oldjoe brings up an intesting question. Just how does the Music Hall rent out the space. What are the various options available?
When New Line rented the Hall did that include all seating areas, orchestra and all three mezzinees, or can one just rent the downstairs area. What about staffing such as stagehands and front of the house? What happens in a four wall agreement, etc etc.
I understand the need to close off the first mezzanine when a Digital movie is shown but I wonder if the other two can be used.
Any of our RCMH insiders care to enlighten us on how the Music Hall
rentals are handled. Also what happens when a name star holds a one night concert, is that usually four wall or does the Hall collect the money from ticket sales and charge a fee to the talent.
So many questions I know, but I think this would make for some interesting comments.
Bill, I recall being told on many an occasions not to talk to anyone, especially the press, about a movie we had screened before it opened. So it went beyond a question of a “code of ethics”,
the studios were/are a bit funny that way. We even had a few newspaper/TV critics who would get bent out of shape if word got out about a movie before “they” saw it and reviewed it.
A also loved your comments about how great it is to see a movie shown at the Hall, and how wonderful it would be to see that more often and open to the public. The whole idea just makes my heart go
pitter patter. :))
RCDTJ, A year or so ago I would have agreed with you. However there is a hugh push for Digital that has been growing rapidly this year.
It seems as though everyone is now aboard the Digital band wagon.
Do us a favor and don’t let them ever take those 5 projectors out of RCMH. Guard them with your life, post youself outside the booth door with a rifle if need be :))
Incidently I would love to be wrong and you wright about Digital growth and the demise of film. Bless you for trying to give us hope.
I am so glad I posed the original question regarding the screening the other night. We sure learned a lot of what whent on that evening and I wish to thank RCDTJ and REndres for their imput. Please guys keep that info coming, I love hearing about what is going on in the booth at RCMH.
Times are-a-changin that’s for sure.
Digital is here to stay and will just keep getting better. We have to acknowledge and accept the changes being made in the way we show movies. What is important is that movie theatres stay strong and survive, The new guys coming in to our industry want nothing to do with film, and as REnders pointed out more and more theatres are no longer putting film in the new locations. Many insiders I know predict that in only 3 or 4 short years, film will have gone the way of Vinyl records and video tape.
Those of us who worked in film will of course be sorry to see it all end, but ya can’t hold back progress, and at least we have our memories.
Thanks Rob for making some sense out of all this.
I had not thought about the problems of using the 7k lamps on a 35mm print. I just don’t get it, forgive an old man but we did just fine for all those years, and now they seem to be looking for much more profection then we ever did.
As for the picture size, I guess if “size matters” they got what they wanted. So more power to em.
It still seems a bit much and unnessary.
But what do i know, I am so old school.
William, I HAD my fun in the booth.
Roadshows,Cinerama,3-D and all the wacky wonderful gimicks of the 50s. Based on what I hear about what goes on in the booth today,
I think the fun is gone. That horse and pony show at RCMH with the screening the other night would have drove me nuts.
Hey RCDT, hows about next time you have a screening you invite Peter and I over to run it with you. No industry people allowed, tell em just drop the print off and get lost. leave the rest to us.
Oh, and REndres, you are invited as well.
We can show em how it should be done and have a hell-of-a lot of fun doing it.
Long live film indeed!
Did you run the film on a MUTT?
As to the tech prolems, I can recall many a roadshow dry run where there were just two many cooks in the kitchen. The more they tinkered the worse it got. BUT, we never spent 7 hours on it.
Why in the world were they paying with the audio levels. Couldn’t they just balance the channels and assume the mix on the track was done coreectly? In 70mm or 35mm for that matter, prior to the screenings, we simply ran levels, and later with Dolby, Pink noise and in about 45 minutes we were done.
It is unfortunate for RCMH mnagement not to address the exhaust system, it must have cost a unnecesary amount of money in man hours setting up that Digital, as opposed to the cost of an improved exhaust system.
They oversold the house???
