Bow Tie Cinemas at Reston Town Center is reopening on Friday (May 28), just in time for the holiday weekend.
Making good on a March promise, the movie theater will open its doors for Memorial Day weekend, marking the return of audiences more than a year after it closed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The company told Reston Now two months ago that they hoped to open by this coming weekend, but it depended on the major movie studios releasing films into theaters, as opposed to streaming and on-demand services.
With vaccinations up across the country and region, that appears to be happening. According to Bow Tie Cinemas, the major new Hollywood releases waiting to greet Reston moviegoers include “A Quiet Place Part II”, Disney’s “Cruella,” and “Spiral: Saw.”
“I am thrilled that we are finally able to reopen our Reston location,” Bow Tie Cinemas Chief Operating Officer Joseph Masher said in the press release. “By exercising our health and safety protocols, we have been able to successfully provide a clean atmosphere for our guests to return to the cinema.”
Masher says the chain has not recorded any cases of COVID-19 transmission among patrons or staff since it first reopened some locations last summer.
“Guests have been returning, and leave feeling a sense of normalcy that has been sorely missed during the pandemic,” he said.
The Reston Town Center theater will reopen with a series of safety and health protocols in place in accordance with the National Association of Theater Owners’ CinemaSafe initiative, which commits participants to following guidelines that, in some cases, are stricter than what Virginia and Fairfax County now require.
The state will lift capacity limits on movie theaters and other entertainment venues starting on Friday.
Bow Tie’s protocols include 100% reserved seating, the installation of plexiglass barriers at box office and concession stands, contact-free ticket and concession purchasing, and enhanced cleaning.
Additionally, all staff must wear a mask, even if they are fully vaccinated.
“Bow Tie Cinemas staff must wear masks at all times, whereas fully vaccinated customers are welcome to remove their mask,” a Bow Tie Cinema spokesperson confirmed to Reston Now in an email. “If a customer has yet to be vaccinated, we ask that they continue to wear their mask unless they are actively eating and drinking in their seat.”
There are also several promotional offers for those who come to the Reston Town Center theater on the first weekend.
From May 28 to 30, a purchase of a non-alcoholic beverage comes with a free small popcorn and entry into a raffle for free movie tickets. Reston customers can also continue to rent out an entire theater for up to 30 guests for a private screening.
Bow Tie Cinemas is one of the last movie theaters to reopen in the area, with theaters in Herndon, Tysons, and Dulles already showing movies again.
Bow Tie Cinemas acquired the theater at Reston Town Center from Rave Cinema in 2011.
Reston Town Center’s Bow Tie Cinemas is looking to re-open by Memorial Day.
A company spokesperson tells Reston Now that they plan is to turn the projectors back on when “the film supply becomes more stable, perhaps by Memorial Day at the latest.” Meaning, when studios begin releasing more movies again to theaters (as opposed to streaming services or on demand).
The spokesperson noted that studios have already started doing this, advertising summer releases and populating the calendar for the later year, due to the re-opening of theaters in New York and Los Angeles.
The Reston Town Center movie theater shut down a year ago and has yet to reopen.
However, several other local theaters have already opened their doors including Herndon’s AMC Worldgate 9 and AMC Tysons Corner 16. The Regal Dulles Town Center, however, remains closed.
Virginia currently allows movie theaters and other arts venues to open with up to 30% capacity.
Bowtie Cinema’s only other Virginia location in Richmond reopened in July. The company spokesperson didn’t answer a follow-up about why the Richmond location is open while the Reston one is currently not.
When it does re-open, a number of safety protocols will be in place including mandatory facemasks, increased cleanings, social distancing, and contactless cash exchange.
Bowtie Cinemas acquired the theater at Reston Town Center in 2011 from Rave Cinema.
After delays due to the coronavirus pandemic, several new films are hitting the screens at newly-reopened movie theaters.
“Tenet,” “Wonder Woman 1984” and “Bill & Ted Face The Music” are some of the films poised to hit theaters soon.
AMC Worldgate 9 in Herndon is set to reopen Thursday (Aug. 27).
Gov. Ralph Northam forced movie theaters to close in the spring, but under Phase Three, which started July 1, movie theaters can open at 50% capacity.
Let us know in the poll and comments below if you are comfortable heading to movie theaters.
