01/05/2026
Saved: Metro Theater
Twenty years after the Metro Theater was gutted and padlocked, the New York City cinema has a new steward!
The nonprofit Upper West Side Cinema Center (Uptown Film Center) purchased the long-disused building earlier this year, with plans to restore the original exterior and transform the space into a five-screen art house theater.
Originally named the Midtown Theater when it opened in 1933, the cinema was designed by New York architects Boak & Paris with Art Deco elements. After a stint as an adult film house in the 1970s, the Midtown reopened as a repertory theater in 1982 and was renamed the Metro Theater.
The property changed hands a couple more times over the years, but in the mid-2000s its historic interior was ripped out.
When film producer Ira Deutchman heard the theater was potentially on the market in 2024, he, film programmer Adeline Monzier, and communications expert Beth Krieger founded the nonprofit and started raising money to purchase the site.
The Upper West Side Cinema Center closed the $6.9 million deal earlier this year with the help of state grant funding.
The organization has brought Voith & Mactavish Architects, a preservation-minded firm, on board to design the facade restoration and interior rehabilitation.
“The terra-cotta facade is just gorgeous, even in its current shape, which is showing a lot of wear and tear,” says Deutchman. “We’re going to do everything we can to make [the exterior] look as original as possible.”
From the Transitions section of Preservation magazine Fall 2025.
Photo by Alison Max Rothschild
