As part of a larger plan to start screening sports games at its Gurnee location, Marcus Theatres — a movie theater chain with a location in Gurnee Mills — company representatives gave a presentation to the Village Board Monday asking to make changes to its liquor license.
One of the changes would be to allow the delivery of alcoholic beverages to patrons in the theater. Currently, drinks can be delivered only within the theater’s bar area. Company officials said they are hoping to be able to bring drinks to customers directly in the theater, so they wouldn’t have to leave the auditorium. In addition to delivering drinks, they also hope to deliver food.
“What we’re looking to do here is have the ability, with a server inside of the auditorium, to deliver directly to the guest at their seat,” said Rob Novak, the vice president of concessions and food & beverage for Marcus Theaters. “Otherwise, the guest is going to have to actually get up, leave the auditorium, go out into the lobby, go up to the bar and order a drink.”
He added that all of the same restrictions would remain in place, including a wristband policy for patrons who are drinking alcohol, as well as the checking of IDs.
They also hope to have a portable bar inside the auditorium to sell drinks directly to guests.
The third change the company hopes to see changed is the limit on drink sizes. Currently, Marcus Theatres’ liquor license limits the size of drinks they can have to 12- and 16-ounce beers, as well as 6- and 9-ounce glasses of wine.
This is all part of a larger plan from the company to offer free tickets to see sports games on 12 screens in one of its auditoriums, while the other auditoriums remain for moviegoers.
Novak said the struggles the movie theater industry faced during the pandemic inspired the company to test this new venture.
“If Hollywood can’t produce movies, we need to put new content on the screen,” he said.
The Gurnee location is the first of the company’s locations to test the sports screening. The Gurnee theater was chosen for a multitude of reasons, according to Novak.
“It gives us an opportunity to test the concept close enough to the corporate office in Milwaukee around such a large population base,” he said. “If we’re going to give it a go with the concept that we put on screen here, this would be the opportunity, and this would be the theater to do it at.”
The auditorium will feature a laser projector, as well as a “multiplex unit that allows [Marcus Theatres] to take that center screen, and use the movie theater screen and project it as one, or four images.” They’ve also added eight television screens to the auditorium, giving patrons a chance to watch from 12 different screens.
Marcus Theatres CEO Greg Marcus spoke at the meeting and said, “how important” both the new sports screening project, as well as the Gurnee location are to the company.
“We’re proud of the theater, we’re invested in it and we’ve always had a great relationship with the community,” Marcus said.
Monday’s presentation was purely “informational,” according to Village Administrator Patrick Muetz, and the board will vote on amending Marcus Theatres’ license at a future meeting.