1926 Green's Cinema Service Staff List (p. 68 - Early Scottish Cinema (2018))
Cinema Manager
Booked the programme and then promoted/sold it to audiences and customers.
Similar to a programmer's role in terms of a modern equivalent?
Musicians
Fairly self explanatory - accompanied the film in order to help enhance the audience experience.
Operators (Projectionists)
Responsible for running films and ensuring that they were acceptable for audiences viewing - running films at the correct speed was essential for a comfortable viewing experience.
Attendants
Responsible for managing audiences within the cinema itself and ensuring safety.
Would this section also include the roles of Usherettes, Confectionary sellers, Door Attendants?
The people in these roles likely vary from cinema to cinema depending on size and area, so it might be worth seeing if its possible to bring a more comprehensive examples list of roles for under this umbrella term.
Cleaners
Listed separately from attendants in this section (similarly in the Campbeltown Picture house pay sheet - although admittedly that is a more detailed list of roles) - is there a reason for this? Are they not considered as valuable as other cinema staff?
What structures did the attendants fall within?
Observations/Ideas
All roles technically fall within the background space that is exhibition in comparison to the on screen roles/filmmaking teams.
Blur the line/Transitionary role between the exhibition space and the screen itself.
Bridge the distribution into the exhibition area of films.
This would suggest a level of customer facing? Similar to that of the attendants?
In terms of role, this is often considered an important position because they are the mediators between the film and the audience - in a different way to the musicians, it is a more dictorial role, whereas the musicians almost become part of the film.
They are both roles which actively interact with the audience via the film itself, different to the other roles within the cinema space.
Despite this there is a split in terms of roles which interact directly with the film, and those which don't and are more focused on the cinema space and audience directly.
Observations/Ideas
There are also hierarchies which emerge within the cinema roles, but interestingly these are not based on one set of ideals, but multiple which work in conjunction with one another.
Some possible markers of these hierarchies to explore are..
Gender
Class
Education/Skill Level
Age
Position within society/local community
Given that a lot of the earlier cinema set up was local community based this feels important to consider?
Shareholders
They are not mentioned within this particular booklet, but as the Campbeltown Picture House project has identified, they had a important influence on cinemas.
How far does this influence reach? Is that something which is documented?
Audiences
Where do the audiences themselves fit within this model?
Income and Status were very much influencing divisions within the cinema roles.
Cinemas frequently employed women but they were generally restricted to certain lower status roles or were musicians.
“Armed with such experience, managers were charged with securing programmes likely to appeal to house patrons, overseeing the maintenance of the physical fabric of the building, ensuring order, particularly at crowded Saturday evening shows, and thereby securing the house’s reputation within the local community. In pursuing their business, managers found themselves answerable to a variety of publics: directors and shareholders, anxious as to the portability of the concern, audience members seeking attractive entertainment with which to occupy their free time and a workforce occasionally vociferous in defence of its status rejected both in wages and working conditions.”
definition of managers role p.73