News & Events

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And the Graffiti Comes Down!

  • Graffiti on the landmarked facade. Photo: Randy Enochs

What a milestone! Thanks to the support of New York Landmarks Preservation Commission, Uptown Film Center was able to remove years-old graffiti from the landmarked Art Deco façade of its home at Broadway and 99th Street on Manhattan’s Upper West Side.

The graffiti had been a highly visible presence on the building for a number of years and a longstanding neighborhood concern. Its removal allows the building’s distinctive façade to stand out along Broadway.  It also marks the first visible step in the development of Uptown Film Center as a new five-screen arthouse cinema and cultural center.

Because of the façade’s landmark status and historic materials, the graffiti removal required a highly specialized treatment to protect the façade and its distinctive architectural details. Uptown Film Center’s architects, Voith & Mactavish, worked in coordination with the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission to ensure the protection of the terra cotta.

PRESS COVERAGE:
West Side Rag
I Love the Upper West Side
WABC News (below)

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Light Up the Uptown: 30 Volunteers, 330 Donors, and $62,758 Raised!

Campaign captains for the Light Up the Uptown peer-to-peer fundraising campaign were celebrated at our final outdoor screening in Riverside Park.

What happens when 30 people who believe in the Uptown Film Center ask their friends and family to believe in it, too? An incredible $62,758 raised from 281 new donors and 49 repeat donors!

This summer, 30 Uptown supporters stepped forward as Light Up the Uptown campaign captains, each committing to raise a modest $500 by asking friends and family to make a gift of $20 or more. While the original overall goal of the campaign was $20,000, the captains more than tripled that number—and almost everyone exceeded their personal goal, with most raising more than $1,000.

The idea for the campaign came from Natalie Dawe, an Upper West Side volunteer and Uptown’s lead marketing consultant.  She knew that a personal invitation would be much more powerful than a generic fundraising appeal.  “Anytime I tell someone in my network about the Uptown Film Center and talk about how passionate I am about it, the excitement is infectious.”

Campaign co-chair Raquel Munive (right) with campaign captains Frederique Henriot and Susan Goodman

Natalie proposed a peer-to-peer campaign that would give supporters their own personalized fundraising pages and the tools to share the Uptown story with their personal networks. Raquel Munive, another Uptown volunteer, joined the effort as co-chair. Together, she and Natalie created a toolkit to make it easy for first-time fundraisers to get started, providing information about the Uptown, sample emails and texts, social media posts and photos. Each “captain” also had a personalized donation page where they could watch their fundraising progress and receive regular updates.

The result was an extraordinary outpouring of support!

The captains ranged in age from 17 to 85; many had never raised money before. But because the ask was just $20, they say they felt comfortable reaching out to their friends and family.  And then the gifts started coming in.  One fundraiser identified a leadership donor; others kept raising their goals as they surpassed them.

It’s a family effort! Co-captains Nicky and Kristen Dover with their next generation cinephile! 

By mid-August, after the eight-week campaign, the 30 volunteers had raised $62,758—three times the original overall goal.  Just as important were the 281 new donors who joined the Uptown community by donating through the campaign.

“A broad base of community support matters enormously to a project like ours,” says Beth Krieger, Uptown Vice President/Development and Communications.  “Foundations, government funders and individual major donors want to see evidence that our project has the support of the community it will serve.”  The influx of donors from the summer campaign, she says, has brought the total number of donors to 1,400.

(L-R) Campaign captains Corinne Constantine and Lorraine Zamora

“I hope the captains feel a lot of pride because they did something significant for their community,” adds Natalie. “The Uptown belongs to all of us—and these 30 volunteers showed just how much can happen when a community comes together to build it.”

Raquel notes that several captains have asked to continue their fundraising efforts through crowd-funded Name a Seat campaigns, working toward the $5,000 need to name a seat in one of the Uptown’s future theaters.

Natalie and Raquel hope to repeat the Light Up the Uptown campaign next summer.  A call for volunteers will go out next May in our newsletter, so if you are interested, be sure you sign up for Uptown mailings at uptownfilm.org/mailing-list.

