Movie Tavern

Movie Tavern started in Fort Worth. According to Cinema Treasures, after General Cinema closed its Ridgmar Town Square multiplex in October 2000, a new operator refreshed the six-screen building so it could serve pizza, appetizers and wine. It reopened as the Ridgmar Movie Tavern on November 16, 2001, under the slogan "Where movies never tasted so good." Marcus Theatres, which owns the brand today, also dates the first Movie Tavern to 2001 in Fort Worth.

The chain grew around Dallas-Fort Worth by taking over older multiplexes. After a full-service location in Bedford, it gave the former UA Hulen 10 in Fort Worth a $2.5 million makeover. That theater reopened on September 7, 2007, with stadium seating, high-back leather rockers, a lobby bar, an outdoor patio and a dinner menu served in the auditoriums. A 700-seat theater at West 7th Street in Fort Worth followed on November 6, 2009.

By 2013 Movie Tavern was a Dallas-based Texas corporation with 16 theaters and 130 screens in seven states. A Justice Department complaint filed that May showed who controlled it. Alder Wood Partners, a Dallas partnership 99% owned by Cinemark founder Lee Roy Mitchell and his wife, held all of its voting shares, and Mitchell sat on its board. When Cinemark agreed to buy Rave Cinemas, the Justice Department and the State of Texas said the deal would leave Mitchell-controlled theaters as the main rivals to Cinemark's new Rave Ridgmar 13 in western Fort Worth, where Movie Tavern ran the Ridgmar, West 7th and Hulen. The proposed settlement required Alder Wood Partners to divest Movie Tavern. In September 2013 the chain was sold to New Orleans-based VSS-Southern Theatres, a circuit George Solomon formed in 2003.

Under Southern Theatres, Movie Tavern expanded to nine states. On November 2, 2018, The Marcus Corporation agreed to buy its 22 dine-in theaters for $30 million in cash and 2,450,000 shares of stock, valued at about $126 million. The deal closed on February 1, 2019, and the chain became Movie Tavern by Marcus. The original Ridgmar location had closed on December 2, 2018. Marcus opened the first Wisconsin Movie Tavern in Brookfield in October 2019. As of December 31, 2025, Marcus ran 19 Movie Tavern by Marcus theaters, all with in-theater dining.