Post by Miss Dee on May 26, 2010 17:51:13 GMT -5
Dormont's Hollywood Theater set to close
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
By Barbara Vancheri and Kaitlynn Riely, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
The Hollywood Theater in Dormont, crippled by a harsh winter and shrinking customer base, will close at month's end.
Bill Dever of Motion Picture Heritage Corp., the Franklin, Ind., nonprofit that has managed the Hollywood since June, said they made the decision to stop showing movies because "no one's showing up.
"We tried to get a program of promotion," he said in a brief phone call Tuesday afternoon. "We offered discounting, and it didn't give a single percentage rise to the business, and at some point in time, we didn't want to throw good money after bad."
He said Motion Picture Heritage will stop management of the venue on Sunday.
The theater issued a call to arms in April, held a Mother's Day craft show and fundraiser May 1 and shortened its screening schedule after that. In recent weeks, the theater has been available for rental Mondays through Wednesdays, with movies being shown during the balance of the week.
The landmark, at 1449 Potomac Ave., recently had just one part-time employee and relied largely on volunteers.
The theater, which underwent $300,000 in renovations in 2007, reopened in August 2009. It has movies scheduled Thursday through Sunday with the last trio of features "Revenge of the Pink Panther" at 2 p.m., "Nine" at 4:30 p.m. and "A Bridge Too Far" at 7 p.m., all on Sunday.
It's too early to know if another group will step forward to accept the challenge of running a neighborhood theater in these days of megaplexes with stadium seating and "Shrek Forever After" in 3-D and "Sex and the City 2" on multiple screens.
The past year has been brutal for theater operators. In November, the Cheswick Theatre closed. In March, the Squirrel Hill went dark, in April the Showcase Cinemas West called it quits and, come June 17, Carmike's Galleria cinemas will stop operating, too.
There are rumblings about possible new theaters in Monroeville and McCandless but nothing has been announced.
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
By Barbara Vancheri and Kaitlynn Riely, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
The Hollywood Theater in Dormont, crippled by a harsh winter and shrinking customer base, will close at month's end.
Bill Dever of Motion Picture Heritage Corp., the Franklin, Ind., nonprofit that has managed the Hollywood since June, said they made the decision to stop showing movies because "no one's showing up.
"We tried to get a program of promotion," he said in a brief phone call Tuesday afternoon. "We offered discounting, and it didn't give a single percentage rise to the business, and at some point in time, we didn't want to throw good money after bad."
He said Motion Picture Heritage will stop management of the venue on Sunday.
The theater issued a call to arms in April, held a Mother's Day craft show and fundraiser May 1 and shortened its screening schedule after that. In recent weeks, the theater has been available for rental Mondays through Wednesdays, with movies being shown during the balance of the week.
The landmark, at 1449 Potomac Ave., recently had just one part-time employee and relied largely on volunteers.
The theater, which underwent $300,000 in renovations in 2007, reopened in August 2009. It has movies scheduled Thursday through Sunday with the last trio of features "Revenge of the Pink Panther" at 2 p.m., "Nine" at 4:30 p.m. and "A Bridge Too Far" at 7 p.m., all on Sunday.
It's too early to know if another group will step forward to accept the challenge of running a neighborhood theater in these days of megaplexes with stadium seating and "Shrek Forever After" in 3-D and "Sex and the City 2" on multiple screens.
The past year has been brutal for theater operators. In November, the Cheswick Theatre closed. In March, the Squirrel Hill went dark, in April the Showcase Cinemas West called it quits and, come June 17, Carmike's Galleria cinemas will stop operating, too.
There are rumblings about possible new theaters in Monroeville and McCandless but nothing has been announced.