Is that because they closed all the mezzanines and did not tell the folks handing out tickets??
I can’t take any more of this, thank God I retired.
Thanks for that info. What madness!
Do you not have 2 or 3 of the 35/70 projectors set up with 7k Lamp? For heavens sake, all they had to do was run the damn thing in 35mm reel-to-reel,they would have had plenty of light and not have to spend 7 hours seting the thing up. It sounds like they created a nightmare waiting to happen with that converged Digital setup.
Plus they would not have had to close the mezzanines.
I suppose the Digital equipment was set up in nthe first mezzanine?
Let me repeat, MADNESS!!
I have to say, and many will think, I have lost my mind, but i would have loved for that Digital set up to fail and blow up in their face forcing them to run film, which is what they should have doine in the first place.I sort of understand running Digital in some locations, like the Ziegfeld, it is quite good, But if you have to go to all the trouble as they did at the Hall, it just makes no sense to me at all. Oh, did I mention I thought this was MADNESS?
Justin, I have it on good authority that Summner will never die :))
By the way I am very proud of what Shari (not Sharon) has been doing with the theatres. She is very inovative and dedicated to keeping the movie business thriving.
Edgewater is a classic Multipex operation,but the Cinema De lux design is more in line with NA’s future plans. Long Island does have one,but we also have one in White Plains.
Garth, we did have plans for a renovation of Amboy back in 1991.
Then came Menlo Park and others, and suddenly the project was killed.
The folks at National Amusements are very good at what they do, the decision not to renovate turned out to be a good one.
Justin, The reason for putting the theatre in that location was due to the demise of the Drive-in theatres. The property was formally the Amboy Drive-In.
After Summner Redstone built the Sunrise Multiplex on the grounds of the old Sunrise Drive-In, it was only a matter of time befoe all of NA’s Drive-in locations became Multiplex theatres; the Last one being Hazlet in 1992. It was sad to see all the Drive-In theatres go, but from a pratical business sense it was inevitable.
Does anyof out RCMH insiders know how the “Sex and the City” movie is being projected tonight,film or digital.
What is going on that ghost town we used to call the projection room.
Here in Hawaii the picture opens on Friday and all the showings will be 35mm film.
I should mention that apparently Fox did not strike any magnetic stereo prints for the original release of “Planet of the Apes”.
I remember making a few calls at the time,
and was told “there ain’t any”.
I wonder if anyone ever did get their hands on one.
The ad posted by Mike is NOT Century’s Plainview it is the
RKO Plainview Twin which was located behind the Plainview Centre on South Oyster Bay Road. This building was converted into a Shoprite.
The more I think about this whole projection mess the more irritated I become.
A message to Craig from Clearview:
I know you read theses posts and I believe you owe it to the people who attend the classic movie showings to look into this.
As a professional projectionist with over 50 years in the booth under my belt, I can tell you with great authority that the people running the booth at the Ziegfeld are either up to no good or completely incompetent, either way they must be replaced. It is simply not possible for a professional projectionist to make a change over in a reel-to-reel operation and not notice the incoming reel is out of focus and worse yet not correct it. In fact, after complaints were made it was made worse. The same applies to the missed changeover, I am not buying it, and I think it was done deliberately. The man up there is a fool if he thinks for one moment those of us who know better can accept this outrage in a New York theatre, much less the Ziegfeld. For heavens sake, we can’t even get them to use the curtains, and please,“The curtain is broken"
is getting old.
Why deliberity? That’s simple, thy do not want to be bothered running reel-to-reel, and will stoop to any lengths to discredit the operation to avoid having to do it. They prefer the easy life of running a platter or a Digital presentation so as not to have to put in much effort. I can also tell you, the union must have plenty of projectionist who would jump at the chance to operate a show in that ole time format, they need to be found and put to work at the Ziegfeld then and put the current crew in the usher staff.
SHAME!
My goodness, how could I possibly not comment on that reel-to-reel story.
