Saturday movies for children, art house and second-run films, and youth theatre are all in the pipeline at Maryport’s new £3.2m entertainment and visitor centre.
Karen Thompson, manager at The Wave centre which is due to open next month near the harbourside, this week disclosed details of what people can expect to find there.
It houses a theatre with a state of the art sound and light system, and it also has two cinema screens.
Karen said it would be possible to run Saturday morning matinees for children.
The theatre could be used in the same way as the Kirkgate in Cockermouth, showing art movies or big screen productions once they had completed first runs in mainstream cinemas.
She said she would also like to see special occasion film screenings.
Karen said: “If someone is celebrating a wedding anniversary and the first film they ever saw together was Brief Encounter, we could get Brief Encounter for them and show it as part of their anniversary celebration.”
She was also interested in starting youth theatre in Maryport.
The theatre can also be used as a flexible conference space. It contains 60 fixed seats at the back of the room and will seat a total of 235 people. The rest of the chairs can be removed when not in use.
The Wave will not officially open until next month and already changes are being made to the original plans.
A bar is to be installed in the foyer where there will be a bistro to seat about 50 people at a time.
The entrance will include a reception area and entrance to the exhibitions, a theatre ticket office and a Made in Cumbria shop.
“The nearest one as big as ours is at the Rheged centre near Penrith,” Karen added.
A heritage exhibition will combine history with state of the art technology.
There will be touch screen directions and pictures of Maryport trails, and a hanging board game based on tall ships.
A mural of Maryport sailing ships will be part of the nautical theme running throughout the building.
Over recent days key members of the community, and some of The Wave’s strongest critics, have been through the building.
