Loews: $10 tix (soda extra)

Manhattanites begin paying new price Friday

By JILL GOLDSMITH

NEW YORK -- To the list of barriers once viewed as unbreakable, like the four-minute mile and 60 homers in a season, add the $10 movie ticket.

Cash-strapped theater chain Loews Cineplex Entertainment said last week that it will charge $10 for a movie ticket in Manhattan starting Friday.

Increase, the first in two years, will boost the price by 50¢. When the hike to $9.50 went into effect in 1999, City Council speaker Pete Vallone and others called for a one-day boycott of Loews' theaters. That fizzled out as movie-crazy Manhattanites continued to flock to the theaters.

Gotham-based Loews, in particular, dominates the New York City market with booming multiplexes at 68th and Broadway, Times Square, Kips' Bay and other locations.

In Brooklyn, Loews' adult tickets will stay put at $8 but discounted tickets for seniors and kids will cost $5, up from $4.75.

Company cited higher real estate and labor costs in Gotham. Move is part of a push by Loews, which filed for bankruptcy protection earlier this month, to raise its ticket prices across the U.S. by an average of 25¢, or 4%.

In Los Angeles, Loews Cineplex tickets will rise to $9 from $8.75. It remains to be seen which other big theater chains follow suit and whether the extra cash will pull the exhibition biz out of its malaise, which has seen at least six chains file for Chapter 11.