cosm

A few years ago, Jaleel White got really into game shows.

The actor, most widely known for his role as the nerdy, suspenders-pulling neighbor Steve Urkel on “Family Matters,” began appearing as a celebrity guest on shows like “25 Words or Less,” Anthony Anderson’s “To Tell the Truth” and “Pictionary” with Jerry O’Connell.

“I just enjoyed winning the money for the people,” White says. “It’s strangely equally gratifying.”

In Sunday Funday, L.A. people give us a play-by-play of their ideal Sunday around town. Find ideas and inspiration on where to go, what to eat and how to enjoy life on the weekends.

Soon, his longtime producer friend asked if he wanted to host a game show. He did. “Flip Side” is a survey-based competition in which two teamstry to determine how the majority of a crowd voted on various this-or-that questions for a chance to win $10,000. Its second season aired earlier this month.

White says that, in a way, hosting the show feels similar to being on a sitcom.

“When I did sitcom, I really felt the audience,” White says. “I really felt where the audience wanted to go emotionally in our storytelling, and I would play with it. I would consciously hear them and be like, ‘Milk that or dial that down.‘” He adds that he thrives off that “symbiotic” interaction, which is similar to engaging with contestants.

White is also developing a TV show based on his memoir, “Growing Up Urkel,” which was released last year.
While the Pasadena native’s Sundays during the NFL season are typically dedicated to Chargers games, he takes us along on his ideal day in L.A., which involves eating fluffy pancakes after church, checking out a show or game at the immersive venue Cosm and playing footgolf.

This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

9:30 a.m.: Sleep in, then head to church
If I’m not shooting “Flip Side,” so man, I might not get up before 9:30 a.m. I typically stay up late. I’m just a late-night person by nature. My mom said that she would stay up late a lot while she was pregnant with me, eating Mexican food, so I think biologically that turned me into a night owl, and I really appreciate great Mexican food [laughs]. If I’m on my game, I like to go to Oasis church on Wilshire. Shout to Pastor Julian. I think he’s one of the most underrated spiritual voices in the city, and he’s a pastor who wears Js, so that’s just kind of cool in itself to get the word like that.

Noon: Time for pancakes
If you want to have the best pancakes in the city after you go to church, [go to] Redbird, which is near downtown L.A. Their pancakes are crazy with the char on the edges. Not everybody makes them like that. I also like Takagi Coffee on West Third Street. It’s a Japanese cafe and they have soufflé pancakes. Those are my two favorite pancake spots to hit after church. We get screwed in the cost of living in L.A., but the cultural exchange that we experience daily is so taken for granted. In L.A., I just gave you an all-American spot and a Japanese coffeehouse after leaving a very diverse church.

2 p.m.: Experience a game or a show at Cosm
I rarely get to the movies these days and I feel terrible. I want to try to be like Kevin Bacon and encourage people to go to the movies and experience communal entertainment again. But one of my favorite places is Cosm in Inglewood. They are revolutionizing the sports bar business model. You can catch Cirque du Soleil with your family. You can catch a game. It’s just a big screen. It’s an experience that actually puts you on the field, so you feel like you’re actually at the game. Sometimes they get wild and they start shooting T-shirts with the T-shirt gun into the stadium seats.

5 p.m. Play footgolf
But if you’re on a budget, a really fun thing to do actually is to play footgolf. One of the best footgolf courses is at Rancho Park. It’s literally golf with your feet, a soccer ball and an oversized hole. We’ll go out there, smoke some purple, grab some snacks and just be out there like kids, betting on each hole [laughs]. That’s the adult way of doing it, but you can also do it with the kids. You can hit up a good taco truck beforehand. I think Mariscos Jalisco is my favorite taco truck. They make a crunchy shrimp taco that is just ridiculous.

8 p.m.: Order in from Goop
At this point, we’re kind of scrounging for dinner. I got to admit it, Gwyneth Paltrow be killing it with the Goop [Kitchen] order in. ’Cause I’ve eaten junk all day, so now I gotta start cleaning it up. Get yourself a salad from Goop, and really at this point, I’m probably on my couch trying to catch up on some binge TV with the lady and prepare for Monday.

11:30 p.m.: Binge TV until bed
On a Sunday, I can probably do a little bit better, somewhere around 11:30 p.m. or midnight. I’m going to get my series binge on, and we have to watch the highlights from the games that we just attended. I recently finished up “Forever” on Netflix and “Wednesday” is back. I’m such a kid. I love Tim Burton. I’m all over the place in my film and TV appreciation. People would be really shocked by what I enjoy.

When you watch “The Matrix” at Cosm, you’re essentially seeing a film within a film. A shot inside an apartment becomes a glimpse into an entire complex. A fight scene on a rooftop is now one small part of a giant cityscape. Look to the left, and a once off-screen helicopter is suddenly entirely visible.

Cosm has won attention and a fan base for its focus on sports programming. A domed, 87-foot-diameter wraparound screen surrounds audiences at the Inglewood venue, creating an illusion of in-the-flesh presence. Can’t make it to that NBA Finals or World Series game? Cosm wants to be your fallback plan, combining front-row-like seats with unexpected views.

