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White Elephants & Disposable Cinemas

ccrouch — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 11:45:49 +0000

Theatre structures have regularly posed a dilemma for property owners. While serving as potentially lucrative tenants and offering up considerable consumer drawing power, there is often a problematic issue once a theatre has run it’s coarse as a viable business. After movie goers have moved on, the property owner is left with a “white elephant”; a building which, by it’s very design, is both difficult to rent/sell and expensive to maintain.

Beginning in the late 1950′s, this problem became particularly palpable, as residential populations shifted towards outlying suburban communities, leaving behind the formerly thriving cinemas of urban downtown’s. A trend later exacerbated with the arrival of multiplexes and “modern” cinemas. In an attempt to circumvent the “white elephant” issue, the 60′s and 70′s saw an increase in theatres being designed as temporary configurations, which could be converted to alternative uses with a minimum of effort.

One Orange County example of these “disposable” theatres can be found in Buena Park. Today, the modest cinder block building ,standing at 7886 Beach Blvd, serves as the home for a popular skateboarding retail outlet. However, back in 1959, the structure opened as the “functionally modern” Electrovision Corp. Buena Park Theatre.

In stark contrast to the cavernous auditoriums and ornate designs of other county cinemas, the Buena Park was purposely designed “on the cheap”, with cinema specific features that could easily be altered or removed. Built for $75,000, the theatre featured a false auditorium floor (which could be removed to reveal a conventional level slab) and non load bearing internal framework (allowing the floor plan to be reconfigured readily). Even the venue’s box office, concession, and projection areas were designed for seamless removal; utilizing a minimalist approach for each. While serving up an under whelming moving going experience, the approach was unquestionably cost effective and, some forty years later, allowed for the theatre to live on as the Identity Boardshop.

The movement towards “disposable” theatres never caught on as an industry standard. While AMC utilized the idea heavily during their early 70′s national expansion (even going as far as to include ground floor projection booths in many locations), the concept transitioned more in to tighter design budgets, than truly temporary cinemas. At most, the “white elephant” issue may carry some of the blame for a generation of generic shoebox multiplexes, which plagued much of the cinema landscape throughout the 70′s and 80′s.

In an interesting bit of cyclical history, the present day exhibition industry is beginning to face the “white elephant” issue once again, as a generation of expensive, 20 – 30 screen, megaplexes become increasingly obsolete. Thus far, the reaction has been to build slightly smaller venues. However, one has to suspect it’s only a matter of time before someone revisits the idea of “disposable” theatres.

Online Anniversary: The “New Era” Begins

ccrouch — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 13:54:33 +0000

On this week, ten years ago, six national theatre chains announced their plans to form a joint venture that would “begin a new era for the industry”. The chains involved included Lowes Cineplex Entertainment, Regal Cinemas, Cinemark Theatres, General Cinema Theatres, Edwards Theatres, and Century Theatres. The “new” concept would be selling movie tickets online, via Fandango.com.

Even in 2000, online ticket sales weren’t exactly a new idea. Moviephone, which had made a name for itself selling tickets over the telephone, had already established an online service and sold the operation to AOL by 1999. Additionally, Movietickets.com, a venture backed by Hollywood.com, AMC Theatres, and National Amusements, had announced plans for a similar online service a month prior to the six chain operation. However, being the “.com” era (all be it the tail end), anything related to the Internet was seen as “industry changing” and “the future”.

Ultimately, this “new era” would prove to be more of another available option for movie goers than true industry changer. The promises of non existent box office lines, no hassle transactions, and “straight to your movie” service never quite materialized; nor did the chains’ intended payroll savings and streamlined operations (some had envisioned this as the first step in fully automated theatres). The vast majority of movie goers continued to utilize theatre box offices for their tickets, with online sales generally existing as a somewhat awkward and less favored option.

Perhaps, the one true revolutionary change that resulted from the online movement was a dramatic shift in where moviegoers went for theatre and show time information; the near century old stand bye of newspaper print adds being quickly replaced by these online services. Certainly not the consumer trend the industry was aiming to create in 2000, but one they have come to encourage and exploit over the ensuing years.

A Theatre of Great Contention: Foothill Ranch 22

ccrouch — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 16:13:29 +0000

This week marks the tenth anniversary of Regal’s Foothill Ranch 22. While the theatre has never quite lived up to business expectations, the site does have a rather colorful back story.

Back in 1993, the Foothill Ranch Development Company announced plans to build a retail and entertainment center, on a fifteen acre parcel, beside the Foothill Transportation Corridor. The centerpiece of this development was to be a 24 screen, 4,000 seat cinema, run by AMC. At the time, the theatre would have been the nation’s largest and AMC’s fourth venture in to Orange County. This announcement also came on the heels of Edwards’ plans to develop an eighteen screen venue a few miles away, at what would later become the Irvine Spectrum complex.

