Newmark Theatre — Attraction in Portland

I loved EVERYTHING about this theater! Stunning building, a work of art! 🎨 Wow what an experience going to see Ilana Glazer with my besties for my 🎂 birthday. Truly I have never felt more welcome at a theater in my whole life. First of all it's spotless, every single one of the staff members we spoke with were so friendly and obviously absolutely LOVE their jobs. I have never experienced customer service like this at a theater before. Lots of security made us feel safe and calmed my PTSD immediately, I never once felt unsafe in this building which is huge for me. So many smiling welcoming staff happy to assist in showing you to your seats, where the bathrooms are or any questions you can think of. Lisa helped us find our seats which were super comfortable and moveable. Lisa was super personable and fun to be around, she also told us where the short line bathrooms were after the show which we appreciated. I loved the gender neutral bathrooms and the free tampon/pad machines in all the bathrooms, way to be progressive! 👏 When we got to our amazing seats in the balcony I asked another staff member Rachel if there was a way to get a tie dye gift to Ilana that I had brought. She couldn't possibly come to PDX and not leave with a tie dye from a small women owned business after all! She said "Great question... let me find out!" Soon after Michael came over and said he would get it to his manager who would in turn give it to the artist manager. How kind! 💜 I laughed from start to finish and felt like I had done 3 ab day workouts in a row. 😂 Ilana is the Kween of comedy! ❤️ 🌹 I haven't laughed this much in soooo long and it felt amazing. Laughter is the best medicine! I love that this is a women owned theater also 🎭 💜. Well laid out merch area and bar. Prices were reasonable. I will definitely be back to support this wonderful business and will be telling everyone I know about it. Thank you to this AMAZING TEAM!! Well...

First of all, my review is not in anyway on the show we saw. The entertainment was exactly what I had hoped to experience. This review is of the Newmark Theater. The theater itself is beautiful and intimate. However, the "event staff", aka security, aka in-your-face rudeness that we experienced was enough for me to never return. Apparently someone in the audience may have been recording somewhere around me. But because the seats were vacant in front of me and thus easily accessed, the "security" selected me and my neighbors to reprimand. We all looked at her dumbfounded because none of us was even holding a phone in our hands or had one close by. When we questioned her accusations we were told "someone around here is recording, I KNOW IT." That was now the second pass through by her. The first time she pushed her way down the aisle behind us knocking our heads as she forced her way over people.

As a result, she has now taken a song about turning darkness into a new beginning and she's crammed the sentiment right out of the moment. Twice. I don't know who or if anyone was recording or not, but she disrupted about a dozen more folks because she KNEW IT was someone in our area.

No Newmark. Your staff is a direct reflection on your ability to welcome guests or squash 6 months of anticipation because of your part-time...

Bought tickets for the Kurt Elling show to go with a friend the night of my birthday (2/4/2022)... the website specified that all parties need to be fully vaccinated and masked, and that vaccinated means "either the two dose Moderna or Pfizer vaccines OR the one dose Johnson & Johnson". NO mention of the booster shot. I am fully vaccinated, yet have yet to get my booster, though I am scheduled now for this week. Got to the door and got declined entry. Didn't throw a fit, just went with the flow, but you MUST keep your information updated on your websites, especially with information as fluid as it is. Had I known I needed the booster to get in, I either would have scheduled it ahead of time, or not gone. The ticket-takers seemed to have no clue that the website didn't specify it. While I was calling my friend to let them know we couldn't go, I saw several other people get declined, and dealing with the same problem I had. I hope a refund is forthcoming and won't be difficult to obtain. A theatre of this caliber can't have mistakes like this. I feel bad for Elling, I would guess at least 25% of his patrons couldn't get into the show due to misinformation on the venue website. See two attached photos for what I paid for tickets, and information about the vaccine...