China's Cinema Screen Count Leaps Despite COVID Closures
Rebecca Davis, provided by
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Despite nearly six months of cinema closures due to COVID-19, China actually built nearly 6,000 more new screens in 2020, according to a new report from the country’s film authorities.
The data contradicts the disastrous predictions made over the summer about the extent to which the pandemic would devastate the Chinese exhibition sector.
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China now boasts 75,581 screens nationwide at some 12,700 complexes, having built 5,794 more screens last year, said the National Office for Special Film Funds, a committee under the direct management of the powerful Central Propaganda Department made up of cadres from that body and the Ministry of Finance. Growth did slow, however: to compare, China built around 9,700 new screens in both 2019 and 2018. It began 2020 with around 69,800 screens at some 12,400 complexes.