If you enjoy sitting in a dark room watching pixels move while eating popcorn, you are participating in a legacy of heavy expansion. This local spot is part of a chain with a pedigree for going big. Its parent company, Studio C, used to be Loeks Theatres - a name that sounds like it belongs on a dusty old ledger.
The lineage traces back to 1944, when Jack Loeks opened a theater in Grand Rapids to show the news. He didn't stop there. By 1965, he opened Studio 28, one of the first multiplexes around. He eventually blew the doors off the competition by building a 20-screen monster with 6,000 seats. In 1988, it became the largest multiplex in the United States. That is a lot of seats for people to sit in simultaneously.
The company eventually rebranded to Studio C as a homage to the former Studio 28 theater. They have since distributed their operations across West Michigan, serving about 5.5 million customers a year. They even kept a drive-in in the mix, which is a nice touch for the purists.
Today, the Portage location keeps the lights on with an IMAX screen. It is a far cry from a 90-foot drive-in screen in Wyoming, but the mission remains the same: keep the people entertained while they try to ignore their real lives.
Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons
Written by Kyle McLonely
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