What’s Playing?

I may not remember the first movie I ever saw but I do remember my first experience at a movie theater – the Bama Theatre. My bachelor cousin, Sonny, invited my sisters and me to the movies and perhaps not realizing just how young I was – around four years old – he carted the four of us downtown to the Bama Theatre. We bought tickets at the booth outside the theater, walked through the glass doors into the lobby and up to the ticket collector. When we got past the ticket collector, a difficult task since we were roped out by velvet, we found ourselves in front of the concession stand and were treated to popcorn and cokes. On the left side of the concession stand were a flight of stairs going up to the balcony and a set going down to the movie but Sonny chose to take us down a long hall to enter the movie where an usher with a flashlight led us to our seats.

Sonny did not know that a four year old can be somewhat unruly and I certainly was not aware of appropriate behavior that ranked quietness high on the list of acceptable behaviors in theaters. Seeing the night sky when we entered the seating area, I yelled out, “I didn’t know we were going outside again.” The Bama Theatre was the most beautiful place I had ever been, with walls replicating a courtyard of an Italian palace, complete with ornate doors and iron balconies. If that wasn’t enough, the ceiling was a night sky with twinkling stars and clouds. I was quiet for a while just staring at the starry sky.

Before the movie began, there was a newsreel of the current events. I can date the year of my movie experience because I vividly remember the news story – The Coronation of Queen Elizabeth in 1953. The news was in black and white and I remember her walking down the aisle in Westminster Abbey and being crowned Queen of the British Empire, whatever that was.

After the newsreel and cartoon, the movie started. I have no idea what the movie was or whether it was black and white or color but I was soon bored with being still. The only relief I could come up with was to sing – in a very loud voice. So I started singing a song from my very limited repertoire: “Mama’s little baby loves shortnin’, shortnin’. Mama’s little baby loves shortnin’ bread.” Sonny tried to stop me; my sisters tried to stop me but I just sang louder. “Put on the skillet, put on the lid, Mama’s gonna make a little shortnin’ bread.” Before I got to the sad part about the “three little children layin’ in bed, two of ‘em sick, the other ‘most dead,” Sonny removed me from the theater and we went home, never to be taken anywhere by that cousin again.

Theater going was the entertainment event in the 1950s because many families did not have those newfangled television sets in their homes. Mama took me to the Bama on Saturday mornings with my six Pepsi Cola bottle tops to get into the free movies and cartoons. Ginney’s Toy Shoppe held auctions for toys and bicycles and we would bid used Golden Flake potato chip bags for them. We watched serials like Batman and Flash Gordon with Bugs Bunny and Tom and Jerry cartoons. Through the years I watched countless movies at the Bama, including a Gone With the Wind rerun, which I left during the intermission thinking the movie was over. My husband and I even had our first date at the Bama – a double feature Dean Martin-Jerry Lewis movie. Of course I couldn’t name those movies either, but I do know we sat in the balcony.

The years have not been kind to the Bama; it has suffered from too many updates altering the essence of the building. Originally the ticket booth was in the center of the entrance with double glass doors on either side. The lobby area was lined with large posters of upcoming feature movies displayed in glorious Hollywood style. Red velvet and brass ropes corded off the entrance guarded by the uniformed ticket collector. The ticket booth has been replaced by a plastered structure with little peek holes – an out-of-place structure marring the grand building. The concession stand has been moved across the room because … can’t imagine why other than the flow of all the large crowds that get through the velvet fence … oh but its gone too. The Bama was taken over by the Arts Council in the 1970’s so the modern-art deco-Gaudi remodeling continues with the latest addition of an electronic digital marquee akin to emergency traffic warning signs like “Caution Detour Ahead, 6^thand 7^thAvenues Closed during Football Season. Welcome to Tuscaloosa and Ya’ll Come Back Soon but Don’t Expect 7^thAvenue to still be between 6^thand 8^thAvenues.” My opinion probably explains why I will never be asked to join the Arts Council.

The Druid Theater on Broad Street (aka University Boulevard) was originally the old Bama Theater. It was an alternative to movies at the Bama and we spent time there on Saturday too. Somewhat smaller and not as grand, I remember seeing many westerns and science fiction movies at the Druid. I enjoyed “The Creature Walks Among Us” so much one Saturday, I simply sat there and watched it again. The Druid moved down the street in the 1960s and built a new theater, a good place to watch musicals like Bye Bye Birdie, Grease, and Scrooge (Albert Finney version).

Across the street from the Bama on Greensboro Avenue was the Ritz Theater, a place that did not have the good movies or the best reputation, so we called it the Rat Theater. In 1963 the Ritz was remodeled and became the Capri Theater. Upscaled movies were played at the Capri such as Dr. Zhivago, the Sound of Music, and Jeremiah Johnson, popularizing the theater with its blockbuster features.

Since we were the segregated products of the time, there was also the Diamond Theater on 23^rdAvenue, which catered to African American customers. The Diamond Theater opened in 1946 accommodating 500 customers and promoted its modern cinematic equipment and fireproof construction, a need caused by a cigarette prone society at the time. The Diamond was closed in 1967, not because I never bought a ticket at this theater or attended a movie, but it was to be demolished to make way for the city’s inter-modal facility, in other words: a parking deck.

Downtown movie theaters became obsolete as urban areas expanded to include malls and shopping centers. In the late 1960s, Bama Bowling Lanes on University Boulevard was converted to the Tide Theater whose claim to fame was the airing of the original Star Wars movie as well as the screening of X-rated movies. The Fox Theaters located in McFarland Mall and Bama Six Cinemas in Meadowbrook Shopping Center provided theaters that showed six to twelve movies simultaneously. We now have Cobb Theater’s “Super-Mega-Complex” with a thundering sound system and rock n rolling seats designed to give fans a virtual reality experience of Hollywood action movies.

I will never believe that action thrillers combined with bouncing in a theater seat make a movie any better than one starring Cary Grant. I’m nostalgic enough to prefer good acting to the “Sexiest Heartthrob of the Week.” I am naïve enough to rely on wholesome goodness to potty mouth dialogue spewing forth uncontrollably. But I am wicked enough want the good times back and to remember to “leave the gun and take the cannoli.”