The owners of the Pacific Theatres and ArcLight Cinemas have confirmed that their popular cinema location will not reopen post the pandemic and permanently shut down. This comes as a shocker to all the moviegoers in Southern California. The Pacific Theatres and ArcLight Cinemas have remained favourites of many entertainment industry professionals and celebrities, and the announcement of their permanent closure is nothing less than a jolt. Over the years, the celebrated movie chain has had many firsts to its credit.
In 2002, The Archlight Hollywood was the first in the chain to start the novel concept of reserved seating, had ushers who introduced each showing, and the latecomers weren’t allowed entry. The shutting down of Pacific & ArcLight, owned by Los Angeles based Decurion Corp. is one of the highest-profile entertainment industry collapses due to the pandemic.
ArcLight was operational in 11 locations, of which six were in L.A, which also had the Flagship Hollywood Theatre and Pacific Cinerama Dome on Sunset Boulevard. It also had theatres across Boston, Chicago, Washington, and San Diego. The Coronavirus pandemic has forced several theatres across the country to survive by way of negotiating deferred rent payments to landlords. One of the world’s largest cinema chains, AMC Theatres, has even taken shelter with Wall Street to raise cash multiple times, just to stay on the surface.
It is well to be noted that the ArcLight brand was important to the film community as its Hollywood location was known to host special industry screenings and also had filmmakers as guests who often spoken about their work.
