I have a theory about the new Sundance Theater here in Madison, Wisconsin.

This is how I look while explaining a theory... specifically, how I look at the Sundance Theater bistro while explaining my theory -- which is mine! -- about the whole Sundance Theater enterprise.

I mean, check out this place:



This is upstairs, in case you want to get something to eat and drink before the show. Relax and mellow out. You won't have to worry about going down in time to get the seat you want, because you've got a ticket with the seat number on it, a seat you selected on a touch screen computer down at the box office. And don't worry if you don't have a dining companion to amuse with your theories. Go to the restaurant alone. There's WiFi. And think about it: you should go to that café downstairs all the time and hang out, use the WiFi, drink some coffee, and just see if you get in the mood to drift over into one of those arthouse-type cinema concoctions they're always showing.

Mmmm... but isn't this kind of... mmmm... elitist? I thought Robert Redford selected Madison for its lefty politics. Who's going to this place, anyway? How much money did you drop there? Who are these people?

Ooohhh.... look... trees:



This place is so... green!

See my theory?

What a fabulous commercial niche for the wily old Redford! What a perfect merger of left-and-right-winginess as aesthetic pleasure and refuge from the riff-raff are served up in perfect style. From the right, the aesthetes and sybarites will show up and bring their money because it's beautifully designed to dispense film art, and the lefties can set aside their worries about elitism and bring their money because it's Redford and it's green and it's lefty.

Ah. Enough theorizing. Let's say goodbye to the waitress and go downstairs to see the movie "Waitress." But first, let's pause in the stairwell to rake the Zen garden:



And now, to our supremely comfortable reserved seats. There will be no commercials, no piped-in music, just a perfectly charming and subtle animation occupying the screen to maintain the purity of our aesthetic experience: