Michael Moore: Here's How We Built a Movie Theater for the People -- and Why the MPAA Says It's #1..

Michael Moore
Oscar and Emmy-winning director

Here's How We Built a Movie Theater for the People -- and Why the MPAA Says It's #1 in the World


This past week, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), the main federation of Hollywood's six major studios, posted on their web site a list of what they believe are some of the best movie theaters in the world.

And listed as #1 is the historic State Theatre of Traverse City, Michigan, an incredible movie palace which I restored and now run as a nonprofit theater -- along with a few hundred great volunteers!

This month, we will sell our one-millionth admission ticket since we opened five-and-a-half years ago. What makes this statistic even more remarkable is that Traverse City's year-round population here in remote northern Michigan is only 16,000 people. And mostly we show only "smaller" indie and foreign films that open nationwide on less than 200 screens.

Even with those limitations, in the 286 weeks we've been open, for 51 of those weeks, the State Theatre has been the #1 grossing theater in the country for the movie we happen to be showing. We've placed in the top 10 grossing cities for 120 of those weeks (the other cities on that list are usually New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, D.C., Dallas, Boston, etc.). ....................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-moore/heres-how-we-built-a-movi_b_3391123.html?utm_hp_ref=yahoo&ir=Yahoo