The first comment has my story of having to run the endless loop platter.
I could never get over the lengths the theatre owners would go to trying to get rid of the projectionist position.
I worked the projection booth at the NATO convention when it came to Atlanta in 1987. The Christie company had one of these things set up on the exhibit floor with a big display reading “Let The Gremlins Do It.” I guess the gremlins were not covered by the minimum wage law. People were free to wander the exhibit area at any time during the 3 day convention, but on the final day there was a two hour period set aside for everyone to attend at the same time. When I walked through on that day I noticed that the platter was not turning and thought someone might be giving a demo to the crowd gathered around it. No such thing. When I made my way to the front I saw that the film had either backed off of the edge or had been slung off onto the floor. Two Christie reps were on hands and knees splicing away trying to get the mess cleaned up before the end of the exhibition period.
That night at the banquet I ran my five presentation reels flawlessly without the help of a platter, endless loop or otherwise. Later I saw the DM of the company I worked for and asked him if he noticed the difference in the way I ran the booth compared to the endless loop platter he had also seen that afternoon. He just said “You have to keep up with the times” as he walked away. Theatre owners: they would spend $10 to aviod paying someone a buck and still think that they had come out ahead.
I ran across a couple of Ziegfeld tidbits yesterday while going through some old files.
From Boxoffice Magizine, May 1978, an article on CE3K expanding from its exclusive Ziegfeld run in Manhattan to the Loew’s State 1 (70MM), Bay Cinema (70MM), and RKO 86th Street (35MM) on 4/26/78.. (A comment on this site on the latter theatre says that it closed in 1968, so I don’t know. This is the way the article listed it.) Michael Coate’s post of 4/16/08 shows 4/26/78 to be the date CE3K ended its 23 week run at the Ziegfeld to be replaced by The Last Waltz.
As background the article stated that CE3K opened at the Ziegfeld for a NY / NJ exclusive run on 11/16/77 before expanding to 11 other locations four weeks later. However it stayed exclusive in Manhattan for all 23 weeks. According to Boxoffice, the Zeigfeld grossed a record setting two million dollars during its run.
At the opposite end of the record setting department is a note from Variety from December 1971 when they still listed the Manhattan theatres and their grosses, usually with a cute line to describe the take.. According to Michael the theatre had been closed for 14 weeks leading up to its big Christmas movie of 1971, Star Spangled Girl. It opened on 12/22/71 and here is the way Variety described the gross: “Only $928 for this huge house.” That means that this 1300 seat theatre with its listed $16,500 nut brought in about 250 customers all week. Got to be the record. Should have stayed closed.
Thanks to Michael I see that it ran for 5 weeks before the theatre went dark again for the three weeks prior to the opening of Cabaret.
Gee Terry, check your math and you will see that it is not even that. The building was demolished in 2005 so it only lasted 13 years. Even worse, the place closed about 2000, 2002 at the latest. That means this brand new 10 screen theatre operated only about 10 years at the most. I never saw much of a crowd at this place and could not understand why this location did not do better. It was in something of a no mans land development wise, but it was only minutes away from Brentwood and the I-65 interchange. If it could play the same movies as Cool Springs and 100 Oaks you would think that people would prefer this nice quiet intersection to getting caught up in the mall traffic.
In the end it was probably what killed off most marginal locations: Minimal upkeep, indifferent presentation, and lack of adequate or good quality staff.
Thanks for that additional information Tim. I am really surprised that GTC added on a tiny theatre for #4 instead of just tearing off a chunk of the remaining large house. In 1978 they quaded the South DeKalb Twin and turned two beautiful 540 seat showcases into four 338 seat shoeboxes. They would not even consider leaving one side intact but since they even carved up their Lenox Square flagship there was nothing sacred to them in that respect. Riverside could count itself lucky that at least one house was still something to be proud of.
In the early Weis days the newspaper ads indicated which movie was playing in which theatre. #1 was named “The Popular Showplace” and #2 was labeled “The Intimate Theatre.” I could never notice any effort was made to play a particular type of movie in one side or the other. I also do not remember any difference in the two. I know one side was twinned when you started, but do you think that they were identical when built?
After 1974, Weis renamed this the “Weis Cinema Centre” and quit making any note as to which movie played in which side or even how many theatres were at the Centre. I like the “re” instead of “er” spelling. I am sure that made it a much nicer moviegoing experience. They did the same thing in multiscreen theatres in other cities except Atlanta where there was a single screen “Weis Cinema” already in business. There they took the Arrowhead Triple and named it the “Arrowhead Cinema Centre.” They did not do the same with the Cinema 75 Triple. I guess a name of “Cinema 75 Cinema Centre” was too much.
When you came to work there, did you come as a projectionist or did you move into that job? I ask because the very nice, orderly appearance of the booth suggests that there might have been some long time operator there who had taken care of the place for years. I can not begin to count the dumps I have walked into over the years and spent countless hours trying to organize the mess left by a succession of previous “projectionists.”
I did not realize that the old Macon Mall Quad had been dozed and a new theatre built. I thought that booth looked a lot bigger than I remembered.
Thanks again for the pictures and video. I have been passing them around to some of my former booth mates from years past.
Link to the Drive In ladder ad in the Atlanta paper on August 5, 1964. The blogger has also written up some of his memories of working at these places. Worth a look if you are interested in the drive in culture from 1970 – 1990.
Tim, thanks for that website. It brought back a lot of memories. I just assumed that Georgia Theatre Company split both houses at the same time, but your descriptions and pictures indicate that only one was split and the fourth was an add on. One of your pictures shows an intact auditorium complete with the panels I mentioned on the side wall where the slide projector was aimed. The conversion from twin to quad has Georgia Theatre written all over it. The split auditorium shows no sign of the seating area being relocated, and that little theatre, well, it beats anything I have ever seen. The smallest theatre I ever worked in was the Baronet, in Atlanta. It had four seats on each side and 15 rows. Until your picture I have never seen a theatre with rows of only three seats. I would have put the aisle off center and had the seating 2 and 4.
Another giveaway to the GTC influence was the Potts platters in the booth. I was never in the Riverside booth, but have run countless others and the only time I have ever had to run these pieces of crap was at GTC locations. They looked like a Strong, but I guess they were cheaper, and their on / off motors as opposed to constant feed were always a threat to sling the print off onto the floor, or cause a brain wrap. With all of those reels hanging on the wall and the spindles still in place, it looks as if the projectors were reel to reel during the twin days, and then divided as the houses were increased. Those V 8’s were great machines, and still are. In fact I am working a booth with one as I write this. Unfortunately the others are belt driven V 5’s.
From the pictures and video it certainly seems that the projectionist ran a neat and orderly booth. I was in the Macon Mall Quad several times but was not aware that it had been divided into 8. It was built by Georgia Theatre in the mid 70’s and was included in the sell out to United Artists Theatres in the late 80’s before UA was bought by Regal. Aaron Manheim was the long time manager there. Does that name ring a bell?
Thanks again for the great website. Wish I had taken the time to make pictures like yours. I just assumed the theatres would always be there.
Thanks for another trip down memory lane Michael. I am glad you did not try to list the theatres involved. With 1500 locations that would have been a time consuming task. With so many multiplex screens and the end of exclusive runs and year long engagements that sort of thing had lost its charm by 1985.
