Technology opens up concert options at local theaters

Related:

• Gallery: Metropolitan Opera shows coming to Ashland theater
• Video: Metropolitan Opera coming to local theaters in high definition via satellite

In the past month, Dorothy Daugherty has seen The Metropolitan Opera perform live twice.

She didn't jet off to New York City and she didn't pay $200 or more a ticket. Daugherty, of Huntington, simply drove over to Ashland's Cinemark Movies 10, plunked down $20 and joined an audience of more than 150,000 people in movie theaters around the world watching "The Metropolitan Opera: Live" in high definition via satellite.

Thanks to the digital transformation at theaters across the country, The Met is not alone in riding the new movie theater trend of capturing an audience made up of people in all corners of the country who simply had to visit their local movie theaters.

Other national-act artists are jumping in the game, and the viewing of major sporting events also is coming soon to a theater near you.

Last fall, Ashland's Cinemark 10 sold out a live-via-satellite concert from Kansas City by country superstar Garth Brooks.

This past week, Marquee's cinemas at SouthRidge in South Charleston and in Beckley both sold out broadcasts of West Virginia University's Fiesta Bowl stomping of Oklahoma University.

Here in Huntington, tickets are already selling quickly for the much-anticipated Feb. 1 Disney Pictures concert, "Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Disney Digital 3-D." It will be beamed down to the Pullman Square 16 in its new state-of-the-art DLP Cinema, a digital 3-D projector.

Daugherty, a resident of Woodlands Retirement Community, said she's going to all eight of The Met high-definition performances. She was delighted by the quality of the first two operas.

"I thought it was marvelous," said Daugherty, who was last at The Met in New York in 2001. "You had a better seat than if you had the very best seat at the Met because the cameras were everywhere. They were on top of the performers, they were on the stage, and they were showing some of the scenes from backstage."

Daugherty, who was joined by about 50 folks at the first showing, said it is a chance to see high-quality performances without having to travel so far to do it in person.

"I think the experience would depend on the theater and that theater's sound reproduction," Daugherty said. "Cinemas 10 has marvelous sound. It's a huge screen and it's clear as can be. It's really a wonderful opportunity."

Chad Riedel, assistant manager at Cinemark, said that although the Ashland theater hasn't gone fully to digital showings, it does have a digital projection system for pre-show and the live shows where they can beam in certain events.

"It's been a great success and it's really revolutionary to bring a concert to the people nationwide at the same time," Riedel said.

Although showing live concerts at movie theaters has been done since 2001 when Sugar Ray broadcast an Atlanta show to 44 theaters across the country, the frequency is increasing now.

Charlotte Alesi, manager at Marquee Cinemas' Pullman Square 16, said the high-definition offerings, which included Bon Jovi and Beyonce at Pullman in 2007, fill a void. These are artists who are not coming to smaller-market towns such as Huntington, said Alesi, who is a live concert fan who's seen a ton of rock concerts at the Big Sandy Superstore Arena.

Alesi said the concert crowds at the theater started out small, but she thinks it is just taking a little time for folks to warm up to the idea of going to a movie theater for a concert event.

That slow start is getting rolling now as tickets are already selling briskly for the 3-D concert on Feb. 1 starring Miley Cyrus as Hannah Montana and The Jonas Brothers.

Tickets for that 3-D concert at Pullman are $15, far more affordable than the $950-a-person tickets for Cyrus' gig Monday night at The Verizon Center in Washington, D.C.

The closest Hannah Montana concert venue is Detroit or Chicago.

"I really believe that it is futuristic," Alesi said. "When you are in a small place and you can't get big names because you don't have the capacity that they want to sell to, they can come here and watch that act that they really want to see."

Curtis McCall, CEO and president of Marquee Cinemas, the Beckley-based theater company that owns and operates 18 theaters from New York to Florida, said the investment in the past year of transforming its theaters to digital and 3-D digital gives them an incredible new flexibility in programming.

"There are a lot of possibilities and we are still in the infancy," said McCall, who is also a board member of the National Association of Theatre Owners. "We track all of the distributors to see if we are missing anything. From an entertainment standpoint, we're still on that cutting edge of what we can offer people. If we can bring it in -- whether it's on a digital hard-drive or in a satellite delivery -- the cost of delivery from producer to the person enjoying it makes it so much more affordable."

McCall said his company already has picked out some new 3-D concerts for 2008, including a U2 3-D show in February. He said 2008 has a number of 3-D movie titles, while 2009 has many, many more, including pretty much every animation film. McCall said he hopes in the future to get in all the "Star Wars" movies on 3-D.

"They're starting slowly to roll in," McCall said. "We were at a convention in October and every animated film will be coming out in 3-D, like 'Shrek' or some of those titles. They're really stacking up in 2009. It still takes a long time to make them."

McCall, who got to watch an NBA game in 3-D digital film, said there's nothing like the experience.

"It's not the old shaky glasses where you couldn't lean or twist," McCall said. "The new digital recording and filming is so much crisper and snappier, and you don't see someone just jumping out at you -- it is more like living in the real movie."

McCall said Marquee tested a digital showing of bowl games last week by showing the Fiesta Bowl in South Charleston and Beckley, and the University of Louisville bowl game in three theaters in Kentucky.

Since those two showings sold out in West Virginia, McCall said Marquee is looking at other big sporting events, college and pro games that they might show in the future.

Starting this weekend, Pullman Square 16 also is starting a Kidtoon Series on Saturday and Sunday mornings that will feature G-rated films for the family at a reduced rate of $3.50 per film, McCall said.

That series will include such films as "Strawberry Shortcake Let's Dance," "Tonka Tough Truck Adventures: The Biggest Show on Wheels," and "Care Bears in Oopsy Does It."

McCall said all of these new offerings are a way to entice people to check out the new theaters.

In North America in 2007, ticket sales were up 4 percent over 2006, to $9.7 billion, according to Media By Numbers, a box office tracking company.

But after a narrow increase in '06, attendance (1.42 billion) was flat and down from the 2002 high point of 1.61 billion tickets sold.

"We do surveys in the industry that says a quarter of the population doesn't go to the movies or only goes to the movies maybe once a year," McCall said. "But I think if you can get them to come to a new theater, they'll come back because the experience has changed so much."

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Photo courtesy of Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera Above is a scene from Verdi’s “Macbeth.” The Metropolitan Opera will be performing “Macbeth” at 1:30 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 12, at Cinemark’s Cinema 10 movie theater at 400 Winchester Ave., Ashland. Tickets are $22; $20 for seniors; and $15 for children.