Arts & Entertainment

From Getting Started to Ghostbusters, Hollywood’s One-Year Success

Dormont's Hollywood Theater celebrated its first anniversary of re-opening last weekend, and from the looks of it's May marquee, there's no slowing down.

has gone from hoping for success to , all in one year that has seemed to fly by for those who brought the theater back to life.

The Hollywood celebrated its one-year anniversary last weekend, with a lineup that included “Ghostbusters” (1984), “Psycho” (1960), “The Big Lebowski” (1998) and a full day of Elvis specials, complete with live entertainment.

Such high-impact weekends are becoming the norm at the Hollywood, and to Friends of the Hollywood Theater President Scott Jackson, that’s a really good sign.

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“We’ve made it past a year and we’re going strong,” Jackson said. “We feel like we’ve accomplished something just in hitting that milestone.”

Jackson said one of the biggest challenges in the past year has been the programming. Some shows did much better than expected, while others were expected to do well … and kind of didn’t.

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That’s just the movie theater business, Jackson said, and every situation is something learn from.

“The challenge and the fun of it is pretty much why all of us volunteers got into it,” Jackson said. “We really wanted to see that theater stay a theater.”

In the past year, the Hollywood has , and cult classics. Its has given local businesses a place for free advertisement, and many of it’s event serve to promote the surrounding business district.

It has , and . The Friends of Hollywood Theater also received in December.

None of it would have been possible without the volunteers, who Jackson called the "lifeblood of the theater."

“We have a really, really good core group of volunteers who have helped us throughout the year, and we’re hoping to recruit more,” he said. “Everyone who gets involved really comments on how much fun it is to get in there and help out. Everyone has a good time.”

The next year holds more charity events, educational events, live shows, and a few new things. Jackson said the Friends organization want to amp up the things that are working, and introduce a few new things, such as a membership package.

Always, the goal of the theater is to bring together the community.

“We’re in it to make the Hollywood a real community asset,” Jackson said “We’re in this for the long haul. I’m looking forward to getting more and more people involved and having them feel like they’re more a part of the theater.”

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