Dunellen Theater and Cinema Cafe in Dunnellen, NJ

In a small town of roughly 7,000 people in central New Jersey, about 35 miles outside of New York City, remains a single show movie theater which also offers dinner and cold beer to accompany your show. I first heard about the Dunellen Theater from a co-worker that lived in the town. The theater has been operating since 1921, had about half a dozen owners in its first 20 years, and initially seated 500 people. The current owner (owner since 1989) of the Dunellen Theater and Cinema Cafe also owns the adjacent Zupko's Tavern and after purchasing the theater reduced the theater capacity to 350 patrons by removing every other row. The owner created a completely new and unique experience by replacing those removed aisles with small black coffee tables and offering theater patrons the ability to buy pizza, beer, soda, and other food to enjoy during the movie.

The theater airs new Hollywood releases, however, there is typically only one movie airing at a time and occasionally two. The theater generally tends to show children and family friendly films. I was lucky enough to be able to catch The Dark Knight here on it's opening night, and I did not need to purchase tickets ahead of time because they do not sell tickets through Fandango (a ticketing service) and do not sell tickets earlier than 45 minutes prior to the showing at the box office. After purchasing your movie tickets and/or dinner package (which was $7.00 for adults for a 6:45 p.m. showing whereas other movie theaters charge $9.50, tickets are $5.00 for children under 11 and senior citizens) you step inside an extremely small lobby. At the ticket booth the theater offers the very popular Pizza Special, which includes two movie tickets, 1 large pizza, and one pitcher of beer or soda. It appeared to me that virtually everyone before me ordered this option. If you are not in the mood for pizza there is an entire menu of food including fries, burgers, veggie burgers and typical pub food that you can order at the concession counter. When you place your order they give you a number display that they use to identify you once you have chosen your seat in the theater. I was worried that the waitresses bringing the food out during the film would be disruptive as would people eating and drinking alcohol. Most likely due to the small size and the adult nature of the film I saw, this did not turn out to be an issue.

Although I understand the proprietor attempted to restore as much as possible of the theater to retain it's history, for a long film like The Dark Knight I found the seats to be incredibly uncomfortable. As far as the rest of the theater it was certainly a unique experience and I would return. I do not think it would work as well with live entertainment like stand up comedy since there are so many other up-to-date dinner comedy options available that would put this old, small theater to shame, but for the purpose it currently serves it works well.