SCRANTON -- Employees at Marquee Cinemas on Lackawanna Avenue have confirmed that the theater will close at the end of business Tuesday.
This is more bad business news coming out of the 300 block of Lackawanna Avenue.
Marquee Cinemas opened up as a United Artists theater across the street from the Mall at Steamtown in 1995.
It's still the only movie theater in the city of Scranton, but when newer theaters came into the area business started to decline here. There's been talk about the Marquee closing for the past few years.
19 years later, most of the passersby we met said the same thing.
"I`ve never been [in there]. I don`t know. It just doesn`t interest me. I don`t find it to be appealing," said Dave Felker of Scranton
Business owner Erin Gibson can see the theater from her shop window. She's never been in it either.
"I see the marquee that doesn`t even have the movies listed. Am I surprised by this? No, I`m sad because it`s another empty place it`ll be, but maybe that`s the way it`s going that they want bigger places they can just drive in and go to watch a movie," said Erin Gibson, owner of L`Erin Boutique.
The big movie theater will be empty very soon. The big mall across the street is about 75 percent empty. That has people who have been in Scranton a long time wondering if bigger is really better.
"What they should do is try to attract the mom and pop shops, the people that built the community. Try to get them back into downtown and then it would flourish. I`ve seen it in other cities where they`ve done that and it works. They should give it a shot here," Felker said.
The downtown movie theater is failing and the Mall at Steamtown is up for sale, but Gibson says business has been very good the past years for smaller shops and restaurants.
Maybe this latest closure is another sign that downtown Scranton is changing.
"The shift was to always go to the malls, big stores, you know, convenience. And now you see they all want smaller things," Gibson said.
Marquee Cinemas is part of the Mall at Steamtown property, and according to published reports, the mall's leasing agent is looking for a new tenant for this theater.
Newswatch 16 reached out to mall management and the leasing agent several times, but we have not heard back.
The theater’s final showing is Tuesday at 8:30 p.m.
