Film Journal January 2018

COMMUNITY SPIRIT
Convergence Founder Russ Collins
Reflects on the Relevance of Art Houses
Convergence is a “coming together” of
art-house cinemas. We don’t care if they’re
for-profit or not-for-profit—all we care
about is that they’re community-based and
passionate about programming for the community.
We think of them as “communitybased,
mission-driven.” Independent cineby
Bob Gibbons
The timing was almost perfect. In
the early 1980s, as Russ Collins was
completing his graduate degree in
Arts Administration at the University of
Michigan in Ann Arbor, the Michigan
Theater, a former movie palace from the
1920s, was on the verge of being turned
into a food court. The community saved
it, but when volunteers tried to run it,
they floundered. In 1982, they hired Collins,
and he began his long career as its
executive director. Now, fully restored and
operated as a not-for-profit cinema and
performing-arts facility, the Michigan
Theater has been named the Outstanding
Historic Theatre in North America by the
League of Historic American Theatres.
Along the way, Collins turned his talent
for business and his passion for independent
cinema into a continually expanding
career. Today, he’s executive director of
both the Michigan Theater and Ann Arbor’s
State Theatre. He’s also artistic director
of the Cinetopia International Festival
in Detroit. And he’s the founding director
of the Art House Convergence.
The 2018 annual conference of the Art
House Convergence takes place Jan. 15-18
in Midway, Utah. Over four days, there are
dozens of speakers, 20 educational sessions,
several film screenings, and lots of opportunities
for art-house cinema operators to
learn from one another. In a wide-ranging
conversation, Collins began by talking
about the conference’s progress since its
inception.
On the beginnings
of the conference
In 2006, Sundance invited 14 respected
art-house cinemas from around the country
to join them at the Sundance Film
Festival to celebrate the 25th anniversary
of the Sundance Institute. We were one
of the theatres selected. We got together
with our colleagues and had a wonderful
time, sharing problems and solutions and
war stories. Sundance invited us back the
second year so we could continue the dialogue.
In the third year—2008—we went
off on our own and started the first Art
House Convergence conference.
That first year, twenty-seven people
attended. Last year, we registered 620
delegates; this year, we’re expecting to
have to turn people away. There have been
many people who’ve attended our conferences
and said: “I want to start a community-based,
mission-driven cinema in my
home town”—and they did. But I can’t
think of any established theatres that have
come to the conference and have gone out
of business.
On this year’s
conference themes
Russ Collins
We’re focusing on two important legal
and ethical issues. One is how well arthouse
cinemas do—or do not—deal with
diversity and inclusion. The other has recently
dominated weeks of the news cycle:
harassment and intimidation—particularly
sexual harassment and intimidation. But
we’ll also be talking about what theatres do
in terms of programming, marketing and
operations.
The role of the conference is to gather
people who are passionate about cinemas and
local communities and willing to share information
about how they’re achieving success
and how they can do things better. They help
each other through their collective experiences;
they discuss their successes and their
failures honestly with their colleagues.
The conference has exclusively a cinema
focus. But the ethos and the history of
performing arts—which as late as the early
20th century were exclusively commercial
enterprises and then gradually developed
both a commercial and cultural dynamic—
provide a good model for cinema exhibition.
Art-house cinemas often are operated
as highly commercial enterprises—and
simultaneously as institutions that focus
intently on artistic and cultural aspects.
On learning
from other performing arts
My background and training are in
nonprofit performing arts, and what I’ve
contributed to art-house cinema is helping
them to think of themselves as a cultural
organization that is of great benefit to their
local community. That’s how nonprofit arts
organizations function—as communitybased
philanthropic organizations. And
since cinemas have the same pressures and
face the same issues as other performing
arts, I used to wonder why there wasn’t
that same thinking going on for cinema.
We often consider cinema as exclusively
a commercial business. But we don’t do
that with music, for example. With music,
we understand there’s a commercial part—
and another part that’s more cultural. And
there are parts in between. And it seems to
me that cinema should be thought about
the same way. That’s especially important
in smaller towns, where cinemas may need
community support—beyond just ticket
sales—to survive. That’s where this notion
of culturally based cinema programs
exists—and that’s part of what the Art
House Convergence is about.
On the enduring purpose
of the Art House Convergence
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