Ritz Theatre in need of donations

ROCKVILLE, Ind. (WTHI) - Ritz Theatre, built in 1912, has seen thousands of visitors come through these doors, featuring the most popular movies of its time.

"I've been coming here since we came in 1957, so I've been coming to the theater for about 55 years myself," Parke Players Board and Cinema Director Jim Meece said.

These days, premiere movies only make their way onto this film about six times a year.

The Ritz is having a rough time keeping up with technology.

The theater needs to transition over to digital projection, an $80,000 project.

"It's so expensive to put their movies on film versus putting it on a digital format, and so the theaters are having to go towards digital format and since we haven't made that change yet because of the money holding us back, we don't get first run films," Meece said.

Without new movies, attendance has dropped by about 80 percent.

When the theater was thriving, it would sell 300 or 400 tickets.

"We'll have oh, 10 or 12 people here for a movie, but we would never not show a movie because there's only 10 or 12 people because it's not fair to the people that did come," he said.

The theater needs other repairs as well, like expanding the backstage and fixing the back wall's structure, a $100,000 plan.

It's a family oriented theater that volunteers believe has something for everyone.

"Goes all the way from schools to churches to families to movies to plays, it's quite an organization, quite a theater."

They said the community is what's kept this theater going for so long.

They'll need that community support in a big way and soon.

"So the biggest thing for our 100th Anniversary is try to revitalize, a fresh start, and keep it going for another hundreds years."

If you like to donate and help the theater, call Parke County Community Foundation at (765) 569-7223.

Or click on this link .