A movie club gets a reboot
Maybe this plot twist snuck by you, but there aren’t any movies theaters in Greenwich.
Greenwich isn’t alone. Connecticut theaters dropped during the pandemic like villains at the end of a Marvel flick (remember those?). Darien, New Canaan, Westport ...
But when the multiplex on Railroad Avenue next to the Greenwich train station shuttered in 2020, it marked the end of a ribbon of films that reels back to 1914. That’s when the Greenwich Theatre opened on Greenwich Avenue and Grigg Street for the first generation of film buffs, who could walk from the train station or take a trolley to catch “high-class vaudeville and photo plays” for 15 cents.
The Greenwich Plaza theater made a cameo in August of 2020 with advance screenings of “Tenet,” then went dark again. “It doesn’t look good,” for pre-pandemic plans to give the theaters a glossy upgrade, Greenwich First Selectman Fred Camillo told me Friday.
“It is heartbreaking,” said Camillo, who recalled the 2019 Beatles’ fantasy “Yesterday,” as the last movie he saw in Greenwich. “I hate to see the town without a movie theater.”
Greenwich residents Michelle Howe and Kerry Anderson, who launched the Morning Movie Club in 2016, refused to let the credits roll and fade to black.
They’ve already rebooted the club at the recently renovated Majestic in downtown Stamford and the Ultimate Royale 6 on Westport Avenue in Norwalk, both Bow Tie Cinemas. The club screens movies at 10 a.m. one day a month from October through May, serving cinephiles who can’t make later showings (largely moms). To be even more efficient, they spare the trailers. For the $110 annual membership, they also throw in coupons to local merchants. The concession stands are open, Anderson notes, as “Some people say, ‘I can’t see a movie without my Milk Duds.’ ”
Stamford provides a significant advantage over Greenwich by having ample parking. In Greenwich, Howe and Anderson would scramble around the area with a pile of quarters feeding meters for members during screenings.
“There were no parking tickets on our watch,” Howe says proudly.
When their new season officially opened in Stamford earlier this month, the comments from members entering the lobby said it all:
“Parking is so much easier than it was in Greenwich.”
“Wow, look at those new seats.”
“I forgot how good popcorn smells.”
The theater screens all of the current showings for members. On this day, that means Clint Eastwood’s “Cry Macho,” “Venom: Let There Be Carnage,” “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings,” “Jungle Cruise,” and the 1999 space parody “Galaxy Quest” (theaters are reviving old films due to shortage of product).
I mention that “Cry Macho” is available for streaming on HBO Max.
“But you know what,” Howe accurately observes, “people are tired of being at home.”
I make a meek comment about the offerings skewing male, trying to dodge the phrase “chick flick.” Citing the “Jungle Cruise” leading man, Anderson notes that no one is complaining about spending a morning with the Rock.
“Cry Macho” is the top draw, followed by “Cruise.” When the list of offerings was read in the lobby, one member responded to “Venom” with an exaggerated “Nooo thank yoooou.” She could have been speaking for the group, as it draws as many takers as “Quest”: zero.
Like the movie industry itself, they have reopened the box office and are hoping audiences will return.
“We are trying to fill a need for the theaters when there aren’t butts in the seats,” Anderson said. “It’s our collective goal to get people feeling comfortable about returning to the movies.”
At its peak, the club had 400 members in its two chapters. They are down to 160, though the number is moving in the right direction. But the world has changed. Work schedules are so not 2019 anymore. Morning movies could catch on.
They stress that their initiative (a professional sequel to their volunteer efforts organizing school sales) isn’t just a celebration of America’s greatest export. “We’re movie fans, but we’re also gathering-peopletogether fans,” Anderson says.
Still, it’s hard to miss that as the Rock cruises the jungle and Venom rages for no one, Howe and Anderson stay in the lobby handling bookkeeping.
It seems funny that you don’t actually see the movies, I comment.
“Yeah, people say that a lot,” Howe responds.
So I ask about their earliest movie memories. Howe offers the evergreen Disney answer. Anderson shares a cherished family anecdote of going with her sister to see “The Sound of Music” in Larchmont, N.Y., their first movie sans parents. When they returned home, their mother asked for a review.
“What did you think of the wedding?”
They didn’t recall a wedding. It turned out they mistakenly left at the intermission, which meant they — 56-year-old Spoiler Alert — skipped the entire singalong escape from the Nazis.
COVID-19 could be seen as just another intermission. Motion pictures survived the 1918 pandemic. This sequel won’t mean The End.