Hayden Discount Cinema owner Michael Lehosit heard Thursday from colleagues, who like him have had their businesses decimated by the coronavirus pandemic, that major theater chain Regal had planned to close certain locations across the country.

“And then the news came that the new James Bond movie was going to be pushed, and everything changed,” Lehosit said.

Cineworld Group Plc said Monday that 536 Regal cinemas in the U.S., which would include Regal Riverstone in Coeur d’Alene, and 127 Cineworld and Picturehouse venues in the U.K. would close Thursday. About 45,000 employees are affected.

“This is not a decision we made lightly,” Cineworld CEO Mooky Greidinger said.

The Regal cinemas at Spokane Valley Mall and NorthTown Mall in Spokane have been closed temporarily under Gov. Jay Inslee’s phased reopening plan in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

One of the few places Spokane-area residents can see a movie is at Hayden Discount Cinema, at 300 West Centa Dr. in Hayden, although few customers are taking advantage of it, Lehosit said.

Attendance at Hayden Discount Cinema has fallen off by 80%. It doesn’t help that Hollywood is holding back on the release of movies because the major markets of New York and California remain shut down because of the pandemic, he said.

Lehosit has a six-screen indoor theater that seats up to 900 people. Prior to the pandemic, he would offer lower prices for showing movies a few months after their big-theater release.

“What really hurts with Regal closing was they brought an awareness that theaters are open,” he said. “People would look to us as another option. I think a lot of people in Spokane don’t know that we are open.”

The one bright spot came with spring, when Lehosit converted his parking lot into a drive-in.

“The drive-in has helped pays some bills. But I’m not sure what will happen when winter comes,” he said.

Asked how long he can survive with 10 or 12 customers paying per show, Lehosit said he didn’t know.

“I’m still losing money, but not losing as much money if I was totally closed,” he said. “I’m paying my employees and … most of the bills. But, it’s going to be tough when the drive-in closes, because that was an extra bonus for us.”

The same economic forces are ravaging Cineworld’s Regal, which has high debt as it struggles with the effects of the pandemic. The absence of the biggest North American markets and a consistent, solid release schedule from Hollywood studios have been devastating to their business.

“We never argued the fact that we needed to be closed until we saw that similar activities to us started to open,” Greidinger said, citing indoor dining.

“We cannot be in a situation where we lose more cash when we are open than we lose when we are closed.”

Last week, groups representing theater owners, movie studios and directors issued a plea to U.S. lawmakers to provide relief to ailing movie theaters. The letter, signed by the likes of Steven Spielberg, Christopher Nolan, Patty Jenkins, Clint Eastwood and Martin Scorsese, said that if the status quo continues, nearly 70% of small to midsize movie theaters could be forced to close permanently.

Efforts to slow the spread of the virus resulted in closure of most cinemas for nearly six months.

Many started tentatively reopening in late August, anticipating the release of blockbusters like Nolan’s “Tenet,” the Bond pic “No Time to Die” and Marvel’s “Black Widow.”

Exhibitors also poured resources into enhanced safety and sanitization protocols, including limited capacity theaters, social distanced seating, cashless transactions and staggered show times.

Some studios moved back 2020 openings as late as possible, like “Death on the Nile” (Dec. 18) and “Wonder Woman 1984,” which is now set for Christmas.

But others abandoned the year entirely, including Marvel’s “Black Widow,” Spielberg’s “West Side Story” and Universal’s “Candyman,” all of which were pushed to 2021 in recent weeks.

Although there are a handful of major films still set for 2020, like Pixar’s “Soul,” as well as a consistent calendar of independents and art house films, Friday’s announcement that “No Time To Die” was being delayed to 2021 came as a final blow.

Without the big releases, Cineworld said it can’t give customers “the breadth of strong commercial films necessary for them to consider coming back to theaters against the backdrop of COVID-19.”

“We did everything in our power to support safe and sustainable reopenings in all of our markets – including meeting, and often exceeding, local health and safety guidelines in our theaters and working constructively with regulators and industry bodies to restore public confidence in our industry,″ Greidinger said. “We cannot be in the situation where every week we are getting another delay and another delay.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.