The owner of the Rio Theatre has cleared a major hurdle in the path to revamping the cinema as a multimedia concert venue, but provincial liquor laws may prove to be another obstacle.

Vancouver city council endorsed the Rio Theatre’s liquor-licence application at a meeting on October 20. The application still needs the sign-off of the provincial government. Rio owner and operator Corinne Lea expects the process, which began a year ago, to take about another month.

But Lea has been told that she won’t be able to operate even a part-time movie theatre with a liquor licence.

“We’re just trying to be an innovative, multimedia venue, and we just want to figure out how we can do that, and I was really surprised to hear that once we got our liquor primary licence that we would be limited to what we could do programming-wise,” Lea told the Georgia Straight by phone.

Lea said she’s still hoping to eventually screen some films there without serving alcohol. She plans to follow up with the province on what is permitted when the venue is not serving alcohol if the liquor licence is granted.

“I feel like I’m being forced to make a choice that doesn’t seem fair, and also it hurts my business,” she said. “We have a really passionate film fan base here who would be very disappointed if we didn’t show movies anymore.”

Lea sees the expansion of concerts at the East Vancouver venue as a way to remain financially viable when many single-screen cinemas are struggling to stay afloat.

"You can't survive just selling movies," she said.

In a report that went to city council on the Rio’s application, staff also expressed concern about provincial liquor laws determining that running a live-performance venue would preclude its operators from showing feature films.

“It’s one of the many archaic liquor laws at the provincial level that we think need to change,” Vision Vancouver councillor Heather Deal told the Straight.

Deal said city council has been advocating for a variety of changes to current regulations and will continue to work with the province on its wish list of changes.

Lea said she also intends to advocate for changes to provincial liquor laws that prohibit alcohol from being served during films.

"Of course it affects us directly, but I think it affects a lot of arts organizations," she said.

"So I feel it's something that I would definitely take the time to follow through right to the end until that law gets changed."