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Working at a Movie Theatre is Weird.
WeX Majors
8th Floor, MegashipRegistered User regular
8th Floor, MegashipRegistered User regular
Back during the Christmas board, I couldn't help but notice that there were quite a few people who had dealt with working at a theatre. So I've been wanting to start up a general thread for it for awhile.
Because for those that don't know, it's not really like any other sort of retail-like job. It's like a mix of Fast Food, Retail, Office Work, Show Business, and Theme Park thrown together. You could come home smelling like cooking oil, or film cuts on your fingers because you're an idiot and forgot to wear gloves when you were threading a movie through 8 projectors for kicks.
It works on the opposite schedule of nearly everyone else, so you come to love weekday mornings and loathe Friday nights. You'll wish the country was atheist to never have to deal with a holiday again, but can't wait for January 3rd and school to start back.
You'll wind up with so much free swag you won't know what to do with it all, until the next blockbuster comes out and all you get is a mini poster because the rest of the cool shit was locked behind a Get Smart hallway.
So come share in the oddness my fellow brothers in popping oil, so that we don't wind up throwing xenon bulbs at the next customer to piss us off.
To start things off, let me tell you about spending the night at the theatre.
Yes, during the insanity that was the blizzard this Wednesday, I was working through it. We should have closed early, but because it was Inventory Count, we were positive The Company wouldn't let us. So we bust our asses to be done as soon as those last movies were finishing. 14 minutes past midnight, I'm getting ready to clock out when my manager comes back inside.
"I'm stuck"
Sure enough, there is at least 1-2 feet of loose snow. I knew as soon as I stepped outside. We were going to have to sleep at the theatre. But it gets better.
We were not the only ones there.
The only two people to show up in the last hour, was The Old Man and His Son. The reason we had assigned them a nickname, is because they would try every week for 3 months to not pay for tickets. No one stops an 80 year old man from going to the bathroom. After 3 months of solid "they're totally scamming us", one Verbal tirade later and they got kicked out.
So sure enough, the first time they both buy tickets, the four of us are now stuck there overnight.
I get many people wanting to see Projection. The mystique and the utter lockdown we put it under, even with our own employees, makes some people go "what do they have in there?". The answer is:
My Shit.
I've spent the last three years, turning the place into a pseudo-apartment. My Boss had to spend the night once AND open the next morning years ago, and ever since then I swore I would be way more prepared than he was.
So among the old equipment left there after the digital transfer(which is a whole other story), I've got a whole damn wardrobe. I've got giant pieces of foam taken from packaging and old seats to make a bed and pillow out of. I even had packets of Hot Chocolate and my own pepsi cups (because fuck coke.) to use.
So with my socks and wet clothes hanging on heaters, I wound up spending the night walking between theatres, watching all of the movies I had been wanting to see but didn't want to spend free time driving back down to the place to watch. Oh and watching exorcist finally. Amazing flick, totally deserves the praise.
By then, it was about 8am, so I went outside to help my manager shovel us out til the plows came. Also to get away from the OMandSon. The plows dug us a path out of there, I got home and passed out for the next 7 hours, only to have them call me because they thought I would be coming back in that night.
So fellow ticketushtakers and concessprojectionists, how weird is your theatre?
Because for those that don't know, it's not really like any other sort of retail-like job. It's like a mix of Fast Food, Retail, Office Work, Show Business, and Theme Park thrown together. You could come home smelling like cooking oil, or film cuts on your fingers because you're an idiot and forgot to wear gloves when you were threading a movie through 8 projectors for kicks.
It works on the opposite schedule of nearly everyone else, so you come to love weekday mornings and loathe Friday nights. You'll wish the country was atheist to never have to deal with a holiday again, but can't wait for January 3rd and school to start back.
You'll wind up with so much free swag you won't know what to do with it all, until the next blockbuster comes out and all you get is a mini poster because the rest of the cool shit was locked behind a Get Smart hallway.
So come share in the oddness my fellow brothers in popping oil, so that we don't wind up throwing xenon bulbs at the next customer to piss us off.
To start things off, let me tell you about spending the night at the theatre.
Yes, during the insanity that was the blizzard this Wednesday, I was working through it. We should have closed early, but because it was Inventory Count, we were positive The Company wouldn't let us. So we bust our asses to be done as soon as those last movies were finishing. 14 minutes past midnight, I'm getting ready to clock out when my manager comes back inside.
"I'm stuck"
Sure enough, there is at least 1-2 feet of loose snow. I knew as soon as I stepped outside. We were going to have to sleep at the theatre. But it gets better.
We were not the only ones there.
The only two people to show up in the last hour, was The Old Man and His Son. The reason we had assigned them a nickname, is because they would try every week for 3 months to not pay for tickets. No one stops an 80 year old man from going to the bathroom. After 3 months of solid "they're totally scamming us", one Verbal tirade later and they got kicked out.
So sure enough, the first time they both buy tickets, the four of us are now stuck there overnight.
I get many people wanting to see Projection. The mystique and the utter lockdown we put it under, even with our own employees, makes some people go "what do they have in there?". The answer is:
My Shit.
