Ah, the days of yesteryear.

I went home last weekend. For a night. A night back home makes DeKalb start to look better and better…, but that’s a story for another day. A friend of mine, who also was home for the evening, took me to a movie at a $1.50 bargain theater that can be found in many towns. (Yes, the same friend that was with me the day my antenna took a turn for the worse.) I’m a cheap date, what can I say? Plus, I’ve always enjoyed going to this theater—it was always so beautiful.

Was always so beautiful. Was. What once was an enormous, spectacular theater with one of those cool ceilings that have the fake stars twinkling during the show is now four Cracker Jack Box-sized—I hesitate to call them theaters. I don’t know what to call them.

This is really sad. I mean, I used to go to the theater so I could stare at the ceiling. All those stars. It was just like being outside, but warmer. And I didn’t have to worry about bugs. (I have a slight phobia of small living pests that crawl, buzz, fly, sting,…) It was so fun.

Was so fun. Aw, gee. (Please sigh to get the full feeling of my sorrow.) I’m so depressed. What’s happening to the theater business? Why don’t the theater owners just sell tickets for groups to sit in small living rooms together and watch a video? It’s practically the same feeling—crammed into seven or eight rows of seats, a measly ten or fifteen feet away from a screen the size of the ones in your choice of rooms in DuSable, there you are—you, and say, 40 or 50 other people. Perhaps some of your closest friends. And if they weren’t your buddies when you stepped into the theater, they will be when you leave.

Part of the fun of going to a movie was that you were GOING TO A MOVIE. You could sit way in the back and throw Milk Duds at people. Except now, when you sit way in the back you’re actually sitting way in the front. (A phenomenon I haven’t yet come to terms with.) You’re sitting in those seats that were always filled last because no one wanted to break their neck staring up at the screen for two hours. You lucky dogs—you’ve got the best seats in the house. Or should I say the only seats in the house?

I long for the old theaters. I want them back. I want someone to take my money from those quaint little booths in front of the theater. I want a million lights shining in my eyes, colored rays streaming from the marquis, which blinds me and reminds me of those old movie greats. (No, not Sylvester Stallone. Try someone like Kate Hepburn or Bing Crosby.) I want the stars to twinkle at me from above so I miss half the movie. I don’t want to sit in a stuffy shoebox, listening to the soundtrack from stereo speakers clinging to the walls, using long nails as brackets. I don’t want to be able to hear the dialogue from Indiana Jones while I’m watching Batman. Is that asking too much?

Well, perhaps so. I’m only paying a buck and a half. What more do I want? Maybe I want the unattainable: a theater that feels like a theater, not like a shoebox. A theater that looks like a theater and not like a classroom with falling apart, plush seats and a slightly over-sized screen. Twinkling stars instead of blocks of cardboard ceiling. Real butter instead of…well, I don’t know what it was before.

Oh heck, I don’t know. Whatever happened to beautiful theaters? Who decided that people didn’t like to go to them anymore? And just why wasn’t I asked? I’ll go! I’ll still go to those big old theaters. I’ll go, I’ll go, I’ll go,…

Especially if the stars are in the ceiling, that’s my favorite. Oh! And if they sell Milk Duds—those are good too.