The historic 1912 movie house on Roncesvalles closed in June of 2006 after operating solidly for 94 years. The building has classical Edwardian detail and is apparently typical of the World War 1 era. The marquee, which came dramatically crashing down last February, was in an Art Deco style, added later to the original structure.

It seemed the entire neighbourhood was mourning the loss of its local theatre, as most neighbourhoods do when the quaint movie houses are replaced by shopping mall behemoth multiplexes that have the air-conditioning on too high and are plastered in bad carpet. The rarest of rare happy endings came about when local residents Danny and Letty Mullin bought the old theatre. They are two generous souls who wanted to bring back their childhood theatre to the neighbourhood they love. Can you believe it?They then leased it to the Revue Film Society that will run it on a not-for-profit community-based model.

The theatre is slated to reopen in August. The last movie to play at the Revue was Lawrence of Arabia. What will be the first?

They still need donations to fix up the theatre and pay staff to get it running. I’m going to give them something. http://revuecinema.ca/

Technorati Tags: philanthropy, roncesvalles, theatre