Back To The Future was notable to me because it was one of those movies that kind of slipped in under my radar. I am not a TV watcher and had never heard of Michael J. Fox, or any other of the actors except Lea Thompson, and the anticipated sci fi movie of that summer, Cocoon, had opened a couple of weeks earlier. However, when the staff unlocked the doors on opening day, it was obvious that I was about the only one who was not ready for it. For the first couple of weeks we had sellouts even during the week despite the wide break release it had in Atlanta. I was working at Greens Corner at the time and we continued to have weekend sellouts until Labor Day. I also did some relief work at the GCC Southlake 3 and it was a big hit there as well.
As for the Mike Rogers comment above I would say two things:
First, it reminds me of a humorous episode regarding the film critic of the Atlanta paper whose last name was Ringel. (I forget the first name.) My one contact with her leads me to believe that she is a pleasant enough person, however, it was a standing joke among those of us who worked in theatres that if you wanted a good review from her then your movie better have subtitles. Back To The Future had received the expected lambasting on opening day although it was obvious that it made no difference at the box office even in those days when newspapers were relevant. Later on, outraged that it was still doing big business weeks after opening, she wrote another article lamenting that this piece of lightweight fluff was a hit while more worthy fare (in her opinion) was being ignored. In less than subtle language she questioned at least the taste if not the intelligence of the movie goers of Atlanta. As you might expect, this brought a flood of letters to the editor raising the same questions about her. In the end she wrote yet another article explaining her reasoning and suggesting that the Back To The Future fans could still find her reviews useful by going to see any movie that she hated.
Secondly, I hate to tell Mike this, but it is doubtful that he will ever see another movie as good as 2001. I saw 2001 when it first came out in 70MM at the Martin Cinerama. I liked it, and still do, better than the majority of the many movies I have seen since. However, if I judged every movie I saw by how it compared to my all time favorite, which is The Best Years Of Our Lives, then I would find very few even bearable. If I had to write a one sentence evaluation (obviously not my style) of Back To The Future, it would go something like this:
“A pleasant, well made film with good production values that entertained the movie going public to the point that many of them came back for more.”
If more movies could live up to that description then they would have to build more theatres to hold all of the people, and all of us who enjoy this business would have jobs for as long as we cared to work.
As to the 70MM version, I do not believe that it had a 70MM release in Atlanta, but the next summer, the Fox Theatre ran both Cocoon and Back To The Future in 70.
I think that you are confusing two drive ins because of the similar names. This page refers to the Highway 85 Drive In which was located on State Highway 85 just south of the city of Fayetteville which itself is south of the Atlanta city limits.
The other one is the North 85 Twin Drive In which was located in Interstate 85. It was not really near Gwinnett County. In fact it was just north of the Atlanta city limits at the Shallowford Road exit, several miles inside I-285. Further up I-85 at the intersection with I-285 there was the Northeast Expressway Drive In. It was located about four miles from the Gwinnett County line.
I do not know when this Highway 85 location closed, but it was probably in the 70’s. I think it was one of two “Adult Only” drive ins advertised in the paper. Or, it might have been the Highway 54 Drive In which was also known as the Forest Park Drive In. I know that the other one was the Lithonia Drive In, which was sometimes known as the Highway 12 Drive In because of its location on State Highway 12, or Covington Highway.
As far at the time when Atlanta had only two drive ins, that would be from about 1985 until 2002. From the mid 60’s to the mid 70’s there were over 20 drive ins with ads in the paper. Then, they started closing fast as land values went up and the profits from a single screen theatre, even a drive in went down. In 1983 the Bankhead and the Northeast Expressway closed up leaving only the North 85, the Twin Starlight, and the South Expressway Twin in operation. A couple of years later the Starlight had been converted to six screens and the South Expressway closed. The North 85 closed in about 2002 leaving only the Starlight Six.
Ned: As I pointed out earlier, I have learned never to say never about anything when using my memory, but I am as sure as I can be without going back and checking all of the newspapers that Star Wars did not play here in its initial release. It opened at the Tara, Doraville, Franklin Road, and Arrowhead, and at least the first two on that list ran it until the Christmas season. I know it did not play here during the Christmas 1977-78 season, so at the earliest it would have been Spring 1978. I was not a regular employee there at that time but I would hate to think that I would not have remembered such a booking.
Star Wars did play here in the mid 90’s when they had that nationwide release of all three in their remastered and digitally updated form. For the record, I am not a Star Wars fan, but I thought that changing the content was a travesty even though the original director did the changes. In my opinion, the genuine version of Star Wars is the one that came out in 1977.
As for Phipps, it opened Empire on a four week 70MM exclusive in late May of 1980. The #2 house, the right hand one downstairs was the only 70MM equipped house and that is where it played for its run there. There was no 35MM run of Empire at Phipps during that booking.
I also saw Jedi there. The first half of it anyway. It was a hard week at my theatre and I fell asleep half way through about the time the Ewoks showed up. I never bothered to see the rest. As I said, I am not a big fan. Sorry R2.
Cone: Thank you for taking the time to comment on this site. I have very fond memories of working for Modular in the early 70’s and to this day keep in touch with some of the people I met there. Most of my work was at Sandy Springs although I also spent a good bit of time at Peachtree Battle and Doraville. I never knew anyone at this location until I started managing the South DeKalb in 1974 by which time it was a Weis operation.
That is an interesting story about the seats and equipment. I was really surprised when I first walked into Candler by the condition of the furnishings since I always thought that Sandy Springs and Doraville were very nicely appointed. All of that was before I started working in theatres and I assumed that the company must have changed hands or something when the Candler was built since it was so different.
Assuming that you are the co-founder and not Cone Jr., I can recall meeting you a couple of times when you attended movies at Sandy Springs. Roger McClure was the manager at that time. Aaron Bouldin was at Doraville, Bill Henley was at Peachtree Battle, and Bill Sheely was the roving relief manager / operator. I was still a college student just doing hourly work wherever I could pick up some work that fit my schedule, but I also did a lot of film and concession supply delivery which is how I got to know people at the other theatres. Those were great times to work in theatres and your little neighborhood chain was a good place to learn the trade before it became dominated by the big corporations and multiplexes and megaplexes of today.
You should take a look at the Sandy Springs page on this site. Barbara Gentry has posted some information about how her dad and you started the company. It is listed under the name Sandy Springs Theatre. Perhaps you could shine some light on the time when Sandy Springs went independent while the rest of the Mini Cinemas operated under a kind of co-op agreement with Storey before getting back together as Mini Cinemas.
Thanks again. I am still in this business after all of these years and many of my favorite memories are thanks to your company and the people I met there. Just this past weekend a group of retired managers, projectionists and friends from those days had our regular lunch and get together at the old Sandy Springs site which is now The Brickery restaurant.
Nope. Like you I was assuming that Jack meant indoor theatres, or as they say in the trades, walk in or hardtops.
The Starlight opened the south field in 1949 and the north in 1953. The south was closed for a while when the snack bar burned. The north closed a year later when it was split. Every winter one side or the other closes for the season, something I never understood the theory on. However, as far as I know, at least something has been open there since opening day although they close on Christmas Eve, and for the occasional power outage.
I no longer work there, at least regularly, but I did write a history of the place on its page here:
As for indoors, without looking at a list, I can think of the Grand, the Fox, Garden Hills / Fine Art, Plaza (if you count its XXX years), and the Lenox which might have been only 39 years 8 months. I hesitate to even go down this road because I know that people will start listing reasons why some of these places were not in continious operation. Even the Tara shut down once for two days when it was first twinned.
