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For the week of January 21 - 27, 2004

News

Second multiplex
cinema planned
in Hailey

Magic Lantern owner unfurls
proposal for four-plex theater


By MATT FURBER
Express Staff Writer

Magic Lantern Cinema owner Rick Kessler plans to approach the Hailey Planning and Zoning Commission with design plans for a new multiplex cinema on River Street.

The application will be the second film theater complex to come before the city this winter. A previous application was submitted for the proposed Big Wood 6 on Main Street.

A four-screen cinema on River Street, east of Bullion Square in Hailey, is planned byMagic Lantern Cinema owner Rick Kessler. Architect’s rendering

A name for Kessler’s plan has yet to be determined, but he said the location is perfect. The four-screen cinema would be built on a lot on River Street, east of Bullion Square.

"We’re still fine-tuning the size," Kessler said. "Each auditorium would have about two-thirds stadium seating and one third regular seating. Nothing will be bigger than what we have here (at the Magic Lantern in Ketchum), except for the screens."

There would be about 120 seats in each of two auditoriums and about 80 seats in each of the second pair.

Kessler said when he first conceived of moving the first Magic Lantern Cinema out of the old Odd Fellows Hall on the corner of Washington Avenue and Second Street in Ketchum, his first thought was that the cinema should go in the Ketchum Industrial Park. He thought parking could be better accommodated there. He said the City of Ketchum insisted on keeping the cinema in the city core.

"The city was right," he said. "It helps to stimulate the activity of the core."

Kessler also said his parking concerns have been alleviated because people can park anywhere downtown and still walk to the cinema.

"This project is smaller than the other one designed for Hailey," Kessler said. "The purpose is not to draw people from Ketchum. This is Hailey’s cinema."

Kessler expects to go before the Planning and Zoning Commission and hear some criticism of the plan. But, he said the feedback would help him modify the plan designed by a theater architect in concert with building architect Ned Hamlin.

If the plan goes forward, Kessler hopes to open the cinema by late fall or Christmas, 2004.

Kessler had hoped to announce a project last spring, but those plans fell through, he said. An alternate design for Bullion Square also did not pan out because the ceiling height was too low.

 

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The Idaho Mountain Express is distributed free to residents and guests throughout the Sun Valley, Idaho resort area community. Subscribers to the Idaho Mountain Express will read these stories and others in this week's issue.