The acquisition of the 54 theaters in 14 states, including the Inwood Theatre in Dallas, is aimed at building a start-to-finish company that produces films, airs on the duo's high-definition channel and distributes to art-movie houses. Cuban and partner Todd Wagner's entertainment portfolio includes part ownership in Magnolia Pictures, another art-house venue, and the Lions Gate Film Co. Their HDNet is a high-definition broadcast format particularly popular for its sports programs and movies.
"Our goal is to aggressively leverage our ability to produce our own films, promote and display them on HDNet and HDNet movies and exhibit them at Landmark," Wagner says in a press release. He and Cuban have been building an entertainment portfolio since 1999 when they collected $5.7 billion from the sale of Yahoo.
The Landmark Theatres' ownership has been passed off three times since 1998 when Dallas-based Silver Cinemas bought it. Two years later, Oaktree Capital Management took over the reins after Silver Cinemas filed bankruptcy. Now, it's Cuban and Wagner's try at turning profits for an art-movie chain, founded in 1974, and the nation's largest stage for independent films. Besides Inwood, other high-brow names in the portfolio are the Embarcadero Center Cinema in San Francisco and the Kendall Square Cinema in Cambridge, MA.
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