Last year my employers were good enough to send me to San Francisco for a publishing conference. Not only was it a great professional development opportunity, but San Francisco was a marvelous location for blog-related activities, as detailed in last year's postings about Borderlands, rocket ships, and changes of hobbit.
This year the conference is being held in Austin, Texas at the end of April, and I put in a request to attend again - I fully accept and understand that the company has the prerogative of turning down this sort of request, but if you don't ask, they can't possibly say "yes".
As it turned out, my VP and new departmental manager agreed that I could attend - much thanks to John and Ted - but I didn't see Austin as offering very much in the way of genre-related sidetrips.
And then I stumbled across a reference to the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema...
The Alamo Drafthouse is arguably one of the world's most famous theatres when it comes to genre films. It's actually a chain, with locations in a number of US cities, but it got its start in, you guessed it, Austin Texas. They're not exclusively a genre chain, but their annual Fantastic Festival, famous poster series, and general interest in science fiction and fantasy films have given them a strong presence in the community. In fact, I've mentioned the Alamo Drafthouse before - that was the location of the surprise debut of the 2009 Star Trek reboot, introduced and hosted by Leonard Nimoy.
In addition to that reputation in the fan community, the Alamo Drafthouse has taken a unique approach to the movie-going experience. Their theatres have a full dinner menu with table service (the seats have something very similar to lecture hall countertops), and also serve alcoholic beverages. In addition, their online booking system lets you reserve a specific seat in the theatre in advance, so there's no need to show up early and stand in line. Finally, they are famous (or infamous) for their draconic rules involving summary ejection for cell phone use or talking during the movie.
To summarize: the Alamo Drafthouse is a genre-friendly movie theatre that lets you pick your seat in advance and drink beer during the movie, and throws out people who talk or use their cell phones - is there some reason NOT to go?
So that takes care of one evening's entertainment in Austin. Hmmm...I wonder what my movie options will be? End of April, start of May - damn, no, I miss the premier of Iron Man 3 by one day. Unless I get lucky - wow, imagine if history repeated itself and Robert Downey Jr. showed up on stage!
Or, if not so lucky, Tom Cruise with the blooper reel from Oblivion - sometimes you pays your money and you take your chances.
- Sid
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