True to form, Edwards didn’t take this encroachment on their home turf lightly. Accelerating and expanding their Irvine project, the chain opened the Spectrum theatre early (before the retail portion of the development had broken ground) and increased the cinema’s screen count to 22. Also in retaliation to AMC’s Foothill plans, Edwards took a more aggressive approach to winning bids on cinema projects, in near bye Aliso Viejo and Mission Viejo. Faced with ever stiffening competition from Edwards, AMC officially backed out of the Foothill Ranch project in the summer of 1996.

The following year, another suitor entered the Foothill Ranch Cinema project, via Knoxville, Tennessee based Regal. At the time, Regal was a newcomer to the Southern California market, having entered the area through the purchase of Krikorian Theatres’ original chain. The Foothill location, while now downsized to a 22 screen plan, was slated to be the company’s west coast flagship. However, as with AMC’s earlier effort, Edwards quickly took action to hinder the project.

Initially threatening to build it’s own theatre across the street from the Foothill Ranch Center, Edwards managed to push, then cash strapped, Regal in to a “wait and see” mode. After waiting out Edwards’ fruitless threat, Regal completed the Foothill cinema in 1999, only to consider a last minute offer, from Edwards, to purchase the venue. However, having lost the company’s patriarch in 1997 and recently entered in to a $250 million financing deal with Bank of America, Edwards was unable to pull off the deal, making way for the theatre’s long delayed opening, on September 17, 1999. None the less, Edwards did manage one parting jab, offering a week long free popcorn and fifty cent hot dog promotion at it’s locations, to coincide with the Foothill’s opening week festivities.

The ensuing years would see Edwards and Regal slip in to bankruptcy; both ultimately falling under the same ownership and Regal Entertainment Group banner. The Foothill Ranch cinema, which had been the source of so much contention, for the better part of a decade, would prove to be a disappointment, settling in to being one of the county’s under performing theatres.

The Rise An Fall of Mann Theatres

ccrouch — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 11:43:17 +0000

These days, the Mann Theatres chain exists as a mismanaged handful of leases, in search of new operators. Yet, in the not so distant past, Mann was a major player in the exhibition industry; for a time, the nation’s largest independent chain.

Mann’s story begins with the chain’s namesake, Ted Mann. Born on April 15, 1916, Mann first became interested in cinema while working as a theatre usher, during his teen years. Parlaying his early interest in to a career, Mann leased a theatre in St. Paul Minnesota, for $100 a month, learning the ins and outs of the business through a period of “hands on” trial and error. After earning enough money to purchase the theatre he was leasing, Mann expanded his cinema interests in to a twenty-eight venue, Minnesota based, chain, by the time he was forty. After moving to California in the late 60′s, Mann sold his Minnesota theatres to the General Cinema Corporation in 1970 and pursued a side career in film production.

In 1973, Mann returned to the film exhibition business, purchasing the struggling National General Theatre chain (the descendant company of Fox, Fox West Coast, and National Theatres) for $67.5 million; re branding the collection of 240 aging cinemas, Mann Theatres.The upstart Mann Theatres quickly gained notoriety (perhaps infamy) for “modernizing” many of National General’s classic cinemas and renaming the iconic “Grauman’s” Chinese, “Mann’s” Chinese. While controversial, from a historical perspective, these early efforts proved to be keen business moves, as the chain’s holdings began to fall in line with a modern business model; turning a formerly dying chain in to a viable competitor, within a few years.

By the 1980′s, Mann’s remodeling and restructuring work transitioned in to the creation of a multiplex oriented chain. Casting off older, under performing, sites, the company began an aggressive expansion of new builds; growing from 276 screens in 1973, to 450, by the close of the decade. As with most multiplex chains of the time, Mann’s initial generation of new theatres were a far cry from the grand palaces the company had inherited; typically modest four to six screen cinemas which were designed with more of a focus on low cost efficiency than opulence. However, Mann’s redirection ultimately built the chain in to the nation’s third most profitable exhibitor.

Flush with success, Mann garnered the attention of the Gulf & Western Corporation, to which Ted Mann sold controlling interest in 1986. Mann remained chairman of the company until 1991, overseeing an expansion of higher quality theatres, which reached 510 screens by the time of his departure. In 1997, the chain, changed hands once again, selling to Westar for $165 million. Unfortunately, the Westar sale also marked the beginning of Mann Theatres’ slide in to irrelevance, as the chain wilted during the megaplex era. Unable to keep pace with the era’s building craze, Mann was forced to sell or close it’s ever dated sites, shrinking to 351 screens by the new millenium; parent company, Westar, mismanaging their investment to the point of filing for bankruptcy, in September of 2000. Ted Mann, long removed from the mess his former chain had become, passed away in 2001.

