PORT TOWNSEND — The owner of the Wheel-In Motor Movie drive-in theater is raising the curtain early this year.
Rick Wiley, owner of the only drive-in movie theater on the North Olympic Peninsula, said Thursday he is starting the outdoor movie season tonight instead of the usual beginning of May with showings of two new Walt Disney films, “Cinderella” and “McFarland, USA.”
The box office opens at 7:30 p.m. and movies begin at dusk at the 62-year-old cinema, one of four drive-in theaters in the state.
The Wheel-In is the last of the bunch with a digital projection system, purchased last year with the help of 460 donors who covered half the cost of the new $70,000 setup.
“This is our earliest opening since the ’80s,” said Wiley, the third generation of his family to run the drive-in.
“Last year, we were a little late because we were installing the digital equipment.
“Now that it’s in, we’ve got to put it to work.”
Regular schedule
The Wheel-In, at 210 Theatre Road near Port Townsend, also will show the two movies this Saturday and Sunday before beginning a regular Wednesday-Sunday schedule of movies through Halloween, Wiley said.
The digital projector was needed to obtain movies from Hollywood distributors who no longer circulate film copies to theaters.
Wiley saved the Wheel-In last year by raising donations through the online crowdsourcing site Kickstarter.
In 2013, Wiley, 58, converted the Uptown Theatre, also in his family for three generations, to digital projection through a separate crowdsourcing effort after the Uptown’s digital Kickstarter campaign failed.
The state’s other drive-ins are in Bremerton and Shelton and on Whidbey Island.
Wheel-In is one of about 340 drive-in theaters in the nation.
________
Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5060, or at pgottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
