It looks like Cinemark wants to be the first theater chain to try reopening after movie theaters across the country have been shuttered due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. While it remains unclear whether current social distancing guidelines will be lifted anytime, it’s clear that some businesses are itching to get back things to normal.
According to a report by SlashFilm, Cinemark is hoping to start reopening theaters on July 1. This came out in a conference call with Sean Gamble, Cinemark’s CFO and COO. The plan is to reopen theaters slowly, state by state, with employees coming back in June to prepare. Cinemark would show older movies for a while since so many new ones have been delayed, although there are a few new hopes on the horizon, like Christorpher Nolan’s Tenet, which is due out on July 17. “We won’t be everything back day 1, but dip our toe approach,” said Gamble.
Whether folks will actually feel comfortable go to theaters again is the real question here, beyond whether there are new movies for them to see there. Even if crowding into public places is safe and sanctioned by July 1, and that’s a big “if,” it may take longer for people to feel up to it, whether because they’re still nervous or because they no longer have as much disposable income to see movies, since the crisis has put so many people out of work. This is going to be gradual process.
At the same time, the crisis has led Cinemark to lay off 17,500 hourly employees and furlough 50% of its corporate staff at 20% of their salary, so we also understand the desire to start things up again. Time will tell us how this is all going to pan out; until then, stay safe folks!
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h/t AV Club