Motion Picture Herald (Jan-Mar 1956)

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A COUPLE of sears ago, when we were operating in another town, we told you of a stunt we had used to make closer contact with the youngsters. We showed some of the school kids around the theatre and had them write an “essay” on what they saw. Well, we dusted it off in our present town a couple of weeks ago. 1 don’t know what it will mean at the bo.xoflRce, but it gave us a lot of fun, and these days in small town exhibition you gotta get a big percentage of your take in the fun you get out of it. • \Ve invited the fourth grade class and had it for nearly two hours on a Cook’s tour topped off with a cartoon and a comedy. We picked the fourth grade to take the tour because those kids were old enough to be interested and to understand what we told them, yet not too old to know' it all already and embarrass us with a lot of wdse-guy technical questions. The idea behind this tour is that the kids are impressed by w'hat you say and indebted to you because you got them out of two hours of class w'ork. They all learned more about the theatre than they dreamed existed. We seated them in a group and started talking to them about how' the theatre w'as different than any other store on Main Street, how its front was different and why, how its inside was different, its floor sloped, its lighting effects for beauty instead of for just illumination like stores. • We first showed them how the physical building itself was a thing apart from other business places, then w'e told them about seating with self-rising seats to make it easier for them to approach their chair and nicer for the janitor and how the mohair backs made them more comfortable, w’ere prettier and better lor acoustics. We explained about the acoustical treatment on the walls, drawing the pebble in the water simile for them so they w'ould get the idea of how' sound travels and bounces. We explained the stage, footlights, spotlights, switch panels, screen and traveler curtain, and they were interested enough to ask questions about them. Then we tore up an old polio trailer into one-foot lengths and let them all have a sample of film. We explained the sound track to them and demonstrated with the trusty Zippo that the film w’ould not burn. We even gave them a squirt of the fire extinguisher down the aisle to show what we’d do if we had a fire. We went around to other parts of the theatre, including the air-conditioning plant, the furnace room, back stage, mouseproof popcorn bin, candy room and projection room. We let them watch a projector run with film in it and let them peek inside the lamphouse. After the tour we gave them a few minutes talk on what we expected of them when they came to the theatre, how they were being judged by everjone in the theatre as to what kind of boys and girls they were, what kind of manners they had, etc., etc. We explained why running in the aisles was dangerous and distracting. 1 think they got the idea. We finished by asking them to go back to school and write a short essay on what they had done and learned this afternoon. I later picked up the essays and published a few of the best ones in my ad in the newspaper. They were all looking to see if “theirs” would be one of the essays printed. 1 called them “testimonials” in the paper. That was one ad 1 knew was read. Does this sound like fun to you? WTll, maybe not, but it was for us and it was for our kids. It’s fun to see some enthusiasm generated on the faces and in the countenances of a group of today’s small-fry who will become tomorrow’s full-price patrons. It does something for your ego and something for your faith to learn first hand that you are still dealing in a very saleable product, one that still has more glamor and interest than any store on Main Street. Not that business has boomed because these kids got the grand tour, but it’s like insuring against loss of interest in the theatre. It’s leaving no stone unturned in doing everything you can, and can afford, to keep the doors open. But before we get too profound let’s look at a few of the “essays” that resulted 28 MOTION PICTURE HERALD, JANUARY 7, 1956