The Hollywood Theater Is Under Attack

     The Hollywood Theater, a 90+ year old, single screen movie theater, located at 1449 Potomac Ave, in Dormont, is under threat of a hostile takeover by the Theatre Historical Society of America, which is run by Richard Fosbrink.  The Friends of The Hollywood Theater is the non-profit organization that currently operates the theater and has stated that they were on good financial footing and that this sale was not due to an impending closure.  Fosbrink is attempting to buy the building from the property owner and remove the non-profit group as the theater's operator.

     Fosbrink and his group attempted to buy out the Friends of The Hollywood Theater in early 2017 but his offer was declined because the non-profit was planning on purchasing the building themselves.  Before the non-profit group could get the purchase lined up, Fosbrink came in and bought the building out from under them after agreeing to not pursue the purchase without their consent.

     If the sale goes through, the new owner would turn the theater into a second run theater.  This means that the theater would play movies after their initial run following their release.  This model will doom The Hollywood Theater to failure and limit the films and other events that are currently programmed by the Friends of The Hollywood Theater.

     As a second run theater, The Hollywood would have to sign a contract with a film distributor and be obligated to screen the movie a certain number of times.  This would drastically limit the number of special events the theater would be able to offer due to the lack of flexibility with the distributor and also only having one screen.

     This also puts the theater at a financial risk of being contractually obligated to play a movie that no one wants to see.  If the Hollywood would have signed on to screen Justice League as a second run, after word got out how horrible the movie was, they would have been stuck wasting resources on an empty theater.

     On top of that, the second run model has already failed at the Hollywood.  Before the Friends of The Hollywood Theater reopened it as a non-profit, there was a group from out of town that tried to reopen the theater but closed down shortly thereafter because they went the second run route.

     The main reasons I end up at The Hollywood are for the music documentaries, weird arthouse films and when they screen classic films from my childhood such as Jaws or The Goonies.  I take my daughter to these screenings because there's something magical about seeing Bruce the shark getting blown up on a big screen that a DVD can't match.

     One of the best times I've ever had at The Hollywood was watching my child's brain melt out of her ears while we watched the Star Wars Christmas Special.  The first twenty minutes of non-subtitled Wookie dialogue is one of the greatest worst moments ever captured on film and had her puzzled for days afterward.

     As a second run theater, The Hollywood would also be unable to host one-off screenings of films where the filmmakers are present for a Q & A because they would be forced to show something like that mummy movie with Tom Cruise instead.

     The loss of The Hollywood Theater would also be a loss for the surrounding community.  The Friends of The Hollywood Theater has opened their doors to other non-profits in the area to hold fundraisers for different charities.  A for-profit second run theater would be unable to do this because of their obligation to a distributor.

     This all comes back to the idea that just because you can buy something doesn't mean that you should.  The buyer's initial offer was rejected and his ego couldn't take being told “no” so he went around the non-profit organization and bought the building anyway.  The future of the theater is clearly in danger if Fosbrink takes control.  He has already lied three times in gaining control of the theater.  The first lie was to the Friends of The Hollywood Theater when he said would not pursue the sale without their consent.  The second lie was to his financial backers when he told them that a single screen, arthouse theater could be turned into a profitable second run theater.  And the third lie was to the public when he said that the programming offered at The Hollywood won't change when he takes over.

     I would much rather see The Hollywood Theater operated as “the little theater that could” until the end of time and not a shuttered second run theater that closed after a year.  Just because Fosbrink has the most money in the room doesn't mean that he's the smartest person in the room.