That theatre manager was either completely misinformed or part of a plot to disgrace reel-to reel showings. How sad to think that such a situation could exist in New York at the Ziegfeld. None of what he said made any sense, the one hour prep time, his explanation of the problem being caused by the “old reel-to-reel and calling it “retardedâ€.
Are the people at Clearview aware of the moron they have running the Ziegfeld? I won’ even go into the ridiculous idea that the focus issue could not be addressed or that running reel-to-reel had anything to do with it.
I will be writing a letter to someone I know at Fox, they need to know about this. I will ask that someone contact Clearview to look in to it.
I believe the whole situation is a plot by management and the projection staff, to create a problem that should not exist in order to gain support to eliminate reel-to-reel showings. There is just no other explanation. These idiots should not be in our business.
Well Sam, some of us would avoid the noise of the needle hitting the record by killing the volume at the end of the song and raising it again after the record was changed and the needle was safely on the next record.
That’s how anal we were about that :)
I forgot,33 and one third records, which were also very popular in the booth.
One more very important thing about pre show music (non sync)
NO VOCALS! music only.
You boys have great memories of the early scope days. We sure had fun in the booth putting on a show. Yes,it ws policy with some circuits to never show the masking move. As a matter of fact Century theatres insisted on Delux presentsations at all their theatres. Delux meaning closing the curtains between shorts, trailers etc, as well as bringing uo the stage lights, then opening the curtain and lowering the lights at the start of the feature. Another rule was “Never Cut a Record”, that meant you never faded a song out or cut it half way through to start the show. We would always wait for a song to finish, sometimes if there ws only a minute or so before showtime we would simply stop the music then and not allow another song to start. By the way, we played 78 RPM records, later we had
45 RPM and then tape.
Stan, what you have described was very common in theatres without movable masking. Often, as I wrote before, the footlights were defused enough and refocused to show only on that portion of the screen not being used. A sort of red glow would be seen surrounding the picture area.
In addition, we had theatres which had to remove the curtains completely in order to accommodate the new bigger screens. The proceniums were simply not wide enough for the traveler curtains to open past the ends of the screen. Theatre owners wanted the widest screens possible. So rather than refit the entire mechanism the curtains were removed. Fortunately since most traveler curtains open to completely disappear behind the procenium it was not a problem, but in some situations they did not, happily, this happened in only a few theatres. Two of the theatres I worked in on Staten Island at the time, the Liberty in Stapelton and the Lane in New Dorp, removed the curtains. The Liberty only lated about two or three years after converting to scope and the Lane was the last theatre on SI to install the process. The Paramount was the first theatre to install scope for the “The Robe”, we opened on Christmas day and spent most of Christmas Eve doing the installation. The curtain was not removed at the Paramount. Some locations would show a slide which would be projected from the booth featuring some sort of scenic design or in some cases a picture of a curtain was projected on to the screen.
REndres, thsnks for that info, I love hearing all those wonderful behind the scenes stories you share with us. RCMH really did need audable signals, that’s for sure. We would not want any crushed Rockette’s or camels. :))
Warren, I never realised the Roxy screen was so huge as to dwarf Cinerama. Sitting in the Roxy I still remember the impact of seeing that huge screen when I saw “The Robe” for the first time, it still seemed small compared to the Warners Cinerama screen.
“Pint-sized” was a great way to put it.
Yes mjc, we used a buzzer as well. Some theatres had loud bells!!!Even in some of the theatres were we had ushers “pull the curtain” we would buzz twice to the stage to alert and they would buzz back twice to confirm they were there and ready. One buzz would signal opening or closing the curtain. Of course everyone had their own signals.
I am sure RCMH also used a buzzer in the stage/movie days as well.
I remember hearing them. Come on REndres, fess up :))
Sorry mjc, I should have been more specific. Before scope we had masking that was as pictured in the Roxy photo. Later when Scope came along not all theatres installed movable masking. It took a little while for everyone to get on board with masking flat pictures shown on a scope screen. Still, not every theatre installed masking but used a curtain or foot lighting. I don’t recall any B'way houses doing this however, I believe most if not all installed masking.
