The Berkshires Will Be Down To One Movie Theater

Regal Cinemas temporarily is closing all its theaters in the country, including the one at the Berkshire Mall in Lanesborough, starting Thursday.

The second-largest movie theater chain in the U.S. said Monday that the decision was made in response to challenges from the COVID-19 pandemic.

The temporary closure of the cinema at the Berkshire Mall means that you will have to take a ride to North Adams to see a movie. The closing will leave the county with just one theater that remains open, the North Adams Movieplex 8.

Mooky Greidinger, CEO of Cineworld, said in a news release. (Cineworld is the parent company of Regal).

" This is not a decision we made lightly, and we did everything in our power to support a safe and sustainable reopening in the U.S. from putting in place robust health and safety measures at our theatres to joining our industry in making a collective commitment to the CinemaSafe protocols to reaching out to state and local officials to educate them on these initiatives."

The Beacon’s owner, Corey Jacobson, said the Michigan-based Phoenix is planning to open its three theaters in the Detroit metro area on Friday and will monitor that situation before deciding how to proceed with the Beacon.

" Once we get that established and running, we’ll make some decision on what to do in Pittsfield,” Jacobson said. “Basically, you get one big bite at the apple. You want to make sure that you can open and be successful. We don’t want to reopen and then close again, either."

Doug Jones, executive director of Images Cinema, said the state’s new indoor seating guidelines will benefit multiscreen cinema complexes more than Images, which has only one screen and 160 seats.