Maybe I should start off the previous paragraph with the words “Generally speaking….”
Most of the indoor theatres built during the 60’s lasted only 25 or so years at the most, some a lot less. I think that the shortest existance for a regular indoor theatre (as opposed to some of the XXX storefront operations) was the Atlantic, an Eastern Federal location on Memorial Drive in or near the Kirkwood area. It lasted only about 5 years.
Doctor Zhivago played at the Ritz during the fall of 1966 not 1965. I saw it for the second time on its final night of the run which was December 22, 1966. The next day, December 23 was the day I saw the Sound Of Music which I also mention in that post.
Thanks to Michael Coate for helping get the dates right.
Thanks for that information Michael. Your research efforts never cease to amaze me. At least this time I caught my memory lapse before you had to point it out to me. This confirms to me that I saw Doctor Zhivago for the second time on the night of December 22, 1966, and then SOM the next afternoon.
This means that SOM played its reserved seat engagement for four months at the Eastwood Mall (not really that long compared to some of the engagements in comparable cities), left for 13 months, and then returned for four more months at the Ritz. This also means that it was the Christmas attraction at the Ritz that year. I hope they got another print quick as I can not imagine that one lasting for another four days much less four months.In all of my years of attending and working in movie theatres I have seen movies that looked worse, but never encountered anything like the breaks and delays of that SOM show, which is probably the reason I remember it so well.
The only time even close was when I was managing a theatre running Elephant Man with a defective print. The black and white emulsion started flaking off and jamming the gates to the point that by the end of the opening weekend, we were having 2 to 3 breaks a show. It got so bad that before the lights were dimmed I would make an announcement telling the sold out house what was going to happen and why. A few people took my advice to get a refund and try again the next weekend when we would have a new print, but most people were good natured about it. At least the projectionist was ready for trouble and we were back on screen quickly with minimum missing footage.
Bill: White Castle has made it as far south as Nashville, so I have tasted them. The only difference I could notice is that Krystal’s did not have holes and were, of course, much MUCH better. In those early to mid 60’s days, we would usually see a movie on Friday nights a couple of times a month. Usually as a family, but sometimes our parents would drop my older brother and me off at our movie and go see a more adult film at a different theatre. We would then meet at the Krystal when our movies were over. All of this was in about a 6 square block area, but now it is hard to imagine two boys ages 7 and 12 going to a downtown movie alone to say nothing of walking to the Krystal on a Friday night in downtown Birmingham, or anywhere else for that matter.
I guess movies were not the only things that were better about those days.
Michael: One more note on my last comment. The more I think about it the more I think that I have the date wrong. No suprise there is it? (Bob, I feel your pain.)
I know the Ritz engagement of SOM started the day after the end of the run of Doctor Zhivago. I attended the final performance of Zhivago and remember the marquee and lobby posters were changed when the movie ended. That is how I found out about SOM starting there the next day. Since I had never heard of Zhivago until we watched the Academy Awards the night SOM won, that means that the SOM engagement at the Ritz had to have been Christmas of 1966.
That would still put it ahead of some initial engagements of some notable cities, but not as outrageous as I first thought. Maybe some day you could do an article on Doctor Zhivago. I have a whole boatload of stories about that one.
Thanks Bill and Bob for the kind words. I always enjoy reading your posts on the Ziegfeld page. I got so engrossed in that discussion once that I made a trip to NYC to see one of the first Classic Series showings.
On the subject of the 70MM staffing question, I can only speak for the practice here in Atlanta. In the 60’s theatres with IATSE contracts had a choice of paying two operators for 70MM showings or pay time and a half for one man. This also applied to 35MM runs of reserved seat engagements. The last time I recall this coming into play was in April of 1973 at the Atlanta Theatre when they ran the 70MM reissue of This Is Cinerama. That was also the only time I ever saw the time and a half for one man option used.
Michael: I have a Birmingham note to add. Your research shows that SOM played at the Eastwood Mall for 17 weeks starting in July of 1965 which would take it up to around Thanksgiving. I recall that I saw it again at the downtown Ritz Theatre during Christmas holidays. I think this was just a filler until the Christmas attraction for the Ritz started. I do not recall it being a moveover since there was a break between the engagements. I described that showing in my post on the Ritz page: /theaters/9396/
I see your list did not mention this engagement. Do you think there were any runs of this nature during Christmas of 1965 which was prior to many cities getting a booking. I am pretty sure this was 1965 since I recall it being shortly after the Eastwood run ended. Of course I am going on my memory here, and you of all people know what can happen when I start doing that.
Thanks Michael for another one of your exercises in research. I have always enjoyed your efforts to list the movies that played in certain theatres and what theatres played some notable movies.
For me, SOM was one of those watershed movies that opened up a whole new area of interest, namely musicals, just like The Longest Day did for war movies and Doctor Zhivago did for historical drama. I can remember the day I first saw SOM like it was yesterday. I still have my reserved seat ticket stub from the Eastwood Mall Theatre in Birmingham with its SOM logo printed on it. The date has faded, but it was a Friday, October 13th I think, 1965. 2 PM showing. I was 13, and even in those days we had teacher work days, just not as many as they do now. My mother offered to take me out to lunch and then all the way out to Eastwood Mall to see the movie. Going to Eastwood, which was a long way on the other side of Birmingham in those pre expressway days, was always a treat since it was one of the first enclosed malls in the southeast.
I fell in love with everything about this movie that day. The beautiful picture, impressive locations, wonderful music, and an entertaining story really made it a day to remember. On the way home we picked my dad up at work, and I could not wait to tell him about my day. He did his parental duty and listened, then told me that he was happy I enjoyed the movie, but he would pass on it. O well. He was a Georgia Tech man who five years later would be paying for me to earn a liberal arts degree, so SOM was not the only thing we did not have in common. The next day, he did take me to the local Woolworths so I could buy the record, my first movie soundtrack. It still sits on my shelf to this day. Shortly after that was another first, a return visit to see the movie again. I remember seeing the same movie twice, but usually as the co feature at the drive in. This was the first time I returned to see a movie during the same engagement.
This was a great time to be starting an interest in movies. Titles such as the three I mentioned above plus Lawrence, Goldfinger, Thunderball, Man For All Seasons, Mary Poppins, and McLintock made movies hard to resist.
Like countless others, I have seen SOM many times over the years. In the late 60’s it made a final round of neighborhood theatres in Atlanta, where I was living by then, with the tag “Going Out Of Release Until 1973.” In late 1971, about the time I started working in theatres, there was word that Fox was hurting for money and was considering bringing SOM back a year early. However, French Connection bailed them out and the big reissue took place in April 1973. By this time, the Martin Cinerama in downtown Atlanta had been sold to the Walter Reade Org. and been renamed The Atlanta. This magnificent theatre with its 70MM Cinerama projectors, deeply curved screen, and plush appointments had run SOM in its premiere release for 90 weeks. In addition it had run 3 strip Brothers Grimm, HTWWW, and 70MM IAMMMMW and 2001, as well as musicals such as Thoroughly Modern Millie, Mary Poppins, Camelot, Fiddler On The Roof, Man Of La Mancha, and even Goodbye Mr. Chips. But times had changed and it was now preparing for a run of the third Ginger movie, Girls Are For Loving, to be followed by Super Fly TNT. Needless to say, SOM would not be returning to its Atlanta home.
