I walked out into the auditorium and sure enough, there was a row of about seven kids sitting in the back row under the port.

So I called down to the manager and informed him of what was going on. He wasn't too impressed as it was almost a full house.

Anyway, I kept looking out the port to see if anything happened. In every other theater I've worked at before and told them there was trouble of some sort, MAYBE you would get an usher to come in and have a look and if they weren't playing up at that point, the usher would just shrug, turn around and walk out again.

So I kept looking to see what would happen...nothing...nothing...Oh well, it's no different here either. I was thinking that thought when about _5_ ushers came in in a line...shone their torches in their faces and marched them right out of there. Real S.W.A.T. team stuff! It was all over in about 30 seconds!

Très impressed, I can tell you!

It makes such a nice change to be working in a theater where all the staff are friends and there is no apathy. (There's no time for it 'cos it's so darn busy!)

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"It's not the years honey, it's the mileage".
Indiana Jones.

or peopl have a tendency to throw drinks at the porthole.

one kid actually thought it would be funny to slap the porthole.

one time someone slapped the porthole so when the movie was restarted, ther was a nice hand imprint on the glass.
frustrating

I was watching a film where I used to work(off-duty,but close to the start of my shift) and these girls (4th or 5th graders) would yell and talk loudly during parts. After the first time I shooshed them from my seat, they came past my seat and said some pretty rough things. I waltzed out,put on my uniform,and told them to shoosh again or out they go. No more problems, and they left early. Never did see em' again.

jasoN

He was quite surprised when I left, returned with our security officers, and had him thrown out..

Ahhh... the sweet revenge of watching them scream out of the cinema to the bathroom to scrub themselves silly. And the sweetest part of the gag...?

...we were running on carbon arcs! Ha Ha Ha!

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"It's not the years honey, it's playing gags on little assholes who put their hand in the beam".
Diana Jones. (his sister, who once ran a small, single screen theater in downtown San Francisco before her brother got really rich from selling off religious artifacts and supported her enough so that she could quit her cinema and be rid of those little shits once and for all)

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One probem we've seen in the drive-in business in recent years is laser pointers. This seems to have lessened a little bit, I think because kids have found other things to play with, but they still pop up occasionally. Is this also a problem for those of you that work in in-door theatres? Have any of you figured out how to find them?

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After the film was over, and we let the theater, we were followed for 2 blocks by the group. I guess they were trying to intimidate us. I was glad when we got to the car and left the area.

You should've complained nice and loudly to the AMC district office over that one.

After a minute or two, our local tech also showed up, and was happy to see a few familiar faces.

So anyway, we stood there talking for a while, discussing old times, projection, and the theatre in particular, and had a generally good time. None of us gave a single thought to the kids.

Until...

...an usher came running up the stairs, asking what the hell we were doing. It turned out that the kids had stood in front of the porthole for several minutes, creating all kinds of shadow animals and figures. The audience, about 500 people all in all, was NOT amused.

One night, me and my spouse couldn't solve the babysitting problem, so my kids, then two and four years of age, had to join me to the booth until their mother could pick them up. I had one single feature to screen, and thought that I could handle it.

Sure. When it was time for the change-over, I sat down by the projector to wait for the cue. Of course, I told the kids to sit tight, wait, and NOT TOUCH ANYTHING. The cue came about two seconds before the four year-old found out how to turn off the Xenon bulb of the machine that was running. OK, I thought. Five seconds of darkness... maybe the audience will live. Maybe. I'll just make sure not to show myself until it's all over.

I completed the change-over and checked for image sharpness and framing. Suddenly, the image disappeared, replaced with the remaining few feet of the just-finished reel.