- [Announcer] For over a century, movies have been our cultural campfire.

Movies reflect who we are, our loves, hopes and dreams.

They present us with other worlds and points of view.

They can inspire awe, laughter, fear, and a sense of wonder.

Movies transcend borders and bridge cultural barriers.

They can ambush our emotions and take our breath away.

While huge theater chains exhibit films in urban areas, there are still a few independent theater owners scattered across the land.

Howard and Ayron Pickerill and their family have been presenting movies across rural Montana for over 70 years.

This is a celebration of movies and the people who keep small theaters open, the popcorn popping, and the projectors running at a theater near you.

- If you want to get in this business, and anybody you know could get in this business.

I have a string of theaters I'll sell you if you really want to be in the business.

Back in the day as you put it, the theater people wore uniforms.

They had little pillbox hats and flared pants and a little jacket, a pipe jacket, or whatever you want to call it.

They all wore the same shoes.

And as you know, in Montana and in every state in the union, there are motion picture palaces and they were palaces and they were beautiful.

One that they tore down in Missoula, the Fox Theater, it was absolutely gorgeous and it had things in it that nobody even thought could exist.

These were all a takeoff of Grauman's Chinese Theater in Hollywood where they did all of this stuff.

And it was a truly, they call it a show house.

A lot of older people still call it a show house.

And it truly was a show house.

They had plush seats, they had carpet on the floor and it was a far cry from the original benches in a flat floor with a flickery picture.

And people went to it.

They used to have, what comes to mind is Wolf Point, for example, on Wednesday night they had limousines, rolled out the red carpet, the whole nine yards.

And when you came to the show, you were treated just like the movie star that you didn't see on TV, but you saw it on the newsreel.

I went to work here in 1953 and I became a projectionist at the Lake Theatre down on Highway 93.

This was the Lake Theatre, belonged to Jensen Brothers and after the new theater was built, why the people who built the new theater bought Jensen out.

And I was the projectionist here in 1954, '55, and '56.

- Well, to me, movies are the lifeblood of telling a story, hearing a story, seeing a story, and the joy that that particular experience can bring to you.

Blessed career is all I can say 'cause I went from driving into management and transportation, production management, producing, and it doesn't get much better than that in Hollywood, to be able to go from one thing to another without, you know, being outta work all the time.

So I was blessed.

- The best thing about being an independent theater is that you don't have stockholders and then you become the third largest chain in the state of Montana because you're independent.

And most of the time, the ones who aren't independent theater owners have nothing to do with little towns because little towns don't produce enough money for them.

So they kind of shy away from them.

- Had a lot of extra friends when your birthday rolled around because they knew it was happening at the movie theater.

- Perks were free movies, free popcorn, free pop, free range of the theater, could explore everywhere.

I guess a free afterschool program since it was just a block or two away from the school.

I had a few years where we'd hook up my gaming systems and play on the big screen.

That was definitely a once in a lifetime opportunity.

- Overall, we were very fortunate to have such a unique, unique experience growing up.

- I was working at the intown theater and Howard had been away from work ever since I started and he was going to come in that evening and all of the girls that worked there were so excited.

"Howard is coming in, Howard is coming in."

And I thought, "Oh my gosh."

And that was the first time I saw him.

- Hey Sandy, do you know Bill Donovan?

- No, I don't.

Hi Bill.

- Hi Sandy.

So Sandy, have you got a date to the prom yet?

- Not yet.

I just broke up with Tom a couple weeks ago.

- Oh, well if you're not going with Tom, how'd you like to go with me?

- Sure, that'd be great.

- Listen, I'll call you tonight, okay?

- Okay.

Bye.

[Playful Music] [mouths "Popping Sounds"] - When I first met Gary, he was so cute.

He was cute and good in sports and funny.

- I was attracted to her because of how cute she was, how her personality was just out there bubbly, very nice.

She was popular with her class as far as being an overachiever.

We were friends for about six months of just casually we'd meet up as high school kids did in a small town.

- And when I came through the door, she was taking tickets and she was a cute little thing.

- He was a nice looking and had a nice personality.

So I did agree with the girls that were so excited to see him afterwards.

- She had on the prettiest yellow dress I ever seen in my life and I thought, "I'm going to have to get to know this lady."

And then later on she worked for me out at the drive-in.

So that's kind of where it got started.

- [Becky] Then he finally asked me out.

- [Gary] Yes, I asked her if she wanted- - And guess where he asked me to go?

- I asked her if she wanted to go see a movie, you know, because her parents of course owned the movie theater.

So I thought, "Well, we could at least try an inexpensive date."

- He wasn't gonna be out anything if it didn't work out.

When Gary and I started dating, Gary was probably one of the first dates that I had that actually came to the house and picked you up.

- [Narrator] Well, maybe you better try to be more friendly this time.

- Hi Bill.

Oh, that's quite a costume.

- Most other dates were that you met at the theater and went to the movie or met at the ballgame or something because of course I was only a sophomore when I started dating Gary.

- Hey, say wait a minute, is this social courtesy what I've been doing?

- [Narrator] It's part of social courtesy.