Martins suburban Cinerama house, the Georgia Cinerama got the honor. Not as big or plush as the downtown theatre, it did have the 70MM projectors and curved Cinerama screen. They had a 12 week run of packed houses before the picture was pulled in July and sent on a wider “intermediate” break. By this time the thrill of The Atlanta had faded and I was working at the Sandy Springs Theatre which got one of the intermediate bookings. For five weeks I had the pleasure of seeing this show as much as I liked, and on slow nights would prop the auditorium doors open so I could listen along as I worked. I was sure sorry when it had to go to make room for that next big Fox hit, Neptune Factor.
Within five years the video revolution had begun, and one of the first movies I bought to play in my $1200 RCA Selectavision VCR was a pan and scan copy of SOM from that producer of incredibly fuzzy, grainy, movies, the Magnetic Video Corp. I swear the thing looked like it was filmed in 8MM aimed at a screen showing a 16MM print. However, thinking that this was the ultimate in technology, I was happy to have it.
In the early 80’s a 70MM print of SOM showed up at the Rhodes Theatre which in better days had premiered such hits as West Side Story, Lawrence of Arabia, and Sand Pebbles, to say nothing of Darling Lilly. As a payback for that great afternoon 16 years earlier, I took my mother to see it, and then again a couple of months later when the same print showed up as part of the Fox Theatre summer film series.
In 1984, I passed through Saltzburg Austria, and spent a day seeing all of the SOM sites. I was impressed with how compact the city is and how many of the buildings and landmarks from the movie can be seen from one spot. The magic of film angles and editing made the place look much bigger. Even more so, the church where the wedding scene was filmed was amazingly small. I have photographed many places where movies scenes have been filmed over the years, but the one that hangs on my wall is a picture of my mother standing in front of the fountain where Julie Andrews and the children were dancing, with the castle in the background.
In the 90’s I started working in the projection booth of the Fox Theatre in Atlanta, and twice have had the pleasure of running SOM. In fact, that is the only time I have run this picture as a projectionist. The last time, I had finished inspecting the film for the next day, and had the chance to relax and watch the last hour or so. Sitting on the window sill of the spotlight booth, looking out over a packed house of over 4000 people, it was impossible for me not to think back to that day about 30 years earlier when I first saw SOM and started a life long love affair with movies and theatres.
Dmorg: Thanks for that nice write up of your memories of the South Dekalb. Maybe I saw you on your first visit since on my first day as manager we were running Herbie and Crazy Mary Dirty Larry. This was a very enjoyable theatre to work in and even when busy was easy to run since you could stand in front of the box office and see almost the entire operation. The only time things got hectic was when you had to line people up in the mall for #1 or outside for #2.
Your memories of what type of movies played on which side may be correct, but content had nothing to do with it. During cold weather, we usually tried to put the busy movie in #1 so we could line people up inside the mall. This was always a problem as the line would get confused with the people in the mall and it was too easy for people to hang around the mall entrance and break in line once we started to let the people in. Whenever the weather permitted, the busy movie would be in #2 so we could run the line up the hall and outside.
Of course this all changed when they split the two houses. Then, things got too hectic with different showtimes and exit times so you just had to do the best you could and when possible stretch out the intermissions. On some movies like Jaws 2 and The Muppet Movie, and the Bo Derek Tarzan of all things, the crowds were so large you would have an entire sellout lined up while the previous movie was still on. No amount of intermission could solve that.
I have always thought that the original twin theatre was the nicest theatre combined with the best presentation of any theatre I ever worked in. Glad to see someone else noticed.
Mike, This is an odd page to bring up the Weis chain since this theatre was never operated by Weis and has spent the vast majority of its life as a porno house. However, since you asked, all of the Weis theatres in Atlanta have pages and comments on this site. They are:
Only the last two were actually built by Weis. All of the others were already operating, sometimes under different names, when purchased by Weis. You will have to read down into the comments section to get to the Weis information on these.
Dave Poland was gone from Atlanta by the time I went to work for GCC, and his place was taken by Larry Pittman. I first met Larry Anderson when he replaced Webb Brainerd, who was the opening manager for the Perimeter Mall Triple. I think Webb went to Columbia SC, but he eventually ended up in Dallas in the booking department.
Larry stayed at Perimeter until 1978 when he went to open the new Akers Mill. I think that he was replaced by Stu Hoffman. If not, Stu came in shortly afterwards. I never met Larry or Stu at the time, but before our GCC days we were all managers for Loews. I think that they were both in Miami then.
Larry stayed at Akers until he was made DM. I think that at one time he was a DM in another area, but most of the time he was in Atlanta. In the early 80’s he left GCC to become the head of operations for Septum Cinemas, an Atlanta based regional. He must have left with a return option, because in less than a year he was back, not starting over as a manager, but in his old DM job. In the late 80’s he left GCC to work for Storey, another Atlanta based local chain. Within months, Storey was bought out by Regal and last I heard he was in NC.
Stu left GCC and went to work for NCN, the intermission slide show advertising company. I last saw him in 1988 when he came by a theatre I was running to check the slide set up. That job was a natural for him. When he and Larry were managers for Larry Pittman, they would travel all over the Pittman district selling screen ads for the Christmas season. Each manager was supposed to do that, but many did not have the knack or interest, so Larry and Stu would earn a lot of comissions and the results for Pittman’s district would be near the top.
That is too bad about Craig Zacker. I only met him at the Northlake. From my recollection of him I would say the he was a prime candidate for a heart attack. I think that Larry Anderson used him as a helper because Craig enjoyed the work and did not mind the extra duties. Some of the managers thought that Craig was just trying to get in good with the DM and that his own theatre could never measure up to the standard he held them to when doing his inspections.
Managing for GCC was no picnic, at least in Atlanta, and I think that most of the managers were just trying to get through the week without anything bad happening. Some of them hoped to move up in the company, like Anderson, but I do not recall any who did. Some of them did leave GCC for much better jobs.
Link to the Drive In ladder ad in the Atlanta paper on August 5, 1964. The blogger has also written up some of his memories of working at these places. Worth a look if you are interested in the drive in culture from 1970 – 1990.
Link to the Drive In ladder ad in the Atlanta paper on August 5, 1964. The blogger has also written up some of his memories of working at these places. Worth a look if you are interested in the drive in culture from 1970 – 1990.
Link to the Drive In ladder ad in the Atlanta paper on August 5, 1964. The blogger has also written up some of his memories of working at these places. Worth a look if you are interested in the drive in culture from 1970 – 1990.
Link to the Drive In ladder ad in the Atlanta paper on August 5, 1964. The blogger has also written up some of his memories of working at these places. Worth a look if you are interested in the drive in culture from 1970 – 1990.
Link to the Drive In ladder ad in the Atlanta paper on August 5, 1964. The blogger has also written up some of his memories of working at these places. Worth a look if you are interested in the drive in culture from 1970 – 1990.
Thanks for the stories ediemer. This link is for a theatre near Atlanta Georgia..
/theaters/17682/
The first comment has my story of having to run the endless loop platter.
I could never get over the lengths the theatre owners would go to trying to get rid of the projectionist position.
