For some reason the site is not letting me enter a reply to the topic, only to a specific post so this is not intended as a reply to @Singswimsew , but rather a general comment.
My wife and I love musicals and have seen well over 150 performances over the past 20 yrs. We love theater. We also love movies. Although I enjoy movie musicals that are done well, I find most of our friends have little interest (they also don’t attend theater often).
We saw WSS over the weekend. Spielberg did a fantastic job. Initially I was thinking, “What’s the point, why do we need a remake when the original is so great”. But the modern shots and overall cinematography were beautiful and made a 2 hr 30 minute movie fast paced (don’t generally like movies over 2 hrs). Personally, I think the singing and dancing in the original was far superior, but the remake will be more captivating for the general public because of the way it was shot. Spielberg is a genius bar none!
All this said, I would have preferred to see it at home on my big screen and my comfortable couch. I was amazed at how dirty the theater was (including the concession area) with very little traffic. There were only about 10 of us in the theater on a Saturday afternoon. I told my wife for me to go back to theaters (not because of covid but because it wasn’t a great experience) it would require a movie that needed to be seen on the big screen (epic type). I think this will be a real challenge for the theater Cos. All I recommend is they realize they’re in the service business and do everything they can to make their “guests” have a terrific experience. At a minimum, clean the damn place, make sure the AC is working, don’t have a bunch of teenagers who are supposed to be working standing around texting when a line is forming or when floors could be swept, or soda machines wiped down.
I’d see a “Saving Private Ryan” type movie in the theater but other than that, I’ll take my family room any day! Lots of me out there. Rant over.