WF Cinema Holdings (a limited partnership between Warner Brothers and Paramount) purchased the remnants of Mann, out of bankruptcy, for $91 million, in 2000; the partnership had previously owned the chain, as Gulf & Western descendant, Cinamerica, and had been the selling party three years earlier. Despite this return to an ownership that had experienced great success with Mann Theatres, the chain never managed to regain it’s former glory. The one time “king of independents” continued to implode under mismanagement, declining from 53 venues to the handful of questionable leases that are currently on the market.

National General’s Chinese

ccrouch — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 23:27:41 +0000

In keeping with the recent announcement that Mann is selling off theatres, including Grauman’s Chinese, here is a picture from the last time the Chinese changed hands.

The picture comes from a 1970-1971 souvenir brochure National General Theatres released; although the photo was likely taken a few years earlier. Then part of Gene Klein’s insurance and entertainment conglomerate, National General Corporation, the theatre division was sold to Ted Mann in 1973, launching Mann Theatres (the chain went on to change parent companies three times over the ensuing decades).

End Credits For Mann Theatres

ccrouch — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 11:21:20 +0000

This week, Cinemerica (the co venture of Warner Brothers and Viacom, which owns Mann Theatres) officially announced intentions to sell off Mann sites piecemeal, including the legendry Grauman’s Chinese. While the company had been quietly shopping the dying chain for a number of years, this public acknowledgement, that they have decided to sell off remaining theatres as individual lots, surely marks the end of a chain with a rich history.

I’ll post more on the history of Mann Theatres later, but, for now, here is a picture from the chain’s heyday, operating the Chinese (then controversially re branded Mann’s Chinese) during “Star Wars” initial run.

The Many Births of the Multiplex

ccrouch — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 12:32:56 +0000

The theatre industry has long been rather “creative” with it’s own history; especially when it comes to who was first to reach a specific milestone. Be it the result of exhibitors attempting to “one up” each other or simply classic showmanship, there are usually numerous parties holding claim to the same industry breakthrough. One such multi storied first is found with the multiplex concept.

Perhaps, the most well publicized multi screen pioneer was AMC’s Stan Durwood. Often referred to as the “father of the multiplex”, Durwood opened his first multi screen theatre in 1963, via Kansas City’s Parkway Twin; company folklore stating that the idea came to him a year earlier, while standing in the empty lobby of the Roxy theatre (realizing that multiple auditoriums would provide a more advantageous business model). Mr. Durwood would go on to refine and popularize the concept over the ensuing three decades, eventually pushing venue screen counts to their late 90′s megaplex peak. However, despite his name being forever linked with the concept (even headlining his obituary), Stan Durwood was more modern multiplex innovator than inventor.

The commonly cited inventor of the multi screen theatre is Canada’s Nat Taylor, who twined the Elgin Theatre on December 31, 1947 (the 800 seat Elgin and 350 seat Little Elgin). Initially, showing the same feature on both screens, the Elgin would eventually screen two separate features, which many consider to be the true birth of multi screen theatres (the key difference being multiple features screening in the venue). The Elgin would last until 1994 and Taylor would go on to co found Cineplex Odeon, a company that would set several screen count milestones and temporary records over the years.

A lesser known early multiplex pioneer was a name that would go on to become rather well known in Southern California, James Edwards. Long before Edwards carved out a monopoly in the greater Orange County area, he was a successful theatre operator in Los Angeles. Among his cinema holdings at the time was the 900 seat Alhambra Theatre, which he twinned in 1937; through purchasing a neighboring storefront and converting the space in to the smaller, Alhambra Annex. As with other multi screen theatres that emerged in the 1940′s, the complex initially screened a single feature title in both auditoriums; one screen showing a double bill (feature teamed with a lesser film), while the smaller screen ran the feature as a stand alone. While predating most other claims to being the “first”, Edwards’ multi has often been overlooked, due to it’s later conversion to more than one feature being shown. None the less, the Alhambra stood as one of the earliest multi screen theatres, until earthquake damage forced the cinema’s demolition in the late 80′s.

Ultimately, the “inventor” of the multiplex concept depends on one’s definition of a multiplex (more than one screen verses more than three, whether the number of screens or films is the defining factor, etc.) and which particular exhibitor’s story has managed to gain the wider degree of acceptance at any given time. In addition to the three named previously there are numerous other theatres and individuals that lay claim to the title. In the end, we are left with a novel idea, that has been developed and exploited (for better or worse), by numerous individuals over the past seven plus decades.

