What it takes to be almost a drive-in

photo from the MAIN Facebook page

photo from the MAIN Facebook page

When you think of a drive-in theater, you’ve got a picture in your head. If someone asks you whether a given business is a drive-in theater, it’s usually a pretty easy call. I wrote about this a couple of months ago, and now there’s a fledgling business in West Virginia that illustrates the gray area between Yes and No.

From all indications, MAIN Movies has been doing a great public service. This summer, it launched by showing free movies on a field owned by the Belpre OH Volunteer Fire Department, selling concession items and asking for donations to defray licensing fees. As chronicled in the Parkersburg News and Sentinel, owners JD and Leann Nicolais named their company after three daughters (Madison, the late Arabella, and Isabelle) and their family name.

MAIN used an inflatable screen and a “compact but powerful projector” that couldn’t handle rain. They had earlier tried something similar in Parkersburg’s City Park. “We just saw a need for cheap entertainment, for families to come out and literally spend $10 for a whole family to watch a movie,” JD said. It was outdoors, but everyone used lawn chairs or blankets, so it definitely wasn’t a drive-in.

According to the prolific posts on MAIN’s Facebook page, in early August they decided to switch to a true drive-in format and needed a “place to leave a screen up”. After asking around, the family settled on the 4H campground across the Ohio River in Mineral Wells WV. MAIN ran a haunted woods attraction in October and movies most weekends, though the battles with precipitation were exacerbated by the possibility of flooding.

A few days ago, the Marietta OH Times ran a story of the new drive-in. The MAIN charged just $8 per carload and sold pizza, snacks and sodas. From the story and a few Facebook posts, after a few weeks at the new location, they built a new 24-foot screen, larger than the inflatable one. “The screen is temporary and completely movable,” JD said. “But the goal is to find a permanent location that will allow us to have a larger, permanent screen.”

The Times story ran on November 5. The same day, MAIN posted on Facebook, “Looking for a business opportunity? We have decided to move and would like to leave the business here. You will receive every single thing we have for movies including an inflatable screen.”

A campground with a permanent drive-in screen and regularly scheduled movies? That sounds like Sokol Park in suburban Omaha NE. But a temporary screen, erratic schedule, and an owner that’s leaving the business? New management might change the situation, but for now I’d say that MAIN Movies is almost a drive-in.

How to define the drive-in theater

Blue Moonlight Drive-In at night

The Blue Moonlight Drive-In (Galesburg IL) at night. © DepositPhotos / sgtphoto.

What is a drive-in theater?

That’s not a rhetorical question. Over the years, I’ve called out Things That Are Not Drive-Ins. The most common example of Not is a movie night in a park where everybody sits in chairs or on blankets and the organizers can’t resist calling any outdoor movie a “drive-in.” But the line between Drive-In and Not is getting thinner.

Consider what a drive-in theater requires. It must have a permanent location, although that location can shift. A “pop-up drive-in” that visits various parking lots doesn’t count.

A drive-in theater must have room for cars. Additional pedestrian seating is okay, but you can’t have a drive-in without drivers.

A drive-in needs a screen, but now the line starts to get blurry. Does it need to be a permanent screen? Consider the Blue Starlite Mini Urban Drive-In in Austin TX. As you can see by this photo, the BSMU used a very temporary-looking screen. Other such parking-lot drive-ins have used the side of a building as a screen. Should that disqualify it? I’d say no, so screen permanence isn’t a requirement.

I can’t think of any other requirements, except perhaps that it needs to be open to the public. Whether it uses film or digital, new movies or old, mainstream or porn; whether it’s got a concession stand, food trucks, or nothing; if cars can drive to a particular place to watch movies on a screen, that’s a drive-in theater.

Here’s a related question: When is a drive-in “active,” as opposed to permanently closed? Most cases are obvious. Many drive-ins are dormant over the winter, but like leafless trees in December, that doesn’t mean they’re dead. When a drive-in stays dark through summer, or announces that it won’t reopen, then it’s closed.

Turns out that there are some marginal cases. Consider Manistique MI’s Cinema 2, a single-screen theater named for US Highway 2. The Cinema 2 closed in 2001. Fifteen years later, its screen and buildings were amazingly still in good shape, so civic charities sponsored one-shot movie nights twice in 2016. (The most recent was covered here.) For now, I’d still call that one closed, but if they ramp up to once a month or more, I’d reconsider.

Then there’s the Hilltop in Chester WV. Struggling with the conversion to digital movies, it was closed all summer until it found a film distributor and reopened this month. Was the Hilltop “closed,” or was it just dormant? I’m just glad it’s back now.

There will always be cute little stories about fake drive-ins, like the Kansas elementary school that built one in its gym. These offshoots illustrate how deeply the idea of a drive-in is ingrained even for those unfortunates who haven’t experienced it. Drive-ins are here to stay, and Carload will be here to tell you about them.

Meadow Bridge Drive-In keeps its locals together

Meadow Bridge Drive-In marquee

Photo by neshachan. Used by permission.

With all the talk about drive-ins in trouble, we need a positive, uplifting article about a drive-in. The Register-Herald of Beckley WV has come to our rescue with a fine, lengthy story about the Meadow Bridge Drive-In (Meadow Bridge WV). On a summer night, the Meadow Bridge is the only local source of dining and entertainment, and the community gathers there for a good time. “It’s like a picnic at night. And it’s a tradition,” says owner Howard McClanahan.

The Meadow Bridge was built in 1953 by a local guy. Eventually, Thomas Theaters ran it, and years later “(w)ord on the street was that the theater was going to turn X-rated because its screen faced away from the road.” That’s when McClanahan, then a projectionist, bought the place.

There are no worries about the digital conversion here. McClanahan already bought his digital projector, which cost more than he spent to buy the Meadow Bridge in the first place, and he’s happy with the results.

There is so much more to this article, including lots of photos with lengthy captions, happy anecdotes of pizza and other community attractions, and a long, lingering warm feeling in general. You just know that you should go read it!