New Healdsburg movie theater planned

AVFilm, which founded the Alexander Valley Film Festival in 2015, hopes to open a three-screen movie theater, to be called the Plaza Cinema Center, in downtown Healdsburg as early as the summer of 2023.

“If we’re able to raise $1.5 million by next February, we could start remodeling,” said Kathryn Hecht, executive director of AVFilm. “We are in the early stages of gathering donors.”

AV Film is in negotiations to lease a two-story building on a site once used for a movie theater in the 300 block of Healdsburg Avenue, near Healdsburg Plaza, Hecht said.

“We’re hoping to open in time to take advantage of summer 2023 film releases,” Hecht said. “We plan to show both first-run films and art films.”

Healdsburg hasn’t had a movie theater since the closure of the Raven Film Center in 2020.

Plans for the Plaza Cinema Center call for the creation of three movie auditoriums on the first floor, with a classroom, offices and meeting spaces on the second floor.

“We envision this as a project to serve all of northern Sonoma County,” Hecht said.

Over the past eight years, the film festival, now called AVFest, has expanded from Cloverdale to include Healdsburg, Geyserville, Windsor and Santa Rosa.

Hecht also serves as chairman of the advisory board for the Sonoma County Economic Development Board.

Alfonso Felder, executive vice president for administration of the San Francisco Giants, will serve as volunteer project leader for the Healdsburg cinema project, Hecht said.

You can reach Staff Writer Dan Taylor at dan.taylor@pressdemocrat.com or 707-521-5243. On Twitter @danarts.