GREENFIELD — The Garden Cinemas will close for the winter after its last show on Sunday, Jan. 10, unless the governor orders cinemas closed sooner, and plans to reopen in March or April.
Isaac Mass, who owns the Main Street theater with his wife, Angela, said the Garden will be closed until the spring, when the COVID-19 vaccine is more widespread and the studio distribution calendar has stabilized. The Garden, along with all cinemas across the state, closed when the pandemic first hit Massachusetts under Gov. Charlie Baker’s restrictions. It reopened on July 10, but has since operated with limited capacity because of state guidelines.
Mass said from July through the end of 2020, the Garden operated on 10 percent of its normal revenue because of public concerns about COVID-19, as well as a lack of movies being released by major studios in favor of streaming services.
“It was pretty awful,” Mass said. “We would say, ‘If we can hang on for three more weeks, there are big movies that will come out,’ and then two weeks later those movies would be bumped or released simultaneously streaming.”
The Masses bought the cinema on Nov. 15, 2019. They said they have spent well beyond the purchase price, “pouring tens of thousands of dollars” of their own savings into keeping it operational for the past six months.
He said the cinema business is seasonal, with the bulk of revenue earned from Memorial Day through July and Thanksgiving through New Year’s Day. While the cinema has seen a slight uptick for “Wonder Woman 1984,” Mass said revenue remains at 10 percent of his seasonal expectations.
“January and February are traditionally the worst months for the theater industry,” he said. “At 10 percent of last year’s revenue, we would not be able to meet payroll, much less pay the more than $6,000 heating bill each month.”
Mass said last year there were major films released over the winter, but there are no major films scheduled to be released this month or next. Disney is currently scheduled to release “Raya and the Last Dragon,” followed by “The King’s Men” in early March, and the theater hopes to open in time for them.
“We really are not confident of the release schedule, though, after ‘Mulan,’ ‘Soul’ and all of Warner Brothers went streaming,” he cautioned.
Mass said the good news is the cinema has received some help — early on, it received a $2,500 grant from the Art House Conservancy, which it used to pay for two-thirds of the cost of an industrial upholstery cleaner. The cinema used the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) to pay employees to clean all 1,001 seats throughout the theaters.
Additionally, the cinema recently received a $5,000 grant from the Franklin County Chamber of Commerce-administered program of discretionary funds secured by state Sen. Jo Comerford, D-Northampton. Mass said that money helped pay utility bills.
While he’s grateful for the help the Garden received, it was not able to secure funding from the other state grant programs offering up to $75,000 because even though the theater has been in operation for 90 years, the entity the Masses formed to acquire it was formed a month and a half after the program’s deadline. The cinema also does not qualify for any of the state’s cultural grant funding for COVID-19 relief because it is a for-profit business.
The city has done all it could, he said, offering a 10 percent discount on renewal of the cinema’s annual beer and wine license, which it received last spring after the shutdown. Mass, a lawyer, said he and his wife, a Greenfield High School teacher, don’t meet the income guidelines of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to apply for other programs.
“We are not personally hurting,” he said. “Those programs have been extremely helpful for our tenants, which have helped us pay the mortgage on the building.”
Mass noted that cinemas are included for grants as part of the Save Our Stages Act inside the recently signed COVID-19 relief bill.
“We are cautiously optimistic about that,” Mass said. “With all the trouble we had not qualifying for the state program, if it has similar requirements, we are not going to see anything. Still, anything that helps the industry and gets studios to release films theatrically will help us.”
If the Save Our Stages grant comes through for the Garden Cinemas, it will be ineligible for a second round of PPP funding, Mass noted.
Movies will show through Jan. 10 and concessions will be sold. People can have popcorn delivered to their vehicles if they call ahead to 413-773-9260. Gift cards and streaming films are still available at gardencinemas.net. Mass said those who purchased gift cards can use them after the theater reopens if they don’t attend a movie by Jan. 10.
Reach Anita Fritz at 413-772-9591 or afritz@recorder.com.