I've spent the last three years, turning the place into a pseudo-apartment. My Boss had to spend the night once AND open the next morning years ago, and ever since then I swore I would be way more prepared than he was.
So among the old equipment left there after the digital transfer(which is a whole other story), I've got a whole damn wardrobe. I've got giant pieces of foam taken from packaging and old seats to make a bed and pillow out of. I even had packets of Hot Chocolate and my own pepsi cups (because fuck coke.) to use.
So with my socks and wet clothes hanging on heaters, I wound up spending the night walking between theatres, watching all of the movies I had been wanting to see but didn't want to spend free time driving back down to the place to watch. Oh and watching exorcist finally. Amazing flick, totally deserves the praise.
By then, it was about 8am, so I went outside to help my manager shovel us out til the plows came. Also to get away from the OMandSon. The plows dug us a path out of there, I got home and passed out for the next 7 hours, only to have them call me because they thought I would be coming back in that night.
So fellow ticketushtakers and concessprojectionists, how weird is your theatre?
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Cleaning a public bathroom is something that will make you hate human beings.
Yesterday I am changing the trash and wiping everything down and sitting there in the sink is the biggest, nastiest glob of bloody, yellow, green, black snot and mucus I ever saw.
Literally less than a foot away is a fucking paper towel dispenser. Blow your fucking nose into a paper towel i dont want to have to wipe up your goddamn snot out of a sink. I almost vomited while doing this.
it sucks
at
Hot Topic
mods please ban yaya
I sat quietly with my cellphone off, didn't make a mess, and politely excused myself to the staff as I passed them leaving the theater.
Or else thats what it fucking looks like because why the hell am i constantly wiping up knotted piles of pubic hair on urinals all the time.
like i'm a pretty hairy guy in general and i never do that shit
I get along with my coworkers and managers, and 90% of our customers are generally nice people
I love my job
thank you
you're a good man
or a good girl named mitch in which case you're still good but weird
my job has better stories than yours ever will
do corpses show up where you work
This was in the women's room.
actually my name is george
wtf
I know it all.
maybe I should call you Clarissa
so you can explain it all
kpop appreciation station i also like to tweet some
I wonder if I've offended some subset of the forum culture unintentionally
a testament to my kindness
uh..
I don't know a while.
JordynNolz.com <- All my blogs (Shepard, Wasted, J'onn, DCAU) are here now!
So I got like...some time off.
JordynNolz.com <- All my blogs (Shepard, Wasted, J'onn, DCAU) are here now!
"Oh, no, I haven't gotten a chance to see it yet, but one of my friends saw it yesterday, and said it was really funny/good/interesting."
Said that so many times. Sup, tickets.
Edit: to future YaYa. Not as much, but moreso IF they should see something. They're gonna buy it anyway, but I gatta ham it up just to make sure.
when you sold tickets did you regularly get asked by customers what they should see
e: guess that answers that
I find it so perplexing that people would go to the movies without any idea of what to see and then not even decide by the time they got to the head of the line
asked for time off
JordynNolz.com <- All my blogs (Shepard, Wasted, J'onn, DCAU) are here now!
*old people
old guy sees a commercial
remember only one thing about it
goes to the movies, watches it
forgets his wife's name
but
but it's right there on the thing
it's right in front of you how do you even
oh lord i forgot my glasses in my purse
where's my purse
where am i
this isn't my home
where's harold?!
"So that'll be two for Pirates of the Caribbean 3: At World's End."
Also, middle schoolers are the worst and I hate them.
There were four main areas I worked. Floor, which was cleaning up theaters after movies got out and keeping the hallways clean. Lobby, which was just keeping the big open area in front of concessions clean, helping people that needed it, and the bathrooms. Tickets, which was just taking people's tickets, and finally, concessions.
Screw concessions. Screw concessions so hard.
Floor was by far the best. Every 5 minutes or so you had to walk into theaters to make sure the emergency exits were closed, and that people were not being horrible. Mostly though it was a chance to watch a couple minutes of a movie when it was slow.
Fuuuuuuuuck. Every Wednesday night it was like church group after church group.
You guys know this is rated R right? You know it's like bloody and violent as fuck right?
Oh we looooove Jesus, give us tickets.
At the same time, the hockey film Miracle was playing at the theater. One night, Passion is almost sold out, when an older lady comes in with her two kids and buys three tickets to Miracle. She comes over to the concession stand and sends her kids in to the movie. I am helping another customer but sort of...observing this all as I do. The kids come back out to their mom.
"Mom, that movie is about hockey."
"No it's about Jesus."
"No, it's hockey."
"No, it's Miracle of the Christ, it's about Jesus."
I immediately realized what had happened but decided to just wait for everyone else to realize it too, as I found it hilarious and wanted the moment to last.
JordynNolz.com <- All my blogs (Shepard, Wasted, J'onn, DCAU) are here now!
Box (ticket sales, lobby cleanup after shows started)
Usher (ticket taker, bathroom cleaner, theater cleaner)
Concession (what it implies)
Mid-Day (weird inbetween shift, did everything)
I was such a damn good usher. I would clean the theaters fast as shit and start tearing tickets quick like damn