Keep in mind, many of the local neiborhood houses could all but afford the conversion to Scope, to cut costs many simply did not have masking installed initially but some added it later.
I reacall one theatre I worked where I would mask the screen for scope or flat depending on the format of the movie. I had to go backstage and move the masking in and out by hand. In the case of a double feature where one picture was flat and the other scope, the masking was left in the scope position for the flat feature. I do recall adjusting the masking on busy nights when we had an intermission. However most days we did not stop at all during the day, the local movie house often emptied out and filled up again during the short subjects. We always showed shorts such as travelogues, comedy’s, cartoons and of course news and trailers.
The bigger downtown houses of course would hold intermissions, often with an organist performing.
I hope that clears up the masking issue, I was not refering to all the big downtown or B'way houses but rather just some of the Main Street movie palaces.It ws very hit and miss in the 50s, we did the best we could with what we had.
Another problem was being able to use the curtains and masking at all in some of the old vaudeville or legit houses that were converted to movies. The unions insisted on a stage hand on duty to pull the curtain and even control the lighting if the controls were backstge as many were. It became necessaty to move the lighting controls and motorise the curtains, then move the controls to the booth to avoid the cost of having a stagehand on duty every day.
on duty every day.
I would like to add to Warrens post regarding masking.
Many of the palaces I worked in during the 50s had no masking, when scope came along we would simply use one of the travelor curtains to hide the portion of the screen not being used. In a situation where a theatre had only one curtain (rare in those days), when we showed a flat picture on the scope screen we would not open the curtain all the way, stoping it just after the edge of the image.
Warren also mentioned colored lamps which some theatres, including the Staten Island Paramount. would use lamps in the foot lights to color the edge of the screed not being used.
oldjoe brings up an intesting question. Just how does the Music Hall rent out the space. What are the various options available?
When New Line rented the Hall did that include all seating areas, orchestra and all three mezzinees, or can one just rent the downstairs area. What about staffing such as stagehands and front of the house? What happens in a four wall agreement, etc etc.
I understand the need to close off the first mezzanine when a Digital movie is shown but I wonder if the other two can be used.
Any of our RCMH insiders care to enlighten us on how the Music Hall
rentals are handled. Also what happens when a name star holds a one night concert, is that usually four wall or does the Hall collect the money from ticket sales and charge a fee to the talent.
So many questions I know, but I think this would make for some interesting comments.
Bill, I recall being told on many an occasions not to talk to anyone, especially the press, about a movie we had screened before it opened. So it went beyond a question of a “code of ethics”,
the studios were/are a bit funny that way. We even had a few newspaper/TV critics who would get bent out of shape if word got out about a movie before “they” saw it and reviewed it.
A also loved your comments about how great it is to see a movie shown at the Hall, and how wonderful it would be to see that more often and open to the public. The whole idea just makes my heart go
pitter patter. :))
RCDTJ, A year or so ago I would have agreed with you. However there is a hugh push for Digital that has been growing rapidly this year.
It seems as though everyone is now aboard the Digital band wagon.
Do us a favor and don’t let them ever take those 5 projectors out of RCMH. Guard them with your life, post youself outside the booth door with a rifle if need be :))
Incidently I would love to be wrong and you wright about Digital growth and the demise of film. Bless you for trying to give us hope.
I am so glad I posed the original question regarding the screening the other night. We sure learned a lot of what whent on that evening and I wish to thank RCDTJ and REndres for their imput. Please guys keep that info coming, I love hearing about what is going on in the booth at RCMH.
Times are-a-changin that’s for sure.
Digital is here to stay and will just keep getting better. We have to acknowledge and accept the changes being made in the way we show movies. What is important is that movie theatres stay strong and survive, The new guys coming in to our industry want nothing to do with film, and as REnders pointed out more and more theatres are no longer putting film in the new locations. Many insiders I know predict that in only 3 or 4 short years, film will have gone the way of Vinyl records and video tape.
