LA County Restaurants, Movie Theaters Hoping For Busy Weekend

LOS ANGELES (CBSLA) — Brew Brothers restaurant in North Hollywood was gearing up Friday afternoon for a big weekend.

"Good times and, you know, happy beginnings," Elsa Anderson, the manager, said.

Anderson said she was excited to reopen with indoor dining for the first weekend in more than eight months.

"To be able to see people inside and greet them and talk to them and just kind of a little bit back to somewhat normal," she said.

And while restaurants will be allowed to allow diners indoor, they will have to keep capacity to 25% and some might still prefer eating outside, though Anderson said she thinks customers are ready to come inside.

"I would sit outdoors usually, but now since we can't do something, of course you want to do that," Anderson said. "So I think people more gravitate to that and just like, 'Oh my God, we haven't been able to do it for so long, let's do it!'

RELATED: More Movie Theaters Reopen Across LA County Friday For First Time In A Year

Movie theaters are also hoping for a blockbuster weekend, even though they must still operate at 25% capacity or 100 people — whichever is fewer — and masks will be required unless patrons are eating or drinking.

AMC has announced that when patrons book a seat, the computer system will automatically block out the surrounding seats to maintain social distancing.

One AMC in Porter Ranch will be celebrating it's long-awaited grand opening this weekend, originally set for March 2020 — just days after the pandemic hit.

AMC said all 25 of its theaters in L.A. County would be reopening and Cinemark has opened 10 of it's LA-area theaters.

"The theater experience definitely is much different," Siyana Ramzy, a theatergoer, said.

Also on Friday, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health reported 756 newly confirmed COVID-19 cases and 60 deaths, bringing countywide totals to 1,213,288 cases and 22,722 deaths.

Health officials also announced that nearly 3,235,000 COVID-19 vaccine doses had been administered to L.A. County residents. Of those vaccinated, 1,057,794 people have received second doses and 25,170 people received the single dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine

There were 861 COVID-19 patients hospitalized, 28% of whom were being treated in the intensive care units. With testing results available for nearly 5,994,000 individuals, the county's overall positivity rate was holding steady at 19%. Friday's daily test positivity rate was 1.7%.