Dear Mr. Orrock:
My name is Jack Jason and I’m a Producer in Los Angeles with Marlee Matlin, the Academy Award winning actress from “Children of A Lesser God.” I am also the son of deaf parents. I grew up in San Leandro just a few blocks from the recently reopened Bal Theater on E. 14th Street. As a journalist who reports local news and community tidbits, I thought you might get a kick out of this story.
Back in the Fifties, every Wednesday night, the Bal Theater initiated a promotional event to encourage female patrons to come to the movies. It was Plate Night. Every Wednesday, the Bal gave out a single plate (yellow and white with a large painted Hibiscus flower) to female patrons. It was a smart marketing ploy. Female patrons would come for the free plates and would return the next week, regardless of the movie, just to get another plate. Eventually, they would have a complete set (after having spent a small fortune in movie tickets). My Mom was one of those female patrons.
Now recall that my Mom is hearing impaired. At that time, there was no such thing as closed captioning. Each week she and my father would walk arm and arm, down the street to the Bal and pay their $1.50 for the movies. There, they would sit silently, without the benefit of captions or sound, just so my Mom could get a free plate. She didn’t mind that she might have missed some of the story (more than likely, she and my father concocted their own story just from the images they saw — maybe a story better than what was actually written?); she wanted a set of those plates. Just like the hundreds of other women who attended the Bal on Wednesday nights, my mom stood in line after the movie to get her free plate.
Eventually, my mother got a set of those yellow and white Hibiscus plates — and then some. They were our “special” plates. Or the plates we took out for fancy occasions. For when my parents had too many deaf friends over (there were lots of times like those). They weren’t the Jewish holiday plates, however; we had other “special” plates for those days. They were the yellow and white flower plates. The ones mom got for free from the movies.
One would think, after all these years (45 to be exact), those plates would be long gone — broken, chipped or just shipped off to the Goodwill. But, then, you’re talking about the Jasons here. The Jasons saved everything. Just look in my garage. I’m proof of it. I’ve got little hand painted birthday cards and book reports from when I was 6 to 16 years old. So, when I moved back to California from New York a few years ago, my Mom and dad thought it was time I added to my collection of mementos and give me theirs! They brought down everything; their antiques, my grandmother’s antiques. So much stuff, that I needed a whole garage to store it.
And somewhere in that pile of stuff, were the plates.
When the Bal Theater recently reopened with a promise to recapture its past glory, my brother who lives in Castro Valley, asked me to check out their website. It was a blast relive the past through the site. Somewhere, down at the bottom of the Bal Theater’s website was a request for any old photos or mementos from the early days of the Bal — days when people used to cruise up and down East 14th Street and movies were less than two dollars. Sadly, the website recounted, most of Bal Theater’s original neighbors were long gone and photos and mementos were hard to come by. Was anything left out there, the website asked? You bet.
On August 24, 2000, the Bal reopened its doors. As part of a program to provide a variety of movie and theater going experiences, the Bal Theater will begin showing Captioned Films for the hearing impaired, a few nights each month, as a means to reach out to the hundreds of deaf and hearing impaired residents of San Leandro and the East Bay.
So, just like they used to do in the Fifties, my Mom and Dad plan on walking down the street, arm and arm, and catch a movie. But this time, they don’t need a plate give away to entice them to the movies; this time they can now sit in the theater and UNDERSTAND what is going on. Movie going for the sheer pleasure of it, imagine! They don’t have to make up their own stories or try to read the actors’ lips, because the stories will be right there, on the screen for them (though, it’s doubtful that the stories will be as good as when they used to go in the Fifties, or even the stories that they made up!). And they can share their pleasure with their deaf friends who will be sitting right next to them, just like the hearing people have been doing at the Bal Theater for the last 54 years.
When the movies are over, the lights will come up and the patrons will shuffle out into the street. There, my Mom and Dad can proudly point to a small reminder of the way that things once were. On display, in the lobby of the Bal Theater, will be a set of yellow and white hibiscus plates that say “On Loan from Benny and Sarah Jason.” People will marvel. Times were simpler then, they’ll say. Things were given away for free. But movies weren’t captioned back then, my Mom and Dad will say. Mom and Mom were deaf and couldn’t understand the movies.
“How sad,” someone might say. But knowing Mom and Dad they’ll say “no.”
They came regardless.
Why not? They liked going out to the movies. They liked the faces, the places they went, the stories they told (or thought they told). They liked the flickering images on the screen.
And they got a free plate every week.
Enjoy the movies now, Mom and Dad. Have a popcorn on me. You deserve it.
Jack Jason – [email protected].
