Cinemark, the Plano-based theater chain, said Wednesday that it would open five theaters in the Dallas-Fort Worth area on June 19, beginning phase one of a four-phase reopening plan. On Friday, Grand Prairie's Premiere LUX Cine announced that it would also reopen on the same day.
AMC, the world's largest movie theater chain, said it would open its 49 Texas locations, including 17 DFW locations, before Christopher Nolan's highly anticipated spy film Tenet, set to release on July 17.
These movie theater re-openings start almost a month and a half after Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) first allowed movie theaters to open on May 1. Last week, Abbott loosened restrictions to allow theaters to operate at 50% capacity.
Cinemark closed all its U.S. locations March 17 and after losing $59.6 million in the first quarter of the year it will try to lure movie-goers with classic films and low prices in the first week of reopening. The movie theater company has not yet announced which five locations would reopen.
To increase social distancing, movie times will be staggered, but masks won't be required for guests, only encouraged.
Similar policies, including optional mask-wearing, are in place at Premiere LUX Cine, where designated seats will be left unoccupied to allow guests to spread out and observe social distancing.
One of the first Dallas movie theaters to open, Cinépolis Luxury Cinemas, rented out theaters to "quarantine crews," where people are able to rent out an auditorium space to spread out and watch their own DVDs, play video games or do a graduation slideshow.
Local
The latest news from around North Texas.
As all these movie theaters across North Texas begin to reopen in time for the summer blockbuster season, surveys from analytic company EDO indicated that 75% of people are "somewhat likely" or "highly likely" to return as long as appropriate sanitation measures were in place.
