The Cap Times has more on the opening of Sundance 608. While the theaters will open to the general public on the 11th of May, there will be benefits preceding this occasion.
To kick off the festival, Sundance officials decided to hold three separate fundraising events during opening week, each benefiting a different local nonprofit organization in Madison. The events include a benefit for the Chazen on Sunday, May 6, a benefit for the River Alliance on Monday, May 7, and a benefit for OutReach on Tuesday, May 8.
While I'm really looking forward to the opening, I'm a bit worried about the atmosphere:
In addition to the six-screen theater, the facility will include a restaurant and bar called Bar Bistro 608, a second rooftop bar upstairs, and a coffee shop called Caffe 608 that will serve breakfast items, pastries and coffee from San Francisco-based Peet's Coffees and Teas. There will also be a 608 Gallery selling gift items featuring the Sundance logo, as well as work from local artists.
That just sounds a little too fancy for my blood. Can you imagine Jim Kreul hanging out at that joint with his gray zippered hoodie sipping on a cup of Harvey Milk Blend coffee? (I suppose he doesn’t wear a hoodie anymore.) It sounds more like a place where one would go to hear Tino Balio talk about how indie films from Kenya find completion bond guarantors. Please don't take that as an insult being hurled at Prof. Balio. I had him for a class or two and thought he was a great teacher and got a lot out of his lectures. I thought about him a lot as I read Future Noir: The Making of Blade Runner. The minute I started reading about the completion guarantee company, Tandem, you can bet your ass I flashed back to my classes with him. Prof. Balio is a big, tall guy with a vague resemblance to James Burke and has a pedantic air about him that is perfectly suited to my vision of what Sundance 608 will be like. Hopefully he won't be ensconced in the film archives at the Historical Society for the opening because I'd like to meet him there and thank him for giving me the habit of not getting up from my seat at a theater until every last credit has rolled. I'm a victim of Pavlovian conditioning. In fact, I've gotten some of my friends into this habit and we cheer together when the name of the completion bond guarantor company scrolls by. Thank you Prof. Balio! Your tutelage serves me well.
5 comments:
"San Francisco-based Peet's Coffees and Teas."
Too bad we don't have any local coffee roasters in Madison that could really make it a Caffe 608. Oh...wait...
I may be part of the hoi polloi, but I'm not above having a nice cup of Just Coffee's Reanimator.
Why ship pastries from the west coast when a local joint can deliver 'em fresh?
That coffee thing doesn't bode well... Perhaps Sundance 608 will respond to pressure (I assume someone will do it) and make Just Coffee or another local roaster their java of choice.
The more I hear about this place the less likely I feel to go there on a regular basis. But as with so many things Madison these days, I am not the intended audience.
It will definitely be interesting to see what the place is like.
Coffee is one thing but, if they don't have local brews, they are in for a fight.
If they show quality films, I'll definitely go. I don't see myself hanging in their taverns or cafe, but I intend to spend lots of time in those plush stadium seats.
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