05/03/2017
By JULIET LINDERMAN, Associated Press
BALTIMORE (AP) — The old Parkway, where filmmaker John Waters once sipped espresso and “looked at women’s breasts and Ingmar Berman movies” decades ago, is about to be reborn as Baltimore’s newest movie theater and the home of the Maryland Film Festival.
The $18 million Stavros Niarchos Foundation Parkway Film Center in Baltimore’s Station North Arts and Entertainment District will open its doors to film fans on Wednesday, nearly 40 years after the original Parkway Theater, which opened in 1915, closed for good. It’s made up of a 414-seat theater in the building’s original auditorium, and two additional smaller theaters.
The Maryland Film Festival organizers hope the theater will support and foster the city’s already robust art and film community.
Waters, known for such cult classics as “Pink Flamingos,” said movie theaters, like independent bookstores, both define and support creative communities. The new Parkway, he says, will aim to do just that.