Vox Cinemas teams up with celebrity chef Gary Rhodes

Chef Gary Rhodes has teamed up with Vox Cinemas to launch Vox Theatre by Rhodes in Dubai. Lee Hoagland / The National

Vox Cinemas is set to turn up the luxury a notch with the new Vox Theatre by Rhodes, a partnership with British celebrity chef Gary Rhodes that will be launched in Dubai this September before it is rolled out across the region.

Cameron Mitchell, Vox chief executive, says: “While we do the VIP cinema better than anyone else, there’s a huge element missing, and that’s food. This year we’ll serve about 10 million customers food in our cinemas across the region, and we feel we need to lift our standards even further ... To have food in a cinema prepared to Gary’s standard is something we don’t feel anybody in the world is doing, not just the Middle East.”

Mitchell insists this is more than a simple franchising exercise, and that Rhodes will be involved in every aspect of creating the new Vox Theatres from scratch, from setting up the kitchen to training the staff and creating the menu, with occasional themed menus dedicated to big releases or premieres. The theatres themselves will be a step up from the existing Gold level. Each is expected to seat just 40 people, in recliners, with blankets and pillows.

Rhodes adds: “Although I have restaurants all over the world, this really is a completely different experience and completely new, and I really want to add the Rhodes touch to it.”

Speaking in the Gold Lounge of Burjuman Vox, he says: “We couldn’t be in better surroundings. Here is fantastic, it’s quite stunning, but wait until you see the whole new concept. We’re really going to take things to another level at Mall of the Emirates when it opens in September.”

Rhodes wasn’t giving too much away about what the new menu would offer, but he was predictably optimistic.

“We have a great international audience for cinema here, and I want to be able to offer something to please everyone. I don’t think any other cinema worldwide will be able to match this. I’ll also be keeping the food very simple and easy to eat. We’re not talking about sitting with a knife and fork with a steak in the cinema. I don’t want to interrupt the movie with my food, but at the same time, when the audience leaves the movie, I want them talking about the fabulous food, not just the movie.”