Mark Kearney, local historian, professor and trivia guy, has an article in this month’s London CityLife magazine about the Capitol Theatre:
The lobby doors are locked, but if you peek through you see bits of paper on the floor, two step ladders leaning against a wall, and some debris on the wine-coloured carpet that leads past the snack bar to the two cinemas inside. The box office window has a small crack, and the entranceway could use a good sweeping. … [N]ow, everything at the Capitol is as silent as the movies it used to feature…. [B]eauty and age are rarely respected in this business anymore.
The Capitol, née the Allen, is the site of what could be my ideal movie theatre. (See The Majestic.) Unfortunately I don’t have the cash or business acuity to make it work. But I can dream….
Step by step
The first thing I’d do is work on the sound. Correction: on the soundproofing. When it opened, the Allen was a single 1200-seat auditorium; in the mid-’70s, as the Capitol under Famous Players, it was split into two smaller cinemas. Perhaps movies weren’t played as loudly then, or maybe Famous just skimped on the renovation, but it suffers from what seem at times to be paper-thin walls. I’ve got a friend who’s an engineer specializing in acoustics, noise and vibration, and he could fix that up in a flash.
Next is the sound proper. Even at the local SilverCity, the sound reproduction is horrible; the last two movies I saw there, Insomnia and XXX, had terrible pops that at times overwhelmed the dialogue. (That’s difficult to do in a movie that’s as loud and that has as little dialogue as XXX, but there you go.) Installing digital sound is a must, but it’s got to be well-maintained.
Digital projection, on the other hand, is right out. I’d love to have a DLP monitor or projector for my home theatre—then again, who needs a home theatre when you own an actual theatre?—but based on my own experience and those of people whose opinions I respect the present state of digital isn’t good enough. What I really want is to retrofit the two projectors with MaxiVision48. Providing rock-solid projection for even standard 24fps 35mm films, and enhanced clarity and resolution for “native” 48fps films, MaxiVision has to be the best $280 per month any theatre owner could ever spend.
Along similar lines, I would hire a projectionist—not just a projector operator, but a real projectionist—and ushers, at least for premieres or special showings. (Classic, festival and art films
will be booked regularly, particularly those that don’t go into wide release.) There would be no product advertisements before the films, and only one or two trailers would precede the film, with others following the credits.
Not to be too sexist or anthropomorphic about it, but I’d fix the old girl up. The building has original stonework and windows, but you’d hardly know it these days. I’d bring back the screen and door curtains, which in dark rose velvet [hung] softly before the low doors at right and left
. Maybe remove a row or two of seats to give more leg room. A balcony might be a classy addition, as long as it didn’t interfere with sight lines.
I despise people who eat during a movie; more correctly, I despise hearing people eating during a movie. But never let it be said that I’m not open to compromise or suggestions: the snack bar will serve popcorn in reusable containers, although I’m undecided about chocolate bars and other packaged foods. All items will be reasonably priced, of course.
And now all you business majors are about to roll your eyes. This is the controversial part.
My house, my rules
Cell phones, pagers, PDAs, etc. will be banned. Totally and completely and utterly. There will be no please turn off your beeper
announcements before the show. I doubt I’d go so far as to shield the theatres from the digital communication spectrum, but bad manners will be punished.
(Which brings up an idea I had recently: a snooze button
for digital devices. It’s my theory that most people don’t like to turn off alarms, ringers and the like because they don’t think they’ll remember to turn them back on. The phone companies have offered a privacy
service for a while that behaves pretty much like I’d want: through a few keypresses you tell the system that you don’t want your telephone to ring for the next x hours, and when the time’s up it automatically starts ringing through again. It would be simple to add this functionality to your device of choice; even better would be a configurable preset time period and a single-key activation sequence, exactly like a snooze button. I’ll take that million-dollar royalty cheque now, please.)
In fact, patrons will be penalized or banned for any bad behaviour—talking, kicking seats, etc. I haven’t worked it out yet, but whatever the solution, it must be as minimally disruptive as possible. Perhaps a silent electronic gizmo at your seat will allow you to rate
those sitting around you; as in boxing, a certain number of hits
in a period of time would count as a strike.
If you build it, they will come.
Are these pipe dreams? Perhaps. I’m talking about ideals here, and by definition they’re goals that can’t be attained. But that’s no reason not to strive for them.
The city of London and local economic development organizations are making a push to bring people back downtown for shopping and entertainment. The theatre’s already there, lying dormant, surrounded by their activity. It’s just waiting for someone to awaken it.
