AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc. (doing business as AMC Theatres, originally an abbreviation for American Multi-Cinema; often referred to simply as AMC and known in some countries as AMC Cinemas or AMC Multi-Cinemas) is an American movie theater chain founded in Kansas City, Missouri, and now headquartered in Leawood, Kansas. It is the largest movie theater chain in the world. Founded in 1920, AMC has the largest share of the U.S. theater market ahead of Regal Cinemas and Cinemark Theatres.
After acquiring Odeon Cinemas, UCI Cinemas, and Carmike Cinemas in 2016, it became the largest movie theater chain in the world.[3] It has 2,807 screens in 353 European theatres and 7,755 screens in 593 American theatres.[2][4]
The company is listed on the New York Stock Exchange; from 2012 to 2018, the Chinese conglomerate Wanda Group owned a majority stake in the company. Private equity firm Silver Lake Partners made a $600 million investment in AMC in September 2018, but the voting power of AMC shares was structured so that Wanda Group still controlled the majority of AMC's board of directors.
Amid financial downturns caused by the COVID-19 lockdowns, in January 2021, Wanda's ownership was increasingly diluted due to new financing by AMC, as well as short squeezes that resulted in Silver Lake converting its $600 million debt holding to equity. In early-February 2021, Wanda converted its Class B shares to Class A shares, thus reducing its voting power to less than 50%.
History[edit]
Feature Presentation snippet from 1980
AMC Theatres was founded in 1920 by Maurice, William, Irvin, Edward, and Barney Dubinsky, sons of Russian Jewish immigrants Simon and Sarah Dubinsky. The Dubinsky brothers had been traveling the Midwest performing melodramas and tent shows with actress Jeanne Eagels. They purchased the Regent Theatre on 12th Street between Walnut and Grand in downtown Kansas City, Missouri.[5] Maurice, the oldest brother, died in 1929, and Barney left the company in 1936 after being injured in an auto accident.[6] Edward, the youngest brother, eventually changed his last name to Durwood, and the company they formed eventually became known as Durwood Theatres, after a legal fight with his brothers.[6] The chain also had theaters in St. Joseph and Jefferson City, Missouri and Leavenworth and Topeka, Kansas.[7]
When Edward's son Stanley left the U.S. Air Force after World War II, he joined the company in 1945. He persuaded his father to build drive-in theaters in St. Joseph, Jefferson City, and Leavenworth. In 1947 they expanded further with the acquisition of the Liberty Theater in downtown Kansas City which they remodeled and renamed the Roxy.[8] They won an antitrust suit to enable them to show first-run product at the Roxy and went on to acquire all of the downtown cinemas in Kansas City including The Empire Theater, the Capri Theatre, the Midland Theatre and the Paramount Theatre.[7]
In 1961, after Ed died, Stanley took control of Durwood Theatres, a small ten-theatre chain. With an interstate planned around Kansas City, Durwood looked to sites outside downtown and acquired two sites at a shopping center on Kansas City's Ward Parkway to build a 700-seat theater. As the sites could not be combined, they opened two theaters side-by-side as the Parkway Twin Theatre in 1963.[7] This was the company's first foray into using the multiplex model. According to Variety, Stanley Durwood later claimed in 1962 that he "was standing in the lobby of his 600-seat Roxy in Kansas City mulling over its poor grosses, when he realized he could double his box office by adding a second screen and still operate with the same size staff."[9]
Following the success of the Parkway Twin, AMC followed up with the Embassy 3 triplex at the Country Club Plaza; the Metro Plaza, a four-screen theater in Kansas City in 1966; and a six-screen theater in Omaha in 1969.[10][11][7]
The industry quickly embraced the multiplex concept, where additional screens meant very little difference in staff and operating costs but resulted in a significant profit increase. The concept also provided more film choices at one location, drawing bigger crowds. It also gave owners the flexibility to show big hits on more screens and less reliance on any individual film that could turn out to be a bust.[12]
Stanley renamed Durwood Theatres as American Royal Cinema on October 1, 1968, after the American Royal livestock and horse show, but the latter's producers sought an injunction, and the name was changed to American Multi-Cinema, Inc.[13][7]
Stanley began to apply military management and the insights of management science to revolutionize the movie theatre industry.[14] As he later explained to Variety magazine, "We needed to define what our company was doing in the (exhibition) business. My dad wasn't that organized."[15] It was structured under the belief that every customer was a "guest".
Growth[edit]
The AMC Empire 25 theatre in Times Square, New York City
By the 1980s, the company was experiencing strong growth; in 1983, it had its initial public offering.[16] AMC Theatres built its first multiplex overseas in 1985, the 10-screen multiplex at The Point, Milton Keynes in the United Kingdom,[16] and later opened additional sites in the UK such as in Dudley and Tamworth, Staffordshire. In October 1988, they announced a joint venture with United Artists Theaters and Cinema International Corporation (a partnership of Paramount Pictures and Universal Studios) to run their combined cinemas in the UK, Ireland under the AMC name, however, AMC pu