Sayville Theater

The second Sayville Theatre was opened by Prudential Theatres in April, 1951. It was designed by John and Drew Eberson. Photos of both the interior and exterior of the house were featured in an ad for Heywood-Wakefield theater seats in Boxoffice of December 8, 1951.

One comment on the Patchogue theatre. That multiplex was around a lot longer than anybody anticipated. It was running on empty by the end. Speakers were broken, staff was down, the place was always a mess. I used to go there a lot, as well, in the 1990s. The last movie I saw there was “Open Range.” But I stopped going, because it was so poorly maintained. It was only a matter of time. One of the signs of it’s impending passage was that the sign out by the street still said “U/A” but the signs on the doors said “Regal.” A shame, too, because now Patchogue has no movie theater. Everybody has to go to the Island 16, which is hard to get to because of its awkward location in Holtzville and no buses go near there. It’s expensive, too. That’s why I like Sayville. They have better prices, and it’s actually been redone nicely.

Why does it only show one movie on the marquee?

Does SBS (Shadow Booking Service) have other independent theatres in the area as clients or in other states as well? If so, who are the other clients? It’s interesting to know.

Yes, because of the opening of the Holtsville theater. Also, the Patchogue Theater was not maintained as well as it should have at the end, that in combination of the Patchogue also needing an upgrade of course made box office reciepts suffer.

I don’t think that the Patchogue Theater closing had to do with it “not being able to make money”. The problem is just what LImovies said, that the land was worth more than anything they could ever make as a theater, and that is what the problem there was. That coupled with the fact that the Patchogue was in need of an upgrade to compete with the more modern multiplexs like the Holtsville Island 16. The Patchogue was beginning to show it’s age. People now have come tp expect things like stadium seating, and other amenities the newer multiplexes have.

Now isn’t that something that we are now seeing 13 screen multiplexes closing down. It use to be that people told me you cant make money with a single or a twin, now, in the year 2008, I guess the saying is you cant make money with 13 screens. What next?

Lesser Theaters never renovated Sayville. The theater was renovated by previous ownership. Lesser Theater Service was strictly the film buyers. SBS is Shadow Booking Service. They took over the film buying for Sayville on 5/1/2007 after ownership felt they needed to make a change. Sayville was the first client of SBS. I know of this because I am a part of SBS. And yes it’s true, Patchogue closing really did help this theater come alive again. But current ownership has also made a greater effort to widen the spectrum of the types of films brought in to appeal to all different audiences. Where the theater used to mostly play childrens films and older audience pictures, current ownership has opened it up to comedies and horror films that appeal to the high school and college crowd. Let’s face facts. That’s the audience that keeps theaters in business. Unfortunately, you don’t make the money at the box office. It’s all made at the concession stand.

The theatre from the outside looks old but from the inside it doesn’t look that bad. It looks like an old Cineplex Odeon movie house because Cineplex use to operate the theater. It’s now independently owned with Lesser booking it before. Now I wanna know who is SBS? Funny thing is I never been to the theater.

It looks like this theatre is going to draw lost business from the Regal (UA) Patchogue .

What is this SBS listed in the movie listings? Is it the booking service or the owner? Before, Lesser was the booking service for this theatre.

THANKS