Anybody want to buy a theater?

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Don Arthurs turned a dream into reality. But now he’s ready to move on.

The lifelong Columbiana resident bought the old movie house in his hometown after it closed. He just couldn’t stand to see the Columbiana Cinema — where he had spent so much time as a youth — gathering dust.

After sinking $1 million into renovations, he reopened it in 2008 as Main Street Theater.

Now it’s for sale again. Arthurs is asking $750,000.

He, and his wife, Dawn, are the managers of the venue, and they keep it busy with family-friendly movies, plays, concerts and more.

But business could be better.

And more importantly, Arthurs realized that he’s just not the right man for the job.

“I’m good at getting something to a certain level and then handing it off and starting something new,” he said. “I call myself a bored dreamer. ... I dream big and then get bored quickly. I can’t do the same thing for too long. But I’m smart enough to realize that I’m not the right person to make this place what it can be.”

History proves Arthurs’ assessment of himself.

He is one of the founders of Youngstown’s vaunted Turning Technologies company. Although he was instrumental in getting that high-tech startup off the ground, he had no trouble stepping aside last year when circumstances dictated.

“I’m a software engineer,” said Arthurs. “I just wanted to save [the theater] and stimulate growth in the town and give people some place to go. But it really needs a person with a passion for the theater and the arts to be a success.”

He plans to keep Main Street open until it sells, although he won’t be booking events at the same pace. And he still wants to see the theater return to its glory days. But someone else will have to take up the job.

“I’m not big on having my nights and weekends tied up,” he said. “I have a family and other ventures [he and his wife have three kids]. I just don’t have the time to devote to it.”

Still, Arthurs said the place will always be a part of him. “If you look at every corner ... it’s a part of my heart. It was designed by [he and his wife], the decor and the overall look,” he said. “I want to see it continue as a theater.”

The ideal buyer would be a theater troupe. “I’d love to see that happen,” he said.

Arthurs is already moving on to his next project. He’ll graduate in August with a graduate degree in Bible ministry. He wouldn’t give details, but he is pursuing an idea that would merge his software-development expertise with his passion for the Lord.

Regardless of what the future holds, Arthurs said he’ll never regret buying the theater, which has brought pleasure to so many. “I’ve been asked many times by the performers who visited here, ‘Do the people in the town realize what kind of a gem they have here?’ I say they do ... but they might not fully realize it until it’s gone.”