| rev:text
| - As megaplex theaters go, this is pretty much 'another one'. It's ginormous, it's got more blinky lights than Times Square, ads for everything everywhere, and horribly overpriced junk food. They have what I guess you call 'stadium style' seating with big puffy seats and cup holders on the seat arms to fit the oversized giant gulps.
I'm really not writing a review of the theater itself.
What made me a fan isn't the actual venue or the way-the-hell-out-in-the-burbs location. What has made me a fan is their participation with Fathom Events to bring VERY cool and special one-night nationwide events to a culture starved burgh like the Pitts.
I only discovered Fathom Events about a month and a half ago, via someone's random post on Facebook. What they do is bring filmed stage productions to a big screen. From recent Broadway productions that closed, to the Metropolitan Opera, major league ballet companies, and other hard-to-see-in-Murica events.
One of the first e-mails I got from Fathom after joining their Facebook page, and subsequently their e-mail list, was promoting a nationwide one-night-only showing of the Broadway musical 'Allegiance' with George Takei and Lea Salonga, which closed last January. An amazing production based on the real life experiences of Takei, when Japanese Americans were herded into concentration camps after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Not necessarily a Rogers and Hammerstein packed with hummable tunes when you leave the theater kind of musical, but a really frighteningly timely story (now that the Trumplodites are wanting to do the same with the Muslim community). At the age of 5, Takei was rounded up with his family and sent to the Heart Mountain camp, and spent four or five years imprisoned there. I know it doesn't sound like 'musical' material, but it was amazing.
And what a treat to be able to see it in Pittsburgh...well...NEAR Pittsburgh anyway. With the live dreck that is brought in by our so-called 'Cultural' trust and CLO, or the pretty constant regurgitation of Phantom, Cats, Shreck, etc.How refreshing to see an original Broadway cast, complete with theatrical enunciation, the big stars, on a big screen. It was ALMOST like seeing it live.
Now, for a 'movie', $20 a ticket seems a little pricey (and only a $1 discount for students). But...have you priced an actual Broadway ticket lately? Or for that matter, have you seen the ticket prices for our local presentations? Just how much do these local yocals think we all earn? Believe me, it's sooooo worth the $20 to see Broadway legends, than it is to spend $75 plus to see a Fox Chapel housewife with an Equity card.
Coming up in February they're doing a one or two night showing of the Broadway version of 'Newsies'. There were a few things I missed in the past few months before it really hit me what they were about.
Fathom does these presentations at several theaters around Pittsburgh, all off in the deep burbs. Monroeville, Cranberry, and Robinson are the three locations I can recall. But I think there might be one more.
If you feel like making the drive up McNight Road...WAY up...this Cinemark is a good theater for seeing these productions. I would recommend going a little early and grabbing dinner at the Burgatory, or one of the other bigger 'chains' that surround the theater.
The most awesome thing about this experience is that you're surrounded by other cultural people in the theater...so you're not stuck with texting date-night twits at a shoot-em-up and blow-em-up blockbuster.
Thank you Cinemark for participating with Fathom Events!
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