Arts Alive! podcast: Green Light Cinema’s Mike Hazlett

Mike Hazlett is today’s guest on the Arts Alive! podcast. As the owner and operator of St. Petersburg’s independent movie theater, Green Light Cinema, he’s been able to monitor changes in the film exhibition business (hint: streaming has taken a major bite out of movie theater operations), along with changes in the city’s movie-watching routines and habits.

Yes, many people still enjoy sitting in a dark room in front of a big screen, especially when it’s a small, critically-acclaimed film that the big multiplex chains don’t care about.

Those things are on Mike Hazlett’s mind. As well as the unexpected success of his latest venture, which debuted last December. Green Light Kitchen and Lounge, a 3,500-square-foot space adjacent to the theater, has become a runaway hit. Hazlett, it seems, has found an entertainment sweet spot, by providing food, drinks and live music (along with the occasional comedy or theater performance) before or after a film screening.

He also discusses the benefits of partnering with other arts organizations to create events to attract a wide range of visitors, and the importance of paying attention to what people are saying, and asking for.

AND how he could not have predicted any of this when he and his wife Sue, fresh out of Boston, decided to open a movie house in downtown St. Petersburg in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Click on the arrow to listen to the conversation.