Sunny Isles Twin

It may well be but the local paper reports that the Valentine’s 1982 incident occurred at the Plitt Sunny Isles Twin Theatre and that the movie the man and his wife were on their way to attending did play at the Sunny Isles Twin on Valentine’s Day, 1982. The jury award payout occurred in June of 1986.

In 1978, Henry Plitt formed Plitt Theatre Holdings with some partners to buy ABC`s Southern Circuit of theaters includng ABC’s Florida State Theatres for $49 million including the Southern Isles Twin. Plitt operated the venue from December of 1978 until closure on February 2, 1984 as as Plitt’s Sunny Isles Twin.

It reopened as an independent as the Sunny Isles Twin the next day. It closed on March 4, 1984 with “Boarding School” and “Angelo, My Love” placing a “Closed for Remodeling: Returning on May 3d.” But the venue thought better of the plan making the March 4th closure permanent. Following its conversion to retail operationes, the Sunny Isles Twin theatre was in the news one last time in 1986 as Plitt lost a $1 million lawsuit for a 1982 injury incident in its parking lot.

Yes, I know.

That “Cinderella” in the opening ad was one of a small handful of films distributed by Barry Yellen’s Childhood Productions in 1966, each a hastily dubbed U.S. premiere of a foreign language film. Thus, LOW budget, and quite lame. The Miracle in Coral Gables usually had better matinees, although a few of the lower end products slipped in.

The current Scandesign web site clearly shows the old theater as one of its showrooms.

The building is now a Japanese restaurant and lounge(Hiro).

“CHITTY” played on both, but Aquamarine (Twin 2) was on the left and Driftwood (Twin 1) was on the right. Driftwood had more seats.

Aeterna, thanks for the “HOTEL” shots!

Yes, it closed in 1984.

Warner Brothers held a big 3-day event in Miami Beach for the press premiere of “Hotel” that culminated with a black-tie screening of the film at this theater on Saturday, January 21, 1967.

By the time I got to 12th Grade, my brother was managing the theatre with an old-timey exhibitor, known to me only as Jimmy Foof. Dunno where that name could have come from, but with my bro running the place every night, it gave me total access to what was playing, and that year (1973) it was “The Exorcist.” I went through a very short period of film craft interest, just in time to stay through maybe 30 showings of the film. I know every bump and sound in the film track. Max Von Sydow played a 70-80-something priest very convincingly to the point where, before imdb, I never knew his real age. The place had 2 large screens before they multiplexed into 8 smallish screens. At least the concession stand sold Pepsi, “real” Goobers and really good hot dogs. The place still stands, but has been repurposed as a furniture store in a small strip mall. With Oleta State Park right across Sunny Isles Blvd, everyone in the area knew when low tide was. Stinky, stinky mangroves.

I uploaded the December 16th, 1966 grand opening ad here.

“Chitty” was in 1968 – it didn’t open the theater. Ads say “A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the Forum.”