Movie theaters aim for live 3D sports in 2007

By Gina Keating

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Movie theater operators hope to be
screening live 3D sports events by 2007 in a bid to lure sports
fans away from their home theater systems and bolster sagging
mid-week ticket sales.

Ticket sales at theater chains dropped 9 percent in 2005
from what analysts said was a combination of lackluster films,
competition from other forms of entertainment such as video
games, and the spread of large-screen, high-definition
televisions and digital video recorders.

But while worldwide tickets sales are forecast to grow 12
percent over the next five years, exhibitors want to use new
digital projection technology to change the way consumers think
about movie theaters.

“We want to transition our theaters from being traditional
movie theaters to being community entertainment destinations,
and what better way to do this than sports?” said Shari
Redstone, president of the National Amusements Inc. theater
chain.

In 2004, during Boston Red Sox baseball fever — the year
they won the World Series for the first time since 1918 —
National Amusements, the controlling shareholder in Viacom Inc,
began screening high-definition broadcasts of Red Sox games in
its Showcase Cinemas in several New England cities on weekday
nights.

The cinemas brought in vendors to stroll the aisles with
hot dogs, peanuts and beer, sold team gear in the lobbies and
encouraged fans to loosen up as they would in the ball park.

“We are not just putting the game up on the big screen but
making the experience like being in Fenway Park,” Redstone, a
Red Sox fan, said. “The experience is more important, really,
than what you are showing.”

Other chains are looking to much-improved digital
three-dimensional projection for an experience theater-goers
can’t get at home.

But while the projection has greatly advanced from the
early 3D days, special glasses must still be worn to achieve
the full effect.

Michael Lewis, chairman of privately held REAL D, which
created 3D prints for the Walt Disney Co’s “Chicken Little,”
said 3D technology has tested successfully on National Football
League games, but unwinding who owns the rights to screen games
in theaters may be tricky.

“We think the concerts will be the first because they are
easiest to do,” Lewis said. “Sometime in 2007, our goal is to
get live sports programming to theaters. Some of the (sports)
rights holders see it as cannibalizing opportunities in other
venues that they paid a lot of money for.”

Three dimensional filming is achieved by using two digital
cameras set apart the same distance as human eyes.

Lewis would not divulge which distributors Real D is
working with on 3D sports broadcasts.

Peter Brown, chief executive of AMC Theatres, owned by
privately held AMC Entertainment Inc., said exhibitors are in
the early stages of trying to drive more live content into
their venues.

“It’s a bit of a brave new world,” Brown said last week at
the ShoWest convention in Las Vegas. “The folks that control
those rights or owners have to sort that out. (The contracts)
weren’t created with that notion in mind.”

National Amusements had no problem securing rights to
screen games because the Red Sox organization controls the New
England Sports Network that broadcasts the team’s games in the
region — a lucky break, Redstone said.

“I have talked to some of the other (Viacom) entities about
getting some more programming … but it is extremely difficult
to get through the rights issues,” Redstone said.

Nor is it clear whether in-theater games would feature
commercials or if it would function more like pay per view.

National CineMedia, a consortium of Regal Entertainment
Group, AMC and Cinemark theaters, has been working on ideas and
relationships with TV networks and cable programmers, NCM Chief
Executive Kurt Hall said.

National CineMedia has broadcast the NASCAR Daytona 500,
Major League Soccer and part of the Tour de France in some of
its theaters in past years, but wants to expand into regular
sports and concert programming, especially during the weekday
attendance lull.

“The intent is to cross market the theater event and
network TV programming and even start including the theater
audiences in the TV ratings calculations,” Hall said.