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Uptown Campaign Marks Progress

The Uptown Film Center just released its first Campaign Progress Report July 2024-July 2026.

Included in the report is a glance at the finances and goals of the project, construction milestones, and the Uptown’s robust film and educational programming. Also listed are the 1200+ donors and countless volunteers, community partners. and government electeds who have joined the effort and continue to support the mission–to create a permanent home for independent film, education, and community on Manhattan’s Upper West Side.

We hope you enjoying reading how far we’ve come, and we encourage you to join the effort!  The faster we raise the funds needed, the faster we can all say…SEE YOU AT THE UPTOWN!

uptownfilm.org/donate

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Uptown Launches Second Season of Science on Screen® Pop-Up Series

Uptown Film Center launches the second season of its Science on Screen® pop-up series, on Monday, October 5, 7pm, with Peter Weir’s sci-fi film, The Truman Show, starring Jim Carrey and Laura Linney.

Science on Screen® is a nationwide initiative of the Coolidge Corner Theatre in partnership with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation that uses film to engage audiences with science, technology, and the questions they raise in our everyday lives. The series reflects Uptown Film Center’s commitment to science literacy and the kind of thoughtful, educational programming it plans to offer regularly when its permanent home opens. All screenings will take place at the Leonard Nimoy Thalia Theater at West 95th Street, west of Broadway

“What makes Science on Screen® so compelling is the opportunity to use very different kinds of films to explore questions that are increasingly relevant to our lives,” says Ira Deutchman, President, Uptown Film Center. “Through comedy, documentary and science-fiction satire, these films tackle subjects ranging from technology and surveillance to sustainable farming and the future of human reproduction. Together, they show how movies can entertain us while also challenging us to think more deeply about the world around us.”

The Truman Show explores surveillance, privacy and the increasingly blurred boundaries between technology, entertainment and everyday life. Guest speaker Professor Michael W. Morris, the author of Tribal (2024), spent his career studying how shared cultural codes and identities influence the way we think and act. He will address the question, “Who Gets to Decide What is Real?” in a pre-screening introduction, exploring what the film reveals about the invisible scripts that guide our lives, whether we notice them or not.

Next film in the series, on Monday, November 9, is the critically acclaimed documentary film, The Biggest Little Farm, which follows John and Molly Chester as they leave Los Angeles to transform 200 acres of depleted, drought-stricken land into a thriving and radically diverse farm. What begins as an idealistic dream of living in harmony with nature becomes a humbling exploration of biodiversity, resilience, and the delicate balance that sustains all living things. Guest Speaker to be announced.

The last film in the series is Sophie Barthes’ witty 2023 indie film, The Pod Generation, Monday, December 14. The film follows a New York couple (Emilia Clarke, Chiwetel Ejiofor) who contemplate growing their baby in a detachable artificial womb, or “pod,” provided by a powerful tech company. Dr. Elizabeth Reis has taught classes on medical ethics, gender and bioethics, and reproductive technologies. She is the author of Bodies in Doubt: An American History of Intersex (2009), published in an expanded second edition in 2021; Damned Women: Sinners and Witches in Puritan New England.

The Science on Screen series is supported, in part, by public funds from the NYC Department of Youth and Community Development (DYCD) in partnership with the NY City Council and the office of New York City Council Majority Leader Shaun Abreu and Speaker Julie Menin.

Tickets are $7/adults, $5 for seniors and students, plus a $5 facility fee (at check-out). All screenings take place at the Leonard Nimoy Thalia Theater at West 95th Street, west of Broadway.

Details and tickets>>

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Moviegoers Love Their Indie Theaters!

Uptown Attends Nat’l Conference for Best Practices and Trends

by Renee Cho

If you still think movie-going is dead and there’s no future for arthouse cinema, think again…

Art house theater attendance grew nine percent in 2025—and independent theaters that are part of Art House Convergence, a national coalition of independent exhibitors, reported an 8.8 percent rise in yearly grosses last year, with a 38 percent increase since 2019.

