Barring New Members, Sponsors, No Museum Movie Nights this Summer

Noticed how the sign advertising summer movie nights on the side of the South Pasadena Historical Museum is from last year? 

Well, Lori Rusch, a South Pasadena Preservation Foundation board member, isn't sure there'll be a series of Museum Movie Nights this year, given the board's vote to eliminate the program for summer 2013.

But she'd like to change that. 

"It's not too late to restore them,'' Rusch told Patch, adding that 50 new members or sufficient sponsors could replenish some of the depleted general fund that goes toward covering the summer series, Movies at the Museum. The fund took a hit this year due to expenses for the city's 125th anniversary celebration, she said. 

The foundation's fiscal year runs from July 1 through June 30 of the following year, so members are putting together an annual budget now. Last year they were unable to come up with enough sponsors to underwrite their costs for this year's summer movies, Rusch said. This cost is relatively modest, she pointed out, at $360 per show to pay the MPAA for the movie rights. The museum docent, Bill Hilliard, works as the projectionist, so that is not an additional expense. But incurred expenses for the quasquicentennial created extra demands on their general fund, she said.

"We fully intend on having movie nights again and we may have just one move extravaganza at the end of the summer,'' she said. 

Patch Asks: Would you like to see Movies at the Museum restored? Would you be willing to help sponsor the popular event or become a member of the SPPF?