Partners Mike Sodano and Nancy Sabino have big plans for an expanded Showroom. Photo by Mary Walton

By Charles Layton

Ocean Grove del Norte (or Asbury Park as some people call it) just keeps getting better. We thank our lucky stars that the heart of Asbury’s cultural rebirth is happening right across the footbridges from us. And this spring — hopefully sometime in June — we film freaks are in for a special treat. That’s when The Showroom moves into a new and larger space, directly across the street from its present location at 708 Cookman Avenue. Instead of just a single theater, as now, they’ll have three — one seating about 70, another seating 25 and then a place upstairs in what they’re calling “a VIP screening area,” which will accommodate about 12 people. (Their present theater seats about 50.) Since they opened in April of 2009, owners Nancy Sabino and Mike Sodano have offered the kind of original movie fare that you really can’t find anywhere else near here. “We definitely have found our niche to be very independent arthouse films,” says Sabino, “and generally they’re movies that have just opened in New York and they haven’t found a home in New Jersey in any of the larger movie complexes. We’ve been doing very well to pull in foreign films or documentaries that for one reason or another don’t fit onto the bigger screen.” To our knowledge, The Showroom was the only place hereabouts to show Albert Nobbs, which had three Oscar nominations including one for best actress. Actually, that was one of The Showroom’s more mainstream offerings. It’s mainly known for being quirky, avant garde and unpredictable. Here’s what the new theater is expected to look like: The demolition of the old building is complete now, and construction starts soon. Sodano and Sabino are unclear as to exactly when the new space might open — “Renovation is not a perfect science,” Sabino says — but they’re hoping for sometime in June. The plan is to provide not only movies but also live entertainment. “We’d love to have intimate acoustic performances, small theater productions, and comedy,” says Sabino. Because of its uniqueness, The Showroom already draws people from as far away as New York City and Philadelphia. “Our regular clientele is really expanding,” Sodano says. They’ve been written up in the Newark Star-Ledger, New Jersey Monthly and elsewhere. It doesn’t hurt that this particular area of Asbury Park has a good collection of restaurants, art galleries and other shops. Some of the Asbury restaurants — including Trinity and the Pope, Plan B, Ivan and Andy’s Steak House, Tim McLoone’s Asbury Grill and The Tides — cooperate with The Showroom on special “dinner and a movie” deals — 30 bucks for a three-course meal plus a movie ticket. And here’s something else to look forward to: Just down Cookman, across from Old Man Rafterty’s, yet another moviehouse is in the works. “Our plan is to put in a four-screen cinema there,” says Trip Brooks, project manager for the site. He said construction on those cinemas might start in about three months. This place will be less of an indie arthouse and more like the Clearview in Red Bank. “Construction will probably take about a year,” Brooks says. “We still have to go back to the Planning Board with more designs on that.” Once that comes on line, Ocean Grovers will never again have to drive to Red Bank for a night on the town. We can just stroll across one of the Wesley Lake bridges and be right where the action is.