  • Adeline Monzier and Barbara Twist at Ind/Ex Conference
    The Uptown team was "in the house" at the recent 2026 Ind/Ex conference in Chicago, when reports were released about the resurgence of moviegoing. Here's Uptown vice president Adeline Monzier with Barbara Twist, Uptown advisory council member.

The sharp growth in movie-going was noted in results of a 2026 National Audience Survey, conducted by Art House Convergence and released at the recent Independent Film Exhibition Conference in Chicago (Ind/Ex). Among the attendees at this year’s conference were Uptown execs Ira Deutchman, Adeline Monzier and Beth Krieger.

National Audience survey results are based on responses from over 27,000 U.S. moviegoers from more than 50 independent cinemas, with questions about moviegoing preferences and experiences at their favorite indie theaters. 

More than 70 percent of respondents said their preferred art house theater was “very” or “extremely valuable” to their quality of life; 88 percent called it a “cultural hub of the community.” These moviegoers attended more than ten movies a year at their indie theaters, saying they valued the “unique and high-quality films,” interesting programs, and events.

Moreover, of those surveyed, 25 percent of filmgoers began going to their favorite art house theaters in the last three years. These moviegoers had an average age of 40—11 years younger than the average age of all those surveyed. And of these recent attendees, 68 percent were younger than 45. In addition, 43 percent of respondents said they joined their theater’s membership programs to support the theater and get members-only screening and event perks. 

The increase in arthouse movie-going audience bodes well for independent theaters across the country, but it is particularly meaningful for the Uptown Film Center. “When we first started fundraising in the fall of 2024 to purchase the former Metro theater, one of the biggest challenges was convincing donors that people would go back to movie theaters following the pandemic years,” recalls president Ira Deutchman. “But in only two years’ time, there’s been a significant rise in grosses at independent theaters, and a marked growth in the younger audience—which speaks volumes about the future of our business. People WANT to get out of the house, they want communal experiences, and they want to be in the conversation.  We can’t wait to open to fulfill that need!”

ALSO READ:

‘There’s excitement in the air’: how America fell back in love with indie cinemas | Movies | The Guardian

Art House Theaters Beloved by Local Audiences; Younger Filmgoers Grow/Variety

Wait, Moviegoing Isn’t Dead? Our Critic Explains/New York Times

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Meet the Uptown Film Center team at the Community Resource Fair, July 24

 

The Uptown Film Center will be joining the West 90th Neighborhood Assn. and other local organizations for a Community Resource Fair at 96th Street and Broadway, on Friday, July 24, 10am to 4pm. Come say hello! You’ll be able to ask questions about our mission, our progress, and upcoming screenings. Learn about our Light Up the Uptown fundraising campaign and sign up for our newsletter. We’ll also be selling our limited-edition UPTOWN TOTES!

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Uptown Architects Look to Sustainable Strategies

 

VMA architect Isabella Bartenstein (left) and Sennah Loftus, VMA Director of Interiors (at screen) review design and material options with Uptown’s Beth Krieger and Ira Deutchman.

By Renee Cho

The Uptown team is deep into design development this summer; the original architectural renderings are now being refined–from measurements and material choices down to the wires and venting.  For architects Voith & Mactavish (V&M), which has restored and renovated several historic movie theaters,  it also means sustainable strategies are crystallizing.

 “The concept of traditional design and sustainability have always gone hand in hand,” says John Cluver, lead architect on the project. “If you think about what traditional architecture is, it’s designing to the climate, designing to the environment that you’re in, use of natural strategies of ventilation and use of natural materials.”

John and colleague Elie Zeinoun are aiming for Silver LEED certification for the Uptown, which signifies a project that has gone significantly beyond basic green building requirements and standard local building codes, and is making a verifiable commitment to environmental stewardship. 

For the Uptown, this entails reusing as much as possible of the existing building and structure. “This in itself is a huge sustainability boost, because you are avoiding new materials, and avoiding both the outsourcing and the transportation of the material,” explains Elie. “There’s a life cycle impact and carbon reduction that’s tied to that.” The roof structure, exterior walls and center floor will be reused, but all exterior surfaces will be insulated to modern levels of insulation for thermal efficiency.

