Scenes from a Multiplex

Memoirs of a movie theater usher

I got hired at my local movie theater in December 2016, just in time for the onslaught of holiday business. It was my first real job interview; I showed up in my mom’s sweater and a pair of atrociously frumpy closed-toed flats. The theater’s middle-aged general manager, Peter, interviewed me in his office, where he kept spare oversized blazers that looked identical to the car-salesman one he was wearing, a cardboard movie standee for Hotel Transylvania 2, a poster for Rogue One, and a mini-fridge stocked with the bottles of Dunkin’ Donuts sweetened iced coffee that we also sold at the concessions stand. One time, I saw him drink four of those in one day.

Peter asked me questions off a worksheet, and I watched him fill in my words as I answered. No, I don’t have any formal customer service training, but I have lots of leadership experience from all of the clubs I’m in. I’m definitely a quick and eager learner. I’m interested in this job because I love people (lie) and I really love movies (true). When he asked me for three words to describe myself, I pulled from the “unique” persona I was using for my college applications and gave creative, determined, and quirky.

“Quirky!” he grinned chummily. “I love that. That’s cool. Most people say stuff like hard-working.” I quickly reassured him I was obviously that, too, and he gave a laugh that was much bigger than the joke deserved and wrung my hand with enthusiastic strength. “Anyway, we’ll email about setting up your training session so you can get started. Thanks for coming in, Grace!”

That conversation was the first of perhaps five times that Peter would refer to me by my real name. I’d soon learn that he called every employee “buddy-o,” regardless of setting or context or the vociferousness of peoples’ annoyance. Like almost everything else Peter did, I found it hilarious.

I worked there until I left for college in August 2017, and then returned over that year’s winter break and for the following summer in 2018. I hung onto the job for longer than strictly necessary, out of both the obvious desire for spending money and an inexplicable affection. It provided comforting, rhythmic banality as well as bursts of outlandish workplace chaos; practically Machiavellian lessons on the art of stealing food from the concessions stand; and fellow “buddy-o”s who kept me sane during eight-hour shifts and verbal lashings from housewives about the twenty-five cent increase in our ticket prices. It’s my favorite job I’ve ever had.

The theater was a fixture of my high school social scene long before I worked there. Part of a small, California-based chain, the multiplex serves the stuffy Southern California suburbs of Oak Park, Agoura, and Westlake. The best word I can use to describe it is “quaint.” Old-fashioned box offices flank the front doors. Inside, there’s a little lobby with an octagonal concessions stand, manned by scrawny teenagers and outfitted with a Pinkberry machine, a finicky pizza oven, a display case for eternally-stale nachos, and a massive popcorn machine that we always treated with reverence. Our most sacred rule was never to let the popcorn burn, lest the acrid smell scare off customers from buying anything. (Theaters never make money on tickets; the studio does. Only concessions turn profits — that’s why they’re way too expensive.) After concessions, you walk to the ticket taker and enter a T-shaped hallway, which houses the measly eight auditoriums. Our customer service “claim to fame” was the fact that we’d wait outside in the hallway before a screening emptied, armed with a basket of green-and-white candies to hand out to people as they filed out. Peter deemed this “classy.”

The clientele is a neat little cross-section of Agoura Hills suburbia, which generally consists of a lot of white, upper-middle-class, Jewish families with parents who buy their teenage daughters BMWs with customized pink interiors right when they turn 16. The affluent area often deservedly gets referred to as a “bubble,” so much so that it’s become a cliché to make the comparison in graduation speeches for the nearby high schools — Westlake High, Agoura High, Oak Park High, and expensive private school Oaks Christian. The theater was a popular place on the weekends for students to congregate — because, as the joke goes, what else is there to do? They’d sneak Slushee into their free water cups and pack into theaters for the newest franchise film before heading out into the parking lot to smoke weed in their cars, sometimes accompanied by an employee on their 10-minute break. (The customer service reviews on Google are abysmal.) It was typically humiliating to see somebody from school while I was working, the indignity magnified by our uniforms: short-sleeve white button-ups, black dress pants, black dress shoes, a vest, and a bow-tie, a vintage-y look that fit in with the run-down but charming aesthetic of the theater’s gold-patterned carpets and red velvet ropes. It wasn’t all bad, though. Working there meant I could take my friends to see movies for free, and occasionally sneak them into the chilly maze of the projection room after hours.