Those of us who worked in film will of course be sorry to see it all end, but ya can’t hold back progress, and at least we have our memories.
Thanks Rob for making some sense out of all this.
I had not thought about the problems of using the 7k lamps on a 35mm print. I just don’t get it, forgive an old man but we did just fine for all those years, and now they seem to be looking for much more profection then we ever did.
As for the picture size, I guess if “size matters” they got what they wanted. So more power to em.
It still seems a bit much and unnessary.
But what do i know, I am so old school.
William, I HAD my fun in the booth.
Roadshows,Cinerama,3-D and all the wacky wonderful gimicks of the 50s. Based on what I hear about what goes on in the booth today,
I think the fun is gone. That horse and pony show at RCMH with the screening the other night would have drove me nuts.
Hey RCDT, hows about next time you have a screening you invite Peter and I over to run it with you. No industry people allowed, tell em just drop the print off and get lost. leave the rest to us.
Oh, and REndres, you are invited as well.
We can show em how it should be done and have a hell-of-a lot of fun doing it.
Long live film indeed!
Did you run the film on a MUTT?
As to the tech prolems, I can recall many a roadshow dry run where there were just two many cooks in the kitchen. The more they tinkered the worse it got. BUT, we never spent 7 hours on it.
Why in the world were they paying with the audio levels. Couldn’t they just balance the channels and assume the mix on the track was done coreectly? In 70mm or 35mm for that matter, prior to the screenings, we simply ran levels, and later with Dolby, Pink noise and in about 45 minutes we were done.
It is unfortunate for RCMH mnagement not to address the exhaust system, it must have cost a unnecesary amount of money in man hours setting up that Digital, as opposed to the cost of an improved exhaust system.
They oversold the house???
Is that because they closed all the mezzanines and did not tell the folks handing out tickets??
I can’t take any more of this, thank God I retired.
Thanks for that info. What madness!
Do you not have 2 or 3 of the 35/70 projectors set up with 7k Lamp? For heavens sake, all they had to do was run the damn thing in 35mm reel-to-reel,they would have had plenty of light and not have to spend 7 hours seting the thing up. It sounds like they created a nightmare waiting to happen with that converged Digital setup.
Plus they would not have had to close the mezzanines.
I suppose the Digital equipment was set up in nthe first mezzanine?
Let me repeat, MADNESS!!
I have to say, and many will think, I have lost my mind, but i would have loved for that Digital set up to fail and blow up in their face forcing them to run film, which is what they should have doine in the first place.I sort of understand running Digital in some locations, like the Ziegfeld, it is quite good, But if you have to go to all the trouble as they did at the Hall, it just makes no sense to me at all. Oh, did I mention I thought this was MADNESS?
Justin, I have it on good authority that Summner will never die :))
By the way I am very proud of what Shari (not Sharon) has been doing with the theatres. She is very inovative and dedicated to keeping the movie business thriving.
Edgewater is a classic Multipex operation,but the Cinema De lux design is more in line with NA’s future plans. Long Island does have one,but we also have one in White Plains.
Garth, we did have plans for a renovation of Amboy back in 1991.
Then came Menlo Park and others, and suddenly the project was killed.
The folks at National Amusements are very good at what they do, the decision not to renovate turned out to be a good one.
Justin, The reason for putting the theatre in that location was due to the demise of the Drive-in theatres. The property was formally the Amboy Drive-In.
After Summner Redstone built the Sunrise Multiplex on the grounds of the old Sunrise Drive-In, it was only a matter of time befoe all of NA’s Drive-in locations became Multiplex theatres; the Last one being Hazlet in 1992. It was sad to see all the Drive-In theatres go, but from a pratical business sense it was inevitable.
Does anyof out RCMH insiders know how the “Sex and the City” movie is being projected tonight,film or digital.