Photo by Corina Rainer/Unsplash
Local Schools Receive “Common Sense Recognition” — Aldrin and Hunters Woods elementary schools in Reston and Clearview and Crossfield elementary schools and Carson Middle School in Herndon are a part of the 23 Fairfax County Public Schools recognized for their digital citizenship. [FCPS]
Fixing Up Reston Ball Field — The Reston Association recently uploaded a video about ball field maintenance. [YouTube]
Lights! Camera! Action! — People can watch “Jumanji” — a movie starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson — at the Reston Community Center Hunters Woods today from 10 a.m.-noon. The movie is about four high school kids who become adult avatars in a video game’s jungle setting. The screening is free to attend and appropriate for all ages. [Reston Community Center]
Basic knitting — Want to learn how to knit? The Reston Regional Library will show you “the only two stitches you need to knit anything you want” from 7-8 p.m. tonight. [Fairfax County]
Two musical worlds collide —Â Koto player Yumi Kurosawa will perform with tabla player Anubrata Chatterjee, bridging the cultures of Japan and India. The performance starts at 8 p.m. at CenterStage. Tickets cost $15 for Restonians. [Reston Community Center]
Movie theatre chain may come to Reston — “Upscale movie theater chain Cinépolis is close to a deal to open an eight-screen theater at Halley Rise, making the mixed-use project in Reston its first location in Northern Virginia.” [Washington Business Journal]
Students helping students — Leadership students from South Lakes High School recently organized a workshop to teach leadership skills to student ambassadors from Terraset Elementary School. [Fairfax County]
Official Trailer: Another Way of Living: The Story of Reston, VA from Rebekah Wingert-Jabi on Vimeo.
Reston filmmaker Rebekah Wingert-Jabi was on WAMU’s “The Kojo Nnamdi Show” on Thursday to discuss Robert E. Simon’s vision for a new town in the Virginia countryside a half-century ago.
Wingert-Jabi, director of “Another Way of Living: The Story of Reston, VA,” was visiting the show to promote the documentary, which will screen at the National Building Museum March 24 as part of the Environmental Film Festival in the Nation’s Capital.
Wingert-Jabi spoke about how Simon wanted dense housing as well as the beauty of nature when he founded Reston in the mid-1960s.
“When Robert E. Simon saw [the acreage that would be become Reston], what struck him most was natural beauty,” Wingert-Jabi said in response to Nnamdi’s question about Simon’s desire to break away from “Cul de sacs and cookie cutter homes.”
“He also said ‘we don’t have to to that,’ ” said Wingert-Jabi. ” ‘What about the idea of townhouses?’ If we put people together, maybe we can build a sense of community.’ And if you put lots of people together, you will also have lots of open space.”
Listen to the 17-minute interview on WAMU’s website.
Wingert-Jabi’s 70 minute film premiered in Reston last fall. It was edited from a rough cut shown to Restonians in 2014. The final version includes the milestone of Simon’s death last September at age 101.
Another Way of Living will screen at 6:30 p.m. on March 24 at the National Building Museum (401 F St. NW, Washington, DC). Admission to the festival is free.
Just weeks after it screened at Reston Community Center and made its film festival debut at the Virginia Film Festival, the new Reston documentary can now be yours.
Another Way of Living: The Story of Reston, VA is available for purchase at the Reston Historic Trust and Museum at Lake Anne Plaza for $24.95.
Peabody Award-winning filmmaker Rebekah Wingert-Jabi, a Restonian, has been working on the documentary for more than four years. Wingert-Jabi and support staff shot more than 250 hours of footage and sifted through files of historical documents and photos at the Reston Museum to visually tell the story of Reston’s progress from a cow pasture purchased by New Yorker Bob Simon in 1961 to a pioneering “new town” — with some bumps along the way.
A rough cut of the 70-minute film was shown to a select audience in April 2014, during the celebration of Simon’s 100th birthday.
But since then, Metro’s Silver Line brought rail to Reston (in summer 2014) and Simon died in September 2015 at age 101. These significant events were included in the reworked version of the film.
“We wanted to flesh out key moments in Reston,” Wingert-Jabi said at last month’s screening of the film at RCC. “We wanted people to understand more of what happened in the years Simon wasn’t here (1967-92), about Mobil Land’s role in developing Reston Town Center.”
