TALES FROM BEHIND THE POPCORN COUNTER--PART 3

 

FIRINGS--How to get let go from a crappy job in strange and wacky ways.

There were four firings that I can recall during my two years behind the popcorn counter. One of them I was responsible for…well, sort of. I’ll explain that one in a minute.

The first one was the most interesting, so I’ll start there. That one happened in a very strange way. One night, one of the long-term employees was working the ticket booth, as was often the case. We will call him Dude for the purposes of this story. There were a handful of people working at the theater who were absolute movie heads. They knew every film, every actor, directors, the whole deal. A few of them wanted to be screenwriters, and a couple of them were working as PAs (production assistants) in the local film industry because they aspired to make movies. Needless to say, they loved gabbing about all things movie. Dude was one of those people. So, that night, a woman came in and asked Dude if he recommended that she see X film. I’m calling it X film because I can’t remember what movie it was, but also because I’m not going to call anybody out. So, Dude launches into his opinion on the film, of which he had many. And they weren’t all that great. The woman, and I remember this, stood arguing with him for a while, which I thought was a bit odd at the time. I mean, she asked his opinion, after all. I will say that it was somewhat common for people to come in and not know which movie they wanted to see, and some occasionally asked if such and such film was any good, or what would we recommend they see out of the five we had showing, etc. I don’t recall if we’d had any specific guidelines for how to respond to these questions, but the next day, the general manager got a phone call, because the woman who was asking about X film was apparently the daughter of the film’s director, and though I don’t remember which movie it was, I do remember the director and was and still is a HUGE Hollywood director. One of the biggest. And he wasn’t pleased that someone was not recommending his film to patrons, especially patrons who were his offspring. So, yeah. The theater employee was let go. Seems a little harsh, in my opinion. Art is subjective. And that felt a bit like entrapment to me. We were just young kids making minimum wage at the end of the day. He was a big-time director who should have been able to handle a little criticism.  

The second firing was actually a twofer. That’s because two employees were running a scam together, which was this: When one of them worked the ticket box and the other worked the door, the guy working the door would apparently not rip a few tickets. Instead, he would give them back to the guy selling. Since they were not ripped in half, they did not get counted in the nightly drop, so the money did not have to be in the till. And it wasn’t, because ticket guy would pocket that money and the two of them would split it, or so I heard. I have no idea how many times they ran the scam, but I did hear from another employee that they’d been doing it so long, by the time they were fired, they had saved up enough money to buy DJ equipment. Wow. Just wow. I don't know what else to say beyond that.  

So, the last firing was actually of the general manager. I should say that in the two years I worked behind the popcorn counter, I recall three general managers, so it wasn’t that unusual for them to come and go quickly, but this one stood out to me because and I was partly responsible, though only in the sense that I was involved. Reluctantly. First off, I will say in my defense, I did not want this person to be fired. I would consider myself a pretty easy person to work with. I think I’m a pretty diligent worker overall, and I try not to burn any bridges. I’m nonconfrontation for the most part, that is, unless I’m really pushed. And in this situation, I was pushed. Okay. Here’s the story. I had just arrived for my shift. Per my way, I was early. I’m always early for everything. I put on my gross jacket, and I stood behind the counter waiting for my shift to begin. The general manager, from her desk chair in the office, yelled over to me. “Hey,” she said, “Go and grab my lunch at the saloon next door.” I was annoyed on many levels with this request. 1) It was not posed as a question. 2) There was not a please included. 3) I was not on the clock yet, but even if I had been, fetching lunch for the manager was not part of my job. 4) This was coming from the same woman who had been rude to me a few days prior to that, so I wasn’t jumping to do her any favors. 5) Have I mentioned that I made a meager wage? So…I said, “Um. No?” To which she replied, “Come on, you little B$%&%! Go and get my lunch!” I don’t know about you, but when I’m trying to persuade someone to do something for me, calling them a B%*&^ wouldn’t be my first approach. I did not get angry or yell at her. I just shook my head, and I walked away. I was frankly embarrassed and honestly close to tears. She was yelling at me in front of the rest of the staff, mind you. I had no idea why she had singled me out. And, like I said, I was not a drama queen. I was there to do my job, get paid, and leave. Which is what I did that day. I steered clear of the manager, and I left after I was done. But the rest of the staff who had been watching decided to report it to the assistant manager and he called the district manager. I had nothing to do with any of that. I would have just left it alone if I had the choice. But the next time I came in for my shift, I had to talk to the district manager on the phone. He asked me to verify if this was the story, and I said it was. And the general manager was let go. I felt a little bad because she’d relocated from another city to take the job only a few months before that. It obviously wasn’t my fault, but I often find people’s actions to be confusing. Maybe that’s just me. She was a middle-aged woman. I was a nineteen-year-old girl from a smalltown, working my first real job in the city, trying to make money to pay for my college tuition. I was a bit quiet back then, so I guess maybe she thought she could coerce me by being loud and crass. I was taught to be polite, but I also had a strong Mama figure at home. She didn’t take any business from anyone. I hadn’t realized at the time, but I was simply standing up for myself, like my mom taught me. So, yeah. Lots of life lessons from behind the popcorn counter.