Friday Night

The downtown core of North American cities during the 70's and the 80's still had remnants of movie palaces standing within them. In the city that I lived in were the Palace Theater, The Place Theater, The Uptown Theater, The Grand and The Towne. These were ornate examples of the celebration of movie-going. Some of the theaters had auditoriums of up to 1100 seats. I was privileged to experience jam-packed auditoriums with people excited to see and excited to talk about the movie they were about to experience.

?I saw Star Wars, Apocalypse Now, Dumb and Dumber, a re-release of Lawrence of Arabia, When? A Stranger Calls, and many more in these temples of cinema. It was a heady time and a time when my passion for moviegoing was shaped. I was lucky to have been allowed to know, taste, and feel what movie-going is all about. These movie palaces had a distinct dynamic, a certain smell, and a spiritual envelope that embraced you.

Multiplexes never even came close to the same feeling. To this day I still proclaim that the number of auditoriums a theater should have is no more than three. These multiplexes took much away from the grandeur of movie-going. The circuit that put up these theaters was more interested in process than experiences. There was a dilution that occurred when you attempted to present 12 plus distinct movie titles in a single premise. The stories that the multiplex told were far different than that of the movie palaces. The multiplexes said, we have a lot of movies, the movie palaces said we have great movies.

I was lucky to work at a movie palace. I was a front-of-the-house usher at what used to be a 1400-seat vaudeville house.? I had a gold jacket and a little black clip-on bow tie. I had to wear dress shoes with black pants.? Two movies played at one time. There was an upstairs auditorium which was converted from a huge balcony and then there was a much larger main floor auditorium. The ticketing area was a storied oval-shaped booth with space for 4 ticketing positions. It was deeply ornate draped in gold plaster and encased in glass. There were always two people working inside that booth.

I stood just before the staircases leading to the second auditorium, taking tickets and answering questions. There was always a 7:00 PM show and a 9:30 PM show. The show at 7 did 70% of the business, but frequently we would be sold out and the audience would spill over into the 9:30 show. We would have matinees every day at 2:00 PM which would be moderately attended. On the weekends though, frequently the matinee would be sold out.

We were proud to show the movies and excited to see the reaction of the audience. When we played the original Ridley Scott’s “Alien" I would frequently race upstairs to hear the audience react to the chest-burster scene. The shock and the screams would be electrifying. The proximity of the audience members to one another amplified the reaction to the movie. I have written quite a few times about watching “When A Stranger Calls” directed by Fred Walton and how the audience provided so much to the viewing experience. The audience created an electric viewing experience.

When it was my turn to close the theater, I was handed a bunch of keys and would thank the audience for coming, inspect the auditoriums and bathrooms to see if there were any stragglers left in the theater. After inspection, I would lock the top and bottom deadbolts on the front glass doors and begin to clean up.? This was my favorite time at the theaters.? I was alone. I was able to explore.

The magic of a projection booth built in the 1930s, the herculean fire doors, Neumade splicers, and rewinds bolted onto a wooden desk, the lingering smell of the carbon arcs for a dyed-in-the-wool movie junkie, was intoxicating.? I lingered and explored.

One day I tried a key on a door in the lobby, and it opened. I turned on a light switch, a large lamp went on, and a set of stairs was revealed. This was the furnace room. It was huge. I cautiously headed down the stairs and saw in front of me treasure after treasure rivaling the Masonic horde in National Treasure. Pressbooks going back fifty years to the 1930s, old projectors, posters, and broken seats. I spent hours going through all this material and it provided me with a perspective that I hold on to to this day.

I was gifted with a unique perspective of what a movie was, what it has become, and what it could be. There is a sacredness to the collective experience of watching a movie together. From comedy to horror to drama, movie-going is set on fire by the community.

There was something unique in sitting in an auditorium with 400 other people and watching a movie. It is an experience unlike anything else.

When the circuits started to shut down movie palace after movie palace, it was something that should have been warned against. All the movie palaces were shut down in my city and on a Friday, the streets would empty and a decentralization began to occur. Big box stores erupted, and small businesses were forced to close. A vengeance of sorts was visited upon big box stores by Amazon. The multiplex suffered as did the mall economy. The media powers that be hope that consumers will cocoon in their homes, stream movies, consume, and be content.

As for me, I am haunted by what was. This torch that was lit decades ago still is bright and still shines. I know what movie-going is and I know how damn important it is.