Yesterday, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson advised people to stay away from entertainment venues and to increase social distancing efforts as the spread of Coronavirus continues.
Now, major UK cinema chains Cineworld and Odeon have confirmed plans to close down until further notice. The former is the largest chain in the country and owned by Regal Cinemas. Picturehouse is also part of that family, so they will be closing their doors from today onwards too.
"At Cineworld and Picturehouse, we are committed to providing safe and healthy environments for our employees and guests and have therefore made the difficult decision to close our cinemas in UK and Ireland until further notice," says Cineworld CEO, Mooky Greidinger. "We deeply value our cinema-loving customers and have no doubt we will be serving everyone again as soon as possible with a full slate of Hollywood blockbusters and the best of independent films and content."
Odeon, meanwhile, is the second biggest cinema chain in the UK, and they're owned by AMC.
Both Cineworld and Odeon do monthly subscription services for moviegoers, and details on how they're going to be handled will presumably be revealed in due course (freezing them makes the most sense, especially as we don't know how long these closures are going to last). Vue and Showcase Cinemas are expected to make similar closure announcements shortly.
Either way, things definitely aren't looking good for
Black Widow as there are no longer really any theaters for the Marvel Studios movie to be screened in either domestically or overseas.