Movie Theater's Falling Popularity

Haddix Blackmon discusses the effects of COVID-19 on public theaters in the United States and the state of their businesses today in this editorial: Are Cinemas Ceasing to Exist?

Are cinemas ceasing to exist?

By Haddix Blackmon

On March 17, 2020, public theaters all over the United States shut down due to the spread of COVID-19. This shutdown of cinemas across the country caused a great many families to turn to streaming services for their movie night entertainment, rather than going out. Although most assumed that movie theaters might grow back in popularity as COVID has begun to die down, the cinema has continued to be much less popular compared to the great giants of streaming services in 2022. This raises the question: will theaters ever become popular again?

Photo Credit: Valerie Macon/AFP via Getty Images

Photo Credit: Getty Images

Throughout the reign of the pandemic, COVID has seemed to rule the world. Many public establishments have had to be closed down. One of the issues has been the closing of movie theaters across the country. This sudden nationwide shutdown has lost the strained companies even more money, as fewer people can attend their businesses. On average, according to The New York Times, the percentage of theater attendance in 2001-2007 showed that about 68% of people watched at least one movie in theaters, 29% of those having watched five or more. In comparison, theater attendance by the end of 2021 showed that just about 40% of people had seen at least one movie that year. However, only about 9% of those people had seen five or more movies at that time. This shows a significant drop in the popularity of movie theaters. Part of this decrease in theater attendance was caused by the number of theaters closing down during COVID years.

On the other hand, streaming services became more popularized throughout the pandemic. During the quarantine of COVID-19, people were no longer able to go out to the theater. They found other forms of film entertainment--streaming services. When COVID began in early 2020, streaming services grew much more than in previous years. In an article from The Los Angeles Times it is stated that, in the year 2019, streaming services accounted for about 48% of box office revenue for movies. In 2020, that number grew to just about 76%. A statistic that shows that, with the closing of public theaters, many people resorted to streaming services for their movies. However, with theaters opening back up, those numbers still have yet to drop. The effects of COVID-19 have people continuing to spend more time in their own homes rather than going outside. This statistic proves that public theaters may be falling out of fashion to the streaming services.

Photo Credit: Apple

The way things are looking, it does not seem as if public movie theaters will be popular for a long time. They had already been falling out of popularity, but COVID completely destroyed its chance of coming back. Although prospects do not look too great for theaters, no one truly knows what the future holds for them.

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