I worked the projection booth at the NATO convention when it came to Atlanta in 1987. The Christie company had one of these things set up on the exhibit floor with a big display reading “Let The Gremlins Do It.” I guess the gremlins were not covered by the minimum wage law. People were free to wander the exhibit area at any time during the 3 day convention, but on the final day there was a two hour period set aside for everyone to attend at the same time. When I walked through on that day I noticed that the platter was not turning and thought someone might be giving a demo to the crowd gathered around it. No such thing. When I made my way to the front I saw that the film had either backed off of the edge or had been slung off onto the floor. Two Christie reps were on hands and knees splicing away trying to get the mess cleaned up before the end of the exhibition period.
That night at the banquet I ran my five presentation reels flawlessly without the help of a platter, endless loop or otherwise. Later I saw the DM of the company I worked for and asked him if he noticed the difference in the way I ran the booth compared to the endless loop platter he had also seen that afternoon. He just said “You have to keep up with the times” as he walked away. Theatre owners: they would spend $10 to aviod paying someone a buck and still think that they had come out ahead.
I ran across a couple of Ziegfeld tidbits yesterday while going through some old files.
From Boxoffice Magizine, May 1978, an article on CE3K expanding from its exclusive Ziegfeld run in Manhattan to the Loew’s State 1 (70MM), Bay Cinema (70MM), and RKO 86th Street (35MM) on 4/26/78.. (A comment on this site on the latter theatre says that it closed in 1968, so I don’t know. This is the way the article listed it.) Michael Coate’s post of 4/16/08 shows 4/26/78 to be the date CE3K ended its 23 week run at the Ziegfeld to be replaced by The Last Waltz.
As background the article stated that CE3K opened at the Ziegfeld for a NY / NJ exclusive run on 11/16/77 before expanding to 11 other locations four weeks later. However it stayed exclusive in Manhattan for all 23 weeks. According to Boxoffice, the Zeigfeld grossed a record setting two million dollars during its run.
At the opposite end of the record setting department is a note from Variety from December 1971 when they still listed the Manhattan theatres and their grosses, usually with a cute line to describe the take.. According to Michael the theatre had been closed for 14 weeks leading up to its big Christmas movie of 1971, Star Spangled Girl. It opened on 12/22/71 and here is the way Variety described the gross: “Only $928 for this huge house.” That means that this 1300 seat theatre with its listed $16,500 nut brought in about 250 customers all week. Got to be the record. Should have stayed closed.
Thanks to Michael I see that it ran for 5 weeks before the theatre went dark again for the three weeks prior to the opening of Cabaret.
Gee Terry, check your math and you will see that it is not even that. The building was demolished in 2005 so it only lasted 13 years. Even worse, the place closed about 2000, 2002 at the latest. That means this brand new 10 screen theatre operated only about 10 years at the most. I never saw much of a crowd at this place and could not understand why this location did not do better. It was in something of a no mans land development wise, but it was only minutes away from Brentwood and the I-65 interchange. If it could play the same movies as Cool Springs and 100 Oaks you would think that people would prefer this nice quiet intersection to getting caught up in the mall traffic.
In the end it was probably what killed off most marginal locations: Minimal upkeep, indifferent presentation, and lack of adequate or good quality staff.
Thanks for that additional information Tim. I am really surprised that GTC added on a tiny theatre for #4 instead of just tearing off a chunk of the remaining large house. In 1978 they quaded the South DeKalb Twin and turned two beautiful 540 seat showcases into four 338 seat shoeboxes. They would not even consider leaving one side intact but since they even carved up their Lenox Square flagship there was nothing sacred to them in that respect. Riverside could count itself lucky that at least one house was still something to be proud of.
In the early Weis days the newspaper ads indicated which movie was playing in which theatre. #1 was named “The Popular Showplace” and #2 was labeled “The Intimate Theatre.” I could never notice any effort was made to play a particular type of movie in one side or the other. I also do not remember any difference in the two. I know one side was twinned when you started, but do you think that they were identical when built?
After 1974, Weis renamed this the “Weis Cinema Centre” and quit making any note as to which movie played in which side or even how many theatres were at the Centre. I like the “re” instead of “er” spelling. I am sure that made it a much nicer moviegoing experience. They did the same thing in multiscreen theatres in other cities except Atlanta where there was a single screen “Weis Cinema” already in business. There they took the Arrowhead Triple and named it the “Arrowhead Cinema Centre.” They did not do the same with the Cinema 75 Triple. I guess a name of “Cinema 75 Cinema Centre” was too much.
When you came to work there, did you come as a projectionist or did you move into that job? I ask because the very nice, orderly appearance of the booth suggests that there might have been some long time operator there who had taken care of the place for years. I can not begin to count the dumps I have walked into over the years and spent countless hours trying to organize the mess left by a succession of previous “projectionists.”
I did not realize that the old Macon Mall Quad had been dozed and a new theatre built. I thought that booth looked a lot bigger than I remembered.
Thanks again for the pictures and video. I have been passing them around to some of my former booth mates from years past.
Link to the Drive In ladder ad in the Atlanta paper on August 5, 1964. The blogger has also written up some of his memories of working at these places. Worth a look if you are interested in the drive in culture from 1970 – 1990.
View link
Tim, thanks for that website. It brought back a lot of memories. I just assumed that Georgia Theatre Company split both houses at the same time, but your descriptions and pictures indicate that only one was split and the fourth was an add on. One of your pictures shows an intact auditorium complete with the panels I mentioned on the side wall where the slide projector was aimed. The conversion from twin to quad has Georgia Theatre written all over it. The split auditorium shows no sign of the seating area being relocated, and that little theatre, well, it beats anything I have ever seen. The smallest theatre I ever worked in was the Baronet, in Atlanta. It had four seats on each side and 15 rows. Until your picture I have never seen a theatre with rows of only three seats. I would have put the aisle off center and had the seating 2 and 4.
Another giveaway to the GTC influence was the Potts platters in the booth. I was never in the Riverside booth, but have run countless others and the only time I have ever had to run these pieces of crap was at GTC locations. They looked like a Strong, but I guess they were cheaper, and their on / off motors as opposed to constant feed were always a threat to sling the print off onto the floor, or cause a brain wrap. With all of those reels hanging on the wall and the spindles still in place, it looks as if the projectors were reel to reel during the twin days, and then divided as the houses were increased. Those V 8’s were great machines, and still are. In fact I am working a booth with one as I write this. Unfortunately the others are belt driven V 5’s.
From the pictures and video it certainly seems that the projectionist ran a neat and orderly booth. I was in the Macon Mall Quad several times but was not aware that it had been divided into 8. It was built by Georgia Theatre in the mid 70’s and was included in the sell out to United Artists Theatres in the late 80’s before UA was bought by Regal. Aaron Manheim was the long time manager there. Does that name ring a bell?
Thanks again for the great website. Wish I had taken the time to make pictures like yours. I just assumed the theatres would always be there.
Thanks for another trip down memory lane Michael. I am glad you did not try to list the theatres involved. With 1500 locations that would have been a time consuming task. With so many multiplex screens and the end of exclusive runs and year long engagements that sort of thing had lost its charm by 1985.
Back To The Future was notable to me because it was one of those movies that kind of slipped in under my radar. I am not a TV watcher and had never heard of Michael J. Fox, or any other of the actors except Lea Thompson, and the anticipated sci fi movie of that summer, Cocoon, had opened a couple of weeks earlier. However, when the staff unlocked the doors on opening day, it was obvious that I was about the only one who was not ready for it. For the first couple of weeks we had sellouts even during the week despite the wide break release it had in Atlanta. I was working at Greens Corner at the time and we continued to have weekend sellouts until Labor Day. I also did some relief work at the GCC Southlake 3 and it was a big hit there as well.
