Cinema operator to close all UK venues putting 5,500 jobs at risk
Cineworld is to close all its venues in the UK and Ireland for an indefinite period from this Thursday (October 8) – putting 5,500 jobs at risk.
The cinema operator says the continued coronavirus crisis has made the industry “unviable”.
The company owns 128 UK and Irelands cinemas, including Yorkshire venues at Bradford, Castleford, Chesterfield, Hull, Leeds (White Rose), Sheffield, Wakefield and York.
The news comes after the announcement that the screening of new James Bond film, No Time to Die, has been delayed until next April.
Mooky Greidinger, CEO of Cineworld, said: “This is not a decision we made lightly, and we did everything in our power to support safe and sustainable reopenings in all of our markets – including meeting, and often exceeding, local health and safety guidelines in our theatres and working constructively with regulators and industry bodies to restore public confidence in our industry.
“We are especially grateful for and proud of the hard work our employees put in to adapt our theatres to the new protocols and cannot underscore enough how difficult this decision was.
“Cineworld will continue to monitor the situation closely and will communicate any future plans to resume operations in these markets at the appropriate time, when key markets have more concrete guidance on their reopening status and, in turn, studios are able to bring their pipeline of major releases back to the big screen.”
