By Eileen Moon
ATLANTIC HIGHLANDS – It was a plot twist that turned the tale of a small-town movie theater shuttered by the pandemic from a tragedy to a feel-good family feature.
In a post that appeared on the Atlantic Highlands community Facebook page June 8, borough resident Tony Zertuche announced that he and his wife Susanne had signed a two-year lease with the owner of Atlantic Cinemas, Fred Rast, and planned to reopen the historic, five-screen movie house this summer.
With much to be done before the doors open, the Zertuches say they are planning a “soft opening” in July with a grand opening to follow – hopefully in early August.
They haven’t decided what their opening films will be, but they are hoping to offer a mix that will bring people out for the kind of communal film experience you just can’t get at home.
“It will be tied in with what the community wants,” Zertuche said. “I need to find the right mix that will get everyone off their couches. There’s a lot of pent-up demand.”
But the key to survival lies in steady support from residents of Atlantic Highlands and its sister towns around the two rivers.
The Zertuches have set up a GoFundMe page to accept donations from community members willing to help them with the $50,000 startup costs for what they hope will be a profit-making operation.
The 100-year-old theater at 82 First Ave., in the heart of the downtown, has been shuttered since November 2020, when Rast announced he was closing the business and putting the building and an adjoining one he owns up for sale for $2.6 million.
Rast blamed the shutdown mandate ordered by Gov. Phil Murphy in response to the COVID-19 pandemic for making it impossible for him to keep the movie theater going.
During a temporary closure from March to October 2020, Rast said then, he and wife Mickey Rast invested in microbial treatments and other improvements to make it safe for patrons to return under social distancing guidelines.
But when it reopened in mid-October 2020, the theater failed to draw enough business to keep the doors open.
Soon after Rast’s announcement, the Zertuches began to explore the possibility of reopening the theater, but they couldn’t afford to purchase the buildings and began looking outside town for a similar small-town theater venue that might work for them. “It was definitely out of my price range,” Zertuche said.
They were exploring the possibility of purchasing the Showroom in Asbury Park when Rast reconnected with them to ask if they’d be interested in leasing the theater after a previous purchase deal with another buyer fell through.
“Tony’s young and he’ll do some good things,” said Rast, a former Atlantic Highlands mayor.
Rast’s connection with the theater is emotional as well as financial, stretching back to his youth, when he worked as an usher for then-owner Lenny Edwards, a friend and later business partner, who died in 2012 at 88. The Rasts then took on ownership of the movie house.
The building itself, dating back to the Roaring ’20s, was rumored to have been a drop-off point for shipments of illegal alcohol during Prohibition.
Zertuche, a Texas native, studied film at the University of Texas in Austin before moving east to work as an actor and playwright. He met Susanne, a Jersey girl, while teaching at an acting school in New York City.
The couple, who have two children, moved to Atlantic Highlands nine years ago from New York City to give their kids the advantages of a backyard and life in a small town.
“The town has been incredible,” Zertuche said. “I’ve talked to a lot of business owners in town. We got overwhelming support. There’s a lot of excitement and well wishes. That has to translate into people coming to the movies. You gotta keep coming. You gotta get off your tablet, off your streaming. If you don’t, this isn’t going to survive.”
“This is a walking town,” said Stephanie Ladiana, president of the Atlantic Highlands Arts Council, which sponsors the borough’s annual FilmOneFest featuring less than two-minute films from around the world. “It’s one of the things that I think people are drawn to here and the movie theater is a big part of that. The movie theater just makes the town complete. I wish them much success.”
Zertuche grew up in a suburb of Dallas, where he remembers going to a similar small-town theater where he and his friends would turn out for the weekly feature and the Coke machine still dispensed paper cups full of syrup and seltzer.
“We absolutely have a passion for all things film and cinema,” Zertuche said. “Classics, first run, foreign films – all the things that people are asking for. It needs to be tied in with what the community wants.”
In an era of multiplexes and luxury amenities, keeping a small theater alive and profitable will require strong community support.
After consulting with a mentor from the Small Business Administration, “Everybody kind of agreed that this was a great way to see if this would work. In two years, we’ll know if this kind of cinema works. If it works, we can move on past two years.”
While the Rasts made improvements to the interior and upgraded the theater’s projectors and sound equipment – “they’re in great shape,” Zertuche said – the long months of disuse have taken a toll on the theater’s interior that will require some painting, tweaking and TLC before it is ready to reopen.
“There’s a lot to do to get it all started up again,” Zertuche said. “I don’t want to lose the nostalgia that so many people have talked to me about, but I do want to upgrade a little bit.”
They’ve already had requests to bring back an in-house popcorn maker and expand the offerings at the candy concession.
The Zertuches plan to dedicate one of the theater’s five screens to private rentals and may use only three screens when they first open the doors.
“I just want to get it off on the right foot,” he said.
“I think it’s fabulous,” said Loretta Gluckstein, Atlantic Highlands mayor. “Our town is making such a great comeback after COVID!”
The article originally appeared in the July 1 – 7, 2021 print edition of The Two River Times.
