Cillian Murphy and His Wife Save Beloved Theater From Closing

Cillian Murphy and his wife Yvonne McGuinness bought the historic Phoenix Cinema in Dingle, Ireland to save the movie theater from closing down for good, the Irish Independent reported on Friday.

“I’ve been going to see films at the Phoenix since I was a young boy on summer holidays,” Murphy told the outlet. “My Dad saw movies there when he was a young man before me, and we’ve watched many films at the Phoenix with our own kids. We recognize what the cinema means to Dingle.”

The Phoenix had been operating in Ireland for over 100 years, but closed in 2021 over increasingly high operating costs. It had been on the market for years before Murphy and McGuinness had made the deal for the theater. The theater will reopen sometime next year.

“We want to open the doors again, expand the creative potential of the site, re-establishing its place in the cultural fabric of this unique town,” McGuinness told the Independent. The Phoenix is one of the only movie theaters in the area, and in recent years it had started a donation campaign and petition to try and keep the theater open.

Murphy, who won the Oscar for best actor for his role in Oppenheimer this year, has some history with the Phoenix outside of his childhood as well; the 2009 film he starred in, Perrier’s Bounty, premiered at the movie theater.

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Aside from now owning a cinema, Murphy is busy with the film adaptation of the popular show Peaky Blinders, which Netflix announced over the summer. The film’s release date is yet to be confirmed.

“It seems like Tommy Shelby wasn’t finished with me … It is very gratifying to be re-collaborating with [series creator] Steven Knight and [director] Tom Harper on the film version of Peaky Blinders,” Murphy said in a statement at the time. “This is one for the fans.”