Audio By Carbonatix
Midnite Movie Mamacita is a household name around these parts, and she’s hoping her award-winning work translates into overflow crowds when she opens her very own cinema house.
“Finally, after five years of programming [and] doing events at other people’s locations, I’m finally making the step to create my own cinema,” she says.
Andrea Beesley-Brown (the Mamacita’s real name) recently left her programming post at Tempe’s Madcap Theaters out of her own volition to try and live the dream as a repertory movie house owner.
Before Madcap, which used to house the old Harkins Centerpoint 11, Beesley-Brown brought underground indie flicks, cult classics, and on-purpose stink bombs to the defunct Paper Heart Gallery and Chandler Cinemas.
When news happens, Phoenix New Times is there —
Your support strengthens our coverage.
We’re aiming to raise $30,000 by December 31, so we can continue covering what matters most to you. If New Times matters to you, please take action and contribute today, so when news happens, our reporters can be there.
In all, she’s been instrumental in giving the Valley a sorely needed repertory film scene for the past five years — a scene, by the way, that will be bolstered by the scheduled opening of downtown Phoenix’s FilmBar.
Though Beesley-Brown hasn’t nailed down a location for her new endeavor, she and her business partner Mike Heenan are hard at work on creating a one- or two-screen cinema.
In the meantime, she’s renting out a space at Madcap and putting on events at Casa Grande’s BlackBox Theatre, where she’ll present The Being on January 8. (For more about the screening, which will include live on-screen text comments from filmgoers, click here.)
