Palace drive-in to close in August

Marketing Manager of Palace Amusement, Melanie Graham, says the company will be closing down its New Kingston drive-in movie theatre when the lease expires in August. The 100-year-old entertainment company is Jamaica’s sole theatre operator.

Speaking on Taking Stock with Kalilah Reynolds, Graham said that attendance at the drive-in dropped significantly following the reopening of its indoor cinemas.

The drive-in was opened in 2020 in response to calls for a safe way to watch movies during the pandemic.

Palace was forced to shut the doors to its cinemas across the island following the first wave of COVID-19. Since then, the company has had to contend with nightly curfews, weekend/holiday lockdowns and other measures put in place by the government to limit the spread of the virus.

However, Prime Minister Andrew Holness announced the full reopening of the entertainment sector in March as well as the cancellation of all Disaster Risk Management measures.

Several factors behind drive-in failure

Graham said that while patronage at its indoor locations has increased, the drive-in has suffered. She said a number of factors could have contributed to its failure.

“The shopping centre behind us, they recently reopened and they have some powerful security lights that kinda floods our screens,” she said.

Additionally, the Marketing Manager said that changes in technology have also played a role.

“Technology has changed so much since the last time we had a drive in. So, before we never had to contemplate that people wouldn’t be able to turn off their lights, and some cars especially the high end ones, you can’t really turn off the lights. And some people’s cars have a problem picking up the frequency on their radio,” she said.

Additionally, Graham cited loud music from a nearby nightclub that affected the drive-in experience on weekends.

“It’s virtually impossible to recreate the same quality production of sound and audio that people have become accustomed to,” she concluded.

She said that the contract with their current location ends in August and the company will not be renewing it.

Early shows doing better

Graham said that attendance at the drive-in is not the only change that the company has noticed since the reopening of the entertainment industry.

She said there has been a notable decrease in the attendance of late shows, which were traditionally their best performing.

“Our late shows always did better than the early shows. Since we have reopened, the attendance figures have been showing that most of the time, we are doing better at the matinee [afternoon] shows than the late shows,” she said.

The afternoon shows typically start between 5 and 6 pm, while the late shows start between 8 and 9 pm.

Graham, however, is optimistic that the cinemas will continue to rebound. She noted that there are a number of popular titles currently on-screen and several upcoming ones which she said she is hopeful will bring more people out.

These include the highly-anticipated Black Panther sequel expected in November and the new Avatar movie scheduled for December release.

END

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Sashell Williams2024-09-03T21:40:31-05:00