And now, Cosm aims to redefine the moviegoing experience. A revival of “The Matrix” opens Thursday in what the company calls “shared reality,” a marketing term that ultimately means newly created CGI animation towers, over, under and around the original 1999 film. Cosm has in the past shown largely short-form original programming, and “The Matrix” marks its first foray into feature-length films.

Carrie-Anne Moss and Keanu Reeves in “The Matrix,” which is opening at Cosm with newly created CGI that surrounds the original frame.

(Cosm )

The hope is to not only see the film with fresh eyes but to create a sensation of being in the same environment as Keanu Reeves’ Neo, Carrie-Anne Moss’ Trinity and Laurence Fishburne’s Morpheus. “The Matrix” is an ideal film for this experiment, its anti-AI message decidedly topical while its themes grapple with dual visions of reality.

There’s been a host of so-called immersive ambitions to alter the moviegoing experience over the decades, be it the on-and-off flirtation with interactive cinema, a brief trend in the ’90s that recently lived again on Netflix (see “Black Mirror: Bandersnatch”), to more recent 4-DX theaters with movement-enabled seats (see the light, water and wind effects of “Twisters”). Cosm, like the bigger, more live music-focused Sphere in Las Vegas, seems to have a different pitch: an all-encompassing screen that can provide previously unexplored vantage points, even at times creating a theme park ride-like sense of movement.

Cosm’s interpretation of “The Matrix,” a collaboration with experiential creative agency Little Cinema, envelopes audiences from its opening action sequence when a nighttime view of a city skyline seemingly places us on a rooftop. Elsewhere, Neo’s office building becomes a maze of cubicles. The film’s centerpiece red pill versus blue pill moment centers the frame among oversized, glowing capsules. When Neo awakens, we are lost amid mountainous, industrial pods.

The challenge: To not make it feel like a gimmick, yet to also know when to pull back and let the film stand for itself. “The No. 1 core principle was to enhance and don’t overshadow,” says Jay Rinsky, founder of Little Cinema. “Metaphorically for us, the movie itself is the lead singer and we are the backing band. Let the movie be the star. Let it sing. And basically follow the key beats — follow the sound design, the emotional moments and enhance the action.”

The red versus blue pill scene in “The Matrix” is framed with newly created animation.

(Cosm)

The accompanying images get more aggressive as the film races toward its climax. The animations are most effective when they’re expanding the screen rather than echoing the action — showing us the viewpoint of a careening helicopter for instance, rather than repeating or mimicking a beat of the film. Having seen “The Matrix” before, I know the story and its cadence, and was perhaps more willing to turn my attention away from the film, which is placed in the center of the screen and often set within a picture frame.

In turn, I was dazzled by the scenes shot inside Morpheus’ hovercraft the Nebuchadnezzar, in which the vessel’s surroundings — its buzzing, electrical core and its assortment of monitors — are fleshed out around the screen. Film purists, I wonder, may balk at seeing images beyond the director’s vision — Rinsky says he hasn’t been in touch with directors Lana or Lilly Wachowski — but I found it could help build a world, especially for revival cinema on a second or third viewing.

A scene of “The Matrix” starring Carrie-Anne Moss is surrounded with an all-surrounding view of a skyline.

(Cosm)

Expectedly, the film’s final act becomes a bevy of secondary action. Bullets that fly off the frame of the film now find a landing spot, as building walls shatter and crumble around us. Cosm’s screen is crisp and encompassing enough that it can mimic movement or flight, and thankfully this is used sparingly, twisting only when the film’s characters take to the skies.

When Cosm opened last summer Chief Executive Jeb Terry stressed the venue wasn’t in the business of showing films, wanting to focus on sports or original programming. “We’re not a first-run theater,” said Terry. “We’re leaning into the experiential side.” Seemingly, “The Matrix” fits this plan, as the accompanying CGI images have been in the works since about August 2024, says Rinsky, with the bulk of the heavy lifting beginning in January.

Rinsky acknowledges “The Matrix” fits the format particularly well because it “plays in a realm of fantasy that allows you to change environments around,” but is quick to add that Cosm and Little Cinema hope to expand the program of enhancing Hollywood products. “It is a bit of a mission and a philosophy,” he says. “Every film in every genre has its own unique propositions and can be adopted and suited well. We’re excited about horror, and we’re excited about comedy.” Future projects have not yet been announced.

Cosm also has a venue in Dallas, with spots in Atlanta and Detroit on the way. Rinsky’s hope, of course, is that Cosm someday has enough market penetration that filmmakers can create the format from the ground up.

“I’m really bullish about this being the new cinema,” Rinsky says. “I think in five to 10 years, there will be 100 of these around. Once it hits scale, then big studios will have releases created specifically for this format.”

It’s an optimistic view of the future that’s arriving at a time of disruption in Hollywood, from shake-ups due to the streaming market to artificial intelligence. For Cosm, it’s the early days, but it’s a vision that needs neither a red nor blue pill. Its outlook is much more rose-colored.