THE Orange Showcase Cinemas

I could kick myself for not thinking to stop by to take a picture or grab something to remember it by. I'm sure it's too late now. By now most of what remains of the Showcase Orange Cinemas is on its way to the landfill. Actually, from what I heard, a good amount of it will be recycled. Which is comforting on some level and ironic on another thinking about how much recycled crap is coming out of Hollywood these days.

I don't remember exactly when the theater opened, but one look at it, and it's obvious that it was built during a time when the movie industry was lighting their cigars with $100 bills and were sure that the good times would keep rolling. With it's impossibly high ceilings, huge gaudy neon light mural, eight screens (that would now be enough room for 16 smaller ones), and sprawling multi-acre parking lot, this was THE theater that the blockbusters of my youth built.

1994 was a time of optimism for the movie industry and it was reflected in this theater. And what timing too. What with your Twisters, ID4's, and Titanics coming around every summer, how could you not love a place that reeked of excess. I suppose though that one of the reasons I love this theater so much is the memories I have attached to so many movies i went to see there. For example:

-November 11th, 1999: Going into a crowded theater with 3 friends to see Being John Malkovich and being the only ones left in there when the lights came up. I have never walked out of a movie. ever. EVER!

-November 25th, 1999: Seeing The Insider with Brigham and getting asked to be quiet after we started talking about Police Academy movies too loud. BONUS: Watching a woman getting swallowed whole by a Mission to Mars display when she sat on it thinking it would hold her girth.

-January 8th, 2000: Sneaking into Magnolia with Rob after just having sat through Deuce Bigelow. This IS the most ill-conceived double feature EVER. It was like drinking a 40 and eating Taco Bell then deciding to run a marathon, but only you have to look at Tom Cruise for 2/3 of the marathon.

-March 1st, 2004: Taking a first date to see Passion of The Christ. Don't ask me why, but this movie gets chicks HOT.

The frequency with which I would go see movies TWICE was amazing. Now the thought of going to the local shoebox multiplex, even for movies I'm really excited about, is enough to put me in a rage. All I can think of is; "HEY, you! 3 rows up, I'm trying to watch Brad Pitt age backwards! Stop texting!" or "HEY, I'm trying to watch Viggo Mortensen and Mario Bello rage-fuck, WHY IS THERE A 4 YEAR-OLD SITTING NEXT TO ME?" Experiences like that coupled with rising ticket prices and its no wonder I have 148 movies in my netflix queue.

Granted most the stuff in my queue are off-beat movies that didn't get wide releases when they were new. But that was perhaps the best part of the Orange theater. After a certain point, they started showing all the small releases and none of the big ones. Imagine my surprise when perusing the showtimes in Orange to find a movie that wasn't even listed on IMDB. It had the art-house soul in blockbuster clothing. Being able to go see the indie hits or the newest foreign imports in big comfy seats with cup holders was always preferable to rubbing elbows with the Yalies down at the York Square in my opinion. It's funny, however, that the Orange theater closed less than 3 years after the multiplexes put down the York in 2005 while trying to cater to the same, ageing crowd.

All the while I knew that it couldn't last. A theater this size needed to be putting asses in seats. And that's just not possible without the big budget movie selection. Showing movies they were at that theater was like building a 100ft tall robot that runs on 6 AA batteries; it going to run out of juice. Fast. By my records (a box that I keep old movie stubs in) the last movie I saw there was 300, just before I moved. Maybe a last ditch effort on their part to start bringing in the crowds again. The Orange Showcase Cinemas closed less than a year later on March 8th, 2008.

This may sound like nostalgia nonsense and it can be argued that this was the Walmart of theaters, paving over wetlands and swallowing up century old independently owned places. But this is the place that started my love affair with movies. If I had high expectations for a movie I would see it in Orange. Rarely would I be disappointed or bothered by a cell phone or someone dropping a glass bottle 45 minutes into the film. If it was something I could care less about having ruined for me I would go to Milford, or even worse North Haven. Orange was like the good whisky or the pair of pants you only wear on the weekend. It was my favorite place to do one my favorite things. And I miss it.