The Commodore Theatre — Attraction in Portsmouth

My husband and I have been wanting to go to this establishment for a while. We chose Avatar and attended the 7 pm showing last night (December 31st, 2022)

Tickets: The process of purchasing tickets was a seamless process. However, being able to purchase tickets online would be ideal. Arriving an hour and 15 minutes early is not sustainable. When you arrive, the staff arranges you in the order you came and you purchase tickets in that order.

Seating: The seating process was also seamless. When purchasing tickets, you’re shown a seating chart and you pick your seats/table from there. The comfortability of the seats are just okay, so for a three + hour movie, it’s not the best experience.

Menu: For being a dinner and a movie establishment, this is where the Commodore severely drops the ball. The food is terrible - and that’s an understatement. We ordered several items: the fried shrimp, chicken planks, a cesar salad, the commodore salad, hot apple cider, and a seafood chowder. The fried shrimp tasted like it came straight out of a precooked frozen box, the chicken planks also tasted the same, the lettuce was withered on both salads and the dressings were super watery and had no flavor. The hot apple cider was clearly a drink mix that didn’t dissolve all the way, and the seafood chowder tasted like it came straight from the can. Please do yourself a favor and BYPASS that menu with all deliberate speed. Also, the fact that the menu has “fine dining” as it’s heading is a clear SIN.

Service: I completely understand that there’s a staff shortage everywhere. So my expectations weren’t high coming into this. However, having several members of the staff conversing loudly and laughing during the movie was not okay. If it were movie attendees being loud, that would be one thing. But actual employees cutting up during a movie that we paid decent money for? NOT OKAY. Y’all have to do better than that.

Suggestions to management:

Partner with local restaurants to do week-long residencies. For example, Freemason does the cuisine for the movies showing through the first week of January, Gourmet Burger Bistro does it for the following week and so forth. I think this will be a great way to get local establishments through the door and will also give your clientele a variety of food offerings. If that’s not sustainable, I highly suggest getting an in-house chef that does a complete revamp of your menu and knows how to use seasoning and fresh ingredients.

Your phone ordering system is very antiquated. Consider developing an app (or sourcing an app that already exists) that allows guests to order their drinks + meals. For the guests who don’t want to download the app, they should be able to go to a physical kiosk where they can order prior to the movie starting.

Having your staff walk through the theater AFTER the movie has started to pass out bills and collect payment is aggravating to your guests. Payment should be collected BEFORE the movie starts to allow minimal disruption during the movie.

The lamps are too high on the table. Guests cannot see over them and thus have to move to either side of the lamp in order to see the movie screen. They’re too bulky for the small table you all provide, consider downsizing them and making them DIMMABLE.

I hope y’all (management/ownership) are able to take this feedback and make some much needed changes. And I hope if y’all (guests) are considering going to this establishment, that this review gives you a thorough breakdown of the...

November 12, 2022. Third time at the Commodore not such a charm. While attending the 7:00 PM showing of Wakanda Forever with a party of six, we ordered off the menu as had been done on previous visits. This time I ordered the Chef Salad with Ham and Turkey. The show was just beginning as my Salad was brought to the table. Lights dimmed and I applied the Ranch dressing and began to cut into the meats and veggies. I began to eat and was enjoying what I thought was a healthy meal. on about the fourth forkful or so I realized something other than salad had come up as I began to chew. i removed the fork from my mouth and ask my wife to shine her cell phone light at my plate. we found a long strand of hair tangled with the fork and the food in the plate.

Grabbing the closest passing waiter, I showed him the fork, hair and partially eaten salad. The waiter advised that he would take the plate and have the charge deducted from the bill and as he left he asked what type salad I had ordered. Being a little flustered at the moment, it slipped my mind and he said he would figure it out. Being a small business owner myself and trying to provide the best customer service possible, I was under the impression the Commodore was in the same league. I waited patiently under the impression that a new salad was being prepared. I got the attention of another passing waiter and explained what had happened. The second waiter advised that he understood and would go see if a new salad was being made. The second waiter returned and stated that no new salad was being made and the plate with the hair would be deducted from the check. the customer service advocate in me says yes the charge for the hairy plated should have been deducted as well a fresh non-hairy salad plate should have been made.

Because of this experience on top of my wife and myself missing the opening scene to the movie dealing with it is why I give three stars tonight. I would visit the theater again due to good atmosphere and a unique viewing experience. I believe the Commodore could raise the customer service bar a little when it comes to food service...

The theater is nice. We’ve been here numerous times. However, this time not so nice. Like I said, the theater itself is Nice. But as for the food, my God, it’s abysmal the theater stands alone. Nothing you need to do except push a button to start the movie. And obviously keep it clean, which it appears to be.

But really if you’re going to serve food Do it and do it well. We ordered five different things, four of which I should’ve gone into the kitchen and threw it at the so-called chef. I’m sure there is not one.

We ordered a large buttered popcorn. I think it was yesterday’s. It was stale and had No flavor. Now I ask you how could freshly popped buttered popcorn have no flavor and be stale. Bland movie popcorn what the heck.

My wife had a fruit plate, which I must say was nicely prepared and we enjoyed it.

My grandson had a barbecue sandwich. It was cold. The buns were like bricks that’s not a joke. I’m very serious.

I myself had a Caesar salad. The top of the salad was OK when I got into the guts of it. It was a lot of brown salad. I was so pissed.

I also had fish and chips. Now Having been on this earth for almost 60 years. I’ve had a lot of fish and chips. I also know what happens when you deep fry stuff in oil that is not up too temperature. You have a tendency to leave it in too long, which I’m sure is what they did. I honestly could’ve lubricated the bottom of my car with the amount of oil in this fish. The fillets are not supposed to be a dark brown with a crumbly batter. Unless this was pre-done and just refried which now I think about it could explain it, but I don’t know.

Needless to say if anybody in management actually reads this review, they need to make some changes unless it’s the management themselves causing this. In which case maybe the city of Portsmouth needs to make some changes and who’s...