AT LONG LAST, the transformation of the Delft Theater into the Delft Bistro has begun. Crews have begun the demolition and remodeling of the interior of the building.
The Delft Bistro? Yep, it’ll be a dinner theater/restaurant/bar/meeting venue/place to hang out. Two floors for dining and drinking while watching a movie–not your first run features, more likely classics, maybe family features, maybe art or foreign films, maybe outdoor sports films.
One huge movie screen, a couple of smaller ones. Plenty of room for about 200 diners and movie watchers.
Type of cuisine? Still to be determined. Jen Ray, who’s a partner in the project with her husband Tom Vear, promises only that it will be “very good food.” They have yet to hire a chef.
Vear and Ray, of course, are responsible for the reinvention of Donckers, the immensely successfully restaurant and candy store that they re-opened in 2008.
Donckers and the new Delft Bistro will be next door neighbors. Donckers feels like a comfortable, old-time diner. The Bistro, preserving the old movie marquee, will also honor the past with its architecture, atmosphere and movie offerings.
A few questions not yet answered: How loud will the movie’s volume be? Will some diners be annoyed by their neighbors’ talking? Will others be annoyed because the movie’s volume is drowning out their conversation? What happens if you show up for your meal halfway through the movie? Will you even care about it?
Ray and Vear are confident they’ll figure it out. They don’t have a single prototype for what they’re doing. They’ve just picked up ideas for it over the years. Their hope is to make the Delft Bistro a unique experience, a destination.
Plans for it had to be scaled back because of cost. Originally it was designed as a much larger venue with the bridge connecting it to the rest of the old theater on Main Street. No more. In fact the bridge is now being taken down.
The building on Main Street will remain vacant for now. Eventually, it’ll likely be developed for mixed use–offices, retail, maybe residential. But that’s a ways off.
The focus now is on the Delft Bistro. Full steam ahead.
Ah, and the inevitable question? When? When will it open for us diners/drinkers/movie-goers? With a smile, Ray says “By fall, for sure.” For the skeptics in the crowd, that likely means “By Christmas.”
We’ll see. Sounds like it’ll be worth waiting for.
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NOW, ANOTHER STORY about waiting. Long, endless waiting.
Something like 2500 days ago, way back in 2009, a Russian-made tanker landed at Sawyer International Airport for routine refueling on its way to Pakistan. Should have taken a few hours, enough time for the crew, some of them Ukrainian, to get out and stretch their legs and then get back on board.
Well, no.
Turns out there were questions about the plane being stolen, about unpaid bills, about expired visas…about general confusion that aviation officials and federal agents would surely clear up within a few days.
Well, no again.
The Cold War era Ilyushin Il-78 still sits in a hangar, with its tail sticking out, at Sawyer Airport while its owner–an international firm known as Headlands Limited–and its Alabama-based manager–International Jets–try to get a permit for it to fly away. Anywhere.
The State Department has been involved in the delay. Apparently there’s been some concern because the Ilyushin was at one time a military plane. A threat. Now it looks more like a dodo bird.
It’s got to be valuable, though, because the owners still want it back after all these years.
And the good news here? Sawyer is racking up $250 in daily fees while the dodo bird hibernates in its hangar.
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