For Dan Ellis, his underdog story to take on the likes of Odeon and Cineworld to build a community cinema in his hometown – aged just 22 – could be straight from the silver screen. Here, he talks to Alison Cowie about his award-winning journey.
At 16, Dan Ellis was intimidated by the hulking 35mm projector at the Playhouse theatre in his home town of Whitley Bay which, at the time, operated as a second-run cinema. But when the projectionist fell ill one night, the schoolboy on work experience, had to step in.
“It was the most terrifying machine I’d ever seen and I didn’t want to touch it,” Dan remembers. “I’d only been shown how to wind on the film and align the sound once, but there I was, having to show a screening of The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl in 3D.”
Dan may have snatched Sharkboy and Lavagirl from the jaws of defeat that night, but at that time, he was more interested in the live productions happening at the theatre.
After finishing Sixth Form at Whitley Bay High School, Dan studied Applied Theatre at The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in London.
After drama school, he returned to his native North East and enrolled in a Masters in Arts, Business and Creativity at Newcastle University.
To sustain himself, Dan got back in touch with the Playhouse to ask if there were any jobs.
As a part-time usher, Dan was disappointed to find the theatre no longer played films.
“Digital cinema had happened and the big scary projector had been taken out,” Dan explained. “The cost to replace it with digital equipment was through the roof!”
Dan dedicated his MA dissertation to exploring the benefits of starting a small-scale cinema in a provincial town.
The more he researched, the more convinced he became that Whitley Bay needed a community cinema to rejuvenate the town. After graduating from Newcastle University, he set about making his idea a reality.
Dan explained: “I just felt a bit sad about my hometown. It was around 2010 and Whitley Bay was in a desperate state. All the former nighttime economy had died and there was a high population of at-risk people being dumped there without any Social Services support. I wanted to try and do one good thing for the town.”
The budding entrepreneur won a couple of new business competitions, including a regional Blueprint Award, with his community cinema idea – then called Film Central. With the £5,000 prize money he decided to pay himself £500 for 10 weeks to see if he could make it work.
He looked at a few venues before stumbling across an empty first-floor retail unit on Park Avenue in Whitley Bay’s town centre.
“There was a graffitied phone number on the door, so I just called it one day and arranged a viewing,” Dan adds.
To secure the long-term lease, the 22-year-old needed additional support. He took his two best friends, Stephen Fairley and William Smith, out for a curry and asked if they would join his cinema’s board and help with the project. Both agreed.
This was the first of many obstacles Dan overcame to make his cinema – which he established as a Community Interest Company (CIC) – a reality.
The next being barrier was finance. Dan secured a £10,000 Indoor Activities Grant from North Tyneside Council and matched it with a £10,000 start-up loan.
“We thought that would be enough to build a cinema but we were wrong,” he added.
According to Dan, he “begged, stole and borrowed” to make his dream come true, and with the help of Stephen, William and a host of other friends and volunteers, renovated the former unemployment office to accommodate a one-screen ‘cinema cell’.
“The husband of the café owner from downstairs did the rewriting and I got the Playhouse to donate some flooring that had been used in a production,” he added.
Dan began running local film festival events and off-date films at his newly named Jam Jar Cinema. The new name was coined after his dad told him about cinemas that ran in the 50s and 60s where kids could get in free or at a discounted rate if they brought a glass jar with them.
“It was at a time when you could get money back for glassware so the cinema owners would collect the jars and get the deposits back from them,” Dan explains.
“These types of cinemas were in Manchester, Sheffield, Liverpool, and in Glasgow they were called J’eely Jar Cinemas. The earliest record we found of them was in North Tyneside, where they were known as ‘Jam Jar Cinemas’.”
Dan’s cinema began to attract a small and dedicated customer base of cinephiles but to become sustainable, it needed to show the latest films – the cost of which couldn’t be justified with just one screen. Jam Jar Cinema needed to grow.
Dan reveals the start of this expansion came after a couple of drinks when he decided to see what was behind a cupboard and was astonished to find a vast empty retail space.
“I noticed some loose mortar and thought, ‘I should take a hammer to that’. I did and found another half of the building that was completely derelict.”
