Theaters

If you work in guest services at a movie theater, what exactly do you do in your job description? What is guest services? What’s the difference between guest services and the box office?

You would go to guest services to rent a device for the hearing impaired, or to
request a refund or maybe to purchase a theatre gift card.

Just about anything other than purchase a ticket or buy from snack bar.
They handle complaints, lost items, found items, etc.

If you work in guest services at a movie theater, what exactly do you do in your job description? What is guest services? What’s the difference between guest services and the box office?

You would go to guest services to rent a device for the hearing impaired, or to
request a refund or maybe to purchase a theatre gift card.

Just about anything other than purchase a ticket or buy from snack bar.
They handle complaints, lost items, found items, etc.

I’m trying to strengthen my resume, but when I get to the job I used to have at a movie theater, I’m not sure what to write about it. I wasn’t there long enough to receive a promotion, and I don’t really want to just list a boring job description.

How can I write about this position to make it appealing to future employers?

Just tell them you worked as a "Cinematic Facilitation Technician."

I’ve been having a lot of dreams that take place in random movie theaters. The dreams themselves don’t even focus that much on them though, they’re more like backgrounds. What do you think these dreams mean? Is it bad or good?

Movies as a dream symbol are glimpses of real life. So a theater would probably mean that you are ready and willing to look at some aspects of your life on a subconscious level.

How can you release an independent film in theaters without going through a major studio distributor. And ballpark how much would it cost (disregarding the cost of the production of the film).

You would basically have to become your own distributor, going to small art-house theaters around the country and selling your product. That’s VERY difficult. How much it costs would depend on how widely you distribute it, how many prints you make, how successful your travels are, etc.

The more common root is to do the film festival circuit. Submit your film to every festival that will look at it and it will play in theaters around the country. If it’s good enough, you may get a deal that way with a small (or possibly large) distributor. You can also use the opportunity (if your film gets accepted) to establish relationships with the theater owners who are working with the film festival to try to get distribution at that theater later on (that would be a tough sell, but not impossible).

There have been a handful of films that have traveled with very few prints. Those are cult classics. American Astronaut and Rocky Horror Picture Show come to mind. It’s a VERY tough road for a film. If you can’t get your movie into film festivals, chalk up the production and efforts as a learning experience and go back to the drawing board and try again.

Good luck.

EDIT: I suppose, if you really want, you could do it through Fathom Events. They basically will show anything at a bunch of theaters around the country if you pay them enough money. They typically cater to corporate presentations or 1-night only events, but I’m sure if you pay them, they’ll put your movie on as many screens as you want. It would be a REALLY expensive way to distribute the movie though. I don’t really know how much, but I imagine it would be prohibitive.

Or can you just take acting classes for a while? Theater is NOT my thing. Why does it seem like no celebrities have ever done it?

Are you interested in being an actor or are you only interested in being a celebrity? Paris Hilton is a celebrity, but she didn’t get famous because she’s talented. She got famous because she’s rich and photogenic.

Serious actors have almost always done theatre at some point in their lives. It’s the one way to learn the craft of acting that’s available to almost everyone and is relatively inexpensive. Acting classes can help, but there is no substitute for experience on a resume, particularly in the eyes of an agent.

Agents are interested in representing actors who can go to auditions and land the part – which means they, the agents, will get their commission from the actor’s work. That means the actors have to have:

1) Marketable skills (in other words, experience), or
2) Extraordinary looks, or
3) Incredible raw talent, or
4) A relationship with someone famous

Most wannabees don’t have 2, 3 or 4, so that means their only way into the business is to get experience. If you don’t want to do theatre – fine, don’t. But getting an agent without some kind of experience on your resume is difficult, and getting into film and TV without an agent is even harder.

So by next month we will be having a theater presentation in our class. So me and our class president were thinking of what to present. I then thought up of using one of Shakespeare’s plays for it. So do you think it is okay or not? I’ll also accept some recommendations for our theater presentation.

No

I need to know what the average price for snacks is at the movie theater!

Way, Way too much. rent the movie, and pop the popcorn at home. you’ll save money on both tickets and snacks.

What do the theaters do with the movie reels when they are done showing in theaters? Or do they even use Reels anymore what have they updated to? Do they just get thrown away or kept on "file" so to speak?

The films are sent back to the distributor.
.

I’ve always been told that movie theaters don’t make money off of ticket sales. They make money off of their concession stands and other stuff.

So what do they do with the money they make off of ticket sales?

A large percentage of ticket sales goes back to the studio. The theatre keeps some, but it’s a small percentage. That’s why it costs so much to get a drink at the movie theatre: it’s a way bigger source of income for the theatre.