Parkchester community seeks to preserve 74-year-old theater

posted by Michael Zoldessy on February 6, 2014 at 3:45 pm

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BRONX, NY — Locals are getting behind reopening the American Theater, which Bow Tie operated until it closed last Fall. They’ve already put together a petition with 1,000+ signatures to reopen it and has also spoken with the Landmark Preservation Commission.

Read more at News 12.

(Thanks to jeterga for providing the photo.)

Theaters in this post

Comments (8)

markp
markp on February 6, 2014 at 4:52 pm

Im hoping they win. Its time these theatres stay open and not destroyed or turned into retail.

br91975
br91975 on February 6, 2014 at 4:53 pm

I wish the local Parkchester community the absolute best of luck in re-opening the American but, from appearances via the News 12 story, the theatre seems to already be in the process of being gutted.

bigjoe59
bigjoe59 on February 6, 2014 at 8:49 pm

this building was built as a movie theater
for the Parkchester community 74 years ago.
i don’t understand why Bow Tie closed it
to begin with. was it not doing well?

Roger Katz
Roger Katz on February 6, 2014 at 9:10 pm

Bow Tie closed it because their lease was up and the landlord did not renew because he wanted to convert it to retail.

joemasher
joemasher on February 6, 2014 at 11:10 pm

Roger is correct – unfortunately our lease could not be renewed. Bow Tie does not own the building, unfortunately.

DylanAsh
DylanAsh on February 7, 2014 at 4:12 pm

Please, save this place. The Bronx only has two theaters. Talk about underserved.

optimist008
optimist008 on February 7, 2014 at 4:56 pm

To the above, unconfirmed rumor that another theater will open as part of the Whitestone Cinema Paragon Outlet Mall project. The original developer of the HUB retail project proposed a theater and that project fell through, no theater there woth the newest developer. Agree with you, Bronx is “underscreened.” A theater was also planned for the original dead Kingsbridge Armory mall.

R68Dtrain2500
R68Dtrain2500 on November 13, 2014 at 2:42 am

I heard that the AMC is planning to build another theater by the major deegan Expressway and Regal Cinema is also open their theater next to the Hunts point warehouse . AMC might open part of the whitestone cinema property but the only thing is the American Theaters should be operate even AMC or Regal instead of closing the theater located in Parkchester. In my opinion the Bronx need seven more new Megaplex movie theaters to have the people go to the movies more often but good thing AMC keeping their Bay Plaza Multiplex 13 open and the AMC fixed their Bay Plaza Multiplex 13 in good shapes and I still go to the AMC Bay Plaza 13 to see a good movie in theatres .

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