Richmond, Virginia 1951
Mr. Stuart Hall and Mrs. Dianne Hall
Born 1946 + 1947
Richmond, Virginia
Interviewed on February 10, 2024
by Helen Hall
What is the first movie you remember seeing?
Stuart: Uh, let me see, Pinocchio I think, or may have been Snow White. The one that I remember was I’m pretty sure a Pinocchio movie because that’s when they found out I had a hearing problem because they knew that they didn’t think I was hearing good, so they wanted to talk about something that they knew that if I was interested in I would respond. So, we were sitting at the kitchen table on Harwood Street and they were talking about a Disney movie and I’m pretty sure it was Pinocchio.
Dianne: I really don’t remember because we didn’t go to the movies until I was older because we couldn’t afford it. The earliest I can remember is when I was 10 or 12 and we could go up to Hull Street to the Venus Theater. When we were little, we didn’t do stuff like that. Back then, it cost 15 cents. The reason I go to go when I did is when I used to babysit, and one of the girls that went to school with me and lived in the neighborhood, we could go up to the theater and watch movies every once in a while.
Stuart: The Venus Theater was one of my earlier ones too. We could go see the Westerns and everything a little up from 14th street right next to the bowling alley.
Is there a specific Western you can remember?
Dianne: Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, but we saw that more on TV than the movies, but Roy Rogers was on the movie screen too with Gene Autry.
Stuart: Roy Rogers became a household thing, he did a lot of what they call spaghetti westerns early on, cheaply budgeted Westerns. He played good in those roles and John Wayne was also in a lot of the movies back then. Also, How the West was Won, we’re getting into the period when we were teenagers and the are coming out with the really big cinemas that lasted three and a half hours with intermissions. They had the Sound of Music, Shenandoah, Jimmy Stewart in that. But they took things through different stages. There is one thing, an early John Wayne movie I just happened to see the other day, but it addressed realistically what happened when the wagon gets to a cliff, and I was watching it saying that was unbelievable because you never see that now. As far as acting, John Wayne did a good job in most all of his movies, getting better as he got older.
When we were dating, saw Shenandoah, that was the big one about the civil war. And then, It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad World, good one, had a lot fo the comedic actors all trying to find this gold and travel cross country to where this money was buried, long movie but well done.
How did you get to the movies?
Stuart: We caught the bus when we were younger and then as we got older and were dating I picked her up in the car in the same way they do now, there was a parking garage near the Lowe’s theater, which is now the Dominion Center and was the Carpenter Center. Was a big theater company and had them all over the country. It was very ornate, still that way, when the music played if you were in the balcony you could see the keys on the piano playing and the ceiling of the theater had clouds that moved.
Dianne: I remember going with my parents to the drive-in, you could go for cheaper. Mom would take all the goodies and we could pay by the carload. We’d get out and sit on the top of your car or have a chair or blanket.
Did you get concessions?
Stuart: We would always get a popcorn and drink.
Dianne: And sometimes sneak in a candy bar, but always popcorn.
Were there ushers?
Stuart: At the Venus, we didn’t have assigned seats, but at any of the other theaters like the Broad Street ones, they had assigned seats, so the ushers would lead you there. And if people were talking the ushers would come shine a light on you.
What would you say your favorite movie was?
Dianne: Oh gosh.
Stuart: I would still say Sound of Music was one of my favorites. And then I did always like most of the old Disney movies.
Dianne: That was about the only type of movie Stuart would take me to, the Disney movies. I always liked the Sound of Music.
Stuart: And then of course The Wizard of Oz. (Dianne: I didn’t like that too much) I thought it was kinda interesting take on special effects. The special effects were really starting to take place, going all the way back to the Buster Keaton, and you know those, the way he did special effects. He was actually doing the stunts themselves, they would drop the front of the house, and he, the house comes down around him.
Dianne and Stuart Hall are my paternal grandparents – They have always lived in Richmond, Virginia (where I also was born and grew up), and I still often find them watching the Turner Classic Movies channel!
