Historic Houston movie theatre closes due to pandemic

Although some have managed to survive with the help of aid and through workarounds, Landmark Theatres, which ran the River Oaks, wasnt able to reach an agreement with its landlord, Weingarten Realty, over rent it couldnt pay during the pandemic.

A historic Houston theatre that director Richard Linklater called his “film school” and that for decades was the place to catch hard-to-find independent and foreign films has closed for good — like many theatres and other businesses, a victim of the coronavirus pandemic.

After nearly 82 years in business, the River Oaks Theatre turned off its projectors last month, depriving the nation's fourth-largest city of an institution where everyone from rappers to suburban kids and cinephiles formed friendships, fell in love and found community. Its loss has left more than just an empty building behind. “Throughout the pandemic, we've experienced so much loss and so much grief and loss of life. It is also a profound grief to lose the places of community and the places that you would come together and feel that love ... that safety,” Leen Dweik, 24, told dozens of other River Oaks fans during a vigil after the theatre's final showings.

Dependent on large crowds to survive, US movie theatres have been hammered by the pandemic, as they were shut down for months and saw their revenues plunge by 80% in 2020. Although some have managed to survive with the help of aid and through workarounds, Landmark Theatres, which ran the River Oaks, wasn't able to reach an agreement with its landlord, Weingarten Realty, over rent it couldn't pay during the pandemic. Weingarten Realty didn't respond to an email seeking comment. Movie theatre trade groups believe their industry will bounce back after the pandemic, in part with the help of more than USD 16 billion in federal funding from the Shuttered Venue Operators Grant programme.