"The Quad holds an important place in Manhattan moviegoing history: when it opened October 18, 1972, it was the first theater in the city to have multiple screens under one roof. The original ads touted, 'A new way to go to the movies': unlike the competition, the Quad could screen four films at any given time, not just one. This innovation allowed the theater to thrive for decades while many rivals disappeared or replicated its model; it finally gave New Yorkers the range of cinematic options reflective of their hometown’s diversity.
"With our completely reborn Quad Cinema, we intend to honor that legacy. We have maintained the theater’s name, and its DNA, as well as its head projectionist, and its democratic neighborhood spirit. Just two blocks from Union Square, the Quad sits at a nexus of New York City, a meeting point between uptown and downtown, where students from NYU, The New School, and FIT see movies alongside longtime Village residents. Our programming will give you a little bit of everything: high and low, foreign and domestic, fiction and documentary, arthouse and grindhouse." —Quad Cinema