OCEAN CITY — The night sky over Ocean City will see a major change starting this weekend when the new value-added special promotion 100 Nights of Lights premieres.
Earlier this winter, TEAM Productions, which produces many of the value-added special events in the summer, pitched a new concept to the Mayor and Council. Team Productions’ Bob Rothermel and son Jonathan presented the proposed 100 Nights of Lights event, a nightly show on the south end of the Boardwalk that will light up the resort sky several times a night from Memorial Day to Labor Day.
The special event will feature a dozen large spotlights with filters of various colors lighting up the sky in the resort. The spotlights are mounted on trusses installed on the beach east of the Boardwalk on the south end of the resort.
The 100 Nights of Lights will feature 12 spotlights, each with 4,000-watt bulbs, in six displays. The displays will be featured six times a night, roughly every 20 minutes, from 9-11 p.m. The spotlights have been installed on trusses on the beach near the Boardwalk and are ready for their first light show. Rothermel said this week the first 100 Nights of Lights show is set to go off on Saturday as planned.
“We believe this will create iconic images,” Rothermel told the council when he pitched the idea in February. “It will feature giant spotlights, like searchlights at a Hollywood premiere, only our premiere is going to be every night. We’ll use the colored lights to paint the beach and Boardwalk from North 1st Street to Caroline Street.”
A rendering of the 100 Nights of Lights event. Submitted Photo
For each of the last five years, Ocean City has contracted with Rothermel and TEAM Productions to produce a myriad of free, family-friendly special events throughout the summer from the fireworks displays downtown, the laser shows downtown, Sundaes in the Park at Northside Park and OCToberfest around Halloween. The intent is to bring more visitors to the resort and provide them with free value-added special events.
In each of the last five years, the town has funded the special events with a $300,000 line item in the annual budget earmarked for the Tourism Advisory Board (TAB). In the past, TAB has reviewed and recommended the special events package and the allocation of the $300,000 to pay for it. The allocation for special events comes through a funding mechanism tied to the room tax collected in the resort.
