bridgman,
Nickbuol's advice is good. If there's ambient light (never really dark), then a screen with some gain delivers lots of pop and contrast, but it does so at the expense of black levels and shadow detail.
Testing some samples is a great idea. We did some up at Axiom's listening room and over at Ian's place. You can usually find a material that you'll prefer--a compromise between contrast and "pop" with acceptable black levels and some shadow detail. Use a DVD image that you can freeze that has a wide range of brightness to shadow to black and have someone (maybe you could teach those cute dogs of yours..
.) hold each material in part of the image that has bright and dark areas. Pick the one you prefer. In our tests, even the screen material (cloth vs. vinyl) made differences.
Regards,