The worst customers to deal with were the soccer moms who came in for the kids’ movie summer matinees, dragging screaming toddlers and asking me why we didn’t sell healthier food. I’m only a little ashamed to say that when my coworkers and I saw this particular flavor of customer coming, usually climbing out of a sloppily parked SUV and slinging an expensive handbag, we’d jockey for a hiding spot at the back of the concessions stand. Much better were the seniors, fastidious about their discounted ticket price and usually flocking towards Oscar contenders and, on one memorable weekend, selling out every single showing of the 2018 Jane Fonda vehicle Book Club.

It’s easy to make fun of the theater’s clients — and I did, on the job, many times — but I also found them fascinating. I used to play this game where I’d guess if the people I’d sold food to were going to like their movie or not, just based on our brief interaction. After they left their screenings, I’d listen in to their opinions as they exited the lobby. I remember feeling validated in my sense of character when nice customers liked the movies I did (and when the mean ones displayed a perceived lack of taste). Sometimes, I’d be surprised to learn my first impression of someone was wrong, a nice shake-up to my formulaic day. With every new or strange customer interaction, my conception of the theater’s narrow clientele widened, and I grew to appreciate the eclectic range of people who chose to gather under the theater’s stucco roof.

I’d heard from other employees that we sometimes played host to celebrities, thanks to the theater’s proximity to Calabasas, but I didn’t have any star encounters until I sold Kanye West two tickets to Ant-Man and the Wasp in summer 2018. It makes for a great party story: I was on the opening shift with a newer employee, and we’d just cleaned and stocked the concessions stand before opening the theater doors around 10:30 a.m. Not even 2 minutes later, Kanye walked in with his bodyguard. I was practically vibrating with energy by the time he got to my register, but I kept my voice even as I did my usual routine: Good morning, how can I help you? Okay, I’m gonna ask you to pick your seats, front row is at the top of the screen here. At that, he said, “I’ll take these two in row K, since me and my wife’s names both start with K,” and then smiled when I unthinkingly replied: “I know.”

I then had the terrifying task of telling him that we were out of relish for the hot dog he’d just bought and that the auditorium he was seated in that day was having an AC issue so it was bit warmer than normal (read: sweltering). He accepted my apologies without incident and then apparently proceeded to fall asleep during the movie. I think what I find most charming about the story is that before, if you’d asked me how Kanye West watches new releases, I’d have assumed he rents out a private auditorium, or gets sent a special screener to watch at home, or frequents the upscale chains like Cinepolis. I respected the fact that his venue of choice was instead a middle-of-nowhere, only-sort-of-clean movie theater with perpetually low inventory and precious little AC.

I’d be remiss, while I’m on the topic of low inventory, not to mention the Great Popcorn Meltdown of 2017. The inciting event: our ancient popcorn machine finally sputtered out its last breath smack dab in the middle of the afternoon on December 26. What followed is, I’m pretty sure, a preview of the ninth circle of hell.

The day after Christmas is usually one the busiest days of the year. The lobby was full of in-laws and grandparents who were fiending for tickets to The Greatest Showman and most assuredly wanted popcorn as well. Peter handled this conundrum fantastically, which is to say with as little chill as possible. First, he tried to fix the popper before it cooled down, and promptly suffered what looked like a third degree burn when he laid his bare hand on the metal by accident. When I shrieked at him to go the ER, he gave a resolute shake of his head and wrapped his hand up in duct tape before gathering up a collection of trash bags from his office, telling us to “just push the candy” until he got back, and then blowing through the glass front doors with all the gusto of a decorated general leading his troops into glorious battle.

