Tonight: Richmond PBS station to do preview showing of Downtown Abbey Season 3 premiere at Carytown's Byrd Theatre

Since I don't live in New York City, I haven't really followed how much, if any, that the Independent Film Channel uses the cinema they own in Manhattan, IFC Center, to promote their channel and build publicity for it (not unlike how I've recommended that XM Satellite Radio take over Uline Arena to create XM Satellite Coliseum to hold concerts and other events in a manner that promotes their programming, see the past blog entry "XM Radio & Economic Development in NoMA").

And this reminds me that on a Main Street e-list many years ago, I suggested to the Alexandria Economic Development Corporation in Virginia that one way that they could leverage the presence of PBS being located in their city would be to set up a similar kind of arrangement with a local theater facility, like the one on King Street, comparable to the IFC Center.  (I don't know if they ever approached PBS about this...)  Note that the National Film Board of Canada used to have screening rooms in Toronto and Montreal, the latter was called the Cinereobeheque, where they did this kind of programming as well.

Photo of the Byrd Theatre by Steve Pinkus.

So the local PBS affiliate in Richmond, Community Ideas Stations, is going to show the first episode of Season 3's Downtown Abbey at the Byrd Theatre, a 1930s cinema in Richmond's Carytown neighborhood. No charge!

But donors to the station and corporate sponsors have first dibs, which again, is a smart way to promote membership and fundraising.  See "'Downton Abbey' Event at Byrd Theatre" from the Richmond Times-Dispatch.

The Byrd Theatre is a bit in need of rehabilitation but it's a fun place to see a film.  Hopefully the Byrd Theatre is able to leverage value from this event as well to get new members.

It's too bad something like this isn't happening at DC's Lincoln Theatre (they did do something like this for the premiere of the English version of The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo, see "Lincoln Theatre and the movie"), as a way to draw attention to the series, PBS, and to the opportunity of the Lincoln Theatre, for which the city has an RFP out for its operation (see "RFP to Occupy and Operate the Lincoln Theater" from the DC Department of General Services).