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 Advance ticket sales ruled out for 'Menace' April 3, 1999 By Rob Owen, Post-Gazette TV Editor MEMO: We're counting down to the May 19 premiere of "Stars Wars: The Phantom Menace" (aka "Episode 1") with a weekly update. You won't be able to purchase tickets to the new "Star Wars" movie early in May. Lucasfilm has posted a notice on the official Web site (www.starwars.com) saying there won't be advance ticket sales until the film has been in release for a while. "We believe the best way to make tickets available, to be fair to all of you, is on a same-day, first-come, first-serve basis for the first two weeks," wrote Tom Sherak, chairman of Twentieth Century Fox, the film's distributor. For fans that announcement is a mixed bag. On the one hand, it's good that scalpers won't be as likely to take advantage of film buffs eager to see the movie, but it also means some devotees will line up at theaters days in advance. Tom Petropoulos, 28, a free-lance videographer from Mt. Lebanon, plans to start a line the Sunday before opening day at the Carmike 10 in South Hills Village. "Everyone's in the same boat, we're going to have to stand in line," Petropoulos said. "But I don't think anyone around here will camp out for a month before like they are in LA." So far Petropoulos has about 30 people who have expressed an interest in lining up to see the movie. He said the Carmike 10 was selected because it showed the two trailers for "The Phantom Menace" and it has the type of digital sound system George Lucas prefers. Anyone interested in joining Petropoulos and his group can e-mail him at bladerunner_25@hotmail.com.
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