Royal Theatre success

Lisa Milne and her husband bought the rundown Royal Theatre in Trail in 2009, and under their management it has grown by leaps and bounds to be a resounding success.

Lisa Milne talks about the Royal Theatre in Trail like it is a living thing—and no wonder, it is her family's passion, and they live and breathe all things theatre.

Lisa and her husband Jason purchased the theatre in 2009. It was a tired old building dating to 1927, and it had been through a lot over the years: fires, floods and even a bomb threat in 1958. When the Milnes came along, they recognized a building and business worth restoring, and they breathed new life into “the old girl” as Lisa affectionately calls the theatre.

“In the beginning, we considered the purchase an investment opportunity—we both had what I called real jobs,” said Lisa, “and to say the theatre was a rundown dump would be glamorizing it.”

Becoming real theatre owners

Lisa said that she and her husband did a huge makeover. “We thought we would keep the manager running it,” said Lisa. “But when he left, two days in, we had to run it ourselves, knowing absolutely nothing about the film industry.”

She said that at the time, it was a 35 mm movie theatre, showing older movies—nothing special.

“But we fell in love with it,” she said. “I quit my big, fancy, union job, and started to run the theatre, and there was no turning back.”

Lisa said that the Royal Theatre was the first in the Kootenays to be 3D digital in 2010.

“People thought we were crazy—who are these young new kids doing this?” she said. “We kicked it off with the world's largest 3D festival in October 2010, and that put us on the map. We showed back-to-back 3D movies for 24 hours.”

After this, customers started to come back in droves, said Lisa, and she said that the support that they have for the theatre now is phenomenal.

Theatre passion

When Lisa talks about her theatre, you can hear the passion in her voice, she is so excited about it and how it has developed. She loves that she walks down the street in Trail and meets so many people who have some sort of attachment to it.

“Elderly folks in town have told me about working in the theatre as teenagers or having their first kiss there,” said Lisa.

She said there is even talk of a ghost.

Continuing Kootenay firsts

The Royal Theatre, these days, is known for a few things, including fresh popped popcorn with real butter and EZ Tuesday, which features the only place in the Kootenays where you can get a pop, popcorn and movie for 10 dollars, every Tuesday.

And the Milnes have made it a priority to continue to be first in what they do—they were the first in the Kootenays to have installed high frame rate capabilities in 2012—where screen images are clearer, sharper and brighter.

“We have also upgraded to an amazing sound system,” said Lisa. “So combined with our outstanding sound and images, it is pretty cool,” said Lisa. “We have people coming from far and wide.”

Another first for them in the West Kootenay, said Lisa, is that they show productions of ballets, operas and national theatre productions. They broadcast them by commercial satellite onto their screen.
“People are passionate about this, some of them follow it on the radio but can't see it, so now they can,” said Lisa. “People have really embraced this and we are going into our fifth year doing it.”

Lisa said that these performances often happen in the morning and don't interfere with the showing of their first-run Hollywood movies, another bonus about the Royal Theatre.

“You can see the big guys in the evenings,” said Lisa, “and we have diversified our screen to show live performances at other times. “This has been both a success story and a steep learning curve for sure,” Lisa said.

And she wouldn't have it any other way.

Check out the Royal's full schedule of showings on their website.