Wednesday, May 15, 2013

WGN News Visits The Uptown Theater


In case you missed the WGN News at Nine on Tuesday, here's a link to the story. The text portion has a little more than what was shown on the air.  The direct link to the video, as shown on WGN, is here.

Remember that there will be more Wednesday night on the WGN News At Nine regarding the formation of an Entertainment District, followed by a half-hour live show on CLTV, at 10pm.

The WGN page also features a history of the Uptown in photos, from its heyday to the present, linked here.

6 comments:

  1. I'll be damned. For the first time, I'm starting to think this might really happen. Having had the experience of touring the theater last year, thanks to the Alderman, I have a much better appreciation of what bringing it back to life is going to take (which is outrageously ambitious). However, maybe, just maybe, we're about there.

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  2. Excellent reporting by WGN. Looking forward to tonight’s piece.

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  3. It seems like the Uptown getting a lot of publicity. That's a good sign. I'll admit I was concerned with the new ownership in light of the poor condition of the Riviera (which seems to decay badly and be patched even worse each time a repair is done), but each is a different class of venue. Perhaps the Riviera is better suited for its visitors if it's a pit?

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  4. It does seem likely that some "announcement" is in the works. Rahm loves his announcements.

    When one of my nephews was about two years old he liked to make announcements. "I need to poop" being the most common announcement.

    I do find one aspect of this WGN video amusing. Utilizing a charity to raise the money to renovate the theater?

    Sure, THAT'll work. Let's just get 10,000 people to donate $100 apiece and we're nearly two percent of the way there.

    To get this done a more "global" solution is needed. That means possibly rezoning the "Vic Theater" eventually to allow for residential and unfortunately probably some TIF money.

    Although, I'd rather see TIF money spent on this than building more $400,000 units of high priced low income housing.

    Between concerts and weddings/charity events this theater could be a gold mine. The lobby is just the thing nearly every North Shore or Lincoln Park princess dreams about for their wedding reception.

    I'm sure Uptown's own "Anita Mandalay", who makes wonderful Uptown vids, would love to hold a wedding reception there.

    I do look forward to the grand reopening of the theater and the crowd of 4000 well heeled donors touring the theater and then watching a new print of "The Blues Brothers" on the big screen.

    Charge each of the donors $1000 a piece and that's 4 million dollars right there. Actually, I could see raising more by offering to put up plaques and such throughout the theater highlighting various contributions.

    I might donate some cash if I could get a urinal named after myself. Perhaps a trough like at a ballpark. Somehow I picture a long line of people I've pissed off waiting to piss in the IrishPirate All Uptown Urinal.

    It would be a great privilege for people to piss in an IrishPirate themed urinal. We could raffle off fundraising tickets for the inaugural whizz.


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  5. I was in Oakland at a bar 2 months ago. Was pretty late and night and I had decent amount of drink in me. Started talking with a guy who said he was the one who was going to get the Uptown theater done. I of course repeatably told him he was full of bologna. He told me to take a walk with him. Being the real smart person I am I went with him. He took me down the block to the Rotunda building project he just did awhile back. Was pretty impressive place. He also did a bunch of other stuff. Long story short, he said its going to happen soon and that Rahm is a pain in the butt to work with.

    The next day I did some research on the internet and found him. It was Phil Tagimi. Google him and see his resume. He seemed like a stand up guy and has the experience to make it happen.

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  6. This is gonna be great!! Also, IP, that line about the urinal made made actually laugh out loud.

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