Too-Ardent Film Fans Sit On--

Radio Record, Volume X, Issue 3, 24 July 1936, Page 12

Too-Ardent Film Fans Sit On--

Cinema patrons arrive in the | middle of the | afternoon and stay six and _ seven hours. .

An __ eighteen-year-old. who makes a weekly ‘attempt to get into the show for half-price.

AND THE SHOW COES QOUND and ROUND

a shilling won’t buy much nowadays, you don’t know anything about cinema patrons. For exactly | F you think that

12 pennies they buy a comfortable seat in a warm theatre-and,: for anything.up to sever hours, they sit and watch Bing Crosby’s vocal organs, Joan Crawford’s come-hither eyes and Popeye the Sailor wafted across the screen. These too-ardent cinema patrons are the despair of the managers of continuous houses. They watch the-show go round and round, keeping out patrons who may arrive later in the day, "It’s nothing for people to arrive at half-past three or .four o’clock in the afternoon and stay until the theatre closes at half-past ten or so. We can’t do anything about it-we can refuse admission to. a patron, but we cannot eject him once he’s . inside, save 'for disorderly conduct. Once upon a time the slogan of the continuous houses. used to be, ‘Come when you like; go when you like. Some of us now regret this generous offer," said the manager of one Wellington cinema. tos m A PALMERSTON NORTH theatre used to be besieged on Saturday mornings at.11 o’clock-the opening hourby children who would stay the whole day, eating their lunch and tea in the theatre. "And the smell of hot pies and fish and chips that floated over the place was pretty ghastly," said the manager, The programme at the average continuous house runs for three and a. half to four hours-and even then there are people who pay up their shillings and complain because "there are only two big pictures on the programme."

Every theatre has its . "regulars" . who ate as well-known to the ticket-sellers and ushers as Public Enemy No. 1 is -to the police. "One old

man comes two or three times a week," said-the ticket seller-at a Manners Street (Wellington) theatre to the "Radio Record." . "He says quite frankly that he comes in for a rest, and he can never remember if he’s seen the programme before or not. "L HAVEN’T seen a dear old soul of 80 for some weeks. Maybe'she’s ill-or even dead. We never find out what happens to our ‘regulars’ who disappear. She used to pay up.her shilling and ask for a dress circle seat-and they’re one-and-six. After a while we used to give her a circle seat for: a bob, and she used to march up the stairs as proud as'Punech. There’s a lad of 18 who comes regularly every week-and he still passes up a sixpenny bit for a halfprice: ticket. It’s funny, and yet rather tragic, for he crouches down at the box to make himself look the height of a 12-year-old, "Three old Jadies-the oldest must be past 80-never miss a show, and they always have a ‘barney’ about who’s going to’pay for the seats. One of them solved the problem last: week" by walking up to the box in the afternoon and buying.three seats for the evening performance. When they all arrived in the evening and began .their usual good-natured-arguing, the cunning one produced her trump carda seats bought and paid for. MAN came out of the theatre the other afternoon and asked if I would ring a maternity home about his wife. I did so and the matron reported ‘nothing doing. He went back into the theatre, but he was out again. in a quarter of an hour with a request for me to ring again. This went on for.a couple of hours, until he couldn’t bear the suspense anX Jonger and departed to buy himself a beer."