Cinemas In Northeast U.S. Close With Region Buried In Two Feet Of Snow

With two feet of snow falling across five states, and 600K households without power per reports in the latest winter cyclone bomb, cinemas are turning off the lights, specifically AMC with 60 closures in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and Boston areas.

Now, we’re in a low-hum period at the box office following the mega Presidents Day weekend stretch; it’s not like it’s a Monday in July. Typically the prized weekday for exhibitors in any given week is discount Tuesday. It’s not clear if AMC will be reopening some of their closures by tomorrow.

Despite the 20 inches of snow reported in Central Park and 10K flights canceled per FlightAware, what is clear is that some cinemas in Manhattan will reopen later this afternoon and tonight (read Netflix’s Paris Theater, AMC Lincoln Square, Regal Union Square and Regal Times Square to name a few). If power isn’t a problem, than moviegoing in Manhattan can survive on foot traffic via subway or sidewalk.

The news about cinema closures follows Broadway cancelling shows today for a second, consecutive blizzard-impacted day.

While distribution sources saw a post Presidents Day weekend that was up over last year’s in the single digit percentile, Comscore reported that all titles this past weekend made $75.2M, -4% from the same post holiday frame a year ago. Goat was No. 1 at the domestic box office with a reported second weekend of $16.8M yesterday and a running cume of $58.1M domestic, $102.1M worldwide. Warner Bros/MRC’s Wuthering Heights had a $14M second weekend with a running cume of $59.8M.