Another Interesting Night with Kathy

On Tuesday we had a leisurely morning which we needed after the excitement from the night before.  We had received tickets for the The Tonight Show so we left around noon for Burbank.  It took a very long time to get there.  We changed our route due to the traffic on the 405, but it still took us over an hour before we arrived.

We had a fun time seeing the show.  The guests were Zachary Levi, Bubba Watson, and B.O.B. who  had to perform twice due to a malfunction.  We think it was a wardrobe malfunction by the way his dancers were shaking around.  

This is where our day turned interesting; we should've just gone back to our apartment.   And let me say, that there will be some details of this story that will be intentionally left out so not to embarrass anyone.

 Earlier in the week Kathy and I had googled film festivals and found that there was one going on this week.  Together we looked at the different films and decided that if we got out of The Tonight Show early enough that we would go to The Rita Hayworth Theater to see the premiere of Beyond Pollution, a film about the Gulf oil spill.  So off we went with high hopes and high expectations.  After all, when Steve and I had taken Natalie to the downtown film festival we had a wonderful time!  

                         Beyond Pollution Film Screening

                                                     Tuesday, July 10 7:00p

                                 at Downtown Independent Theater, Los Angeles, CA

                                                        Beyond Pollution
                                                  * Los Angeles Premiere *
                                         Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles
                           Tuesday, July 10, 2012, 7:00pm, Rita Hayworth Theater 2501 Wilshire Blvd. 

Let me just say, that not all film festivals are the same.  Our first troubling sign was the location which was quickly followed by pulling into a completely empty parking lot.  We tried to comfort ourselves by saying that it was empty because of our early arrival by 30 minutes.  I wish I had taken a picture of the parking lot and the area.

We both needed to use the restroom, but the door to the theater was locked so we waited in our car.  Finally, another car parked near us and the person went inside.  After waiting as long as we could we approached the entrance where a worker was attempting to unlock the door to the theater window.  He kindly let us in and escorted us to the bathroom saying that giving verbal directions to the bathroom would be too complicated.

He led us to a dark hallway and pointed us in the direction of a very narrow and dark entrance with steps.  Kathy and I were trying so hard not to laugh for more than one reason.  We returned to our car figuring it was probably safer to wait there than inside the empty theater.  We decided that Rita Hayworth would not be pleased with the theater named after her.

A few minutes before 7 p.m. we entered the theater even though no one else had arrived except more workers.  We passed our bathroom escort on the way in, he was still trying to unlock the same door!

I had ordered our tickets on-line so we checked in with the girl at the table;  there was only one other name on the list, another troubling sign.  

We had not eaten anything since before noon and hopeful about getting some popcorn.  No popcorn here -just a full bar and some candy.  So we decided to go on into the theater.

Can you see the size of the screen?  It was a little bigger than a movie projector screen- another sign.  We were laughing so hard- I guess too hard, for our bathroom escort came into the theater and informed us that the theater was not open yet.  

  We went back to the lobby which was empty and sat down and waited.  It was at this point that we decided a Heineken didn't sound so bad.  We overheard that the film was going to be late starting due to some technical problems, so late that the bartender (our bathroom escort) gave the only other ticket buyer directions to a place down the street to get cash since the drinks were "Cash Only".  We had to wait to drink them since they were hot and they were being iced down.  (By the way, there are so many "signs" about this experience that were troubling, I have quit pointing them out!)

Kathy posing as Rita Hayworth 

It wasn't too much longer before the theater was officially open.  We fought the crowd to get a good seat (there were eight people in the theater, six of those were workers).  And the premiere began . . .

After the movie, we quickly left in order to use the same dark bathroom and entered the lobby which was full of all kinds of interesting people.   (Later we learned that there was some sex movie being shown next.)

We were never so happy to get in our car and leave that very interesting premiere experience.