1941 Los Angeles, California

Marvin Albert
Born 1935
L.A., California
Interviewed on Jan 20, 2024
By Jude Sack

The first time I went to the movies was a big deal.

I grew up in L.A., and my dad was nuts over movies. If there was ever an event happening in Hollywood—like a premiere—he would throw us in his 1938 Chevrolet four-door, and we’d watch all the stars walk the carpet.

But I didn’t get to see my first movie until I was 10 years old. See, we were poor. So, I had to do something pretty terrible at my age. I would steal money from my mom. She had a red bowl where she saved pennies. In those days, it was 10 cents to go to the movies. Every so often, I would grab a handful: 10 cents for the movies and the rest for magic tricks.

You’d go to the movies on Saturday. See, kids didn’t have school, and parents still had to work. They worked six days a week during the war, making ships, planes, and everything. So, on Saturdays, it was mainly kids; it became a tradition, and the theaters catered to it. I never missed one. I was almost like a religious person going every Saturday.

The movie theater I went to in those days was The Picfair Theater on Pico Boulevard. It opened in 1941. And the thing I remember most of all were the serials.

Every movie started with the newsreel. This was during World War II, so you would see what was going on in our fight against the Japanese and Germans. Then, it cut to the serials. A serial was like an episode of TV. Each week, a new episode was shown until the series was finished. The first one I ever saw was called Nyoka the Jungle Girl. It was basically the female version of Tarzan.

Oh, and I had such a crush on her back in the day. It was insane. She was gorgeous! I’m walking around with a crush on somebody that doesn’t even really exist. I couldn’t wait till the next Saturday. I was going crazy. I just had the most overwhelming crush on her. I mean, I was falling in love with her. God. It was great, man. That movie was phenomenal. Nyoka, the Jungle Girl.

After the serial, they did a drawing. When you entered the theater, they would tear your ticket in half and put it in a fishbowl. You’d keep the other half. So, when they picked a random ticket, the person with the matching number won a prize.

I got picked once. I was so shocked. I couldn’t get up there. They read it again. I was having a breakdown. First of all, I’m dyslexic, so I couldn’t even really read my numbers. They read it again and said, “Somebody here has got to have 098487. Please look at your tickets, kids.” My friend, Tommy Humes, saw my ticket and was like, “You’ve got it!”. I just about had a heart attack. I was shaking. It was a big moment in my life. I ended up winning a balsa wood model airplane kit.

Yeah. No, that was a big deal. Huge deal. It really did affect me.