Best Grindhouse Cinema
Best Celebrity Temper Tantrum
If you can help us out in paying our legal and bankruptcy debts, please donate!!!!
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Chandler Cinemas entertained valley moviegoers for over 20 years before being closed to the public on Sunday, June 21st, 2009. The building is now occupied by a Catholic Prep School. It will never again operate as a movie theatre.
For traditional discount movies in the East Valley we recommend TEMPE CINEMAS at Elliot & McClintock and Picture Show Theatres at Superstition Mall. AZRocky Horror/Come As You Are and The Midnite Movie Mamacita, as well as much of our programming (and spirit) have found a new home at the much more centrally located MADCAP theatres (formerly Harkins Centerpoint) at 730 South Mill Avenue in Tempe. For more information visit www.MADCAPTHEATRE.COM or AZ Rocky Horror or Midnite Movie Mamacita
WHY DID WE CLOSE? We were forced out with only a few days notice because another tenant was willing to pay significantly higher rent than we could afford and the landlords wanted them in--and us gone--ASAP. We were not shut down for bad business (our business was growing daily) or bad behavior--it was simple business and perhaps some politics.
In our time there we made many friends, fans and extended family members and we thank everyone who helped keep the dream alive for as long as we did. We did not fail!
HISTORY: Originally opened in the mid-1980s by UNITED ARTISTS (who also opened two other nearly-identical locations elsewhere in the Phoenix area at that time), THE CHANDLER CINEMAS have undergone several changes in management in the last few years, including brief turns as both a Spanish Language theatre and a Dinner Theatre.
From 2003-2005 and again in 2007 the theater was operated by Grand Cinemas, who passed the torch to COME AS YOU ARE ENTERTAINMENT at the end of that year. Under the direction of MATTEO YENKALA (aka "The Rocky Horror Guy") and Andrea Beesley-Brown (aka "The Midnite Movie Mamacita"), the dream of independent cinemas in the Valley of the Sun lived, thrived and grew for the better part of two glorious years, boasting innovative, cutting-edge, alternative programming as well as traditional (and value-priced) family movies).