Outdoor movies — and pizza — are returning to Tompkins Square Park this summer.
Teaming up to present the free cinematic series are Assemblymember Harvey Epstein, Loisaida, Inc., Two Boots Pizza and the Lower East Film Festival. One film will screen per month, either on the fourth Wednesday of the month or, in one case, the fifth Thursday.
The diverse mix of flicks will start around 8 p.m. (around sunset) at the Tompkins skatepark rather than the lawn, as used to be done in a previous incarnation of the summer film series.
Things will kick off Wed., June 26, with the kids film “Encanto,” about a Colombian family that receives miracle gifts.
That will be followed on Wed., July 26, by “Little Fugitive,” a 1953 black-and-white “New Realism” gem about a young boy on the lam in Coney Island.
The Thurs., Aug. 29, movie will be the comedic, coming-of-age story about a struggling lower-class family in L.A., “Slums of Beverly Hills.”
The series wraps up Wed., Sept. 25, on a mind-bending note with the 2022 “Everything Everywhere All at Once”; called by one reviewer “a swirl of genre anarchy,” the surreal sci-fi comedy notched a score of 93 percent on Rotten Tomatoes’ Tomato Meter.
Before each main movie there will be short films, performances or live music. For example, on July 24 members of the Coney Island Circus Sideshow will “get freaky.”
Two Boots will provide the free pizza at each screening (while supplies last).
There previously was a park movie series back during the Howl! Festival from 2003 to 2013, but when the annual East Village fest petered out, so did the summer movies.
Assemblymember Epstein said, this time around, the decision was made to project the movies at the skatepark blacktop instead of on the Tompkins lawn since it was just generally easier to do and less of a hassle, for various reasons. For one thing, there are no trees to obscure sightlines.
“People can bring chairs or towels [to sit on],” he said. “There are no restricted views at the skatepark. Families can have a picnic. It’s a much better location. … But, if I’m wrong, we won’t do it there again.”
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