A Sign Of The Times

ccrouch — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 11:42:32 +0000

A sign of our changing times, AMC has now downsized their daily print ad, in “The Orange County Register”, to a less than 2″ square, which directs readers to the company’s website and show time phone line. This comes on the heels of a similar downgrade by Cinemark and hints at where Regal’s ever shrinking block ad might be heading. Hardly “front page news”, as print media advertising has been in decline for over a decade, but the theatre industry had been one of the few newspaper holdouts.

Time was, a given newspaper’s entertainment section was a reliable gauge of success. From the full page ads of major chains, to the co-op block listings of independents, the local paper provided a visual ranking of exhibitors in your area. A near stock ticker, one could track the rise and fall of operators/theatres by the changing size, quality, position, and frequency of their print ads. Even the rise of the industry, as a whole, could be seen, as cinemas slowly replaced live theatre and vaudeville listings, during the early twentieth century; moving on to fully dominate the entertainment section by the close of the century. Now, with most independents having fully abandoned the format and the “big three” moving away from print advertising , we are witnessing the literal end of an era.

The cinema industry may finally be joining the digital revolution, on numerous fronts, but, I, for one, will miss the days of paper and ink.

6/28/09 Update: By pure chance, I managed to scan AMC’s final Orange County Register listing. Within a day of this post, the company discontinued their ads altogether, including weekends. There still remains a sizeable print ad in The Los Angeles Times, but the company seems to have forsaken the more localized Register.

On a personal note, I can’t help but recall the countless mornings I cut out the Register’s showtime listings, as part of my daily management duties. Edwards, Mann, SoCal Cinemas, United Artists, Century, and even Studio Adultland (as a humorous gesture) would be neatly sniped from the paper and posted on a box office clipboard, alongside AMC’s ad. Now, a task that has slipped in to memory, along with the very print ads that were involved.

General Cinema Art Galleries

ccrouch — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 03:25:09 +0000

Today’s photo depicts a unique lobby amenity that was once a signature feature of the, now defunct, General Cinema Corporation. The GCC chain, once one of the biggest names in the exhibition industry, was an early pioneer in the multiplex era and an innovator of many cinema features we currently experience. However, General Cinema’s lobby art galleries were an innovation that never quite caught on with the industry.

As seen in the picture, dating from the late sixties, these galleries held a prominent position in the lobby and were intended as somewhat of a facility showpiece. Yet, also evident in the photo, the galleries were often rather sparse and the quality of art varied greatly between theatres; relying on local artists, exhibitions were subject to the particular area’s art “scene” and availability of locals who were interested in having their work displayed in a cinema lobby. Concerning the overall quality of art exhibited, former GCC theatre manager, Phil Epstein, commented, “There were always a couple of nice paintings, but most of it was stuff you’d see in a motel…I remember a lot of oil painting landscapes.” While never an overwhelming success, these galleries were featured in select GCC theatres throughout the 60′s and 70′s, before being fazed out in the early 80′s.

Hollywood’s Independence Day

ccrouch — Thu, 07 May 2009 10:46:53 +0000

The first week of May is well known for a series of justice, human rights, and independence celebrations; via the Law Day, May Day, and Cinco de Mayo holidays. Interestingly enough, this week also marks a historic breakthrough in film distribution and the proverbial “beginning of the end” for the Hollywood studio system.

Prior to the late 1940′s, the Hollywood film industry was run by five studios, which controlled every aspect of major film production, distribution, and exhibition. Of particular note in this system was the practice of ”block booking” films (i.e. forcing theatres to purchase numerous films, as a package deal) and studio ownership of prime theatre locations; effectively allowing studios to monopolize theatres with their product. In retaliation to this non competitive system, a series of complaints were lodged against the five studios, by independent producers; culminating in the Hollywood Anti Trust Case of 1948 (aka the “United States v. Paramount Pictures”).

On May 4, 1948, the United States Supreme Court handed down a decision on the “United States vs. Paramount Pictures” anti-trust case. The ruling basically held that the established film distribution system was in violation of U.S. anti-trust laws, forcing studios to abandon “block booking” and divest themselves of theatre ownership. While there would be several more court cases, before the studio system was officially broken, the Paramount Decision proved to be the turning point, that eventually “opened” the industry.

In addition to eroding the studio system and opening the film industry to a greater degree of competition, the Hollywood Anti Trust Case of 1948 also resulted in a drastic alteration to the business model of cinemas. No longer being directly tied in to studios, theatres were faced with higher film fees and decreased percentages of ticket sales, forcing a move towards concession as a primary means of revenue; the separation of studio and theatre pushed theatres out of the film business and in to the food business. In turn, cinema design, operations, and the overall movie going experience were set on a new path, ultimately leading to what we see today.