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Film Forum (arthouse and repertory)

Quad Cinema (the first NYC multiplex -- opened 1972)

Lincoln Plaza Cinemas (on the Upper West Side)

Angelika Film Center (now in Dallas and Houston, too!)

Anthology Film Archives (on the Lower East Side)

Film Society of Lincoln Center
(home to the New York Film Festival)

BAM Rose Cinemas (at the Brooklyn Academy of Music)

American Museum of the Moving Image
(at the Kaufman Astoria Studios in Queens)

Cinema Arts Centre (on Long Island)

Jacob Burns Film Center
(in Westchester County; opened just this fall)

Upstate Films (in the Mid-Hudson Valley)

Also close to me is the County Theater in Doylestown PA.

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Centrum to reopen with free weekend

11/30/01

Julie E. Washington
Plain Dealer Reporter

The Centrum Theater, dark since early 2000, is once again scheduled to
reopen - this time presenting Cleveland with a weekend of free movies as
a holiday gift.

The new Madstone Centrum, operated by New York-based Madstone
Films, will offer independent films and seek to form connections with
Cleveland's arts and cultural community.

"This is a market that needs more
independent film," said Dave Anderson,
vice president of creative services for
Madstone.

The three-screen Madstone Centrum,
2765 Euclid Heights Blvd. in Cleveland
Heights, will be the first theater operated
by the two-year-old company. It has
plans to open five more in undisclosed
locations across the country, and hopes
to have 10 to 15 theaters open within a year, Anderson said. These
optimistic plans come at a gloomy time for the movie theater industry.

Several theater chains are filing for bankruptcy or are teetering on the
brink. Midway Mall's General Cinema in Elyria went dark earlier this
month.

Madstone Centrum banks its survival on innovative programming and
outreach to Cleveland's arts scene. It plans to offer subscription series
that would package, for instance, unknown films by obscure directors or
Hitchcock films.

"All the playhouses do it, all the ballets do it. There's no reason why film
centers can't do it," said Anderson, a 1992 Oberlin College graduate. He
visited the theater earlier this week.

The Madstone Centrum will open with an invitation-only party Dec. 19. A
free movie weekend Dec. 21-23 will offer classic and recent independent
film favorites. For information about tickets to the free movies, go to www.madstonecentrum.com next week. The Centrum's marquee, theater
configurations and ornate ceilings will remain unchanged. "You couldn't
mess with this theater, it's so nice," Anderson said. However, the portraits
of Hollywood stars might come down in favor of work by local artists, he
said. Madstone is spending about $100,000 on painting and cleaning the
theater.

Madstone also provides funding and collaborators for young filmmakers. In
the future, Anderson looks forward to presenting films and special
programs such as sporting events and concerts, through digital projection
at Madstone Centrum.

The Centrum opened in 1992 as an art house after a $2.5 million
renovation of the former Heights Art Theater. Its cushy elegance made it
the theater of choice for local film devotees.

In 1999, Landmark Theaters announced that it would not renew its lease
on the theater, and the Centrum closed in January 2000. It was slated to
reopen as a Cinema Grill theater-restaurant, but time dragged on with no
progress in the planned renovations. Some Coventry Merchants
Association members signed petitions last year opposing the Cinema Grill
concept.

Developer Charles Zuchowski, owner of the building that houses the
Centrum, said he is pleased with Madstone's plans. "The theater is a very
key component to keeping the [Coventry business] district thriving,"
Zuchowski said.

Contact Julie E. Washington at:

jwashington@plaind.com, 216-999-4539

© 2001 The Plain Dealer.

Some other Cleveland links are:
Cleveland Cinemas,
The Cleveland Cinematheque,
CWRU Film Society,
Great Lakes Science Center OMNIMAX Theater

and another link,
UCLA Film and Television Archive calendar.

This was my first theatre job and it's a beauty. I wish they would have more pics and info on this site tho'.

Built in 1907 as a nickelodeon and closed in '58 in opposition to the war tax on films. Reopened in 1992. Single screen 158 seats with 9 in the balcony. (You need to duck under the projection window to get to 5 of them!)