A mainstay in downtown Trenton is closing its doors this week.
The Centre Theatre will show its last film on Thursday.
Owners Hollie and Eric Gordon purchased the theatre in 2015.
Eric Gordon has been dealing with serious health issues which led the family to put the almost 100-year-old building and business up for sale in 2023, however, no buyer was found.
In a Facebook post, Hollie Gordon thanked the community for their support and kind words since the announcement.
From the Centre Theatre’s Facebook post, August 13, 2024:
Thanks to everyone who have shared their kind words about the theatre since we announced our closing. The outpouring of messages, memories and questions has been lovely. We have decided to share a bit of our story for those who care to know.
For those who prefer a short post:
The theatre will be closing its doors this Thursday, August 15th . We are very sad. We wish things were different. We thank the community for all their support over the years.
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I have been writing this post in my head for weeks, knowing it would be difficult to say it right. To tell the parts of the story I want shared without it being over wrought.
For anyone who has been to the theatre it’s evident that Covid, mandatory lock downs and the rapid changes to the movie industry overall have hurt our business. Despite the fact that we have had loyal customers who want to support us, the movies are few and far between. We bought the theatre 5 years before COVID hit and it was our dream come true. We loved every minute of it and had so many plans and aspirations for making it even better.
Now, we were crawling our way back as the world started to return to normal. This may have been an impossible task, but we were up for the challenge and it felt like the community was ready to support our efforts.
And then we suffered a terrible setback when Eric found out he had stage 4 colon cancer which had spread to his liver and his lungs. A 42-year-old healthy man with 2 kids was initially told that it was too advanced and there wasn’t much that could be done for him.
We may have been facing some struggles, but we hit the jackpot when a group of surgeons and oncologists got together and decided that they were going to do everything they could to help Eric.
“Everything they could” meant surgeries, chemo, more surgeries, more chemo, and so on.
We are nearing the end of that battle now and Eric is doing so well but in the interest of health and peace we have made the difficult decision to make our world as small and stress-free as possible.
During this time our wonderful daughter Anna took over keeping the theatre going. She did an amazing job especially given the circumstances. She was struggling with her dad being sick, is a full-time nursing student and running a struggling business. There is no person I am more proud of & grateful for. But as she enters her final year of school, she needs to be free of the responsibility. I know it is hard for her to let go. She loves the theatre. It is in her blood.
The theatre has become a place of great sadness for us because it is a reminder of a life we loved that we will never have again. A memory of who we used to be.
It’s time for us to say goodbye.
As most of you know the theatre has been for sale for a while in hopes of finding someone who wants to keep the theatre going and has fresh ideas and energy to pour into the business.
Unfortunately, time is up for us in that search.
We want to thank everyone for their support, and we want everyone to know that the time we spent scooping your popcorn and playing movies for you, really was the greatest time and memories that we can hopefully look back on with nothing but fondness someday.
-Hollie & Eric
