Remembering Good Times at the Cinema

Ron said:
Popcorn and soda seem to taste better in a theater too. Here's a question for you, JediMichael . There's the main concessions stand in the lobby and then there's sometimes an auxiliary one(s) located further in closer to the theaters. I can't recall ever seeing an auxiliary one open. How frequently were they used while you were working?
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When it first opened, they used those on the weekends, I think they quickly realized it just took so much time and money to have the 2 extra stands open. It takes around 2 hours just to clean everything like the poppers.
By 2003 or 04, they had the counters removed and walls built, but more poster frames were added.
 
Ron said:
There's the main concessions stand in the lobby and then there's sometimes an auxiliary one(s) located further in closer to the theaters. I can't recall ever seeing an auxiliary one open.
Click to expand...
I myself only saw one open 1 single time ever. Always so close, but so far away at the same time.
Ron said:
I totally get the turnoff of someone munching popcorn in your ear or talking or my "favorite"; cheering.
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Yeah, noisy crowds are the worst. That being said, I did reluctantly see the first ******* at the theater and it was the best experience I could have asked for. Everyone was rowdy, groaning and yelling in all the right ways at all the right times that it actually enhanced the movie for everyone, due to the chaos of the patrons. Never experienced anything like that before or since.
 
RModin said:
I myself only saw one open 1 single time ever. Always so close, but so far away at the same time.

Yeah, noisy crowds are the worst. That being said, I did reluctantly see the first ******* at the theater and it was the best experience I could have asked for. Everyone was rowdy, groaning and yelling in all the right ways at all the right times that it actually enhanced the movie for everyone, due to the chaos of the patrons. Never experienced anything like that before or since.
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For sure. Comedies are the exception where a lively crowd makes it more enjoyable.
 
We also were threatened with being thrown out if we didn't shut up when we were chanting "Dodgeball, dodgeball..." during the pre-previews filmstrips. We had a dodgeball team, so this was right up our alley. Someone (rightfully) complained to the manager, all the lights were turned on, and we got a right talking to. Wouldn't have made any noise during the movie, but I fully realize what little a-wipes we were being. So yeah, rowdy crowds are terrible, even though I did it once, when I was dumb.
 
When was Good Times shown in theatres? ;p


Best part of working in s theatre was still wanting to go see movies. The Wall or Heavy Metal at midnight or getting to see BIG movies before the public. It was interesting to hear how folks who, for instance, worked in an ice cream store were bored of ice cream after a week.

Scarface sold out for 3 straight months
 
I believe I have posted this in the past here, but its totally fitting.
Another thing I did while working at the theater, was I would sometimes bring my video camera and make stupid videos. (Some that as I had said were for us to show in the theater to the employees) But, other videos that we would have gotten totally in trouble for.

So all the theater standees were suppose to be destroyed after it left the theater, some we kept, but the rest we had fun getting rid of.
I ended up making a whole 3 part series called, How to Destroy a Standee. Heres part 1.

 
JediMichael said:
When it first opened, they used those on the weekends, I think they quickly realized it just took so much time and money to have the 2 extra stands open. It takes around 2 hours just to clean everything like the poppers.
By 2003 or 04, they had the counters removed and walls built, but more poster frames were added.
Click to expand...

I remember the old theater that I had mentioned before was too small to have them, but the large Cinemark has two satellite stands on either end of the theater and I can't remember the last time I've seen them open. I believe it was used for really large crowds for big openings or movies that used to pack them in (all before streaming, of course). I think it was open for 300 (people were sat in the aisles for that one) but that was the last time I really recall it open for anything.
 
Heres part 2.
I actually uploaded the original one around April 2006, although you can tell from the movies that the footage was even older.
Part 2 was October 2006, and part 3 was around March 2010.

 
JediMichael said:
I believe I have posted this in the past here, but its totally fitting.
Another thing I did while working at the theater, was I would sometimes bring my video camera and make stupid videos. (Some that as I had said were for us to show in the theater to the employees) But, other videos that we would have gotten totally in trouble for.

So all the theater standees were suppose to be destroyed after it left the theater, some we kept, but the rest we had fun getting rid of.
I ended up making a whole 3 part series called, How to Destroy a Standee. Heres part 1.

Click to expand...
This looks like the source of some great memories!
 
I probably have an old tape that has a shot of those back concession stands before removing them.
But, from that video above, this was when they had tore out the counters but hadn't made the walls yet, so we lined up these standees. Anyone could have just pushed one over and gotten into the back room where extra concession supplies were kept, minus the candy.

backlobby1.jpg


Here is a picture I found on google maps from May 2017. The woodgrain wallpaper is different than what they put back then, and the carpet.
My 8 years there, the wallpaper and carpets were changed at least once. By now its probably been changed serval more times.
You can also see where they had some of the videos games, but, for the theaters layout, it didn't work out so well, so that was actually walled over first.

backlobby.jpg
 
RModin said:
The amount of effort put into something you were only going to show coworkers is outstanding! Comedic commitment
Click to expand...
Yeah, that is very true.
I think I didn't mention that we would have these employee auctions about once a year, but we used fake money called regal bucks that were gained when a manager thought you were doing a good job on something. That would auction off a ton of the posters, but also had other prizes and gift cards and stuff. I filmed a bunch of them. Thats when I started making videos to show before it.
Here is one that was from real ads that showed in the lobby and theaters. We got SO sick and tired of seeing this, we made our own.
Unfortunately, the quality is very poor.

 
We didn't have much neon here, too. It was mostly fluorescent signage with the opaque acrylic placards over them. To this day, if I see any of them surviving in the wild, if they aren't an off color beige, it just doesn't seem right.
 
The most memorable standee I can remember was for Armageddon with a big digital countdown clock built into it. Looked sad after the movie opened, though, because the clock was permanently at all zeroes.
 

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