After negotiating another lease, raising finance and project managing a major capital build – the Jam Jar Cinema reopened with three screens – seating 47, 38 and 29 - in autumn 2019.
Dan was finally able to show the new film releases and the popularity of his social enterprise cinema soared.
But despite bringing the latest blockbusters to Whitley Bay, Dan knew in order to make his cinema truly community based, he needed to make it accessible.
Installing a lift in February 2020 made the cinema accessible to those with frailty and with disabilities, but Dan wanted his cinema to be financially accessible, too.
“Going to the cinema had become an expensive night out,” Dan explains. “There was the travel to get to the big multiplexes and then there were the high costs of the tickets and food once you were inside.”
Dan and his board decided to bring in ‘pay as you please’ ticketing, which allowed people to choose between three pricing tiers.
“At first, people didn’t quite understand it,” Dan explains. “They thought they’d get a worse seat if they paid less but that wasn’t the case. We were just asking people to pay what they could afford.”
The cinema owner continues: “We get some people who come here once a week who may pay the lower price. But we also get people who pay more because they want to support us or they book on the day a film comes out and they’re so excited.
“People will pay more for an adult and less for a child, or someone will pay more than their friend because they’ve got a better pension. It just works!”
Dan’s efforts to bring a truly accessible cinema to his local community have not gone unnoticed and the Jam Jar’s founder and managing director has been awarded several prestigious accolades, including the Prime Minister’s Points of Light Awards in 2015.
His community work was also recognised in 2019 by the British Academy of Film and Television Awards and Dan took his mum to the prestigious Bafta awards night in London to collect his ‘For the Love of Film’ honour.
During the pandemic – a particularly challenging time for the team who worked tirelessly to keep the cinema open and safe by adopting increased cleaning protocols and running at a reduced capacity – Jam Jar Cinema won the top award in The Small Awards 2020, which celebrates smaller enterprises across the UK.
Most recently, Dan was awarded a British Empire Medal for services to cinema.
“It was a real shock and surprise but great to see that cinema is back on the agenda with Central Government,” Dan adds.
With the Jam Jar Cinema in Whitley Bay celebrating its 10th anniversary last year, Dan has now set his sights on creating his second venture – this time in the neighbouring coastal town of Blyth in partnership with Northumberland County Council.
Dan sees many of the same challenges Whitley Bay was facing 10 years ago in Blyth, and wants to develop a community cinema in the town to boost the economy and support local residents.
As lead operator of the new cultural hub on Market Place, Dan plans to open a three-screen cinema and an events space to host small music gigs, stand-up comedy, children’s theatre and more.
Building work on the new Blyth development began in February this year and while the name for the development is still under wraps, excitement levels are high.
“Blyth is the biggest town in Northumberland and there are so many people passionate about their patch. The town just needs one of two good things to happen to it to help it thrive.
“This development will be one of those good things. It’s going to be a hard slog but we’re up for it.”
Dan expects his workforce will grow from 11 to more than 30 after his second cinema opens, and he says he will most likely recruit a managing director for the Blyth cinema while he oversees both operations.
Building the business in a responsible way is very important to Dan, who describes himself on his LinkedIn page as ‘aiming to be the nicest guy in cinema.’
Asked why being nice is important to him, the business owner replies:
“If you can do one thing in life, it’s be nice to people. So, it really matters to me to be honest, frank and truthful.
“It’s easy to forget that this industry isn’t ‘life and death’. No one’s dying in the cinema industry. We’re not heart surgeons.
“At Jam Jar Cinema, we’re proud that we’re a social enterprise. Our attitude is that the business and the money we make isn’t ours. We’re just custodians of it for the time being.
“Jam Jar Cinema is very egalitarian in its decision-making and we’re always looking at ways to invest in ethical and sustainable ways. It’s also important that we’re a Real Living Wage employer and we treat people fairly.”
Dan’s dedication to run a principled, community-focussed business is admirable. The fact he’s doing it against the odds, in an industry known for its high stakes and cut-throat attitudes, even more so.
Perhaps one day we’ll be sitting down in a Jam Jar Cinema to watch a biopic of its owner’s life.
The film’s name? You wouldn’t bet against ‘The Nicest Man in Cinema’.
For more information visit www.jamjarcinema.com