New sustainable, Red List-free materials [the gold standard for material health and safety] will be used throughout. This means that all paints, carpets, wall coverings, insulation, adhesives, and other materials will be devoid of toxic materials, such as volatile organic components. Restrooms will be equipped with low-flow toilets and fixtures. Water fountains will have bottle fillers.

Acoustics in a multi-theater building are critical. The walls, ceilings and floor materials as well as wall coverings and upholstery affect how much sound is bouncing off and reverberating. “Acoustics are a huge part of the design, and there will be some spots where material will be both thermal and acoustic,” says John. “We are making sure that, where it’s appropriate, they can do double duty without compromising the performance of either.” And while laser projectors emit some heat, that heat can be captured and reused before it’s vented from the building.

The entire film center, including its systems and café equipment, will be electrified, which means no natural gas or fossil fuel will be used. Also, mechanical systems will be highly efficient to reduce energy costs and greenhouse gas emissions. 

“Traditional construction is very durable, and that’s something we’re looking for as well,” notes John. “We want a building that is well built, is going to age well, and uses materials that are going to last a long time.”

While the timeline for construction is dependent on fundraising and permit approvals, the center hopes to begin the build-out next summer, with a targeted opening in winter 2028-2029.  

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Uptown Architects Receive ICAA Award

Uptown’s architects, Voith & Mactavish (V&M), are among this year’s recipients of the 2026 Arthur Ross Award for Excellence in the Classical Tradition, awarded by the Institute of Classical Architecture & Art (ICAA).

Voith & Mactavish, which won in the architecture category, was noted for “architecture that expresses innovation in the context of tradition.” The ICAA noted that V&M has stayed true to their vision “by designing environments that support contemporary uses and carefully respond to the cultural and physical contexts of each site.”

This is the 45th year that the ICAA has bestowed these awards, dubbed the Academy Awards of the design world. Awardees are selected from an international slate and receive the honor for a body of work and consistent advancement of design in traditional idioms.

Earlier this year, V&M senior partner John Cluver–lead architect on the Uptown project–was named to the American Institute of Architects’ College of Fellows, its highest membership honor.

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Shawmut Is Contracted for Pre-Construction Services

After a comprehensive search and bidding process, the Uptown Film Center has contracted with Shawmut Design and Construction as Construction Manager for the pre-construction planning period.

Pre-construction consists of a review of constructability and project documentation, development of detailed budgets, schedules, phasing and cashflows, and creation of a site logistics plan, among other activities.

Shawmut is a 100% employee-owned company with a long history of construction management in New York City. Recent relevant projects include The People’s Theater, four Brooklyn Public Library branches and the Children’s Museum of Manhattan, which is in progress.

The Uptown project is still on track for a late 2028 opening.

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Uptown Announces “Tales of Summer” Pop-Up Series

Footloose
A screening of Footloose on July 21 will feature a Q&A with actor Kevin Bacon.

The Uptown has announced its 2026 pop-up film series Tales of Summer, with eight films screening in various venues across Upper Manhattan from June 3 through September 18.

The series includes three free outdoor screenings–in Morningside Park, Amsterdam Ave at 110th (as part of Open Streets), and Riverside Park, one premiere, and several films featuring Q&As with special guests.

“Summer changes the way we go to the movies,” says Ira Deutchman, Uptown President. “The days are longer, routines are looser, and moviegoing feels more relaxed and communal. In programming Tales of Summer, we were intentional about bringing together films that reflect that same sense of freedom, discovery, nostalgia, and escape.”

For the film schedule and tickets, go to uptownfilm.org/calendar

The Tales of Summer series is supported, in part, by public funds from the NYC Department of Youth and Community Development (DYCD) in partnership with the City Council and the office of New York City Councilperson Shaun Abreu. 

Films are being presented in partnership with the Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan, Maysles Documentary Center, the Bronx Independent Cinema Center, Columbus/Amsterdam BID, Friends of Morningside Park, Riverside Park Conservancy, West 111th Block Assn., and New Friends of Metro Theater.