The Kimmel Center Will Add Movies To Its Offerings


Philadelphia Business Journal reports the Kimmel Center is partnering with the Greater Philadelphia Film Office to begin screening occasional movies at the Center City facility:

Anne Ewers, president and CEO of the Kimmel Center, said the hope is that it will be “a premier venue for movie screenings in Philadelphia.”

It will not have a formatted schedule of movies, like a movie theater. Rather, the theater will be a venue for regular film-related events, screenings, local premieres, independent films, documentaries, film festivals and so on.

“This isn’t going to be a traditional movie theater,” Sharon Pinkenson, executive director of the Greater Philadelphia Film Office, told me. “We’ve been talking to lots of people for years about how we needed more venues for film.”

At first glance, this sounds like the kind of stuff that International House already does in on the Penn campus in West Philly—screening new and old films that fall outside the usual blockbusters at the cineplexes. And one wonders how it’ll fit with efforts by the Philadelphia Film Society, which is attempting to restore the old Roxy Theater on Sansom Street—and which is achingly close, with eight days to go, to meeting is $40,000 Kickstarter goal to do so. Still: We love movies! The more venues, the better!