The One Hundred

Before I get started, let me just say, this was my experience being an employee of [company name redacted]. I also think that my often drunk boss [name redacted] probably had something to do with this as well. I’ve never worked in another theater so I can’t say that this is the norm. I can only pray that it isn’t.

I used to work in a movie theater as an usher. It seems like a lifetime ago now, but for about a year I did. Being a movie freak, I thought it would be a great job – easy line on the cool movie posters, free movies, free concessions. But it was not to be. It was far from the glamorous life that I pictured it. I discovered this right around the time that I had to go and mop up the bathrooms. Not fun.

I did however have the opportunity to see any movie anywhere in any theater (owned by the company I worked for, of course) and even bring a friend, but I never did. I worked there for about a year and I couldn’t bring myself to go to my workplace on my day off.

I luckily never had to remove people for being unruly. I had to wake someone up once though. I think he was homeless. I felt kind of bad though as I remember him paying to get in and it seemed like all he wanted to do was sleep in a dark place that was semi-safe for about two hours. After he left, I found the remains of something that didn’t remotely look like anything that we sold. So sleep and eat… something… for about two hours.

Concessions were always fun. We would start the day by opening up the big metal barrels of coconut oil. Of course it wasn’t oil when we opened it. It had congealed into a paste and it needed to be melted down. So we had this big metal rod that we shoved into the goo and we would plug in the rod and it would slowly heat up and turn the tub of lard into a tub of oil. This, folks, is your butter flavoring. I loved that too. “Would you like butter flavoring on your popcorn?” Not butter. Butter flavoring. Ick.

I know some of the girls that ran concessions, ran other things too. We had to keep inventory on bags and cups so we knew how many were sold versus how much money was taken in. But sometimes the girls forgot their lunch money so, solution? Take a bag that was mostly unused (read: not battered all to hell) — from the garbage — and restock it with popcorn for the next person. The money never went into the register but rather into the girls’ pockets.

It wasn’t all bad though. I met some celebrities (Harry Morgan, Jamie Lee Curtis, Billy Crystal). I remember one time when one usher who was working the front door was berating a couple for not wanting to throw away their drinks before coming in to see the movie — the company had a strict no outside food policy. He was from Tibet and he was very proud to do his job correctly. But being from Tibet also prevented him from realizing that he was chastising Emilio Estevez and Paula Abdul (told you it was a long time ago). I still can’t figure out why either two coffees or two movie tickets were the source of so much trouble for them. Why not just give up on one? Good times.

So, in the end, this job wasn’t all that hard but it really left a mark on me. So much so that I didn’t go to a movie theater for about a year after I stopped working there. I eventually made it back though and I have enjoyed them ever since.

I’m just always hesitant to order the popcorn.

Theater Guys from Tibet, Old Jobs, Used Popcorn Bags, Weird Celebrities