The trio of us manning the concessions stand did not have much success “pushing the candy,” because usually when people try to buy popcorn they expect to be given popcorn and not candy. The lines at each register snaked around the lobby in disgruntled curlicues, held up further with each new group. No, we don’t know when we’ll be able to make more popcorn, you can wait but we can’t guarantee we’ll have anything ready by the time your movie starts so I wouldn’t buy anything, instead would you like some Sour — okay, enjoy your movie, so sorry again.

Into the fray returned Peter, man of the hour, his trash bags newly full of popcorn. He’d driven to another nearby theater and convinced them to share their reserves; the rest of the day consisted of him driving back and forth, back and forth, bringing back popcorn that would sell out frighteningly fast and leave customers at the back of the line incensed when they found out they’d missed their chance to purchase a bag. Those who did buy some were equally displeased; more than once I found myself explaining to a customer that the reason their popcorn was lukewarm and unseasoned was because it had effectively been rolling around in Peter’s Honda in a garbage bag for about 45 minutes.

I was forced to take a “breather” around 5 p.m. that day, when a customer angrily wagged a finger in my face and asked me, “Don’t you see how ironic it is for a movie theater not to have popcorn?”

I snapped back, “No, I’ve been working for five hours today but I just now realized that us not having popcorn is an issue, thanks for letting me know!” which was ridiculously uncharacteristic but also one of the greatest moments of my life. Before Peter could commence his apologies to the customer at my register, I swear I saw him cover a laugh with his duct-taped hand.

All new employees start out as “ushers” assigned the job of cleaning the auditoriums between showings. After you clean enough theaters, you will never, ever leave your trash behind after watching a movie again — I can often be found snatching my friends’ empty soda cups out of cupholders with a judgmental tsk. Gathering up half-eaten bags of sticky candy and mopping up spilled Slushee is a painstaking process made better only if the movie in question has a good end-credits song. Moana, for instance, plays a cover of “How Far I’ll Go” over its credits, a bop that I listened to roughly 1700 times in 2016.

I love recounting my flashier stories, but my memories of working at the theater mostly consist of mundane things: putting counterfeit frozen yogurt in a water cup every time I went on a break, recommending movies to customers trying to aimlessly kill a few hours, sneaking in to an auditorium during a slow day to watch people watch Star Wars: The Last Jedi, sweeping up popcorn in between showing after showing, never managing to get the floor completely clean.

I’ve been thinking about my old job a lot lately, in light of recent movie news. Warner Bros. is releasing their entire slate for 2021 on HBO Max and in theaters concurrently. A few months ago, AMC and Universal announced they were shortening the theatrical window — the amount of time theaters can exclusively show a title before it can go to streaming services or on demand, typically 90 days — to a measly 17 days. These measures are being billed as temporary measures, a placeholder until the pandemic eases, but I worry they signify a sea change in the way audiences watch movies. Perhaps streaming services (and big theater chains like AMC that have been bought out by media companies that own streaming services) will define our moviegoing future. Perhaps little theaters, the kinds with broken popcorn poppers and no AC and character, are doomed to become a thing of the past.

I hated ushering, but I’d do it again now for free (at least for a few busy hours). I miss being in a movie theater, that all-important venue that invites complete strangers to sit together in the dark and invest in what’s on the screen; to laugh at the same dialogue or whoop at the same needle drop or cry at the same performance. There’s a kind of solidarity formed in that space, even if it only lasts two hours, until everyone inevitably walks into the lobby and airs their dissenting opinions in between grabbing green-and-white candies from the ushers. I miss hearing that conversation, forging silent camaraderie and playful rivalry with fellow viewers. I miss singing along to the end credits music with my coworkers. I even miss picking up the trash, the bags of candy and the cups of nacho cheese — detritus of a collective cultural experience, somehow transcendent despite its impermanence.