What is going on that ghost town we used to call the projection room.
Here in Hawaii the picture opens on Friday and all the showings will be 35mm film.
I should mention that apparently Fox did not strike any magnetic stereo prints for the original release of “Planet of the Apes”.
I remember making a few calls at the time,
and was told “there ain’t any”.
I wonder if anyone ever did get their hands on one.
The ad posted by Mike is NOT Century’s Plainview it is the
RKO Plainview Twin which was located behind the Plainview Centre on South Oyster Bay Road. This building was converted into a Shoprite.
The more I think about this whole projection mess the more irritated I become.
A message to Craig from Clearview:
I know you read theses posts and I believe you owe it to the people who attend the classic movie showings to look into this.
As a professional projectionist with over 50 years in the booth under my belt, I can tell you with great authority that the people running the booth at the Ziegfeld are either up to no good or completely incompetent, either way they must be replaced. It is simply not possible for a professional projectionist to make a change over in a reel-to-reel operation and not notice the incoming reel is out of focus and worse yet not correct it. In fact, after complaints were made it was made worse. The same applies to the missed changeover, I am not buying it, and I think it was done deliberately. The man up there is a fool if he thinks for one moment those of us who know better can accept this outrage in a New York theatre, much less the Ziegfeld. For heavens sake, we can’t even get them to use the curtains, and please,“The curtain is broken"
is getting old.
Why deliberity? That’s simple, thy do not want to be bothered running reel-to-reel, and will stoop to any lengths to discredit the operation to avoid having to do it. They prefer the easy life of running a platter or a Digital presentation so as not to have to put in much effort. I can also tell you, the union must have plenty of projectionist who would jump at the chance to operate a show in that ole time format, they need to be found and put to work at the Ziegfeld then and put the current crew in the usher staff.
SHAME!
My goodness, how could I possibly not comment on that reel-to-reel story.
That theatre manager was either completely misinformed or part of a plot to disgrace reel-to reel showings. How sad to think that such a situation could exist in New York at the Ziegfeld. None of what he said made any sense, the one hour prep time, his explanation of the problem being caused by the “old reel-to-reel and calling it “retardedâ€.
Are the people at Clearview aware of the moron they have running the Ziegfeld? I won’ even go into the ridiculous idea that the focus issue could not be addressed or that running reel-to-reel had anything to do with it.
I will be writing a letter to someone I know at Fox, they need to know about this. I will ask that someone contact Clearview to look in to it.
I believe the whole situation is a plot by management and the projection staff, to create a problem that should not exist in order to gain support to eliminate reel-to-reel showings. There is just no other explanation. These idiots should not be in our business.
Well Sam, some of us would avoid the noise of the needle hitting the record by killing the volume at the end of the song and raising it again after the record was changed and the needle was safely on the next record.
That’s how anal we were about that :)
I forgot,33 and one third records, which were also very popular in the booth.
One more very important thing about pre show music (non sync)
NO VOCALS! music only.
You boys have great memories of the early scope days. We sure had fun in the booth putting on a show. Yes,it ws policy with some circuits to never show the masking move. As a matter of fact Century theatres insisted on Delux presentsations at all their theatres. Delux meaning closing the curtains between shorts, trailers etc, as well as bringing uo the stage lights, then opening the curtain and lowering the lights at the start of the feature. Another rule was “Never Cut a Record”, that meant you never faded a song out or cut it half way through to start the show. We would always wait for a song to finish, sometimes if there ws only a minute or so before showtime we would simply stop the music then and not allow another song to start. By the way, we played 78 RPM records, later we had
45 RPM and then tape.
Yes Peter it sure does.
Or as they say, ya gotta do what ya gotta do :))
Stan, what you have described was very common in theatres without movable masking. Often, as I wrote before, the footlights were defused enough and refocused to show only on that portion of the screen not being used. A sort of red glow would be seen surrounding the picture area.
