This story will be updated.
BELFAST, Maine — On Mike Hurley’s downtown Belfast office wall, scribbled movie names fill up a whiteboard calendar that shows four months of the Colonial Theatre’s schedule — but beginning on Monday, Sept. 19, there will be nothing but empty white squares.
That’s because the Colonial Theatre, a vibrant art deco movie palace at the heart of the community, is closing next month.
But movie lovers shouldn’t despair. The three-screen movie theater has been for sale since 2015, and co-owners Hurley and Therese Bagnardi hope it won’t be long before a buyer emerges and the Colonial re-opens. Closing the theater that has held pride of place in Belfast since it opened in April 1912, will be a wrench, but it’s just time for the couple to make a change, Hurley, 71, said Wednesday.
“How wonderful it’s been to be a part of this,” he said. “To think of movies as different as ‘Waking Ned Devine’ or ‘Pulp Fiction’ or ‘Amelie’ or ‘Toy Story’ or ‘Shrek.’ I remember so many people pouring into the movies. I’ve loved being a part of it. I love being a part of the community.”
He and Bagnardi, who are married, purchased the Colonial in 1995, on something of a whim. They figured that running a movie theater wasn’t much harder than selling tickets and making popcorn.
“Turned out, we had a lot to learn,” he told the Bangor Daily News in 2015.
They rose to the challenge, first sprucing up the movie theater’s color scheme from dull yellow and brown to the snazzy green, purple and pink it still sports today. They fixed the broken neon sign on the front marquee and then started on the interior.
The couple restored the lobby, then figured out how to turn the two-screen theater into a three-screen theater by reopening “Dreamland,” which had been the original theater in the building. They replaced seats, created a new concession stand and switched from film to digital projecting when the movie industry required that to happen.
When Perry’s Nut House, another Belfast institution, put some of its treasures on the auction block in 1997, the couple purchased two elephants to liven up the theater’s decor. They put Hawthorne, a trumpeting elephant made of fiberglass, on the roof. Baby Hawthorne, made of wood and much heavier, was carried by local strong men to the lower lobby, where he continues to delight children today.
After Hurley and Bagnardi put the theater up for sale — the list price is $1.3 million — potential buyers have kicked the tires on the business. But none have committed.
Knowledge that the Colonial is closing in September may change that, Hurley said.
“We’re lighting a fire. It’s time — that’s the bottom line,” he said. “We could keep on doing this, but I think if you keep feeding people, they don’t get hungry. Is it risky? Yeah. But we’re sparking a discussion.”
One solution would be for a non-profit organization to buy and manage the Colonial Theatre, similar to how other independent local cinemas are run in communities like Ellsworth, Waterville, Rockland, Bar Harbor and Bucksport.
“In my mind, that is the right, best choice for Belfast, at this point, to have a community-based organization that takes over the Colonial,” Hurley said. “I have so much faith in Belfast.”
