Pittsburgh’s newest movie theater is also its oldest.

Row House-Hollywood first opened in 1926 as the Hollywood Theater, a neighborhood movie house on Dormont’s Potomac Avenue. Two years after its purchase by Lawrenceville-based Row House Cinemas, and following an extensive renovation, it plans a sold-out grand re-opening Nov. 6 to mark a new era screening both new and older films.

This week, it will soft-open with a short series of Alfred Hitchcock classics, including “The Birds” and “Vertigo.” The first new release, opening Oct. 31, will be “Bugonia,” the latest from acclaimed director Yorgos Lanthimos (“Poor Things”).

The theater is one of the area’s last remaining neighborhood theaters. It will look much different than it did when Row House closed the Hollywood’s doors in 2023, after a short trial period.

The 400-seat main theater complete with balcony — Pittsburgh’s largest-capacity full-time movie hall — has been completely redone, with a new screen, digital projector, and décor including a big domed ceiling that will feature the images of galaxies cast by a planetarium-style star projector.

Principal owner Brian Mendelssohn said the renovation is meant to evoke the “atmospheric theaters” popular in the 1920s, when films were the ascendant form of popular entertainment and it was in vogue to give audiences the feeling that they were actually outdoors. Décor in the screening room will hark to Fritz Lang’s period-appropriate 1927 classic “Metropolis,” a favorite of Mendelssohn and Row House staff.

The Hollywood’s lower level will eventually include a bar, a lounge, a 46-seat screening room, arcade games and two small rooms for private events.

However, construction is ongoing, and only the main screening room will be completed in time for the soft opening, with other amenities ready by Nov. 6. Row House-Hollywood ultimately plans to add the capacity to screen both 35 mm and 70 mm films — the latter a big draw for enthusiasts who’ll sometimes cross state lines for the experience, Mendelssohn said.

Overall, he said, the idea is to offer an alternative to streaming movies compelling enough to get people to leave their couches.

“We wanted to create a new path and a new direction for the future of movie theaters,” he said. “It’s somewhere you walk in, you’re excited, you’re happy to be there and it’s a place that has an energy, with you being in there, but also the energy of the people around you, creates this really great experience of watching a movie that you can’t get at home, you can’t get at any other theater.”

Anyone opening a new cinema today appears to face an uphill battle. Both box-office receipts and total admissions still lag behind pre-pandemic levels. Home theaters and even smartphones seem increasingly popular. And 400 seats are a lot to fill.

But Mendelssohn said his experience at Row House-Lawrenceville is reason for optimism. With just 86 seats in its storefront on Butler Street, its mix of arthouse classics, cult films and Hollywood faves of years past is drawing better than it did in 2019, he said.

Row House-Hollywood, though, will be programmed differently. The reopened theater is prioritizing new films. Often, said marketing director Kelsey Zehmisch, they’ll be on the edgier side, like “Bugonia” or films from the A24 studio. But the theater also plans to be among the thousands of cinemas nationally to screen the sequel “Wicked: For Good” in November.

Other events on the calendar include an Oct. 25 midnight screening of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show,” complete with the Junior Chamber of Commerce Players shadow cast (harkening to the Hollywood’s days as the go-to theater for that cinematic ritual).

And Nov. 15, the Hollywood will screen the silent classic “The Passion of Joan of Arc” with the Bach Choir of Pittsburgh performing Richard Einhorn’s famed choral score for the film live.

The theater will also be part of this year’s Three Rivers Film Festival, whose schedule will be announced this week.

“We think it’s important to not just create a movie theater, but also to create a whole experience. This is a night out,” Mendelsohn said.