JERRY LEWIS CINEMAS

From 1969 to 1980, the National Cinema Corp. franchised "Jerry Lewis Cinemas" as a business opportunity for those interested in theatrical movie exhibition. A harbinger of the cookie-cutter "cineplex" type movie theaters that would become popular in the 1970s, a Jerry Lewis Cinema was billed in franchising ads as a "mini-theatre" with a seating capacity of between 200 and 350. Though billed as "luxurious and plush", the actual theaters were not luxurious, but not bare-bones, either. Jerry Lewis Cinemas stated that the theater could be operated by as little as a staff of two due to automation and the fact that the franchisor would provide support in booking films and help in other areas of film exhibition.

National Franchise Corp. successfully wooed Lewis to provide his name and star-power to the franchising operation. As well as bearing his name, each Jerry Lewis Cinema bore a sign with a cartoon logo of Lewis in profile. The theaters were pitched to investors that were not movie exhibition veterans, pitching owning a movie theater as a "mom and pop" operation.

There initially were 158 territories that were franchised, with a buy-in fee of $10,000 or $15,000, depending on the territory, for what was called an "individual exhibitor". For $50,000, the Jerry Lewis Cinemas offered an opportunity known as an "area director" in which the investor not only was given their own cinema, but controlled franchising opportunities in a territory.