The 3-star rating is in large part due to safety concerns in this venue, as parts of the interior…read moreare stunning, and the film festival held there was entertaining and pleasantly educational.
This beautiful old building is surrounded by scaffolding so you can't really see its architecture, but I didn't see any renovation happening outside or inside, where the walls are covered with gorgeous murals, other detailed artistic painting, and intricate hanging light fixtures. The old-but-comfortable theater-style balcony seats are covered with red velvety fabric. It's a visual feast.
However, renovation inside is massively needed, especially for safety concerns. When the lights were turned out for the films it was almost pitch black, with no modern-day dim "safety lighting"...not even enough to navigate if you needed to.
And right in front of each balcony seats there's flooring maybe 1' deep for your feet to rest on (not enough), which then drops precipitiously almost another 1' to the next level of floor that you need to reach to walk in or out of the row! While this creates a clear view of the stage for every row of seating, it's very dangerous. To get into the row you need to step down to the lower section to walk across but there's nothing to hold onto except the arm of the seat on the end, and I needed the help of the willing hand of the kind person seated there to feel safe. The stairs to the balcony could accommodate 3 to 4 people across, but you have to be on the outer edge to have a hand railing.
One woman tripped at the top of the stairs to the balcony and slammed very hard into the backs of our seats, and her popcorn rained down everywhere, including on us. I don't remember how wide the space is between that last step and the seats, but it seems there wasn't enough, or much demarcation visible between the last step and the floor. We were all rattled by the impact, the noise, and the popcorn, but she was able to get up with help and get to her seat. I'm do remember thinking it would be easy to fall there, and I was glad I wasn't the one who did!
The main level has no fixed seats, just
very uncomfortable-looking wooden chairs set up in rows. That didn't seem like a good time during a 3-hour film festival! There were two pretty decent bathrooms available on the that floor, and I was told there was one on the balcony level, but I couldn't see it. However, I wouldn't have even tried to navigate from the dangerous seating set-up in the dark to get to any bathroom!
The only open concession area was on the main level, in a small dark niche, and unlike modern theaters, there was no food, just beverages (including cocktails), candy and popcorn. The high prices on those were the most modern thing in the building!
The eight or so short films in the festival were all human-interest stories of one or more persons and their interactions with and adventures in nature. All were inspiring and interesting, all had some scenic nature and landscape views, and I think all included water elements. But none were quite what I expected, as I had learned about the "Wild & Scenic Film Festival" at a viewing of the stunning panoramic "Wings Over Water" on the Extreme Screen in Union Station in KC a few nights before. Wild and scenic nature at its finest!
This fundraiser for nature and environmental causes was well put-together and organized by volunteers, and I think very successful, because as far as I could see, the theater was packed, and many people had attended it for years! Water One was the main sponsor, joined by many other generous partners.
Raffle tickets were sold for one lucky person to win a large kayak, and everyone received a free ticket for a prize raffle with a plethora of good items, including several wooden bird and bat houses, nature-and-on-the-water clothing items, quality t-shirts and water bottles, and many more worthy prizes winners could choose from.
I was one of many lucky free ticket holders, and very happy with my surprise gift bag containing a soft "There is no lemonade without water" t-shirt, a WaterOne recycled plastic bottle that claimed it "kept 1,085 plastic bottles out of the environment," and a small zippered clip-on pouch full of First Aid essentials!
