{"id":74,"date":"2009-02-11T12:55:02","date_gmt":"2009-02-11T12:55:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cinelog.org\/cinelog\/?p=74"},"modified":"2009-02-11T13:01:03","modified_gmt":"2009-02-11T13:01:03","slug":"an-unlikely-marriage-of-operators","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cinelog.org\/cinelog\/2009\/02\/11\/an-unlikely-marriage-of-operators\/","title":{"rendered":"An Unlikely Marriage Of Operators"},"content":{"rendered":"
Opened in the Fall of 1972,\u00a0at a cost of\u00a0$30 million, the Laguna Hills Mall has served southern Orange County for the better part of four decades. While originally built without a cinema, deferring business to the near bye Saddleback\u00a01-2-3, a theatre\u00a0was later added, as part of an early 80’s remodel. This theatre, which\u00a0is\u00a0about as non de script as the surrounding mall, initially involved\u00a0a rather\u00a0unusual business arrangement.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/div>\n
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The Laguna Hills Mall Cinema <\/a>opened shortly before Christmas, in 1983, under the joint operation of Edwards and Sanborn (later known as So Cal Cinemas) Theatres. Long time competitors in the southern California\u00a0market, Edwards and Sanborn were both family owned chains that had histories dating back to the dawn of the industry (Sanborn\u00a0founded in 1918 and Edwards in 1930).\u00a0The reasoning\u00a0behind the co management was never made public, but the scenario appears to be\u00a0somewhat similar to Mann’s\/Edwards’ Woodbridge theatre deal<\/a>, three\u00a0years earlier; with the exception that Mann sold the Woodbridge, while Sanborn chose to retain partial ownership in the Laguna Hills Mall Cinema.<\/div>\n
.<\/span><\/div>\n
\"Laguna<\/a><\/div>\n
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Specific details, as to which company was more dominant in the theatre’s\u00a0initial operation, are a bit cloudy. The site was definitely intended as a Sanborn Theatre, as the theatre’s design was more reflective of that company’s style and\u00a0early staff were directly employed by Sanborn. However, most of the theatre’s early marketing and promotion were through Edwards.\u00a0As the years passed, this management picture shifted more towards Edwards and Sanborn seems to have fully stepped away from the theatre, by the early 90’s. The Laguna Hills Mall Cinema continued as an Edwards until the new millennium, but, following the company’s 2002 bankruptcy, the theatre was cast off, ending one of the more unusual chapters in Orange County theatre operation.<\/div>\n
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In retrospect, this bizarre marriage of competitors was likely reflective of the “eccentic” personalities behind each of the companies; Sanborn having demonstrated a long\u00a0track record of non traditional operations, Edwards having existed as one of the more\u00a0stubborn and competitive of\u00a0theatre operators. Whatever the\u00a0true\u00a0reasoning may have been, the Laguna Hills Mall Cinema has a truly\u00a0unique back story for\u00a0such an indistinguishable\u00a0theatre.\u00a0\u00a0<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Opened in the Fall of 1972,\u00a0at a cost of\u00a0$30 million, the Laguna Hills Mall has served southern Orange County for the better part of four decades. While originally built without a cinema, deferring business to the near bye Saddleback\u00a01-2-3, a theatre\u00a0was later added, as part of an early 80’s remodel. This theatre, which\u00a0is\u00a0about as non […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-74","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-history","category-theatre"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinelog.org\/cinelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinelog.org\/cinelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinelog.org\/cinelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinelog.org\/cinelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinelog.org\/cinelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cinelog.org\/cinelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinelog.org\/cinelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinelog.org\/cinelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinelog.org\/cinelog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}