This isn't the first time, in the course of eating out for this column, that I've found myself spectating while a couple nearby has a full-blown, marriage-threatening row. But it's certainly the first time I've booked a ticket specifically to do so. This week's assignment sees me braving the new frontier of modern dining. I'm having supper in a luxury cinema, watching a Polanski movie from a huge leather seat while eating venison chilli and sipping a mojito. This is possibly the most middle-class thing I've ever done in my life.
A new venture from Odeon cinemas, now premiering at Whiteleys, a shopping centre in west London, this in-movie fine-dining concept is apparently the first of its kind in Europe. We're not just talking snacks here, but proper, restaurant-quality food, from a menu devised by the estimable Rowley Leigh of Le Café Anglais. The launch a few weeks back attracted loads of publicity. So much, in fact, that I dismissed it as a PR stunt.
But it's clear from the scale of the operation and the enthusiasm of all involved that this is a real... thing. They really think people will want to eat a proper meal while watching the latest blockbuster in club-class comfort. A whole floor above the existing Odeon has been Lounge-ified into an enormous bar and five luxury cinemas, with its own purpose-built kitchen and head chef .
Read more at http://www.independent.co.uk
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