Getty Image / Matt Winkelmeyer
Danny McBride recently sat for an interview where he ripped into the modern movie theater experience that involves eating and drinking while watching films (Alama Drafthouse, Cinebistro, etc).
McBride makes some very valid points about why eating dinner and putting down beers during a movie aren’t an optimal experience and his quotes to GQ are below but before we get to those I simply have to wonder: how often are A-List celebrities going to the movie theaters? Home theaters are so common with the rest of us plebs these days, it’s hard to imagine that any A-Lister in Hollywood doesn’t have an incredible theater at home. Who among them is going to theaters outside of red carpet premieres?
Anyway, while I really do love putting back a few drinks while watching a movie at Cinebistro I tend to agree with Danny McBride’s assessment that the experience of drinking while watching a movie is incongruous. In the GQ Magazine interview Danny McBride said this of dinner-style movie theaters:
“I hate it, I can’t stand it. I also don’t think it makes sense to combine booze with movies. You’re going to have to piss. Doesn’t alcohol make you want to get up and get loose? You don’t want to sit there, drink beer, and just be quiet. I would have no interest in going to see a movie and just pounding IPAs. Just f—— falling asleep.”
The smells in dine-in movie theaters can be overwhelming at times. Constantly getting up to use the bathroom during movies is also quite frustrating. ‘Breaking the seal’ in a 3-hour film is not ideal.
Conversely, McBride believes a movie theater with a built-in weed dispensary would be the perfect business model. He said:
“(Those) go together f—— perfectly. If I went to a theater, and it was like, ‘Here’s your popcorn and here’s f—— weed,’ I feel like that would be an awesome little combo right there.”
Danny McBride’s never not been a ‘weed guy’ but my take on this situation is living in Charleston for the past few years while filming Righteous Gemstones has turned him into a full-blown ‘weed guy’ and less of an ‘alcohol guy.’
That’s the only reasonable explanation here because sometimes a glass of wine or a negroni or an old fashioned during a film really is fantastic. Watching Oppenheimer while someone sitting next to you is eating shrimp scampi might not be ideal but honestly, it seems to always be a very small percentage of people in ‘dinner movie theaters’ actually eating meals. It’s more about the nicer chairs, assigned seats, full bar, and expanded snack offerings.