Tri-City Cinemas

Tri-City Mall opened in 1968 theatre-lessly. The Mann 4 Theatres Tri-City Mall launched with “Crocodile Dundee,” “Some Kind of Wonderful,” “Tin Men” and “Burglar” on May 22, 1987. The Tri-City also added a food court in the 18-year old facility’s second expansion in three years. The theatre laid an egg and on September 4, 1987, its programming policy was changed to a sub-run, ultra-discount dollar house playing two features for a dollar and renamed as the Mann 4 Tri-City Dollar Theatres. Mann bolted the dying mall at the end of May of 1993 but not before changing its name to the Mann Tri-City Dollar Theatres (ending with five screens instead of four, it had dropped the numeral from the moniker).

Harkins took on the venue on June 4, 1993 as the Harkins Tri-City 5 $1.50 Theatre. It was the circuit’s 27th theater. The venue was closed for a brief period with Harkins reopening as the Harkins Tri-City 5 Theatres - hopefully without paying much in rent and still operating as a $1.50 discount house. Harkins took an opt out on February 16, 1998 as the Mall was in irreversible greyfield status - a term associated with a “dead mall.” Harkins ended the venue’s run shy of 11 years and JC Penney would not extend its 30-year lease basically ending the Tri-City Mall’s run. Your final Harkins' double features were “In & Out” with “Seven Years in Tibet,” “Rocketeer” with “Fairy Tale: A True Story,” “Kiss the Girls” with “The Jackal,” “Devil’s Advocate” with “Mad City,” and “Starship Troopers” with - of course - “Walt Disney’s The Little Mermaid.”

With just six stores remaining in the Mall post-Harkins and JC Penney departures, the wise decision was made to demolish the 30-year old Tri-City Mall in favor of the strip shopping center, Tri-City Pavillions. The Penney building did remain - though was demolished in 2008 ending the original Mall’s legacy 40 years after it had launched. (BTW: as you may have gathered, there was no period of the theater’s operation as the “Tri-City Cinemas” though it’s a really good name.)

I went to a couple of movies here back in the late 80’s and early 90’s. Nice theater. It was a dollar theater by then. Used to go to the restaurant in the parking lot there after we would watch a movie. Good times.