ranks of the family-owned theater group.

When The Signal met Gratton on Wednesday for an early look at the new, spacious theater, she was training her new team.

“I don’t have another theater to train my staff,” Gratton said of her team, which started preparing for Friday’s grand opening Monday. Before the pandemic closed theaters, staff would receive training in an open theater.

Despite the atypical circumstances created by the pandemic, Gratton said she trusts her team.

The team is preparing to operate a fully digital theater, a feature that becomes clear to moviegoers shortly after walking into the theater.

Behind the front desk, a tall dark tower with small flashing lights houses sound processers that control the viewers’ experience in the theater’s seven auditoriums, which range from 31 to 120 seats.

The two-story theater features two auditoriums on the first floor and five on the second floor, which also includes an outdoor space. All auditoriums are equipped with an overhead 4K projector and JBL 7.1 surround sound speakers.

Gratton said the theater is taking various measures to ensure moviegoers’ safety.

Her team is equipped with sprays to disinfect auditoriums before and after showings. In addition, Gratton said sanitizing wipes will be available for patrons who want to wipe down their seats, while hand sanitizing stations will be placed throughout the theater.

The theater will provide face masks to any moviegoer who doesn’t have one and the structure’s heating and cooling system is equipped with air filters recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said Gratton.

“We’re operating at reduced capacity,” said Greg Laemmle, who runs the chain of art-house theaters bearing his name. “And whatever the state guidelines say in terms of percentage of seats can be filled, the reality is we also need to provide distancing between groups.”

While the state currently permits theaters to reach 50% capacity, Laemmle said, “We actually can’t get to more than 25% because we’re providing 6-foot spacing between groups.”

Providing that adequate distancing will mean moviegoers will need to reserve their seats in advance, a practice that is new at Laemmle, which will reopen five other locations on Friday. Additionally, the theater will not feature late shows.

Laemmle described the opening of Laemmle Newhall in three words. “It feels awesome,” he said of the project, which began taking shape in 2016 as part of the Newhall Crossings development.

Theater construction, located at the intersection of Lyons and Railroad avenues and anchoring Newhall Crossings, faced several delays.

“These are the kinds of things that happen when you have a complicated project, and this was a complicated project,” Laemmle said. “But we made a commitment to the city and citizens of the Santa Clara Valley to get this project done and we did it.”

Among the first movies being screened at Laemmle Newhall is “Kong vs. Godzilla.” The theater will also show art films, according to Laemmle.

“These are just entertaining films,” Laemmle said. “They might happen to be documentaries. They might happen to be in a foreign language. They might happen to not feature big-name actors. But they’re still entertainment. And it’s still just a night out at the movies.”

A night out at the movies starts with Friday’s in-person ribbon-cutting at 11 a.m. at the theater. While the event is open to the public, Laemmle encouraged those wishing to observe the occasion to do so through a livestream on the theater’s Facebook page.

“It’s going to be outdoors, but even then, we still have to be careful about numbers,” Laemmle said, citing the need to maintain social distancing during the ribbon-cutting.

[Mike Blakesley]

It hasn't opened yet, but I have heard that the Montana Theatre in Miles City MT has been sold. It was built in 1936. It closed at the start of the pandemic and has never reopened since. So far there's been no announcement about an opening date, but it is now sporting black plastic over the windows. It needs a lot of work. I hope the new owners know what they're doing -- and I wonder if their booth equipment has been run at all over the past year.

[Mark Ogden]

The remaining City Cinemas are now being programmed (and maybe operated) by the Angelica.

City and Angelica are both owned by Reading. They just dropped the City brand and merged everything under Angelica.

In the northeast, BowTie Cinemas continues to shed screens, closing a recently remodeled four-plex in Caldwell, New Jersey and the eight screen Wilton Mall Cinema in Saratoga Springs, New York.

[Martin Brooks]

I must have missed it, but the City Cinemas/Reading East 86th Street 4 in NYC closed around May of 2019.
The remaining City Cinemas are now being programmed (and maybe operated) by the Angelica.
Movieworld Douglaston in Queens, NY has permanently closed.

I think because of COVID, a lot of other theaters are "tenuous". About 70% of NYC theaters have re-opened or have announced dates.

Theaters that haven't reopened yet (and some possibly may never, although hopefully that won't be the case):
Manhattan:
Roxy (1)
Regal Essex Crossing (14)
Cinemart Cinema Village 12th St (3)
CMX East 62nd Street (6)
Cinépolis Chelsea Cinema (9)
Regal E-Walk Stadium & RPX (13)

Queens:
Cinemart Forest Hills (5)
Brielle North Shore Towers (1)
Regal Atlas Park (8)
Regal Midway (9)

Brooklyn:
Alamo Drafthouse (7)
BAM Rose Cinema (4)
Regal Court Street Stadium & RPX (12)
Cinemart Alpine (8)

Bronx:
National Amusements Concourse Plaza (10)

Staten Island:
Regal Staten Island & RPX

Theaters that were under construction when COVID hit and never opened, but still might:
Alamo Drafthouse Lower Manhattan (12)
Regal Tangram 4DX Flushing (7)
Alamo Drafthouse Staten Island (10)

In other news, Regal Union Square upped the screen count from 14 to 17 and the AMC 34th Street is open, but going through a renovation of some sort. With the COVID restrictions, the screens at the Union Square have as few as 9 seats.

