Some fans of the film cross-dress as brides, while some don corsets and fishnets.

The theater on Church Street has been the destination of costume-clad movie-goers for the past 28 years to see the midnight showing of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” every Saturday.

Fans of the cult classic “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” are losing their favorite local venue, with the announcement by AMC Theatres that it will close its Harvard Square theater next month.

“It’s an event,” said John Geoffrian, a 40-year-old actor and director who lives in Cambridge. “It’s one of those cult things that keeps on going.”


But AMC Threatres spokesman Ryan Noonan said in an emailed statement to the Globe Thursday that the company has decided to sell the AMC Loews Harvard Square 5 location and will close the theater at the end of business on Sunday, July 8.

“We continually strive to upgrade the quality of our theatre circuit by adding new screens and by disposing of older screens through closures and sales,” Noonan said.

AMC has run the theater since the company purchased Loews in 2006, said Noonan, who added that the company encourages guests to visit its other nearby locations, including the AMC Boston Common 19, which is about five miles away.

Pedestrians on Church Street in Harvard Square walk by a mural at the AMC Loews Harvard Square building in 2010. Essdras M Squarez/Globe Staff/File

Sarah Burks, a preservation planner for the Cambridge Historical Commission, said a movie theater has been at the Church Street location for many years, and the theater at one time had a marquee entrance along Massachusetts Avenue. Burks said Thursday morning that she will have to check the records to see how long a theater has been at the location, but she estimated it could be almost 100 years.

The building falls within a Harvard Square conservation district, and as a result the Historical Commission would regulate any changes to the exterior of the building. But the commission would not regulate the future use of the building, she said.


Geoffrian said it’s a shame that many of the older movie theaters are closing, and he called the theater on Church Street a cultural institution.

“I think it’s a part of the family of the city,” Geoffrian said. “I hate to see it go.”