Read a recap of the film in this previous Reston Now article.
In addition to offering the movie, RHT has also just completed a new book focused on Reston’s past, present, and future. The book showcases images from the museum’s archives as well as text from exhibits to tell the story of Reston. That can be purchased at the museum for $18.95.
When a new version of Another Way of Living: The Story of Reston VA was shown to about 500 viewers at Reston Community Center Hunters Woods on Thursday, there were more than a few tears shed by audience members touched at seeing the final story of Reston founder Bob Simon, who died in September at age 101.
Director Rebekah Wingert-Jabi has been working on the documentary for nearly five years. A previous version was shown at RCC in April of 2014 during the celebration events of Simon’s 100th birthday and Reston’s 50th anniversary.
The newer version was shown at the Virginia Film Festival in Charlottesville earlier this month. It will likely be screened again in Reston in April, as well as in future film festivals, said Wingert-Jabi.
Some major things have happened since the spring of 2014: Metro’s Silver Line finally opened (in July 2014), linking Reston — once considered “the end of nowhere,” as someone in the movie said — with downtown DC; the development in progress spurred by the transit system; and, of course, Simon’s death.
“We wanted to flesh out key moments in Reston,” Wingert-Jabi said of the revisions. “We wanted people to understand more of what happened in the years Simon wasn’t here (1967-92), about Mobil Land’s role in developing Reston Town Center.”
The final edit of the 70-minute film will make the movie more appealing to people less familiar with Reston. The previous version had many more original Restonians talking about the pioneer spirit in moving to Simon’s “new town” in the mid-60s. The point still gets across in the new version, but added is more historical and architectural context.
The film is big on historic photos and documents. There’s Simon and his sisters playing in Riverside Park in Manhattan and touring Europe, which served as the inspiration of his suburban community built around a town piazza. Read More
“At one extreme you have the hermit — he gets his kicks out of solitude. I’m anti-Hermit. I get my kicks out of people.”
That’s the late Reston founder Bob Simon talking in this trailer for Another Way of Living: The Story of Reston, VA, a documentary about Reston.
The documentary makes its film festival debut at the Virginia Film Festival in Charlottesville on Nov. 7.
Award-winning filmmaker Rebekah Wingert-Jabi, of Reston, has been working on the film for more than two years.
The documentary explores founder Robert Simonʼs unique vision for American life. While 1950s post-war suburban sprawl prioritized single-family homes, Simon dreamed ʻanother way of livingʼ that valued community, nature and social equity.
Simon set out to build a suburban town that integrated citizens across racial and economic divides. It wasn’t always an easy ride.
“When you built a suburb, you weren’t building a bedroom, you were building a community,”says one of the architecture experts in the trailer and movie. “What Simon got was a thing that had been missing in suburban development.”
Check out the trailer for more highlights.
Another Way of Living: The Story of Reston, VA, a documentary about Reston, will make its film festival debut at the Virginia Film Festival in Charlottesville on Nov. 7.
Award-winning filmmaker Wingert-Jabi, of Reston, has been working on the film for more than two years.
The documentary explores founder Robert Simonʼs unique vision for American life. While 1950s post-war suburban sprawl prioritized single-family homes, Simon dreamed ʻanother way of livingʼ that valued community, nature and social equity.
Simon set out to build a suburban town that integrated citizens across racial and economic divides. It wasn’t always an easy ride.
Many longtime Restonians are interviewed in the film, which also uses historical photos and items. Wingert-Jabi has filmed more than 250 hours of footage to create the 72-minute movie.
Wingert-Jabi says she hopes the legacy of Simon, who died last month at age 101, will live on through this film.
“The film shows how Simon’s vision was so powerful and touched upon such basic human values that it not only influenced the way the suburbs were developed in America but also guided the development of Reston over the last 50 years,” she says.
A rough cut of the film was screened for Reston VIPs in 2014 as part of Simon’s 100th birthday celebrations. Wingert-Jabi said much more work has been put into editing the film into its current format.
She said she is excited the film will be premiering here in Virginia.
“From the beginning, Reston was shaped by its Virginia context and it continues to grow in that context today,” she said. “The University of Virginia is an ideal setting to have a conversation about how Simon’s vision developed over 50 years and how it can inform community development moving forward.”
