Boxoffice Pro - Winter 2020

THEATER ALAMO DRAFTHOUSE
HOLDING
DOWN
THE FORT
Shelli Taylor Joins Alamo
Drafthouse as New CEO
BY REBECCA PAHLE
“That’s important
to us, to expand our
footprint. If we’re
going to [support]
filmmakers and
studios and maximize
the life of a film, that
footprint matters. We
want as many people
to have access to the
movies as possible.”
The world was a very different place
when Shelli Taylor began the series
of conversations with Alamo Drafthouse
that would land her in the exhibition
industry, even if it was just 10 months ago,
in late December 2019.
Only one month later, cinemas in
China would close due to the Covid-19
pandemic. In February, northern Italy
followed. Within weeks, the bulk of the
world’s theaters—including those in the
United States—had stopped in-person
operations. And on April 30, 2020, Shelli
Taylor was announced as the new CEO of
cinema chain Alamo Drafthouse.
“The goal of the role was very
different” when she first signed on, says
Taylor, with classic understatement.
Covid-19 crystallized her number one
responsibility—nothing less than keeping
her company afloat through a frightening
pandemic and confronting its ripple
effects on the exhibition industry: closures,
wobbly theatrical exclusivity windows,
and a film slate that can’t seem to stay put.
When Covid hit the U.S., “I decided to
leap anyway,” says Taylor—inspired by
the community spirit, customer service,
and “incredible presentation” that first
drew her in as an Alamo fan when she
moved to Austin, Texas, and began taking
her then-13-year-old son to the movies
there. Conversations with Alamo cofounder
and now-former CEO Tim League
(still involved with Alamo and its sister
companies, Mondo and Fantastic Fest,
as executive chairman) took her from an
appreciative fan to a full-on enthusiast,
someone who “fell in love with this
entrepreneurial, scrappy, just really cool
team that’s following their passions and
created an incredible business out of it. I
was just like, ‘How can I pass that up?’”
In looking for a new CEO, League said,
in a statement at the time of Taylor’s
hiring, he wanted someone “with a strong
voice and battle-tested leadership skills.”
In Taylor, Alamo found someone who had
honed those skills outside the exhibition
industry. Before being hired by Alamo, she
served as president and CEO of Austinbased
United PF Partners, a conglomerate
of Planet Fitness franchisees. In 2010 she
started a brief tenure as V.P. of Disney
English China, working to deliver Englishlanguage
experiences, products, and
services to children ages 2 to 12. But her
longest pre-Alamo role was at Starbucks,
where Taylor was instrumental in the
40 Winter 2020