A new drive-in movie theater became one of Provo’s hottest nighttime locations in May, selling out events and amassing thousands of dollars in revenue.

But the sudden termination of a lease agreement hit pause on the show.

CozyFilmz co-founder Jake Colohan said Provo Towne Centre canceled the entertainment startup’s event contract to host drive-in movies in the mall’s south parking lot earlier this month due to a conflict with one of the mall’s tenants, Cinemark.

“The mall didn’t inform us about this at all, but (Cinemark) had an exclusivity clause in their lease agreement, which made them go after the (mall) managers there. And because of that, they chose to just completely terminate our agreement,” he said.

In response to a request for comment, Provo Towne Centre told the Daily Herald, “As a matter of policy, and in adherence with our standards of excellence, we do not discuss confidential license agreement matters.”

Colohan, a Brigham Young University undergrad student who started CozyFilmz alongside fellow BYU student Hudson Barnes, said they’re determined to keep the drive-in going and are reaching out to different landlords.

“We don’t want this to be game over at all,” he said.

But it’s a major setback to the duo’s quest to bring a successful drive-in movie theater to Utah County.

They hypothesized drive-in movies had failed because all they offered was the movie itself, so CozyFilmz would also include food vendors, games and other activities.

Then they placed it in a college town where young adults are looking for things to do.

“We realized that people in Orem and Provo are looking for events to do and everything is over-saturated. You can’t go bowling every single week,” Colohan said.

The business partners reached out to Provo Towne Centre in the winter and later signed a lease agreement for a month. After achieving “phenomenal” success — Colohan said they made $20,000 in revenue in the first month — he said the mall signed them until October.

Only a week later, though, Colohan said Provo Towne Centre ended the contract.

He acknowledged the mall had the right to do so because of the nature of the event agreement but reiterated that CozyFilmz was never informed of Cinemark’s clause when they first made the agreement.

“The fact that they didn’t tell us that kind of screwed over our business, and it’s kind of causing a lot of harm right now,” he said.

The new goal is to find a new place to still get shows up this season.

Colohan said they’re looking for a similar setup to Provo Towne Centre, where they projected the movie on the south wall of the Target instead of using a screen, but that they’ll build a screen if needed.

The ideal spot is Provo, where Colohan and Barnes have obtained movie licensing, though they’re open to going elsewhere in the valley.

They hope the show can go on.

“As much as the money was a thing, it was awesome to just see everybody else and how much they loved it,” Colohan said. “And just bringing activities to a culture like the Orem-Provo area was just really awesome to see. We’ve just received so many emails and DMs on Instagram and different places where people have messaged saying they’re very sad that we aren’t doing it right now.”