1952 Mexico City, Mexico 1

Sylvia Mirsky (friend’s grandmother)
Year Born: 1943
Mexico City, Mexico
Interviewed on: September 21, 2019

by Daniel Lee

Both of my grandfathers have passed away, and my grandmothers are hospitalized, so I had the unique opportunity to interview one of my friend’s grandmother, Sylvia Mirsky. This memory is from her point of view.

I was born in 1943 in Mexico City, and grew up in La Condesa, a neighborhood in Mexico City. I think the first movie that I watched was “Million Dollar Mermaid” starring Esther Williams. It had come out when I was either 9 or 10 years old. At that time, La Condesa had several movie theatres, and so yes – contrary to what all the young people do today via Netflix – we went to the theater. The Cine America¹ was pretty large and had a balcony and a first floor. I went with my youth group (similar to Girl Scouts in the US), and after seeing “Million Dollar Mermaid” with them, we began to go a lot, especially because there were so many theatres in La Condesa (my neighborhood). It was almost like a habit/ritual/tradition to go on the weekends, and it was something to look forward to every week (I’d almost certainly count down the days until I’d go to the theater).

That first experience is still very vivid in my head. There were vendors that walked around the theater (before the movie started) selling snacks (popcorn, mueganos (fried dough coated in sugar), and my friends and I shared popcorn. I remember after watching “Million Dollar Mermaid”, I fell in love with Esther Williams mainly because every single movie that she was in involved some underwater component/portion, which was so much fun! In “Million Dollar Mermaid”, she played the role of a girl who had polio but swims to become stronger. Even though the movie was in English, there were Spanish subtitles and the movie was still very enjoyable. I frequented the movie theater often with my youth group – I even remember the first time I watched Elvis Presley on screen, they got so excited that they threw pillows from the seats from the balcony onto the first floor. There was a lot more things of rambunctious nature (fights, screaming, etc) that happened in theatres than what happens today at regular movie theaters.

Sadly, Cinemax closed shortly after I watched my first movie there, but I still frequented the theatres in the neighborhood. Nowadays, with all these new technologies, I find it crazy that I can watch movies from my living room on the computer and TV – it’s a completely different experience without throwing pillows with my friends, eating mueganos/popcorn, and walking to and from the theater as a group, but I still fondly look back on my experiences at the theater as one that brought my youth group together, set my imagination free, and showed me a new form of media and entertainment.

This is making me reminisce on all the fun times. Maybe I should try to rewatch “Million Dollar Mermaid Today”… all the movies I watched were so much fun and now remind me of my childhood fondly.

The Cine America, which was opened in 1922 and closed in 1955 [http://cinematreasures.org/theaters/53591]