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Hot Docs Receives $5-Million Gift From Rogers Foundation

bloor hot docs cinema feb 2012

On June 23, Hot Docs announced that it has received a remarkable $5-million gift from the Rogers Foundation to support its mission to showcase and celebrate the art of documentary and to enable production opportunities for documentary filmmakers. As a non-profit cultural organization, Hot Docs relies on such support for its ongoing growth and activity, and this gift from the Rogers Foundation is by far the largest it has received in its 23-year history.

From this gift, $1-million will be used to establish the Hot Docs Ted Rogers Fund to provide much-needed financial support to Canadian documentary filmmakers. The balance of the gift will enable Hot Docs to purchase the Bloor Hot Docs Cinema, which it has successfully administered, operated and programmed for the past four years in partnership with the generous Blue Ice Group. Once threatened with redevelopment, this creative partnership saved the much-loved neighbourhood venue, and now Hot Docs’ purchase of the building represents a long-term commitment to its thriving future as a cinema.

Under Hot Docs’ ownership, the cinema will continue as the Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema, in recognition of the late philanthropist and visionary CEO of Rogers Communications, and will continue the tradition of engaging and thought-provoking programming excellence.

Since opening its doors in December 1913 as the Madison Theatre, the Cinema has had many names. In the 1940s, it was rebuilt and opened as the Midtown, while the 60s and 70s saw it as the Capri, Eden and Bloor Theatre. In the 1980s, it became the Bloor Cinema under the management of Carm Bordonaro and his partners. After purchasing the theatre in 2010, the Bordonaro family ensured its survival as a cinema by finding a like-minded buyer in Toronto-based Blue Ice Group and Hot Docs. Following renovations, it reopened in 2012 as the Bloor Hot Docs Cinema. More history of the cinema



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