The screening will be followed by a conversation with Urban Land Institute Global CEO, Patrick Phillips; Virginia State Senator and Reston Resident, Janet Howell; Reston’s first salesman, Chuck Veatch; director Wingert-Jabi; and the University of Virginiaʼs Chair of the Department of Urban and Environmental Planning, Tim Beatley.
What bits of Reston history didn’t make it into the movie Another Way of Living: The Story of Reston, VA?
That some of what filmmaker Rebekah Wingert-Jabi will discuss Tuesday in a special program at Reston Community Center Hunters Woods.
Wingert-Jabi has been working on the documentary about Reston for several years. A first cut premiered in April of 2014, but Wingert-Jabi is still working on the final product, which she hopes will be considered for film festivals and public television stations.
Wingert-Jabi will update the progress of Another Way of Living and share some of the excerpts that landed on the cutting room floor during the editing process.
In the movie, Peabody Award Winner Wingert-Jabi — who grew up in Reston and now is raising her family here — takes a look at founder Bob Simon’s life and what inspired him to purchase more than 6,000 acres of Virginia farmland in 1961 and plan an urban-style “New Town” in an era of neat lawns and tract homes.
Through historical photos and footage, as well as interviews with longtime Restonains, the story looks at Reston’s impact as a groundbreaking inclusive community and its evolution into the place it is today.
The free program begins at 7:30 p.m.
Restonians will get a chance to see the rough cut of Another Way of Living: The Story of Reston, VA, on Saturday.
The film will be screened Saturday at United Christian Parish (11508 N. Shore Dr.) following a community open house to discuss the Reston Master Plan Special Study Phase II. The community open house will feature Hunter Mill Supervisor Cathy Hudgins and will run from 8:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m.
The film, formerly titled The Reston Story, was screened for a select audience at Reston Community Center as part of Reston founder Robert E. Simon’s birthday 100th birthday celebrations in April.
The 70-minute film directed by Peabody Award winner Rebekah Wingert-Jabi looks at Reston’s founding in 1964 as an inclusive community “in the middle of nowhere,” to the vibrant place it is today.
Wingert-Jabi and producer Suzi Jones hope to enter the movie into film festivals.
County planners are beginning Phase II of the Reston Master Plan Special Study about two years behind schedule.
Phase I, which looked at the how development should proceed in the areas surrounding Reston’s upcoming Metro stations, was completed late last year and approved by the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors in January.
Phase II will look at what kind of changes — if any — should happen to Reston’s neighborhoods, village centers and convenience centers, as well as some areas adjacent to Reston. Lake Anne Plaza, which underwent is own rezoning and revitalization process from 2006-09, will not be part of the study.
Reston founder Bob Simon’s idea for density and community was forged in a childhood apartment high above New York City’s Riverside Drive and in the green spaces of urban parkland.
Whether the idea was a good one, a not-so-good one, a half-hatched one or a groundbreaking one depends on who you ask.
And many people are asked — or at least answer — in the documentary Another Way of Living: The Story of Reston, VA. The 70-minute film by director Rebekah Wingert-Jabi was shown at a VIP screening Saturday night at Reston Community Center as part of the Founder’s Day celebrations.
Wingert-Jabi, a Peabody Award winner who shot about 250 hours of film for the project, hopes to enter the movie into national film festivals. After that, it will be available for the public.
The movie looks at founder Simon’s life and what inspired him to purchase more than 6,000 acres of Virginia  farmland in 1961 and plan an urban-style “New Town” in an era of neat lawns and tract homes.
It didn’t always go that well.
“The vision was correct, but his timing was terrible,” says former Fairfax County Executive J. Hamilton Lambert, one of many planners, architects and citizens interviewed in the film. “Putting a town in the middle of a field – people didn’t know how to take this field of dreams.”
Indeed, Reston had many ups and downs to get to the place it is today, with 60,000 residents, excellent amenities, and an important business and retail hub. Fifty different banks originally turned down Simon for financing. And in 1967, After Lake Anne and some of Hunters Woods were built, Gulf Oil took over the struggling operation and fired Simon.
“How could they fire him?” longtime Restonian and chair of the Reston Community Center Board Beverly Cosham wonders in her on-camera interview. “He WAS Reston.” Read More