In addition, we had theatres which had to remove the curtains completely in order to accommodate the new bigger screens. The proceniums were simply not wide enough for the traveler curtains to open past the ends of the screen. Theatre owners wanted the widest screens possible. So rather than refit the entire mechanism the curtains were removed. Fortunately since most traveler curtains open to completely disappear behind the procenium it was not a problem, but in some situations they did not, happily, this happened in only a few theatres. Two of the theatres I worked in on Staten Island at the time, the Liberty in Stapelton and the Lane in New Dorp, removed the curtains. The Liberty only lated about two or three years after converting to scope and the Lane was the last theatre on SI to install the process. The Paramount was the first theatre to install scope for the “The Robe”, we opened on Christmas day and spent most of Christmas Eve doing the installation. The curtain was not removed at the Paramount. Some locations would show a slide which would be projected from the booth featuring some sort of scenic design or in some cases a picture of a curtain was projected on to the screen.
It would be my pleasure Bob, I will be returning to NY in mid April and will contact you at that time.
REndres, thsnks for that info, I love hearing all those wonderful behind the scenes stories you share with us. RCMH really did need audable signals, that’s for sure. We would not want any crushed Rockette’s or camels. :))
Warren, I never realised the Roxy screen was so huge as to dwarf Cinerama. Sitting in the Roxy I still remember the impact of seeing that huge screen when I saw “The Robe” for the first time, it still seemed small compared to the Warners Cinerama screen.
“Pint-sized” was a great way to put it.
Yes mjc, we used a buzzer as well. Some theatres had loud bells!!!Even in some of the theatres were we had ushers “pull the curtain” we would buzz twice to the stage to alert and they would buzz back twice to confirm they were there and ready. One buzz would signal opening or closing the curtain. Of course everyone had their own signals.
I am sure RCMH also used a buzzer in the stage/movie days as well.
I remember hearing them. Come on REndres, fess up :))
Sorry mjc, I should have been more specific. Before scope we had masking that was as pictured in the Roxy photo. Later when Scope came along not all theatres installed movable masking. It took a little while for everyone to get on board with masking flat pictures shown on a scope screen. Still, not every theatre installed masking but used a curtain or foot lighting. I don’t recall any B'way houses doing this however, I believe most if not all installed masking.
Keep in mind, many of the local neiborhood houses could all but afford the conversion to Scope, to cut costs many simply did not have masking installed initially but some added it later.
I reacall one theatre I worked where I would mask the screen for scope or flat depending on the format of the movie. I had to go backstage and move the masking in and out by hand. In the case of a double feature where one picture was flat and the other scope, the masking was left in the scope position for the flat feature. I do recall adjusting the masking on busy nights when we had an intermission. However most days we did not stop at all during the day, the local movie house often emptied out and filled up again during the short subjects. We always showed shorts such as travelogues, comedy’s, cartoons and of course news and trailers.
The bigger downtown houses of course would hold intermissions, often with an organist performing.
I hope that clears up the masking issue, I was not refering to all the big downtown or B'way houses but rather just some of the Main Street movie palaces.It ws very hit and miss in the 50s, we did the best we could with what we had.
Another problem was being able to use the curtains and masking at all in some of the old vaudeville or legit houses that were converted to movies. The unions insisted on a stage hand on duty to pull the curtain and even control the lighting if the controls were backstge as many were. It became necessaty to move the lighting controls and motorise the curtains, then move the controls to the booth to avoid the cost of having a stagehand on duty every day.
on duty every day.
I would like to add to Warrens post regarding masking.
Many of the palaces I worked in during the 50s had no masking, when scope came along we would simply use one of the travelor curtains to hide the portion of the screen not being used. In a situation where a theatre had only one curtain (rare in those days), when we showed a flat picture on the scope screen we would not open the curtain all the way, stoping it just after the edge of the image.
Warren also mentioned colored lamps which some theatres, including the Staten Island Paramount. would use lamps in the foot lights to color the edge of the screed not being used.