Bruce Sanborn, a third-generation theater owner, is out to renew movie night.
His upscale Cinema Fusion movie house at the Anaheim GardenWalk mall lets theatergoers buy beer or wine and hang out in a swanky lobby that looks like it’s out of a hotel.
The theater’s “21+ Screenings” let movie watchers enjoy drinks in their seats with no kids allowed.
There are 14 screens in all, including three smaller screening rooms for parties and corporate events.
Cinema Fusion, which is on the third floor of the mall across from Disnelyand, cost about $17 million to build. The theater is a venture of Sanborn and investors.
His Sanborn Theatres Inc., based in Newport Beach since the 1970s, owns six theaters in California, including in San Luis Obispo and Temecula.
Sanborn calls his company the oldest independent theater chain in California, and perhaps the oldest in the West. It competes with the big national chains, Regal Entertainment Group, which owns Regal Cinemas and Edwards Theatres, and AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc.
Admission at Cinema Fusion is $10.50. Tickets for the theater next to the SkyLobby, where alcohol is served, are $11.50. For the private screening rooms, tickets are $12.50, and the Imax is a dollar more.
The smaller, reserved-seating screening rooms are old school. There is soft music, no commercials and curtains that rise up to unveil the screen.
“It’s like the old days,” Sanborn said.
Once a month, the screening rooms show movie classics, such as “Gone with the Wind” and “Casablanca.”
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Concession stand in SkyLobby: beer, wine along with popcorn, candy |
The SkyLobby is spacious with comfy seats. It’s loaded with ambiance, designed with a retro flair in blue, pink and green pastels and warm-glow lighting.
It is an adult hangout. There’s even wireless Internet access.
Movies are timed so that during the summer, theatergoers can watch the fireworks at Disneyland through a giant window.
The SkyLobby bar is a swanky version of a movie snack bar. It sells wine and beer and other drinks and desserts, such as cheesecake.
You also can get the standard movie fare: popcorn, candy and soda.
As with other theaters, “the snack bar is the profit center,” Sanborn said.
Movie studios get the bulk of the ticket sales, he said. Theaters essentially collect ticket sales for the studios, which license movie theaters to show their films, he said.
The cut for the theater owner, usually less than 40% of ticket sales, has gotten smaller through the years, which is why popcorn now costs $5 or $6.
It used to be there were more films than theaters, Sanborn said. Now there are more theaters than films.
Sanborn said he competes on customer service and by paying attention to details, such as showing remaining seats for a movie on the marquee.
The theater business is competitive, he said. It also has been squeezed by the poor economy and the home theater trend, with more people watching movies at home.
“It’s very tough. Very few companies have made it this long,” Sanborn said. “But the industry has always met all the challenges for 100 years. I don’t think it’s going away.”
His grandfather, Arthur Sanborn, opened Hollywood Theater in 1918.
Prior to owning a theater, his grandfather worked for movie studios, in the days when about eight people made up a studio.
“He wore all hats,” Sanborn said.
After World War I, his grandfather became a silent movie theater owner, before “talkies” arrived in the 1920s.
Sanborn’s father Art Sanborn took over the family business. Bruce Sanborn signed on in the 1970s.
He said he was reluctant at first.
Sanborn grew up working in the family business but went to college with the aim of being a high school teacher.
Lured by Technology
The new automated theater technology and the evolution of the multiplex in the 1970s spurred him to get into the business.
“It was exciting to me at the time, so I got interested in perpetuating the family business,” he said.
His children, who are just out of college, haven’t shown interest yet, according to Sanborn. But he said he would like to pass the business to his children someday.
“It would be kind of cool,” he said.
Like the cobbler who has no shoes, Sanborn doesn’t watch many movies. He likes older movies and counts the 1959 version of “Journey to the Center of the Earth” and the original “The Time Machine” as two of his favorites.
Modern movies are less about stories, he said.
“Generally, movies have become more of a theme ride,” Sanborn said.
Cinema Fusion is Sanborn Theaters’ re-entry into Orange County. The company built Cinemapolis (now called Cinema City) in the 1980s in Anaheim Hills, when Sanborn Theaters was known as SoCal Cinemas. His dad also was a partner at the Lido Theatre in Newport Beach for a couple of years.
Sanborn almost built Cinema Fusion in Upland instead of Anaheim. But the landlord there got cold feet and backed out, he said.
So he took his idea to GardenWalk’s developers, who thought the upscale theater idea would work well for the mall.
Right now, leasing at the mall has slowed as the economy has wilted and tenants are waiting for more stores to open.
The theater is piggybacking on the mall’s marketing efforts, which target tourists and locals.
GardenWalk is advertising the mall at local hotels as well as making sales calls. It’s making sure to emphasize the mall’s entertainment options, which also include 300 Anaheim bowling center, said Kelly Weesner, spokeswoman for the mall.
“The theater is an enormous part of the mix,” Weesner said.
Sanborn considers Cinema Fusion the latest model in theaters.
“This is the next step in theaters,unless nobody likes it,” he said. “We think it will be a hit. We’ve done all the right things.”
