{"id":24058,"date":"2021-04-15T14:44:03","date_gmt":"2021-04-15T21:44:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/hi-lo\/?p=30000019634"},"modified":"2021-04-16T15:35:09","modified_gmt":"2021-04-16T22:35:09","slug":"column-recalling-the-cinerama-dome-twice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/news\/commentary\/column-recalling-the-cinerama-dome-twice","title":{"rendered":"Column: Recalling the Cinerama Dome. Twice."},"content":{"rendered":"

I felt a twinge of nostalgia-enhanced sadness with the announcement on Monday that Arc Light\/Pacific Theaters is closing the Cinerama Dome<\/a> on Sunset Boulevard.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not like I\u2019m a movie-theater snob\u2014I\u2019m not a movie-theater anything; the last time I sat through a movie in a theater was in 1997 when I took my kids, ages 9 and 3, to see a screening of \u201cGood Burger,\u201d which you\u2019ll fondly recall was a Nickelodeon comedy starring the team of Keenan and Kel. We all saw that at the also permanently closed Pacific Theater complex in Lakewood.<\/p>\n

Now, of course, my keeping clear of movie theaters has become a key, if not defining part of my personality, right up there alongside the fact that I\u2019ve never had macaroni and cheese; two unique and unlikely abstinences that have transformed me into an exceedingly interesting person at parties and other gatherings at which I am invariably nudging discussions toward the subject of either movie theaters or macaroni and cheese so I can break things wide open with one of my singularly amazing macaroni\/theater facts.<\/p>\n

Back in my movie-theater-going days, I did manage to see one film at the Cinerama Dome. It was my birthday, Jan. 12, 1969, and I asked my parents to drop me and my best friend off at the theater to see Stanley Kubrick\u2019s \u201c2001: A Space Odyssey.\u201d I felt a combination of guilt and love for asking my dad to take us, because it was also the day of Superbowl III<\/a>, a good chunk of which Pop would miss because of squirreling me and my friend to the faraway land of Hollywood, then driving back to Long Beach to catch about 20 minutes of the game before driving back to pick us up.<\/p>\n

Of course, I didn\u2019t feel any guilt at all at the time. It was my birthday. I was king of this land for the day. It took about an entire generation and my dad\u2019s death before the guilt set in.<\/p>\n

The only thing that marred the day for me at the time was the fact that in the Super Bowl, the New York Jets beat my beloved Baltimore Colts, a team that had become my favorite for the simple fact that they looked cool in their white uniforms one day when my dad was watching them play the Rams on TV. After that, I was a die-hard fan of the Colt legends Johnny Unitas, Tom Matte and Raymond Berry, although \u201cdie-hard\u201d might be overstating it as you\u2019ll note I skipped watching the game so I could see a science-fiction movie in Hollywood.<\/p>\n

For whatever reason\u2014maybe latent remorse?\u2014I never saw another movie at the Cinerama Dome, but I did visit the theater again 27 years later (just a year before the release of \u201cGood Burger,\u201d you\u2019ll note) as a member of the elite will-cover-anything-if-there\u2019s-free-food-involved press corps to cover the introduction of McDonald\u2019s\u2019 Arch Deluxe, the fast-foodery\u2019s \u201chamburger for grown-ups.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was a North American extravaganza event, with satellite links showing the New York celebration featuring Ronald McDonald dancing with the Rockettes at Radio City Music Hall, Toronto\u2019s fireworks display at the perhaps-hamburger-shaped SkyDome, and LA\u2019s contribution: Tarting up the Cinerama Dome to look a a 700-foot tall Arch Deluxe and offering the new burger to the famished reporters along with glass Arch Deluxe flutes full of champagne.<\/p>\n

Much was made about the importance of the order of which the ingredients (lettuce, tomato, onion, American cheese, ketchup, special sauce and the optional sweet hickory smoked pepper bacon) were stacked on the burger. We were told 500 different builds were tried before perfection at last was achieved.<\/p>\n

It was never made particularly clear what made this a hamburger for grown-ups, but it was strongly implied that its own secret sauce (a who\u2019d-ever-guess mixture of mustard and mayonnaise) was a key factor. Or perhaps it was the new potato-flour bun. Or it could\u2019ve just been the champagne speaking.<\/p>\n

Whatever it was, it was a recipe for disaster. After a $300-million research and promotion campaign, the Arch Deluxe blundered along for about four years before it was yanked from McDonald\u2019s\u2019 menus, making it (if you keep its connection to the Cinerama Dome) one of the most expensive flops in Hollywood history.<\/p>\n

Maybe someone will come in and save<\/a> the legendary Dome, though now I\u2019ve forced myself into the position where I won\u2019t\/can’t go back to see a film there. And, as for the Arch Deluxe, it\u2019s dead for good, leaving grown-ups with nothing to look forward to, fast-foodwise, but McRibs and Shamrock Shakes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I did manage to see one film at the Cinerama Dome. It was my birthday, Jan. 12, 1969 and I asked my parents to drop me and my best friend off at the theater to see Stanley Kubrick\u2019s \u201c2001: A Space Odyssey.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":208,"featured_media":71536,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18977],"tags":[31856,69],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[2792],"class_list":["post-24058","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commentary","tag-cinerama-dome","tag-tim-grobaty","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24058","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/208"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24058"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24058\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71536"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24058"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24058"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24058"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=24058"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=24058"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}