Aftershocks

A newly formed nonprofit group purchased an old theatre a few cities/towns/villages away, and I met with the folks who ran it. I told them that I had earlier rescued lots of orchestral silent-movie mood music from the theatre’s flooded basement, together with lots of lobby cards from the 1920’s. I had cleaned them, organized them, and planned to return everything to them. I saw them again soon, for they invited me to Thanksgiving lunch at a house. I returned the first crate of materials, the only crate that was so damaged that I could not repair it. Then, suddenly, they were hostile. One of them was not. One of them was still nice to me, and I could tell that she was not at all picking up on the change in tone. She discerned nothing amiss. She was the principal who had founded the nonprofit. Over lunch, they were discussing booking, advertising, fundraising, and so forth, and I tossed in a few ideas. “How do you know that?” they challenged. “Where did you learn all that?” they challenged again. They demanded, at almost shouting level, to know precisely why I was not volunteering at the Defamatory Cinema rather than at their theatre. I got the message. I never returned. Once they gave me the boot, I loaned the lobby cards to Serge Bromberg, who wished to scan them, and I decided to donate the music scores to a museum. I asked a “friend” to store the music for me for a while as I searched for an appropriate museum, and so he tossed it all in the trash (and he was completely surprised that I was upset with him; he couldn’t understand why, not at all — another psychopath). So much for that. Serge can keep those lobby cards. He’s the best possible custodian. As for the one gal who was still nice to me that Thanksgiving Day, the rest of the board members unanimously ousted her immediately afterwards.

It was more or less at that time that I passed by a cinema about 50 miles away. I had heard that the cinema was for sale, and, though I had no money, I knew someone who did have money and who was considering purchasing a nice cinema to operate upon his upcoming retirement. That someone was also open to hiring me as manager; so hey, I could use a better job than the one I had, a job with a nicer boss. A friend was in my car, and so we stopped and we both entered. We had a nice chat with the owner (I can’t remember his name), who could prove that he got fairly large audiences. Indeed, there was a fairly large audience that evening, which should have been predictable, since there were no other movie houses anywhere in the area. The building was in good shape, which was quite obvious, it was well-maintained with no problems. He wanted about $350,000 for the property, and I thought that was more than reasonable. That was less than the cost of a house.

I mention this because my memory is certainly tricking me. You see, it might have been that cinema owner who told my friend and me a story. We paid it no attention, because it was obvious nonsense, one of those silly stories that people tell, of no import whatsoever. I put it out of my mind right away, which is why I am having such trouble remembering who told it to us, precisely when, and under precisely what circumstances. Maybe it was this cinema owner who related to us this amusing story: There was someone who was attempting to gain admittance to an old theatre simply to sell its booth equipment to a Warner Bros. store in a shopping mall, to be used as a display. If my memory is more or less correct, then, yes, I knew the theatre to which he referred, though I had never been inside, and I was quite familiar with that particular WB store.

Yet another possibility is that it was the new owner of a nickelodeon, who was selling off old items because he wanted to convert the building into a dance club. The more I think about it, the more I think it was the nickelodeon/club guy. The more I think about it, the more I seem to recall him telling us to hurry up and make up our minds, because the Warner Bros. store had already expressed interest in the booth equipment for use as a display.

Whoever told us the story, this much I know for sure: My friend and I immediately recognized that it was total nonsense. WB had no need of any such equipment. Even if WB were to decide to waste valuable floor space on such a pointless display, it had warehouses full of such machinery in California. Nobody would need to sell anything to the store. My friend and I right away forgot about that story, because it was meaningless and irrelevant.

Now, maybe within the next year or so, there was an announcement that an old theatre was about to be restored. This was in the news, and it was exciting. I had been wanting to take a peek inside since forever. One day, I noticed that the doors were open and a crew were working. I parked my car, got out, and had a brief chat with one of the hard-hatted guys in his fluorescent orange safety jacket. I asked what he knew about the restoration. He knew nothing. He was on the demolition crew, taking out the modern stuff so that the restoration crew could build afresh. He was disgusted by the whole project, because he thought the building was a piece of junk that did not merit preservation.

Shortly after my momentary chat with that crew member, I think it was just a day later, an acquaintance (I can’t remember who) told me that he had just witnessed the demolition crew walk off with some projection equipment, apparently without authorization. I wanted to alert the manager about this so that she could get the equipment returned. Because the theatre had been in the news, I knew who the manager was. The moment I got back home, I looked her up in the phone book, dialed the number, introduced myself, and reported on what my acquaintance had just told me. She was harsh as she said that she wanted nothing to do with me. She told me that she knew aaaaaalllllll about me, and she said that she had it on good authority that it was I who had ordered the demolition crew to remove that equipment, because I wanted to sell it to the Warner Bros. store in the mall to be used as a display.

I called the manager again sometime later (days? weeks? months? I don’t remember), since I guessed that she had probably cooled down by then. I definitely wanted that theatre restored correctly, according to the original design, and I knew for a fact that she did not have the original design. I offered to volunteer my help. She did not want to talk. I again asked for an explanation for her earlier accusation, but she played dumb: “No, I never said that. I never heard any stories. Nobody said anything about you.” She said she wanted nothing more to do with me, and that I was not welcome to volunteer.

To this day, I have never seen what that theatre now looks like. I am certain it looks nothing like what it looked like on opening day, more than a century ago. I know what it looked like originally. I know what decorative plasterwork it originally had. I know the original décor. I know the original color scheme. Nobody else knows. I had been willing, nay eager, to share my knowledge for free, but not after that treatment. After that hideous treatment, yes, I could still be convinced to share my knowledge, but only with a new management, not the current one, and the new management would have to be ultra-nice to me and would have to pay me a year’s gross salary and proclaim its indebtedness to my help in large letters everywhere and celebrate me annually, if not more. Less than that? No, to hell with them. Anyway, that whole situation tore me to pieces for years, because that theatre was designed by one of my favorite architects, but now I don’t care. I don’t care in the least.

In about 1996, Cher drove by to visit. As protection, she brought along reinforcement in the form of yet another ex-friend, a huge guy who dwarfed me. Both were high on something, and she was stone drunk as well, and loud and obnoxious. There was a meanness to her that she had never had before. She was quite boastful about the myriad drugs she was regularly taking — cannabis, cocaine, LSD, and I don’t remember what all else. She refused to take PCP, though, because she thought that would be stupid. She continued to drink hard liquor like mad during that exchange of 20 minutes or so, and twice or thrice she curled up in sudden pain, and then winced horribly as she wheezed out, “I’m okay, I’m okay, I’m okay.” Okay? I saw that she had nearly passed out. Then she drove away. Had it not been for the Defamatory Cinema, there was a chance that I would have been able to prevent this disaster.