Page 23 - CinemaRecord #87

up in the ticket box before heading upstairs, I
asked him one day why he left the hat and ear
in the ticket box well away from his work. He
replied, ‘so I can hear if Mrs Kelleher is
talking about me’.

About this time I had been elevated to
assistant projectionist after Tom suffered a
heart attack but Bill, who was a kind and
compassionate person, did not have the desire
to put him off completely so Tom became
doorkeeper and was put in control of sound
volume.

At the old show, a remote volume control had
been installed at the entrance so the
doorkeeper could turn sound levels up or
down to suit. The backstage speaker consisted
of a twelve inch Rola voice coil unit bolted to
a square horn made of three-ply on a rickety
Memorial Hall interior 1950s wooden stand. This was fed by a length of two
core flex along the ceiling and down onto the
stage.
would become interested in the film and the old touring show pre-1920. Norm loved
carbons would run up, turning the screen brandy and could only play drunk.
brown and then black. Bill would yell at him
over all the noise ‘Tom, Tom – the light!’ The show’s owner, one McGuire, always said
that if they ever had a fire Norm would be
I never for one minute thought all this would burnt to death. There was a fire one night
in retrospect give me a laugh as everything while a screening was in progress somewhere
was so serious. At that time I was where it all in the Upper Murray and first out was the
happened and keeping a picture on the screen pianist. Norm had spotted the fire, showman
was a hell of a responsibility. McGuire ‘could not believe it, he ran over the
heads of the audience!’
Bill took me to one side and told me he had
heard I was interested in movies and had made There were the stories about first-time picture
a film. He said, ‘you can come up here any patrons who had turned up at some far flung
time you like, ya know’. I could not believe community and ducked at the speeding train
what I was hearing and from that moment on, as it came hurtling towards the camera and the
my life was set in stone. Bill became my night the Beverly brothers a couple of sheep
mentor. I revered him and he must have liked farmers stood up and started to round up a
me too as we became the best of friends. He flock of jumbucks on the screen, yelling ‘hoy,
was a real old time showman, colourful in the hoy!’
extreme with so many one-liners, stories and
expressions that I have retained to this day. Bill had a flair for the ladies and used to tell
me he had silk shirts especially made. They
He would say if anyone asked what the show were appreciated by the girls, who turned up Bill Jennings 1958
was like ‘it’s so realistic you can smell the regularly to the picture shows at each small
sawdust’. He had heaps of great yarns, such as location visited. Tom was part deaf having been employed in
the one about the time he showed the old-time noisy occupations through life, not least of all
silent movie ’30,000 Horsemen’ and how it The year was 1958 and a new calendar had the bio above the entrance door where he was
took days to clean the horse dung out of the been hung in the ticket box where Tilly now entrenched. He used to set the sound to
theatre. Then there was the sad story of Norm Kelleher sat. Like Tom, she had been with Bill suit himself and when he settled down to
the alcoholic pianist who travelled with the for years as ticket seller. Tilly was a kind soul watch the show, the backstage unit would be
and sometimes the jumping off its stand, unable to cope with the
butt of Bill’s jokes. gain. Eventually someone would always come
Matinee crowd 1963
Bill had an artificial and tell him to turn it down. It wasn’t always
ear, having lost his a bad thing; a family of tourists arrived at the
right ear years hall one night and said they had been attracted
earlier. The fake ear to the show having heard the Fox Fanfare at
was mounted on a the post office some 500 metres away.
spring clip that went
right over his head. During 1958-59, Tom stayed on as
The colour of the doorkeeper and behaviour controller. The kids
fake ear was were always pretty noisy and the occasional
different to his skin seat fell over. There was lots of talking if there
colour and was was a lull on the screen, complete mayhem if
easily noticeable, the show broke down with calls to ‘put a
but Bill did not care. penny in it’, fruit, Jaffas and sometimes
He always wore a watermelon skins flew around in the hall with
hat except when he one woman walking out one night having
was working in the been hit with a tomato. Tom had tried to calm
bio when he would her but she let her thoughts be known and I
hang the hat and ear wonder to this day if he heard her.

CINEMARECORD # 87 23