Manor Theatre celebrates 100 years of movies in Squirrel Hill
The Pittsburgh movie theater landscape is constantly shifting. As theaters like SouthSide Works Cinema and Pittsburgh Mills’ Cinemark 18 closed their doors for good in recent years, new ones like GQT Movies Pittsburgh Mills and MovieScoop Moraine Pointe Cinemas have risen to continue serving Western Pennsylvania moviegoers.
Throughout that ebb and flow, one movie theater has been a constant for Pittsburgh cinephiles: The Manor Theatre, which on Sunday celebrates 100 years on Murray Avenue in Squirrel Hill. The Manor opened on May 15, 1922, and an article in Moving Picture World magazine declared that this fledgling theater “has the atmosphere of a country club.”
To commemorate the theater’s longevity, owner Rick Stern is throwing a centennial film festival through Thursday featuring 10 movies representative of The Manor’s programming over the past century. The lineup includes a special centennial screening at 7:30 p.m. Sunday of “Hail to Woman,” a 1921 silent film that was the first movie shown at The Manor. Tickets to screenings are available at manorpgh.com.
Other films being shown include 1940’s “His Girl Friday,” 1942’s “Casablanca,”
1952’s “Singin’ in the Rain,” 1968’s “2001: A Space Odyssey,” 1972’s “The Godfather,” 1981’s “Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark,” 1994’s “Pulp Fiction,” 2006’s “The Departed” and 2017’s “Get Out.”
“It’s rare that you can see ‘Casablanca’
on the big screen,” Stern told the Post-Gazette. “This is the new 4K restored version of ‘The Godfather,’ so I think that will be a wonderful experience. If you want to see some of your
favorite old films on the big screen, you might not get many more chances. When has ‘Singin’ in the Rain’ played in a movie theater recently?’”
The Manor has been in Stern’s family off and on since his father purchased it in 1967. It changed ownership a few times in the 1970s and ’80s before Stern bought it back in 1992. He had some interior renovations done that same year and again in 2012, which was when the bar was permanently installed in the concession area.
The entertainment industry and day-today operation of a movie theater have “changed dramatically” since Stern took over as owner. A combination of increased competition — especially from the nearby AMC Waterfront 22 in West Homestead — and more movies becoming accessible to stream at home “put a dent into the vibrancy of the business” and prompted Stern to begin focusing on more specialized films that Pittsburghers couldn’t easily find elsewhere.
Audiences responded to that strategy by showing up and helping to ensure that The Manor could make it to its 100th birthday.
“We’ve always had a pretty loyal clientele at The Manor Theatre,” Stern said. “We try to stand out from the chain theater experience. Our staff is more personable and inviting. We have clientele that our staff know by name. It’s kind of like the neighborhood, little boutique theater.
“People are comfortable coming here, and we try to play movies that you can’t always see at a chain theater. That formula has worked for us and continues to.”
COVID-19 was not kind to most independently operated movie theaters, including the now-defunct Penn Hills Cinemas. The Manor shut down in March 2020, tried to reopen a few months later and was forced to close again in December. It made its triumphant return in April 2021 and has been “experiencing a healthy return to the business” ever since, Stern said.
Though The Manor generally caters to an older demographic, Stern found that a younger crowd was “more willing to venture out to the movie theater” following pandemic-induced shutdowns. Its financial outlook has improved even more over the past five months, and Stern is “looking forward to a busy summer” at The Manor.
Stern grew up on Beechwood Boulevard before moving to Fox Chapel in the early ’80s. While a lot has changed in this section of Squirrel Hill since his childhood, seeing businesses like Little’s Shoes and the Squirrel Hill Cafe still going strong makes the neighborhood feel “pretty much the same to me,” he said.
Having The Manor reach its centennial is even more special for Stern after the Squirrel Hill Theater, which his family had operated since the early 1990s, closed in 2010 after 74 years. He fondly recalled a six-month stretch in the mid-’90s when the Squirrel Hill
Theater played “Pulp Fiction” for six months straight.
Despite that setback, Stern forged on with The Manor. He believes that adding the bar and other structural improvements helped ensure the theater remained a destination for local movie lovers.
“We found our niche then, and we were able to move and groove with the times to stay alive there,” he said.
Now, Stern gets to commemorate his theater’s big day with a centennial film festival. He’s still surprised that he was able to track down a DVD of “Hail to Woman” and said he plans to have a piano accompaniment at the screening, a common practice for silent films of that era.
The Manor is “kind of engrained in my soul,” he said.
“I’m super proud to be involved with a theater that has existed for that long. ... The success of The Manor is really a tribute to the clientele and the loyalty of Squirrel Hill and neighboring communities. Without their dedication and consistent attendance, we wouldn’t be here.”