The beacon hill (along with the pi alley and the old Savoy) was one of three theatres the BPD would permit movies to be shown if the film was expected to draw a predominantly African-American audience. The police were very eager to keep such audiences in certain venues.
My grandfather (Ben Sack) explained some of the rationale for the Cheri, one of the first multi-screen threatres in the country. The biggest was obviously the ability to leverage the single service infrastructure. The real key was by staggering the start times of the films, he was able to get by with one projectionist — at that time, one of the biggest fixed cost. (They were unionized.)
The beacon hill (along with the pi alley and the old Savoy) was one of three theatres the BPD would permit movies to be shown if the film was expected to draw a predominantly African-American audience. The police were very eager to keep such audiences in certain venues.
I’m Ben Sack’s grandson and he told me the story.
My grandfather (Ben Sack) explained some of the rationale for the Cheri, one of the first multi-screen threatres in the country. The biggest was obviously the ability to leverage the single service infrastructure. The real key was by staggering the start times of the films, he was able to get by with one projectionist — at that time, one of the biggest fixed cost. (They were unionized.)