The historic Palace Theater in Waterbury, Connecticut. http://www.palacetheaterct.org According to the New York Times, large chunks of the U.S. are currently under something called a “heat dome,” a curved lid of high pressure that traps hot air underneath it, causing corn to sweat, dogs to pant more heavily and people to seek dark interior spaces — for example, movie theaters. I wish that right this minute I were in a movie palace under that other cooler kind of dome, preferably with a gorgeous central chandelier, suggestive as they are or were of a visit from a saucerful of extraterrestrials. I can’t help longing for those fake icicles they used to put on movie palace marquees or the refuge they promised from summer heat, all through my childhood.
At the St. George Theatre, a 2672-seat movie palace I helped manage for one magical overwhelming year, 1976, I spent a good deal of off-time sitting in a mostly empty auditorium, under its consolingly magnificent dome. If the Czars of Russia had their winter palace, well we had our summer one. Czar Nicholas had fireplaces, but we had a giant central air conditioner, reminiscent of the 1930’s. As I recall, it was no easy feat getting the thing — almost the size of a city block — up and running: it shuddered and shook, reminding some of us of Frankenstein, when the monster awakes.
Summer has traditionally been “block-buster” time in the movie business. Epics or big-themed movies with lots of action seem to go well in the dog days. Why is this? The original experience of movie watching in theaters was a first, primitive kind of virtual reality, the ultimate escape: in hot summer the more overwhelming, the better. These days blockbusters are largely special effects driven — think Batman vs. Superman — but in the summer of 1976, titles as various as Futureworld, The Omen, and Silent Movie kept people entertained in the cool dark under one kind of dome or another. With the exception of The Omen, whose reels we somehow got our hands on, other 1976 summer titles went to the first-run houses who could afford to bid for them. Our fare for June, July and August consisted of small bore stuff like Godzilla vs. Megalon, or used titles that had been some other summer’s blockbusters, like Jaws (1974) or even the slightly-antique Deliverance (1972). The Exorcist had never been a summer movie, having enjoyed it’s original release date in December of 1973, but I will always think of it as a summer movie.
This week forty years ago Exorcist became our private blockbuster, the only flick we ever showed that made a clear profit and filled our Spanish Baroque cave practically to the ceiling with people happy to be terrified, in the cool dark, under a soaring dome.
Stay cool this week; air conditioning is too ubiquitous these days to seem transforming, but there are still theaters, and some of them have domes.
At the St. George Theatre, a 2672-seat movie palace I helped manage for one magical overwhelming year, 1976, I spent a good deal of off-time sitting in a mostly empty auditorium, under its consolingly magnificent dome. If the Czars of Russia had their winter palace, well we had our summer one. Czar Nicholas had fireplaces, but we had a giant central air conditioner, reminiscent of the 1930’s. As I recall, it was no easy feat getting the thing — almost the size of a city block — up and running: it shuddered and shook, reminding some of us of Frankenstein, when the monster awakes.
Summer has traditionally been “block-buster” time in the movie business. Epics or big-themed movies with lots of action seem to go well in the dog days. Why is this? The original experience of movie watching in theaters was a first, primitive kind of virtual reality, the ultimate escape: in hot summer the more overwhelming, the better. These days blockbusters are largely special effects driven — think Batman vs. Superman — but in the summer of 1976, titles as various as Futureworld, The Omen, and Silent Movie kept people entertained in the cool dark under one kind of dome or another. With the exception of The Omen, whose reels we somehow got our hands on, other 1976 summer titles went to the first-run houses who could afford to bid for them. Our fare for June, July and August consisted of small bore stuff like Godzilla vs. Megalon, or used titles that had been some other summer’s blockbusters, like Jaws (1974) or even the slightly-antique Deliverance (1972). The Exorcist had never been a summer movie, having enjoyed it’s original release date in December of 1973, but I will always think of it as a summer movie.
This week forty years ago Exorcist became our private blockbuster, the only flick we ever showed that made a clear profit and filled our Spanish Baroque cave practically to the ceiling with people happy to be terrified, in the cool dark, under a soaring dome.
Stay cool this week; air conditioning is too ubiquitous these days to seem transforming, but there are still theaters, and some of them have domes.
 | FLASHBACK FORTY YEARS: Wednesday, July 28, 1976 The Exorcist filled the screen for two weeks and sold out the house at The St. George Theatre, the only title to do so in our tenancy. "All Seats, All Times, $1.50, Children 90 cents." Clip this ad and receive FREE popcorn! Check out our Dinner Movie Special — Dinner at Casa Barone, Movie at The St. George, both for only $4.79! |
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