In a cinema landscape sunk by Covid, with closed theaters and declining spectators, a reality in contrast stands out: the Troisi cinema managed in Rome by the Piccolo America association, a single screen in Trastevere a stone’s throw from the historic Nuovo Sacher by Nanni Moretti. Granted at a subsidized fee by Roma Capitale through a public tender and inaugurated on 21 September 2021, in the first semester of activity it collected € 229 thousand. “Since we left we have been the single room in Italy that has registered the most spectators and receipts”, says Valerio Carocci, 30, president of the Piccolo America association.
In six months 35 thousand spectators
“In just six months, the Troisi cinema has far exceeded the average receipts of single screens in Italy in 2019, which was 82 thousand euros,” adds Federico Croce, director general of Piccolo America. And it has approached the annual average of Multiplexes with more than seven screens (258 thousand euros in 2019). Between September 2021 and February 2022 the spectators were 34,896 (with capacity reduced to 50% in the first month of opening). To understand the extent of the data, just consider that the Nuovo Sacher, winner of the gold ticket in 2019 in the single-screen category, had just over 20 thousand spectators registered in the period September 2019-February 2020 (Cinetel data).
Turnover of 1.3 million
And so this association founded in 2014 after the occupation of Cinema America in Trastevere to block a conversion project into parking lots and apartments (the fate of the hall, vacated in 2014, is still hanging on a sentence of the Council of State) has passed from a turnover of 92 thousand euros in 2015 to almost 1.3 million in 2021, with at least 130 thousand euros of profit (forecast). A small entrepreneurial reality now, with 40 employees, all under 30. And with sponsors such as Bnl Bnp Paribas (“main sponsor”) which granted the 700 thousand euro credit line to complete the renovations, and Iberdrola.
A new model of cinema
Behind the success there is a new model of cinema. «The cinemas were already in crisis before the pandemic – explains Carocci -. Covid has dealt the final blow to a management model based on the mere projection of films. We have aimed to transform the cinema into a meeting place linked to the territory, a house that functions as a living cultural operator ». This is why next to the 300-seat auditorium where four different films a day (both “mainstream” and “arthouse”) are shown in the original language only, there is a Tim study room with 45 internal and 32 external workstations, open 365 days a year, attended by an average of 200 people a day; and a foyer bar with products from Trastevere’s food shops.
America cinema target
“They accused us of unaccustomed people to pay for cinema on the big screen” with summer arenas. But seven years of free outdoor viewing “have created a loyal and paying public”, continues Carocci, who relaunches: “The Troisi cinema for us is not a landing place but a springboard”. The goal is to manage the America cinema (largest single screen, with 700 seats), from which it all started. And current takings are an incentive to believe it. “We await – he concludes – the sentence of the Council of State to open a dialogue with the owners so that that room returns to activity”.