As for the Mike Rogers comment above I would say two things:
First, it reminds me of a humorous episode regarding the film critic of the Atlanta paper whose last name was Ringel. (I forget the first name.) My one contact with her leads me to believe that she is a pleasant enough person, however, it was a standing joke among those of us who worked in theatres that if you wanted a good review from her then your movie better have subtitles. Back To The Future had received the expected lambasting on opening day although it was obvious that it made no difference at the box office even in those days when newspapers were relevant. Later on, outraged that it was still doing big business weeks after opening, she wrote another article lamenting that this piece of lightweight fluff was a hit while more worthy fare (in her opinion) was being ignored. In less than subtle language she questioned at least the taste if not the intelligence of the movie goers of Atlanta. As you might expect, this brought a flood of letters to the editor raising the same questions about her. In the end she wrote yet another article explaining her reasoning and suggesting that the Back To The Future fans could still find her reviews useful by going to see any movie that she hated.
Secondly, I hate to tell Mike this, but it is doubtful that he will ever see another movie as good as 2001. I saw 2001 when it first came out in 70MM at the Martin Cinerama. I liked it, and still do, better than the majority of the many movies I have seen since. However, if I judged every movie I saw by how it compared to my all time favorite, which is The Best Years Of Our Lives, then I would find very few even bearable. If I had to write a one sentence evaluation (obviously not my style) of Back To The Future, it would go something like this:
“A pleasant, well made film with good production values that entertained the movie going public to the point that many of them came back for more.”
If more movies could live up to that description then they would have to build more theatres to hold all of the people, and all of us who enjoy this business would have jobs for as long as we cared to work.
As to the 70MM version, I do not believe that it had a 70MM release in Atlanta, but the next summer, the Fox Theatre ran both Cocoon and Back To The Future in 70.
I think that you are confusing two drive ins because of the similar names. This page refers to the Highway 85 Drive In which was located on State Highway 85 just south of the city of Fayetteville which itself is south of the Atlanta city limits.
The other one is the North 85 Twin Drive In which was located in Interstate 85. It was not really near Gwinnett County. In fact it was just north of the Atlanta city limits at the Shallowford Road exit, several miles inside I-285. Further up I-85 at the intersection with I-285 there was the Northeast Expressway Drive In. It was located about four miles from the Gwinnett County line.
I do not know when this Highway 85 location closed, but it was probably in the 70’s. I think it was one of two “Adult Only” drive ins advertised in the paper. Or, it might have been the Highway 54 Drive In which was also known as the Forest Park Drive In. I know that the other one was the Lithonia Drive In, which was sometimes known as the Highway 12 Drive In because of its location on State Highway 12, or Covington Highway.
As far at the time when Atlanta had only two drive ins, that would be from about 1985 until 2002. From the mid 60’s to the mid 70’s there were over 20 drive ins with ads in the paper. Then, they started closing fast as land values went up and the profits from a single screen theatre, even a drive in went down. In 1983 the Bankhead and the Northeast Expressway closed up leaving only the North 85, the Twin Starlight, and the South Expressway Twin in operation. A couple of years later the Starlight had been converted to six screens and the South Expressway closed. The North 85 closed in about 2002 leaving only the Starlight Six.
Ned: As I pointed out earlier, I have learned never to say never about anything when using my memory, but I am as sure as I can be without going back and checking all of the newspapers that Star Wars did not play here in its initial release. It opened at the Tara, Doraville, Franklin Road, and Arrowhead, and at least the first two on that list ran it until the Christmas season. I know it did not play here during the Christmas 1977-78 season, so at the earliest it would have been Spring 1978. I was not a regular employee there at that time but I would hate to think that I would not have remembered such a booking.
Star Wars did play here in the mid 90’s when they had that nationwide release of all three in their remastered and digitally updated form. For the record, I am not a Star Wars fan, but I thought that changing the content was a travesty even though the original director did the changes. In my opinion, the genuine version of Star Wars is the one that came out in 1977.
As for Phipps, it opened Empire on a four week 70MM exclusive in late May of 1980. The #2 house, the right hand one downstairs was the only 70MM equipped house and that is where it played for its run there. There was no 35MM run of Empire at Phipps during that booking.
I also saw Jedi there. The first half of it anyway. It was a hard week at my theatre and I fell asleep half way through about the time the Ewoks showed up. I never bothered to see the rest. As I said, I am not a big fan. Sorry R2.
Cone: Thank you for taking the time to comment on this site. I have very fond memories of working for Modular in the early 70’s and to this day keep in touch with some of the people I met there. Most of my work was at Sandy Springs although I also spent a good bit of time at Peachtree Battle and Doraville. I never knew anyone at this location until I started managing the South DeKalb in 1974 by which time it was a Weis operation.
That is an interesting story about the seats and equipment. I was really surprised when I first walked into Candler by the condition of the furnishings since I always thought that Sandy Springs and Doraville were very nicely appointed. All of that was before I started working in theatres and I assumed that the company must have changed hands or something when the Candler was built since it was so different.
Assuming that you are the co-founder and not Cone Jr., I can recall meeting you a couple of times when you attended movies at Sandy Springs. Roger McClure was the manager at that time. Aaron Bouldin was at Doraville, Bill Henley was at Peachtree Battle, and Bill Sheely was the roving relief manager / operator. I was still a college student just doing hourly work wherever I could pick up some work that fit my schedule, but I also did a lot of film and concession supply delivery which is how I got to know people at the other theatres. Those were great times to work in theatres and your little neighborhood chain was a good place to learn the trade before it became dominated by the big corporations and multiplexes and megaplexes of today.
You should take a look at the Sandy Springs page on this site. Barbara Gentry has posted some information about how her dad and you started the company. It is listed under the name Sandy Springs Theatre. Perhaps you could shine some light on the time when Sandy Springs went independent while the rest of the Mini Cinemas operated under a kind of co-op agreement with Storey before getting back together as Mini Cinemas.
/theaters/12161/
Thanks again. I am still in this business after all of these years and many of my favorite memories are thanks to your company and the people I met there. Just this past weekend a group of retired managers, projectionists and friends from those days had our regular lunch and get together at the old Sandy Springs site which is now The Brickery restaurant.
Stan
Nope. Like you I was assuming that Jack meant indoor theatres, or as they say in the trades, walk in or hardtops.
The Starlight opened the south field in 1949 and the north in 1953. The south was closed for a while when the snack bar burned. The north closed a year later when it was split. Every winter one side or the other closes for the season, something I never understood the theory on. However, as far as I know, at least something has been open there since opening day although they close on Christmas Eve, and for the occasional power outage.
I no longer work there, at least regularly, but I did write a history of the place on its page here:
/theaters/11497/
As for indoors, without looking at a list, I can think of the Grand, the Fox, Garden Hills / Fine Art, Plaza (if you count its XXX years), and the Lenox which might have been only 39 years 8 months. I hesitate to even go down this road because I know that people will start listing reasons why some of these places were not in continious operation. Even the Tara shut down once for two days when it was first twinned.
Maybe I should start off the previous paragraph with the words “Generally speaking….”
