Premiere Cinemas abandons closure plan, will develop luxury theater at Gadsden Mall

It's not baseball, but credit the City of Gadsden with a “save” in preserving Etowah County's only movie theater.

A $3.4 million redevelopment plan for Premiere Cinemas 16 at the Gadsden Mall was announced during Thursday's City Council work session — at which it was also revealed that the parent company had planned to shut the theater down at the end of 2023.

Premiere has done a 180-degree turn, however, not only dropping the closure plans, but committing to replace the increasingly threadbare facility (which opened in 2003) with a new, luxury theater called the Premiere LUX Ciné.

It will be privately funded, by Premiere Cinemas and the Gadsden Mall, but the City Council on Tuesday (its regular meeting day; this week's meeting was postponed becomes of cold, icy weather) will consider sales tax abatements of up to $600,000 over the next decade to help support the project.

John Moore, Gadsden's director of economic development and governmental affairs, told council members that Premiere had reached out to city officials to let them know about the plans to close the theater.

He said “after much discussion” with Mayor Craig Ford, they reached out to Gary Moore, Premiere's chief executive officer, “and asked him what it would take to get them back to investing in Gadsden, and he brought back a plan.”

The plan? According to a news release from the city following the council meeting, current seating in the theater's 16 auditoriums will be replaced by spacious, electric-powered leather recliners. Each will have a USB port and an individual swivel table to hold food and beverages.

Those offerings will also be upgraded to include gourmet hamburgers and pizza, “all you can eat” popcorn, self-serve beverage stations offering unlimited refills and adult beverages.

Ford in the news release described the plan as a “luxury cinematic experience,” adding, “ As we prepare to transform that entire corridor, this development will fit perfectly into what lies ahead. I look forward to seeing residents and visitors enjoy another new high-quality entertainment option in Gadsden.”

John Moore told council members that Premiere “is bringing the cinemas back to a 'state of the art' that everybody's been wanting, that everybody in Etowah County has been looking for.” He noted that local residents had increasingly been going to other cities to see movies in recent years.

That won't be necessary moving forward, according to Gary Moore. "Once we finish with it, Gadsden will have the nicest cinema around," he said in the release. "It's really a new chapter in Gadsden's entertainment future."

The city will rebate 2% of the theater's sales taxes for five years, then 1% for another five years.

Premiere projects it will be finished with the project by the end of the year. The current theater won't shut down during construction; the plan is to work on eight auditoriums at a time while the others remain in operation.

The company's local director, Ada Woodward, recently helped with the opening of new LUX cinemas in Birmingham and Pell City, according to the release.

“We are extremely fortunate to offer our visitors a diverse selection of stores and the latest experiential concepts, and things are only improving with each passing year,” Kaylie Johnson, the mall's general manager, said in the release.

“This commitment for the long haul reinforces the mall’s status as the ultimate destination for daytime and evening shopping and entertainment,” Johnson said. “We are delighted with the support and enthusiasm we are receiving from the community.”

Ford said city officials had gotten to know the mall's owners, the Kohan Retail Investment Group, at a convention. He called them “easy to work with” and noted how the facility has been “redeveloped and rethought.”

Council member Jason Wilson said people are “sleeping on” what's happening at the mall, which will be in the spotlight again on Wednesday with the opening of the Food City grocery store there.

“I'm not going to use the 'm word' anymore, because it's not a mall,” Wilson said. “They keep doing tiny little continuous improvements over there, and it's developed into a case study any city in America can benefit by looking at. It's impressive.”

John Moore said this was a chance for the city to help an existing business survive and expand. He said they can't just “hand out money to everybody,” but if a business wants to invest millions to increase revenues over the next five or 10 years, “we're looking for opportunities like that.”

This article originally appeared on The Tuscaloosa News: Luxury theater planned by Premiere Cinemas planned at Gadsden Mall