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

For you theatre owners who lease their property to another operator, this is something you need to do. When we retired we leased our remaining two theatres to a single operator. Our attorney informed us that a UCC filing was in order to protect our property interest (equipment, etc) in the event the operator went Bankrupt. In fact our leasee filed Bankruptcy on one of our theatres and the court wanted to take control of our property to dispose of our equipment. I presented our UCC to the judge and control of the theatre's content was returned to us which we later sold to another operator. So if you lease your property, insist that your attorney fill a UCC with the state to protect what belongs to you.

When I worked at GTS we actually did that on a brand new theater and install.... 8 screens.... Had the owner not paid us in full as agreed to we could have shown up and taken all the new gear back out without any warning. That owner got the property owner to purchase the gear, but he did eventually go bankrupt and reorganize.... By then we had been paid. Had we not filed it, GTS would have been dragged into the bankruptcy.

[Don Furr]

For you theatre owners who lease their property to another operator, this is something you need to do. When we retired we leased our remaining two theatres to a single operator. Our attorney informed us that a UCC filing was in order to protect our property interest (equipment, etc) in the event the operator went Bankrupt. In fact our leasee filed Bankruptcy on one of our theatres and the court wanted to take control of our property to dispose of our equipment. I presented our UCC to the judge and control of the theatre's content was returned to us which we later sold to another operator. So if you lease your property, insist that your attorney fill a UCC with the state to protect what belongs to you.

A UCC filing is a legal notice a lender files with the secretary of state when they have a security interest against one of your assets. It gives notice that the lender has an interest, or lien, against the asset being used by you to secure the financing. The term “UCC filing” comes from the uniform commercial code.

[Marcel Birgelen]

In most jurisdictions, the term "Bankruptcy" is indeed closer to what Chapter 7 bankruptcy entails, although most modern economies do have some similar provisions as a Chapter 11 Bankruptcy that gives a failed company some time to reorganize and some kind of protection against its creditors during the time of restructuring. Usually, a majority of the existing creditors need to agree to the restructuring plan, in order for the company to emerge from its failed state.

The Chapter 11 procedure has gotten quite some critics over the years, as in, that it's too easy for companies to simply use this strategy to shed some costs and debs. Similar procedures all over the world have obviously been abused for similar purposes.

[Leo Enticknap]

Bankrupt used to mean bust, out of business, piecing out and auctionioning of the assets underway.

Now it seems to be a legal strategy to throw loans and leases overboard...

I think the latter definition is pretty much unique to the USA, though I may be wrong. A "Chapter 11 [Title 11, United States Code] bankruptcy" is a procedure whereby a business is granted legal protection from its creditors by a court while it is reorganized in order to be viable again. The safeguard against abuse is that a judge has to approve the application for a Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and also to approve the major reorganization steps that are taken. That judge is not supposed to approve throwing any obligations overboard that the business can meet while still remaining viable. That's the theory, anyways.

Chapter 7 is bankruptcy as the rest of the world understands the term: the winding up and liquidating of a business that is no longer viable, and the distribution of its remaining assets to its creditors. One important difference, as I understand it, is that only the business itself can file Chapter 11, whereas creditors of a business that are owed money by it can ask a court to declare it Chapter 7 bankrupt.

[Geoff Jones]

AMC is apparently opening a new cinema in Denver tomorrow, in a redeveloped area at 9th Avenue and Colorado Boulevard known as "9+CO." The theater will have the magnificently awful name "AMC 9+CO 10."

According to 9 News, AMC 9+CO 10 will include "the latest features for the moviegoing experience:"

• AMC Signature plush, power recliners.
• Heated seating.
• Online ticketing, reserved seating and ticketless entry.
• Dolby Cinema at AMC.
• AMC Feature Fare menu.
• AMC MacGuffins adult beverage concept.
• Mobile Food & Beverage Ordering.
• Private Theatre Rentals at AMC.
• AMC Safe & Clean policies and protocols.

There is NO WORD YET on whether or not AMC has figured out how to construct an auditorium with aisle lights that don't shine across the bottoms of their screens...

Perhaps that is a trade secret that other cinemas have kept masterfully hidden from AMC (and Regal)?

[Frank Cox]

Bankrupt used to mean bust, out of business, piecing out and auctionioning of the assets underway.

Now it seems to be a legal strategy to throw loans and leases overboard, maybe lay off a bunch of staff, and then carry on with business as usual afterward. It isn't often that bankrupt actually means gone, it just leaves a lot of people holding the bag.

[Leo Enticknap]

In other words, and doubtless as SMG did in the fall, they're using Chapter 11 as a bargaining chip with landlords and other stakeholders to try to get a better deal. Not surprising. The airlines did this when some of them went Chapter 11 in the aftermath of 9/11 and then again in the late '00s recession, using the process to offload 30-year old leased planes back to their owners, terminate loss-making routes, and get subsidies for others. Fingers crossed that as many as possible of ADH's sites make it to reopening.

[William Kucharski]

The articles on the Alamo Drafthouse bankruptcy state:

The Alamo Drafthouse Ritz in downtown Austin, as well as locations in New Braunfels and Kansas City, Missouri, will be permanently closed. All other theaters that are currently open will continue to be open in accordance with local pandemic guidelines, the company said.

Though they also state:

Alamo said it will continue to evaluate all its leases during the bankruptcy process to determine additional lease terminations and to decide which locations will be part of the future business.

Here in the Denver area, only their smallest multiplex of three (including a huge new theater that opened last year) is currently open.

https://www.statesman.com/story/news...ic/6901907002/

[Mike Rivest]

In NYC, the Concourse Plaza Multiplex Cinemas has closed leaving the Bronx with only one cinema complex left. http://cinematreasures.org/theaters/43139
NA Concourse Plaza 1991 06 28.JPG