Lights! Cameras! Social distance!
CITY MOVIE THEATERS REOPEN
Big Apple movie theaters opened Friday for the first time in almost a year — and many New Yorkers were thrilled to get back in front of a big screen.
“It was just you and the movie screen,” said Holly Stillman, who emerged from the Angelika Film Center just past noon after her first theater visit in nearly 12 months. “It was wonderful to smell the popcorn as soon as I got into the theater — even though I don’t eat popcorn.”
Stillman said she felt extra emotional coming out of the first New York showing of Lee Isaac Chung’s tender family drama “Minari” because it had been euphoric to get back inside a movie theater — even one that’s operating under COVID-19 protocols.
“My mask is drenched,” she said.
Less than half of movie theaters are open nationwide, but reopenings are quickening. Theaters in many other areas reopened last summer around the release of Christopher Nolan’s “Tenet,” but that attempted comeback fizzled. Throughout, theaters remained shut in the five boroughs. For a year almost to the date, one of the world’s foremost movie capitals stayed dark.
For a theatrical business that has been punished by the pandemic, the resumption of moviegoing in New York is a crucial first step in revival.
Mayoral hopeful Andrew Yang also got in on the movie action.
He scooped up two tickets Friday at the 42nd Street AMC Theater to see “Boogie,” a film about an Asian-American basketball star who lives in Queens and dreams of making it to the NBA.
“It combines so many things that I love. It’s made in New York City by an Asian-American filmmaker, and it’s about an Asian-American basketball player, and I love basketball, so it’s kind of the perfect movie,” said Yang. “I can’t believe it’s opening at the same time New York City theaters are opening.”
Theaters in the Big Apple are now permitted to operate at 25% capacity under a directive issued by Gov. Cuomo.
Many theaters were caught off guard when Cuomo said cinemas could, under COVID precautions, reopen.
Some of the city’s prominent theaters — including the Film Forum, the Alamo Drafthouse, the Metrograph and Regal Cinemas — were targeting openings in the coming weeks. Some needed more time to prepare. After sitting dormant all winter, the Cinema Village in Manhattan two weeks earlier burst a pipe, flooding the lobby — one last bit of bad luck in a grueling year.
“This was the worst horror movie. I don’t think any Hollywood director could have dreamed it up,” said Nicolas Nicolaou, owner of the Cinema Village and other theaters. “We didn’t realize we’d be 100% shutdown for this long.”
For some moviegoers who consider the big screen the only way to see a movie, the long-incoming day had almost religious significance.
“Moviegoing for me is like going to church,” said JM Vargas, who had tickets Friday to “Minari,” “The Last Dragon” and “Chaos Walking.” “I’ve been waiting a year to go back to church.”
New York is one of the top movie markets, along with Los Angeles, where theaters are still closed.
“It’s a symbolic moment,” Michael Barker, co-president of the New York-based Sony Pictures Classics, said of the Friday reopening, which came the same day Sony released the Oscar contenders “The Father” and “The Truffle Hunters” in Manhattan theaters.
“It says that there is hope for the theatrical world to reactivate itself,” he added.