Calgary Herald from Calgary, Alberta, Canada • 70

if 4 JfeJI ilffc -9 i fM ratJ fc sir' ill- From page 9 es in Los Angeles, a dumbfounded distributor in Calgary (at that time a city of limited ethnic population) received this memo from his Hollywood superior: "Fill black houses." Ruth Manning, a veteran of 21 years in the industry, remembers working as a cashier at Calgary Place when it opened as the first twin-cinema in the city. A customer offered his money without naming the film. "For Three in the Attic?" asked Manning. "No, two in the loge will be fine," was the reply. Biggest complaint of movie-goers: Teenagers who, accustomed to chatting in front of the television at home, do the same at the theatre, not realizing they are disrupting the film.

Most unusual disruption: The woman at the Chinook Theatre who translated the entire three hours of Gone With the Wind in Chinese to her boyfriend. Most determined customers: Two enterprising little boys once crawled on their hands and knees past the cashier at Palliser Square. Inching all the way down the stairs into an adult movie they were promptly sighted by a patron, and ejected. BEHIND THE SCENES The prize for the most unusual lost-and-found item must go to the pair of dentures once discovered at Calgary Place. (The bite to this story is that they were never claimed.) The runner-up award goes to the unclaimed beaver hat.

Manager's trick: However impossible moving a lineup from one area to another may seem, it is easily accomplished by moving the first two people in line. The rest will follow. Managers welcome complaints. If the screen goes blank or the reels are mixed up, the theatre staff appreciate the customer who finds them and mentions it, as opposed to their accidental discovery of a crowd of people sitting in hostile silence in a dark theatre (as sometimes happens). In the '60s, The Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines played for weeks at a local cinema before a patron (who had seen the film elsewhere) pointed out that a reel (and vital plot point) was missing.

The red-faced theatre staff unearthed the missing reel untouched in its delivery can. (Sure, the theatre staff was embarrassed but what about those movie-goers who had attended in those first weeks and never noticed the missing plot point?) The Show Must Go On Department: Once the staff at the Chinook Theatre were locked out of the janitorial room just before the required cleanup for the next show. Undaunted, the manager and her assistant climbed a rickety ladder to the dark upper level, where she teetered precariously and shone a flashlight into the space so that he could perform a tightrope walk across the beams and break into the room. The Southland Cinemas (Cineplex Odeon) and the Southcentre Cinemas (Famous Players) are frequently cause for confusion. When 160 kilograms of butter arrived on Southcentre' doorstep, it was poured on popcorn, sold to hungry patrons and munched into golden bliss before the staff realized it was meant for the Southland Cinemas.

And the staff of both cinemas regularly telephone each other with descriptions of missing persons. (Boy and girl arrange a movie date. He goes to South-centre. She goes to Southland. Both hang around, sad-eyed, in respective lobbies, thinking they have been stood up.

Observant theatre staff to the rescue. Phone calls and descriptions are exchanged, and the couple rendezvous for the next show.) When Paul Newman (in town to shoot Buffalo Bill and the Indians) caught a movie at Calgary Place, he relaxed by putting his feet up on the seat ahead of him a big no-no. None of the staff had the courage to approach him, not even then-assistant manager Ruth Manning, who walked bravely toward him, then sighted the famous profile, turned on her heel and left. Calgary Place ordered, at great expense, a new projector bulb from Winnipeg, after director Robert Altman viewed a showing of Nashville and gave the bulb in use a bad review. SELLING TICKETS In 1953, a crowd of 1,700 who were lined up all the way to 9th Avenue in order to see Old Yeller at the Palace, suddenly panicked for tickets and rushed the doors, terrifying manager, doormen and ushers, who had to fight them off with muscles and shouts.

(All this for Old Yeller?) In the summer of 1970, Rim Stallknecht, Calgary Herald Famous Players sells up to 4,500 kgs. of popcorn a week in Calgary 'The prize for the most unusual lost-and-found item must go to the pair of dentures once discovered at Calgary Place. The runner-up award goes to the unclaimed beaver IQ 3 jlf I --it "St. IJ52LJ tkl ppWPWWWitl war 1 52 Capitol Theatre was Calgary's largest building when it opened May 7, 1921 1 0Horald Sunday Magazine. Nov.

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