Hilton Head’s quirky movie theater is in peril. Will private parties come to the rescue?
A community effort is underway to keep Hilton Head Island’s family-owned movie theater afloat during the coronavirus pandemic.
Park Plaza Cinema, located on the island’s south end, has been closed for months since the state shut down attractions due to the coronavirus. The cinema is known for its pet-friendly policies and Tuesday ticket specials.
Owners Larry and Lucie Mann are renting out cinemas for private parties and selling popcorn to-go to keep money coming in while people cannot see films at the cozy theater.
The private parties allow people to bring family members or close friends, hit the iconic snack bar, choose their favorite movie and watch it in the theater.
It is a last resort.
“We’re already way upside down. We’ve used up a lot of our savings. I guess you would say reserves. We’re at the end of the line here,” Larry Mann, 67, told The Island Packet on June 19. “If we’re not open by the end of this month, I don’t know what we’re going to do.”
The Manns have run their independent theater on Hilton Head since 2010.
Cosmopolitan magazine once called it the coolest movie theater in the state, noting its luxury reclining chairs and café, which serves beer and wine. The Park Plaza Cinema is the only first-run independent theater in the Savannah region, Mann said.
A fundraiser for the theater has collected donations and memories of the theater from 230 people.
“I LOVE this place!” one donor wrote.
“Park Plaza and Lucie Mann are so important to our beautiful island,” another wrote.
The summertime closure is doubling the damage because movie attendance is usually up in the summer when people are vacationing on Hilton Head every week.
“Everyone knows that the summer months on Hilton Head Island are very important for a small business to make money to carry us through the slow times. Not to mention the jobs we provide our staff,”Lucie Mann wrote on the fundraising page. “To not be able to reopen to the public and offer a decent job for our workers during this time is devastating and scary.”
In late March, as the coronavirus spread across South Carolina, Larry Mann said movie attendance took a nosedive. Before the state told them to close, the co-owners had already boarded up shop and furloughed their 10 employees.
“The first week of March was still pretty busy,” Larry Mann said. “And then it just really tapered off.”
Since then, they’ve tried to keep in touch with customers. They sold popcorn curbside in May. They let a handful of couples into the cinema to privately watch their own DVDs brought from home for $100.
The co-owners also applied for a Paycheck Protection Program loan from the Small Business Administration, receiving about $45,000 in mid-April to help cover payroll costs.
Yet despite all that, they still face the possibility of having to sell the theater if it stays closed much longer.
The struggle comes as corporate theaters make plans to reopen later in July.
AMC Theaters announced in mid-June it would reopen its theaters this month, according to USA Today. AMC Theaters is the largest movie theater chain in the U.S.
Northridge Cinema 10 on Hilton Head’s north end is the only other movie theater on the island. It is operated by Southeastern Cinemas Entertainment, which said it expects North and South Carolina theaters to be open by July 17.
This story was originally published July 4, 2020 at 2:48 PM.
