….unfortunately the preview I splash across the screen is an “R” rated preview of An American Werewolf in London! By the time the horrified parents notify Joe Jarvis (the owner) and he “blasts” me on the intercom the preview is almost over. If we didn’t have a full house that day I think he would have fired me, and rightfully so. Some years later Joe and I would look back on that and laugh.
I did not work in the Heyday of theaters but I certainly worked with machines and in booths that had not been updated since the heydays. Burning carbons, change-overs, cleaning reflectors, and so on. I worked Drive-in’s in the summer in Newport, RI and Southeast Mass. The rest of the year I was at the Opera House and Jane Pickens in Newport, RI. My biggest screw-up, it was a bad one. Picture this, a few days before Christmas The Jane Pickens is screening Miracle on 34th street (Natalie Wood) the Place is packed and the kids are awaiting Santa who will be arriving by fire truck. The children get in line to sit on Santa’s lap. I, being a creature of habit thread up the preview reel as usual and the first reel of Miracle …..
I was a projectionist at the Pickens in the early eighties. the biggest crowd I’ve seen there was the night around Halloween when we screened the silent version of Phantom of the Opera complete with live music from the then restored theater organ. Actually at one point the owner Joe Jarvis had moved much of the organ hardware, bells, whistles, percussion and such from one of the organ rooms that flanked the screen near the ceiling of the theater. He then converted the empty room into an apartment so he could stay over after those late night screenings of Rocky Horror.
….unfortunately the preview I splash across the screen is an “R” rated preview of An American Werewolf in London! By the time the horrified parents notify Joe Jarvis (the owner) and he “blasts” me on the intercom the preview is almost over. If we didn’t have a full house that day I think he would have fired me, and rightfully so. Some years later Joe and I would look back on that and laugh.
I did not work in the Heyday of theaters but I certainly worked with machines and in booths that had not been updated since the heydays. Burning carbons, change-overs, cleaning reflectors, and so on. I worked Drive-in’s in the summer in Newport, RI and Southeast Mass. The rest of the year I was at the Opera House and Jane Pickens in Newport, RI. My biggest screw-up, it was a bad one. Picture this, a few days before Christmas The Jane Pickens is screening Miracle on 34th street (Natalie Wood) the Place is packed and the kids are awaiting Santa who will be arriving by fire truck. The children get in line to sit on Santa’s lap. I, being a creature of habit thread up the preview reel as usual and the first reel of Miracle …..
I was a projectionist at the Pickens in the early eighties. the biggest crowd I’ve seen there was the night around Halloween when we screened the silent version of Phantom of the Opera complete with live music from the then restored theater organ. Actually at one point the owner Joe Jarvis had moved much of the organ hardware, bells, whistles, percussion and such from one of the organ rooms that flanked the screen near the ceiling of the theater. He then converted the empty room into an apartment so he could stay over after those late night screenings of Rocky Horror.