Opinion: Support your theater – or lose it

My name is Johnnie Meier, historic preservation officer for the New Mexico Route 66 Association. I have been leading an all-volunteer preservation team that has been working to restore Tucumcari’s hail damaged historic neon signs and we have been making significant progress.

On Nov. 18, I was in Tucumcari with the association preservation team working on several neon signs. Sitting in my motel room after a hard day’s work, I decided to go to the Odeon Theater to watch a movie. I have long been familiar with the Odeon having watched movies there over the past two decades on overnight trips to Tucumcari.

The action/adventure movie playing at the theater, The Marvels - 3D, was scheduled to be shown at 7 p.m. I was the only customer at the theater. Not a single local citizen was there. I was alone with two employees at the snack bar where freshly popped popcorn was waiting. On the snack counter was a cardboard box filled with hundreds of 3D glasses for viewing the movie.

The employees told me they needed at least three customers to show the movie and they asked if I’d be OK if the showing was canceled. I told them that I understood. I left the lobby and took a stroll around the empty theater on a Saturday night. It was stunning to me.

While standing in the empty theater facing the blank screen, co-owner Christy Dominguez Lopez recognized and greeted me. I had previously met her when I worked on the Odeon neon sign a year ago before the hail storm and had successfully relit the sign after years of the sign being dark. Unfortunately, this year’s hail storm has broken pieces of neon and rendered the sign dark again. The Odeon sign was on our association’s list for repairing.

I sat down to talk with her about the theater. Our conversation continued for over two hours where she talked about growing up in Tucumcari, her affection for the folks of Tucumcari, and she and her husband’s investment in upgrading and preserving the theater for Tucumcari. Her two employees approached her for direction and she told her two young employees to go ahead and clock out. As we continued to talk seated in the empty theater, I could see she was trying to put on a brave face and maintain a stoic composure. However, there were moments in the conversation talking about the uncertain future of the theater where her voice was trembling with emotion.

I am concerned about the young people of Tucumcari and their recreational opportunities and their quality of life. When I was growing up, going to the movies was the highlight of the week where I could hang out with friends and see wonders on the big screen.

Over time, attendance at the Odeon has declined. Christy reached out on social media recently to find out what movies she should book for the theater. She responded to seemingly enthusiastic support for bringing Taylor Swift’s new movie, Eras, to Tucumcari. The movie was booked, hardly any tickets were sold.

I could see and hear that Christy was agonizing over the fact that she may have no choice but to close the theater in January. Is Tucumcari going to allow the Odeon to close down? Are the Hollywood movie distributors going to quit sending movies to the Odeon when not a single ticket is sold on a Saturday night?

Can Tucumcari community government and business leaders get a team together and figure this out?

Contact Johnnie Meier:

[email protected]