Cosm rides premium moviegoing wave with more immersive screenings

The next big thing in premium large format theatrical viewing takes inspiration from the stars.

Cosm, an immersive entertainment technology company, got its start programming planetariums — its name a combination of “cosmos” and “colosseum.” The company’s massive, domed screens first offered guests a view of the universe, now they mimic courtside seats at sports venues around the world and drop film fans into some of Hollywood’s most iconic sets.

At a time when the theatrical industry is seeing its biggest growth from the sale of premium large format, or PLF, tickets, Cosm seeks to offer a fresh take on an elevated viewing experience. And it’s quickly expanding both its footprint and its content library.

Since 2024, Cosm has opened four theaters — near Los Angeles, Dallas, Atlanta and Detroit — with a Cleveland hub set to open in 2027. These experimental venues have garnered the attention of sports fans, screening live matchups in an arena-like environment. Showings often sell out, according to Cosm.

More recently, Cosm has partnered with Hollywood studios like Warner Bros., now a part of Skydance, to bring the likes of “The Matrix,” “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory,” “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” and “It” to its locations. Cosm recently signed a deal with Universal, which will bring “Shrek” to its domes in December.

The agreements mark a lucrative new chapter for the privately held Cosm, expanding its audience reach and viewing opportunities beyond timed, live events.

As a privately held company, Cosm doesn’t disclose its financials. Tickets cost anywhere from $18 for a matinee to around $70 for prime seats or in-demand showings. That doesn’t include added fees for concessions or items from special, themed menus tied to screenings.

Sony invested $100 million in the company in June, taking a minority stake and placing Sony Pictures Entertainment Chairman and CEO Ravi Ahuja onto its board of directors.

Cosm also counts among its investors Cosm chairman Steve Winn’s firm, Mirasol Capital; former Milwaukee Bucks co-owner Marc Lasry’s Avenue Sports Fund; Rocket Mortgage co-founder Dan Gilbert’s Rock; and David Blitzer, managing partner of the New Jersey Devils and Philadelphia 76ers, who invested through his firm Bolt Ventures.

“Cosm is really early in its growth trajectory at the moment, and we saw an opportunity to partner with the company at, what I would say is at, a very important stage in its development,” Jay Levine, chief strategy and business operations officer at Sony, told CNBC. “They have about five locations with the goal of a pretty significant rollout. And the real reason why we did it was it gave us a lot of exposure to a growing distribution and what we deem an experiential platform that we think has long-term potential.”

Sony has made several plays in the theatrical space in recent years. It bought Alamo Drafthouse in 2024 and entered a long-term lease to reopen and restore the iconic Cinerama Dome in Los Angeles in July of this year.

“Our experiences strategy is around tech, it’s around fandom, and it’s around new and innovative approaches to content distribution,” Levine said. “For us, we’re all about these differentiated experiences.”

Cosm’s 87-foot-diameter, concave screens drop viewers into the middle of the action, whether it’s an NFL game or inside the world of “The Matrix.” The company’s forthcoming Cleveland location will have an even bigger dome, at 100 feet in diameter.

The experience is akin to that of the Sphere in Las Vegas, which has garnered headlines since opening in 2023 for hosting high-profile concerts and events.

“People absolutely love to live out what they love in fandom, just like wearing a sports jersey,” Alexis Scalice, head of Cosm Studios, told CNBC. “And I love that I’m seeing that same behavior happen with cinema.”

Stadium-style seating is nestled within each Cosm dome, with booths and tables set on each level. The dome’s width is such that it fills much of the viewer’s periphery, giving the sensation that they are part of the on-screen environment.

The Los Angeles and Dallas locations have capacity for around 350 seats each, while the newer domes in Atlanta and Detroit have up to 500 available seats. Cosm has not shared how many seats the Cleveland location will have, but with its larger screen it is expected to have a larger number of seats.

For live sports events, Cosm has specialty cameras mounted in arenas that broadcast back to the dome, creating the illusion of being on the field of play.

For theatrical features, the film is played in a large rectangle in the center of the dome and the background is transformed to extend the scene.

In Cosm’s presentation of “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone,” for example, during the iconic scene where thousands of Hogwarts acceptance letters flood through the fireplace and into a living room, the background is swarmed with animated envelopes.

Cosm has partnered with experiential production company Little Cinema and creative studio MakeMake to create the visuals and environments for each scene of a film released in the dome. From storyboarding to post-production, this process can take up to a year as Cosm, the participating studio and the visual effects artists craft and render each moment.

“We really work hard not to take away from the story, so the film remains the hero in the narrative,” Scalice said. “Working very closely with Warner Bros. and our creative partners to make sure that we’re not detracting too much from the story, but we’re enhancing those moments for more elevated emotional response.”

With the exception of “It,” which was released in 2017, Cosm’s theatrical offerings thus far have been films that were released decades ago and that typically have long-established fan bases.

That helps Cosm leverage what Scalice called “that nostalgia factor” — “parents coming in that … grew up on this, and they want to share it with their children.”

“We can reinvigorate these legendary films,” she added.

Cosm has dabbled across genres — horror, fantasy, science fiction — and also demographics — family-friendly and R-rated. “Shrek,” set to debut Dec. 16, will be its first foray into animation.

“The thing that’s so incredible about it is everybody thought initially it’s just going to be working for sports, and when you look at what they’ve done, a lot of the titles with ‘Harry Potter,’ with ‘Shrek,’ and some of the other ones, I mean, the fill rates are actually incredible,” Sony’s Levine said.

These elevated offerings — think Imax, Dolby Cinema, ScreenX and 4DX — have bigger screens and better sound or introduce a unique experience, such as moving seats and fog machines. They’re particularly popular with Gen Z and millennials, who’ve yet to be deterred by rising average ticket prices.

While an average standard movie ticket costs around $13, premium tickets average more than $18 each, according to data from EntTelligence.

Prices for Cosm’s events fluctuate based on showtime and venue, but on average it’s “higher than I think anybody really would have thought,” Sony’s Levine said.

Unlike Cosm’s sports offerings, which can also be viewed from outside the dome from its hall and deck viewing areas at a lower price, theatrical presentations are only available in the dome.

“They have no problem selling these tickets because people want to experience these things, like an immersive format,” said Mike Polydoros, CEO at cinema marketing firm PaperAirplane Media. “That is something they can’t get at home.”