GLENDALE : Pacific Regency Theatre to Close

The big screen will fade to black for the last time Sunday evening at Pacific Regency Theatre in Glendale. Slumping ticket sales at the 600-seat venue have prompted owners to shut it down, officials said.

“It’s (been) losing a lot of money,” manager Bob Baron said. “We’ve tried everything” from $2 admission tickets to the current 99-cent fare. “People are upset that it’s closing down, because it’s a real theater.”

Baron couldn’t give exact dollar losses over the years. Pacific Theatres, which has owned the movie house at 210 S. Brand Blvd. since March, 1985, announced the building’s closure this month. The auditorium’s last public feature will be the movie “Homeward Bound,” which ends at 10:39 p.m. Sunday.

“It’ll be hard for us (employees) to say goodby to the theater,” said Jeannie Chung, an assistant manager. “Everybody was like a family.”

Chung and another assistant manager chose to be laid off rather than obtain jobs, at lower pay, at other Pacific-owned movie houses. Ten others, ranging from a third assistant manager to ushers to custodians, agreed to be transferred, Baron said.

Although no farewell party is scheduled at the theater, Chung said employees have planned a reunion at Magic Mountain in August.

Sunday’s closing of the Regency follows a developer’s announcement this week about plans to build an eight-screen cinema complex in a shopping center on Wilson Street at Glendale Avenue.