Visit the 8th Seat in Row BB and say hi to BB-8

Every once in awhile we like to toss out some bragging rights, and with this weekend’s opening of “Star Wars: The Force Awakens“ we found a fun reason to.

Should you be in the Los Angeles area between now and Feb 7th, and are planning on seeing the new Star Wars film at the historic El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood, be sure to head up to the balcony for a fun photo-op in Row BB, Seat 8.

Beyond the Marquee’s own Founder & Creative Director; Steve Czarnecki dreamt up a fun concept for the theater a couple months ago, that has become a reality and was installed just in time for the epic opening day of the new film.

Click ahead to read about the BB-8 theater seat and check out some pics below. 

Star of the Force Awakens, BB-8 rolls along the desert planet of Jakku

BB-8 the new little rolling ball-droid that has captured the hearts and imagination of kids and grown up fans alike, is one of the biggest non-human stars of this Christmas holiday’s ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens‘. From action figures, t-shirts, an app controlled miniature version and more, BB-8 is everywhere, and Steve explains how he helped give this little droid a home in the El Capitan Theatere.

“It was October 19th, the day that tickets went on sale for the Force Awakens. I managed to finally get thru to an operator at the El Cap theater because the site had crashed with everyone trying to purchase tickets at the same time” Czarnecki said. “So while talking to the girl at the theater and picking out my seats, she offers up some good ones in the balcony, in Row BB. Immediately, my mind races and I had to ask if that row contained a Seat #8. She confirmed that it indeed did. That’s all I needed to hear. I secured my tickets, hung up the phone and immediately Photoshopped an image of a theater seat with BB-8 on it and emailed it over to a friend at the El Capitan, joking that this would be a seat I’d love to sit in. He loved it, claiming he thought it was Awesome!”

Original Design and the Final In-Theater Product

“His excitement was all that I needed and I decided to take it a bit further and created a sort of one page visual pitch, adding in some fun ideas on how those fortunate to end up in the BB-8 seat, would be the lucky recipients of some cool BB-8/Force Awakens prizes offered up by the theater. Anyway, I sent it over and he ran with it, turning it around and pitching it to the Disney Theatrical Marketing team and given the Green-light soon after.” Steve says.

The expanded one-page visual pitch for the BB-8 in-theater seat that sold the idea through.

And sure enough, almost 2 months to the day, Steve got an email that morning of Friday December 18th, that his idea had become a reality. That evening Czarnecki and his family visited the theater to not only watch the new movie, but to check out the new BB-8 seat.

“I love robots, R2-D2 is one of my all-time favorite Star Wars characters, so it was pretty cool to see this quirky idea of mine about my new favorite droid in the Star Wars galaxy, coming to life. I mean, it’s just a chair with a printed robot on it right? But guests were coming in and lining up to take pictures with it. It was fun to watch people in the AA, BB and CC rows in front of, besides and behind it, realize what it was on the seat. It’s also been fun to watch images of it show up on-line on Reddit and on people’s Twitter or Instagram accounts. Definitely a proud moment, and my kids were having fun pointing out to people checking it out, that their dad came up with the idea.” Czarnecki said.

BB-8 Theater Seat, installed in the balcony of the El Capitan theatre

The installed BB-8 seat opened up, ready for you to sit and watch the Force Awakens upon…

Czarnecki has also come up with other fun marketing ideas like the TRON-O-RAIL and Toy Story 3 Interactive In-Theater Photo-Op display for Disney during his 8+ years with the studio’s Motion Picture Creative Marketing team.

“I’m a Creative Content Producer and a Promotions/Marketing idea guy, crazy things like this come up all the time in my head, but trying to find the right outlet, connection or opportunity to bring them to life is more challenging than you’d think. So to have not only had a connection at the theater, but one with enough pull to make the idea manifest, well how could I not be delighted and honored?” Steve says. “With all the fantastic marketing and promotion the film has done outside the theaters for the movie, it was really cool to produce an idea that fans will get to enjoy once on the inside. Plus it’s exclusive just to the El Capitan which I think is even more special. To imagine that some lucky Star Wars fans will either willingly or by chance end up in that seat for their 1st experience seeing the Force Awakens, and how cool will that be for them to have that moment enhanced by finding themselves in this BB-8 seat!” Czarnecki said.

The BB-8 seat is a permanent fixture in the theater thru it’s run of February 7th, 2016 at the El Capitan Theatre. Check out more info about the theater and showtimes at: https://elcapitantheatre.com/

Matt Denton one of the the electronic design and development supervisors for the BB-8 droid in Star Wars: The Force Awakens, poses with the BB-8 seat at the El Captain theater in Hollywood.

A Twitter user Tweets about ending up in the BB-8 seat!

Reddit users discuss the BB-8 seat on-line

The Bb-8 seat honorably mentioned in a visual recap of the El Capitan’s viewing experience offerings

A fan is elated to find the BB-8 seat during her movie going experience

Seat Creator Steve Czarnecki and the BB-8 theater chair