This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Arts & Entertainment

PJ's Midnight Movie Madness

PJ reminisces about midnight movie events throughout the years.

This Thursday night (or rather, Friday morning), Nov. 19 at 12:01 a.m., the is going to show the new Harry Potter movie. Over the years midnight shows have become big events, and as such, PJ was asked to share some recollections of them. Well, now that his bedtime and that of most of his patrons is somewhere around 7:00 p.m., he had to go back twenty five years or so to come up with some good stories.

His first memory of a midnight show was in the mid seventies and took place at the old Hauppauge Theater on Route 347. It was Rocky Horror, and what a time it was.  "Virgins" sat on the right and veterans on the left. They almost all came in costume and replete with toilet paper, water guns, and various other props. Oh, how the audience participated. They knew each line and responded en masse. They performed along with the movie right in front of the screen.

Of course, the theater got wrecked. In fact, it was PJ's understanding that Rocky Horror was generally the last gasp of a doomed theater venue. PJ can still vividly remember the tallish young man who came up to his projection booth.

Find out what's happening in Port Jeffersonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"Don't worry about me," he cautioned. "I won't get in your way, but I have to man the spot light."

And he did. With professional gusto. But, sadly he wasn't a conversationalist.

Find out what's happening in Port Jeffersonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

PJ can remember saying something to the effect of, "Do you find that in doing the same show over and over, you tend to lose your spontaneity and you guys get a bit stale?" To which he replied, "That's cool." Hmmm.

And, then there were the concert movies at the old Three Village Theater. PJ can still remember getting home about four in the morning from those "mind altering events."

Then in 1982 PJ bought the PJ Twins. He didn't want to wreck the place so he avoided bringing in the midnight crowd, but sometime around 1986 an idea occurred to him, "Why not present a midnight showing of a newly opening movie?"  And so, when the then hot Sly Stallone's Cobra was scheduled to open on a Friday, PJ called his booker, Ronny Lesser.

"Hey, Ronny," he said, "I have an idea. I'd like to put on a show of Cobra at 12:01 a.m. on Friday morning,"

Ronny said this had never been done and thus, was not permissible.

"Why?" whined a frustrated PJ. "It's Friday. That's the day the movie opens. What's the big deal?"

So, Ronny said, "All right, kid, I'll call Warner Bros. and ask them."

Well, they said, "No." Emphatically.

PJ implored Ronny to ask again, and finally "against their better judgment, they relented." Well, the theater advertised the show all week, and the appointed hour came. And so did about thirty movie goers. Not a rousing success, however, it was fun and PJ wondered if the idea might catch on.

It is interesting to note, by the way, that exactly three minutes after midnight the phone at the theater rang. Guess who was calling? It was the Vice President of the Warner Bros. East Coast Division calling for the numbers. He didn't let on, but PJ had given him a new opportunity, an opportunity that would one day become a mainstay of the movie industry: midnight openings of big, eagerly anticipated new movies.

Oh, and by the way, don't miss Harry at midnight on the 18th, or is that the 19th?

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?