Malverne Cinema & Art Center aiming for December relaunch

The Malverne Cinema & Art Center is eyeing an opening date that could coincide with the town’s annual Christmas tree lighting in December, according to an organizer who’s helping to relaunch the shuttered movie theater.

"We’ve got our timeline," Maria Dente, creative director of the Malverne Cinema & Art Center Committee, said. "Our goal is to be open, with some portions fully functioning."

The Malverne, an Art Deco gem that opened in 1947, served as one of Long Island’s rare art-house cinemas specializing in foreign and independent films until it closed in September. Nick Hudson, a Malverne resident who runs the nonprofit Entertainment 2 Affect Change, teamed up with Dente — whose Lynbrook-based nonprofit, Dente’s Dreamers, produces inclusive stage shows — to relaunch the venue as both a cinema and a community arts hub. They held their first public meeting this year in May.

Since then, the committee has raised $125,000 in donations, according to Dente, and has applied for state and county grants to pay for the roughly $1 million required to renovate the theater.

The building needs to become energy efficient and wheelchair accessible, she said, and will also need to incorporate a stage for future productions.

The theater already has one hidden stage, roughly 15 feet deep, that was walled off in 1981 to turn what was then a single-screen theater into a twin, according to Anne Stampfel, who operated the Malverne for 34 years with her husband, Henry. “I think her group and other groups could utilize it,” Stampfel said of Dente. “It’s not the depth of a stage that you might think. But anything can be overcome.”

Malverne’s Christmas tree ceremony typically takes place in early December. The cinema plans to open with a screening of “It’s a Wonderful Life,” the 1946 holiday classic that was the first film ever to screen there.

“Art is so important,” Dente said, “and the arts bring all of us together."

By Rafer Guzmán

rafer.guzman@newsday.com