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The Name Above the Marquee
By Jorge Casuso
Lookout Staff
"Sometimes people are shocked to learn there really is a Laemmle,"
says the large man with curly salt-and-pepper hair and a goatee.
Bob Laemmle sits in a conference room above the Royal Theater in West
LA, one of the venues that has made his family's name synonymous with
movie houses.
It's the beginning of the week and Laemmle is busy checking out how the
39 screens in his nine art movie houses, including The Monica on 2nd Street
in Downtown Santa Monica, fared over the weekend. Ending with a holiday
(Monday was Martin Luther King Day), the numbers are strong.
So Laemmle - along with his son Greg - has decided to hold over
most of the movies. On the few screens that didn't do well, they'll show
expanded runs of "Confessions of a Dangerous Mind," based on
the double life of legendary showman Chuck Barris, and the drama "Antoine
Fisher."
"The distributor has a strategy, and we try to fit into what their
strategy is," says Laemmle, surrounded by movie posters and snapshots
of workers and family. "Sometimes you can't get the film you'd love
to have because a distributor has a different plan. But you try to get
the films you love."
An abiding passion for the art of film and a sharp business sense passed
down through three generations have made the Laemmle name a household
word among cinema aficionados. Some will drive more than 100 miles to
a Laemmle movie house to catch an independent film or a pristine print
of a classic that few other theaters will show.
"When it's a limited run, people will come considerable distances,"
said Laemmle, who started working for the family business 45 years ago.
The Laemmle family's commitment to film assured the company's survival
during the late 60s and early 70s, when many art houses were turned into
more profitable porno theaters.
" A lot of people were not committed to the art," Laemmle says.
"They were shoe salesmen. It didn't matter what they showed."
The Laemmle chain also weathered the advent of video and the rise of "megaplexes"
that screen the latest Hollywood blockbusters. In the early 90s when Cineplex
began buying up the art houses, Laemmle refused to sell. "That wasn't
really what we were about," he says.
"There used to be a lot more art operators," Laemmle laments.
Bob Laemmle was weaned on the screening business, which is in the family's
blood. His father, Max, had worked "the production and distribution
end of the business" in Europe for his uncle, Carl Laemmle, the founder
of Universal Studios.
After immigrating to America from Paris, where the family had fled their
native Germany, Max and his brother Kurt launched the current company in
1938. They started out with one theater, then expanded to five. Now there
are nine Laemmle-run theaters in the Los Angeles area - from Santa
Monica to Palm Springs and from Pasadena to Newport Beach.
The company also has ventured into booking films for theaters in other parts
of the country. "We've been doing it for many years," Laemmle
said. "What makes us successful is people know what the Laemmle policy
is. We have a very loyal customer base."
Bob's son Greg, who had worked at the family theaters as a kid, studied
marine biology at Berkeley. But the three art houses near the college campus
drove him back to the family business, which he now helps run.
"I was sitting around with fellow marine biology students and they
were talking about going away for four weeks to the gulf or on a Russian
fishing trawler," Greg said. "I just couldn't be away from a movie
theater for a week." |