Most of the indoor theatres built during the 60’s lasted only 25 or so years at the most, some a lot less. I think that the shortest existance for a regular indoor theatre (as opposed to some of the XXX storefront operations) was the Atlantic, an Eastern Federal location on Memorial Drive in or near the Kirkwood area. It lasted only about 5 years.
Correction on my first post:
Doctor Zhivago played at the Ritz during the fall of 1966 not 1965. I saw it for the second time on its final night of the run which was December 22, 1966. The next day, December 23 was the day I saw the Sound Of Music which I also mention in that post.
Thanks to Michael Coate for helping get the dates right.
Thanks for that information Michael. Your research efforts never cease to amaze me. At least this time I caught my memory lapse before you had to point it out to me. This confirms to me that I saw Doctor Zhivago for the second time on the night of December 22, 1966, and then SOM the next afternoon.
This means that SOM played its reserved seat engagement for four months at the Eastwood Mall (not really that long compared to some of the engagements in comparable cities), left for 13 months, and then returned for four more months at the Ritz. This also means that it was the Christmas attraction at the Ritz that year. I hope they got another print quick as I can not imagine that one lasting for another four days much less four months.In all of my years of attending and working in movie theatres I have seen movies that looked worse, but never encountered anything like the breaks and delays of that SOM show, which is probably the reason I remember it so well.
The only time even close was when I was managing a theatre running Elephant Man with a defective print. The black and white emulsion started flaking off and jamming the gates to the point that by the end of the opening weekend, we were having 2 to 3 breaks a show. It got so bad that before the lights were dimmed I would make an announcement telling the sold out house what was going to happen and why. A few people took my advice to get a refund and try again the next weekend when we would have a new print, but most people were good natured about it. At least the projectionist was ready for trouble and we were back on screen quickly with minimum missing footage.
Bill: White Castle has made it as far south as Nashville, so I have tasted them. The only difference I could notice is that Krystal’s did not have holes and were, of course, much MUCH better. In those early to mid 60’s days, we would usually see a movie on Friday nights a couple of times a month. Usually as a family, but sometimes our parents would drop my older brother and me off at our movie and go see a more adult film at a different theatre. We would then meet at the Krystal when our movies were over. All of this was in about a 6 square block area, but now it is hard to imagine two boys ages 7 and 12 going to a downtown movie alone to say nothing of walking to the Krystal on a Friday night in downtown Birmingham, or anywhere else for that matter.
I guess movies were not the only things that were better about those days.
Michael: One more note on my last comment. The more I think about it the more I think that I have the date wrong. No suprise there is it? (Bob, I feel your pain.)
I know the Ritz engagement of SOM started the day after the end of the run of Doctor Zhivago. I attended the final performance of Zhivago and remember the marquee and lobby posters were changed when the movie ended. That is how I found out about SOM starting there the next day. Since I had never heard of Zhivago until we watched the Academy Awards the night SOM won, that means that the SOM engagement at the Ritz had to have been Christmas of 1966.
That would still put it ahead of some initial engagements of some notable cities, but not as outrageous as I first thought. Maybe some day you could do an article on Doctor Zhivago. I have a whole boatload of stories about that one.
Thanks Bill and Bob for the kind words. I always enjoy reading your posts on the Ziegfeld page. I got so engrossed in that discussion once that I made a trip to NYC to see one of the first Classic Series showings.
On the subject of the 70MM staffing question, I can only speak for the practice here in Atlanta. In the 60’s theatres with IATSE contracts had a choice of paying two operators for 70MM showings or pay time and a half for one man. This also applied to 35MM runs of reserved seat engagements. The last time I recall this coming into play was in April of 1973 at the Atlanta Theatre when they ran the 70MM reissue of This Is Cinerama. That was also the only time I ever saw the time and a half for one man option used.
Michael: I have a Birmingham note to add. Your research shows that SOM played at the Eastwood Mall for 17 weeks starting in July of 1965 which would take it up to around Thanksgiving. I recall that I saw it again at the downtown Ritz Theatre during Christmas holidays. I think this was just a filler until the Christmas attraction for the Ritz started. I do not recall it being a moveover since there was a break between the engagements. I described that showing in my post on the Ritz page: /theaters/9396/
I see your list did not mention this engagement. Do you think there were any runs of this nature during Christmas of 1965 which was prior to many cities getting a booking. I am pretty sure this was 1965 since I recall it being shortly after the Eastwood run ended. Of course I am going on my memory here, and you of all people know what can happen when I start doing that.
Thanks Michael for another one of your exercises in research. I have always enjoyed your efforts to list the movies that played in certain theatres and what theatres played some notable movies.
For me, SOM was one of those watershed movies that opened up a whole new area of interest, namely musicals, just like The Longest Day did for war movies and Doctor Zhivago did for historical drama. I can remember the day I first saw SOM like it was yesterday. I still have my reserved seat ticket stub from the Eastwood Mall Theatre in Birmingham with its SOM logo printed on it. The date has faded, but it was a Friday, October 13th I think, 1965. 2 PM showing. I was 13, and even in those days we had teacher work days, just not as many as they do now. My mother offered to take me out to lunch and then all the way out to Eastwood Mall to see the movie. Going to Eastwood, which was a long way on the other side of Birmingham in those pre expressway days, was always a treat since it was one of the first enclosed malls in the southeast.
I fell in love with everything about this movie that day. The beautiful picture, impressive locations, wonderful music, and an entertaining story really made it a day to remember. On the way home we picked my dad up at work, and I could not wait to tell him about my day. He did his parental duty and listened, then told me that he was happy I enjoyed the movie, but he would pass on it. O well. He was a Georgia Tech man who five years later would be paying for me to earn a liberal arts degree, so SOM was not the only thing we did not have in common. The next day, he did take me to the local Woolworths so I could buy the record, my first movie soundtrack. It still sits on my shelf to this day. Shortly after that was another first, a return visit to see the movie again. I remember seeing the same movie twice, but usually as the co feature at the drive in. This was the first time I returned to see a movie during the same engagement.
This was a great time to be starting an interest in movies. Titles such as the three I mentioned above plus Lawrence, Goldfinger, Thunderball, Man For All Seasons, Mary Poppins, and McLintock made movies hard to resist.
Like countless others, I have seen SOM many times over the years. In the late 60’s it made a final round of neighborhood theatres in Atlanta, where I was living by then, with the tag “Going Out Of Release Until 1973.” In late 1971, about the time I started working in theatres, there was word that Fox was hurting for money and was considering bringing SOM back a year early. However, French Connection bailed them out and the big reissue took place in April 1973. By this time, the Martin Cinerama in downtown Atlanta had been sold to the Walter Reade Org. and been renamed The Atlanta. This magnificent theatre with its 70MM Cinerama projectors, deeply curved screen, and plush appointments had run SOM in its premiere release for 90 weeks. In addition it had run 3 strip Brothers Grimm, HTWWW, and 70MM IAMMMMW and 2001, as well as musicals such as Thoroughly Modern Millie, Mary Poppins, Camelot, Fiddler On The Roof, Man Of La Mancha, and even Goodbye Mr. Chips. But times had changed and it was now preparing for a run of the third Ginger movie, Girls Are For Loving, to be followed by Super Fly TNT. Needless to say, SOM would not be returning to its Atlanta home.
