It's A Wonderful Life. Or Sometimes I Had To Work On Christmas

A million years ago, I worked at a little movie theater in Seattle called the Grand Illusion Cinema.

And every Christmas, to make the end of the year come out alright financially, we ran "It's a Wonderful Life".

It's a fine Christmas movie. Jimmy Stewart's George Bailey yells

"Hello, Movie House"

to the theater as he runs through his snowy town.

(the GI was originally called the Movie House under Randy Finlay's ownership)

via GIPHY

But there's a better reason why this is a holiday staple.

Liberty Films,

(the 1945 company that Frank Capra launched with his film "It's a Wonderful Life")

didn't do well, and the company went under.

The film went without distribution or proper ownership.

It fell between the cracks,

and anyone could show it without getting charged for fees 
(see footnotes for some clarification).

So, if you checked a 16mm copy out of the library, (and we did)

you could run it for absolutely free and end the year in the black, with Momma Dollar and Poppa Dollar, hot dog!

via GIPHY

For several years, that person running it was me.

Being the only employee who didn't have family in another city,

I ran it all week. 

With no other staff.

Twice, three times a day.
That's a hard week on 16mm film, which is not designed for that many showings.

Inevitably, the splices in the film would snap, and I'd be 

 running off the reel through the projector into a garbage can so I could manage the mess

(garbage bags are static'y, but cleaner than the floor)

between shows, frantically re-glueing the bits back together in order. 

It was a long week, in a tiny projection booth.

No one I knew came by; they all went home for the holidays. I would comp (give a free ticket) to anyone I knew, or barely knew, who came in.
I had few takers.

One delightful year, I got to watch this after I came home from work at the theater.

https://youtu.be/vw89o0afb2A

where Uncle Billy remembers what he did with the money

Phil Hartman, you are missed.

Recently, my brother in law ran across this video, 
Harvey Danger's "Sometimes You Have To Work On Christmas"

https://youtu.be/H3ogxQsMxO8
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sometimes_You_Have_to_Work_on_Christmas_(Sometimes)

That's my damn movie theater. That's my damn Christmas. 

This is from 1998: how come I am only hearing about this now? 

There was never a rave in the auditorium, though.

I no longer have to work on Christmas.
And the Grand Illusion is still playing "It's a Wonderful Life" at Christmas.
But in 35mm.
Like a REAL movie theater.
http://www.grandillusioncinema.org/

Merry Christmas, Movie House


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty_Films
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It%27s_a_Wonderful_Life#Ownership_and_copyright_issues

Seattle Opera gets a new costume shop

Seattle Opera finally got its new offices and rehearsal space costume shop, right next door to McCaw Hall (where they perform) at the Seattle Center.

Opening Day, and of course there is a line to tour.

The view up the sidewalk after the crowds crowded in

Excuse me, the Robert and Loretta Comfort Ticket Office.

The lobby and the ticket office. 

DISCLAIMER:

I used to work for Seattle Opera in their ticket office, for five nerve-wracking years.

I understand touchy donors, donations and naming rights, but they still crack me up.

The Symphony has endowed 'chairs' in the orchestra, the opera has sponsored performers.

I have wanted to put my name on a bathroom or a ticket window for EVER.

I wanted to be a sponsored ticket sales representative.

I still want to endow that 'chair' in the office

Or the bathroom.

Inquiries welcome.

 But let's cut to the chase:

the kids have a new playhouse. Yes, it's a fishbowl, but it has east facing natural light for DAYS!

The costume shop has windows to the outside and a two story ceiling.

Photos from left to right: click to make them HUGE

the yellow 'don't cross' rope is a measuring tape, of course

They are prepping for Trovatore.

Set in the Spanish.......well, at some "waves hands in air" point.
Operas are almost never set in a specific time and place, and if there's a specific choice, it's to make a larger point.

The 'Sandinista!' Carmen at Vancouver Opera years ago.

You get the idea.

  

 

conquistador armor in the back to the left

Lots of rosaries. The nuns' habits are from a production of Sound of Music.

Nuns are a classic look that never goes out of date.

All the hallways around the shop are full of boxes, labeled and packed on pallets. Many many more skulking around, in rehearsal spaces in hallways.

But they got all packed up and labeled.

With the reference headshots on the outside of the box.

Organization!

But no barcodes. Old style served here.

Naming rights taken.

Needs more fabric. They just moved in. The stash was enormous in the old place. Give them time.

People just leave their paper everywhere it seems.

They were just moving in this week.

There were other things to see. A sword-fighting rehearsal I could not take photos of,

done on a mock-up of the set they are going to use.

The best thing about this place is that they can roll stuff right next door, and not have to drive it the half mile of impassable traffic through what is now Amazon Land in South Lake Union. A ten minute walk (hills) vs an hour drive.

They lost their least last year.

This is an east-facing photo from the Space Needle in 2015, of South Lake Union; the old offices are towards the upper right. All the flat spaces are now holes in the ground with tower cranes and blocked off roads. Normally the streets are full of cars in all directions. Try driving a Peterbilt through that.

I have mixed feelings about my old workplace. It's a different company, with different agendas now.  

When I worked at the box office, a former Opera Guild member's heir brought in boxes and boxes and boxes of scrapbooks of programs and photos and clippings about the company since it's beginnings, and we politely accepted them and politely put them in the dumpster after they had left: there was no place to store them. And at the time, no way to scan and save those things.

There are a lot of people who made this opera company possible, and most of them are not acknowledged here. The turnover in arts staff is always high*, and the new folks always think the old folks were idiots who didn't know how to run a company.

And the ones I worked for felt the same way about their predecessors.

 I'm a staunch Sp8 fan. He made this company matter. 

And he was right: nothing happens in Der Freischütz that you'd remember, and The Pearl Fishers is one song sung twice by the same people who learned nothing in the meantime.

Naming rights taken here, too.

There are two kitchens, this one downstairs by studio and costumes.

With two microwaves each: no waiting!

The upstairs one has a second floor deck/patio and a view of the high school stadium, MoPOP and the Needle. And the loading dock ramps, right in front.

Nice new sign in front

And yes, on the corner of Mercer and Speight Jenkins Way

*the time honored way to get a raise in the arts world is to move from one company to another. Promotion rarely comes from within. This results in a city full of people who have all worked with one another at one point or another.

For better or worse.

The official scorecard for the day:
click to enbiggen