The Newport Roxy Theater
The Newport Roxy Theater is currently a 200 seat theater in Newport, Washington. The theater serves over 9 local communities-including Newport, Blanchard, Oldtown, Priest River, and Usk. It is the only movie theater within roughly 50 miles.
The theater was closed for two years, but was reopened in July 2017 by Jason and Brittany Totland.
What We Are Doing Different
Event Center
It is clear that movie theater attendee numbers have been dropping all across the country. Keeping The Roxy solely as a movie theater is no longer feasible. We plan to attract live performances and rent The Roxy out as a venue as much as possible. Between plays, concerts, birthdays, or business meetings, we hope to maintain enough business to remain open as a movie theater as well.
Remodel
The Roxy’s current design consists of 3 theaters totaling 330 seats. The two smaller theaters have poor sound control, small screens, and cramped seating. These two screens are considered unsuitable for showing new movies. The plan is to only show movies on the front main screen until the remodel to restore the grand theater design can be afforded. We hope to raise the money to restore the theater back to 430 seats.
Subscriptions
A big part of our business plan is subscriptions. Several theaters have gone this route, and research shows that subscriptions will stabilize our revenue and help carry us through slow months. Check out our Friends of The Roxy page for more information!
We have already found that subscriptions are the life blood of The Roxy. These monthly packages have already saved the theater from going under.
Accepting Debit/Credit Cards
Since 1951, The Roxy has operated as cash only. We are excited to bring in the digital age by accepting credit cards, credit chips, and NFC phone payments.
Alcohol
We now server beer an wine for all our showings! Other theaters have reported that the sales in alcohol have made the difference for them, we are hoping it will here as well!
History of The Roxy
Charles Bishop and his son, Dick Bishop hand built The Newport Roxy brick by brick. The theater officially opened in 1951.
Charles owned a handful of theaters in Pend Oreille County, including one in Priest River and another in Metaline Falls. As time passed, the local populations were not large enough to sustain all of his theaters. Charles knew he had to close one down. After drawing straws, he closed the Priest River Roxy Theater. He took the iconic neon “Roxy” sign from downtown Priest River, and moved it over to Newport.
In 1956, Charles sold The Roxy Theater to Dick and Gladys Bishop. The couple carried on Charles’ legacy and ran The Roxy diligently until 2008. With Dick passed away, Gladys decided it was time to sell the theater to younger hands.
The Roxy was sold to Kevin Wright who ran the theater until 2015. Kevin faced many modern difficulties as small town theaters are dying all across the country. Film companies forced theaters to go from film to digital projectors, are raising rental fees, and forcing 2-4 week contracts to rent first run movies. Kevin saw no choice but to remodel The Roxy from a single screen grand theater into a 3 screen multi-theater. Unfortunately, the situation did not improve for small town theaters and The Roxy closed its doors in 2015.
In 2017, The Roxy was purchased by Jason and Brittany Totland. The couple breathed some life back into the old theater and opened the doors once again. The Roxy is currently running at half her seating capacity but is sporting prices 30% lower than Spokane’s big theaters. Come down and enjoy a show at a reasonable price and short drive!