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Downtown's Rooftop Drive-In Gets Booted From Its Location

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One of our favorite drive-ins Electric Dusk Drive-In (formerly known as the Devil's Night Drive-In) is looking for a new home.

Currently, the monthly drive-in event is held on top of a two-story garage at the intersection of 4th Street and Broadway downtown, and the movie is projected on an inflatable screen. At the current location, there's room for 80 cars (and if you don't get your tickets early enough, you can sit on the astroturf).

But that lot—owned by one of the most active groups downtown Pacific Investment Group—has been sold to a developer. It's being demolished to make way for a residential high-rise, according to the Los Angeles Times. Electric Dusk Drive-In was told last weekend that is has to vacate by April 14, so now it's scrambling to find a place to show "Goodfellas" on April 27.

Eric Heusinger, who runs Electric Dusk along with Darryl Semira, told the Times that while the current location had its charms, he's cautiously optimistic, "While this is kind of a scary time, feeling like we are rushed into having to make a change, it's also kind of exciting to see what the other opportunities and prospects might be. Whether we go into a park or there's some giant warehouse that we can operate out of, we're open to whatever that may be."

If you have suggestions about where Electric Dusk should head, the group would love to hear them. Yesterday it posted on its Facebook page, "We looked at a LOT of parking garages today. It wasn't very glamorous, but we did find a couple of possibilities!"

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