Martins suburban Cinerama house, the Georgia Cinerama got the honor. Not as big or plush as the downtown theatre, it did have the 70MM projectors and curved Cinerama screen. They had a 12 week run of packed houses before the picture was pulled in July and sent on a wider “intermediate” break. By this time the thrill of The Atlanta had faded and I was working at the Sandy Springs Theatre which got one of the intermediate bookings. For five weeks I had the pleasure of seeing this show as much as I liked, and on slow nights would prop the auditorium doors open so I could listen along as I worked. I was sure sorry when it had to go to make room for that next big Fox hit, Neptune Factor.
Within five years the video revolution had begun, and one of the first movies I bought to play in my $1200 RCA Selectavision VCR was a pan and scan copy of SOM from that producer of incredibly fuzzy, grainy, movies, the Magnetic Video Corp. I swear the thing looked like it was filmed in 8MM aimed at a screen showing a 16MM print. However, thinking that this was the ultimate in technology, I was happy to have it.
In the early 80’s a 70MM print of SOM showed up at the Rhodes Theatre which in better days had premiered such hits as West Side Story, Lawrence of Arabia, and Sand Pebbles, to say nothing of Darling Lilly. As a payback for that great afternoon 16 years earlier, I took my mother to see it, and then again a couple of months later when the same print showed up as part of the Fox Theatre summer film series.
In 1984, I passed through Saltzburg Austria, and spent a day seeing all of the SOM sites. I was impressed with how compact the city is and how many of the buildings and landmarks from the movie can be seen from one spot. The magic of film angles and editing made the place look much bigger. Even more so, the church where the wedding scene was filmed was amazingly small. I have photographed many places where movies scenes have been filmed over the years, but the one that hangs on my wall is a picture of my mother standing in front of the fountain where Julie Andrews and the children were dancing, with the castle in the background.
In the 90’s I started working in the projection booth of the Fox Theatre in Atlanta, and twice have had the pleasure of running SOM. In fact, that is the only time I have run this picture as a projectionist. The last time, I had finished inspecting the film for the next day, and had the chance to relax and watch the last hour or so. Sitting on the window sill of the spotlight booth, looking out over a packed house of over 4000 people, it was impossible for me not to think back to that day about 30 years earlier when I first saw SOM and started a life long love affair with movies and theatres.
Dmorg: Thanks for that nice write up of your memories of the South Dekalb. Maybe I saw you on your first visit since on my first day as manager we were running Herbie and Crazy Mary Dirty Larry. This was a very enjoyable theatre to work in and even when busy was easy to run since you could stand in front of the box office and see almost the entire operation. The only time things got hectic was when you had to line people up in the mall for #1 or outside for #2.
Your memories of what type of movies played on which side may be correct, but content had nothing to do with it. During cold weather, we usually tried to put the busy movie in #1 so we could line people up inside the mall. This was always a problem as the line would get confused with the people in the mall and it was too easy for people to hang around the mall entrance and break in line once we started to let the people in. Whenever the weather permitted, the busy movie would be in #2 so we could run the line up the hall and outside.
Of course this all changed when they split the two houses. Then, things got too hectic with different showtimes and exit times so you just had to do the best you could and when possible stretch out the intermissions. On some movies like Jaws 2 and The Muppet Movie, and the Bo Derek Tarzan of all things, the crowds were so large you would have an entire sellout lined up while the previous movie was still on. No amount of intermission could solve that.
I have always thought that the original twin theatre was the nicest theatre combined with the best presentation of any theatre I ever worked in. Glad to see someone else noticed.
Mike, This is an odd page to bring up the Weis chain since this theatre was never operated by Weis and has spent the vast majority of its life as a porno house. However, since you asked, all of the Weis theatres in Atlanta have pages and comments on this site. They are:
Capri: /theaters/11420/
Fine Art: /theaters/11485/
Broadview: /theaters/12132/
Weis Cinema: /theaters/11690/
Peachtree Battle: /theaters/12131/
Atlanta: /theaters/4784/
Sandy Springs: /theaters/12161/
Doraville: /theaters/11795/
Candler Road: /theaters/16454/
Franklin Road: /theaters/12863/
Arrowhead: /theaters/12974/
Only the last two were actually built by Weis. All of the others were already operating, sometimes under different names, when purchased by Weis. You will have to read down into the comments section to get to the Weis information on these.
Russell,
Dave Poland was gone from Atlanta by the time I went to work for GCC, and his place was taken by Larry Pittman. I first met Larry Anderson when he replaced Webb Brainerd, who was the opening manager for the Perimeter Mall Triple. I think Webb went to Columbia SC, but he eventually ended up in Dallas in the booking department.
Larry stayed at Perimeter until 1978 when he went to open the new Akers Mill. I think that he was replaced by Stu Hoffman. If not, Stu came in shortly afterwards. I never met Larry or Stu at the time, but before our GCC days we were all managers for Loews. I think that they were both in Miami then.
Larry stayed at Akers until he was made DM. I think that at one time he was a DM in another area, but most of the time he was in Atlanta. In the early 80’s he left GCC to become the head of operations for Septum Cinemas, an Atlanta based regional. He must have left with a return option, because in less than a year he was back, not starting over as a manager, but in his old DM job. In the late 80’s he left GCC to work for Storey, another Atlanta based local chain. Within months, Storey was bought out by Regal and last I heard he was in NC.
Stu left GCC and went to work for NCN, the intermission slide show advertising company. I last saw him in 1988 when he came by a theatre I was running to check the slide set up. That job was a natural for him. When he and Larry were managers for Larry Pittman, they would travel all over the Pittman district selling screen ads for the Christmas season. Each manager was supposed to do that, but many did not have the knack or interest, so Larry and Stu would earn a lot of comissions and the results for Pittman’s district would be near the top.
That is too bad about Craig Zacker. I only met him at the Northlake. From my recollection of him I would say the he was a prime candidate for a heart attack. I think that Larry Anderson used him as a helper because Craig enjoyed the work and did not mind the extra duties. Some of the managers thought that Craig was just trying to get in good with the DM and that his own theatre could never measure up to the standard he held them to when doing his inspections.
Managing for GCC was no picnic, at least in Atlanta, and I think that most of the managers were just trying to get through the week without anything bad happening. Some of them hoped to move up in the company, like Anderson, but I do not recall any who did. Some of them did leave GCC for much better jobs.
Write up on the 1964 single strip presentation of How The West Was Won at the Cobb with newspaper ad:
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Link to the Drive In ladder ad in the Atlanta paper on August 5, 1964. The blogger has also written up some of his memories of working at these places. Worth a look if you are interested in the drive in culture from 1970 – 1990.
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Link to the Drive In ladder ad in the Atlanta paper on August 5, 1964. The blogger has also written up some of his memories of working at these places. Worth a look if you are interested in the drive in culture from 1970 – 1990.
View link
Link to the Drive In ladder ad in the Atlanta paper on August 5, 1964. The blogger has also written up some of his memories of working at these places. Worth a look if you are interested in the drive in culture from 1970 – 1990.
View link
Link to the Drive In ladder ad in the Atlanta paper on August 5, 1964. The blogger has also written up some of his memories of working at these places. Worth a look if you are interested in the drive in culture from 1970 – 1990.
View link
Link to the Drive In ladder ad in the Atlanta paper on August 5, 1964. The blogger has also written up some of his memories of working at these places. Worth a look if you are interested in the drive in culture from 1970 – 1990.
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