- Here I am.

- Let me help.

- [Becky] How long was it before you asked her out?

- Well, I don't know.

That was a long time ago.

- It wasn't that long.

- It couldn't have been long though, because I was Johnny on the spot then.

So you know, you can't wait around.

Somebody else will scarf her up.

- When I first started, everyone was like, "Oh, Howard's scary, you know?"

And I'm like, I don't know.

We didn't talk much when I first started, which was long ago.

You know, I just kind of mumble here and there.

And I think we've gotten closer over the last few years.

So, and I just think he's great.

Like I had no idea, I guess for years I didn't know how he was, 'cause we didn't really talk too much and you know, but we've definitely gotten closer and I think he's great.

He's funny and I would've never thought how funny he was, so.

- Candis got outta school and she was Amber's best friend and she was going to go to- - Missoula to go to college and my financial aid fell through and when that happened, my parents had moved to Alaska and I had nowhere to go.

- She moved into our little grandma house.

- I was staying with them, trying to figure out what I was going to do and Ayron offered me a job in her basement doing some bookkeeping work and a place to live in their little apartment that's attached to their garage.

- Then she went to work for Polson Theatres 33 years ago as a secretary.

And her and Ayron run the office in the basement of our house.

And I never will forget it because the telephone number was the same as it is now.

I still get calls on my telephone, which is still has the same number and they want me to tell 'em what's playing at the theater.

- Both Howard and Ayron, I owe a lot to.

They took a 19-year-old girl whose parents had moved to Alaska and didn't know where she was gonna go or where she was gonna work or where she was gonna live.

And, they trusted me.

They brought me into a family business that had only been run by family and they gave me a chance to learn and to grow within their business.

And now 33 years later, I mean I look back and I am still thankful every day for the fact that they took me under their wing.

- Candis has been part of the family.

She's my other blonde's daughter because that's how we feel about her.

- I remember going to the movie pretty much every day.

We'd walk from the school to the theater and wait for Mom or Dad to get done working upstairs.

And we'd just sit in the movie and.

- Well we had about school got out at 3:15 and the earliest movie started at four, usually.

So we would bug Mom in the office for a little while, use all of the expensive cardstock and colored paper to make crafts, get our treat of 7-Up or root beer, no caffeine.

♪ Let's all go to the lobby, let's all go to the lobby, ♪ ♪ let's all go to the lobby to get ourselves a treat.

♪ - And popcorn.

And then we'd catch about the first 20 minutes of the movie and then it'd be time to go home.

I think I watched "The Incredibles," the first 15 minutes of that, probably 12 times in three weeks.

- Yeah, I remember watching "Narnia" about 20 times.

That one got old.

- We were both tired of working for someone else and we had looked at a lot of businesses in Polson and the previous owner of the theater decided he needed to sell the theater and he helped us a lot with the sale of it and the purchase of it.

- Everybody but my mother agreed that it was a good idea to buy the theater.

She was, you don't take a chance on anything.

- Along with loving the theaters, that's why we ended up in the theater business and not in some other business on Main Street.

- I had worked for Parker and Shell Incorporated, which is what the name of the company that Bill Shell and Alvin Parker.

And so Alvin died and then Bill, he took over and I always worked with Bill and Bill and I were really close and he just went overboard with making them available, the theaters in Polson, which consisted of a drive-in and a indoor house.

The drive-in theater in its heyday was good.

It was good and people enjoyed it and it was a lot of family stuff.

At one time the drive-in theater played five changes a week and it was always a big crowd.

When we first started, we had a complete lack of money.

- First night we were open, by the time we got that far, we had no money, and we needed change to start.

The kids had a little savings account that their great-grandmother kept putting a little money in every birthday.

So we gathered up all the money out of their savings account and turned it into nickels and dimes and quarters and dollars and put it in the snack bar and the ticket booth.

And we never gave it back to 'em.

And they really feel that they own the parts of the theater now.

- Investors- - Investors.

Yes.

- And we have our two contenders- - Contestants.

- Lydia, contenders.

Lydia the daughter, and Becky the mom.

- Mom is hardworking, got straight A's and she will never let us live it down.

She has incredible tenacity.

Literally never stops.

The most caring woman I know.

- [Becky] Just glamorous.

Lydia Dupuis, Princess of Hillcrest.

- Yeah.

I think we are very fortunate to have a mom like we do.

Sorry.

I don't know if I can talk about you today.

- I Love you.

- I love you.

- Well Gary just kept hanging around.

So finally we give him a job.

- He was working at the theater and the drive-in most of the time that we were dating.

[Silent Movie Piano music - I have a mishap with one of the first times that I was learning to build up film.

And so it was in my second summer working out at the drive-in, and Howard was still running the indoor house on Friday nights.

So he calls me up and says, and this is during the first "Indiana Jones, Raiders of the Lost Ark."

So that was a big opening.

I had two reels.

I had reels three and four mixed up.

I put reel four on, spliced it on, ran it on, I spliced reel three, ran it on and then five and then six.

And you don't just get to test those movies prior to.

So he proceeded to call me and say, called me a few choice words in his way and said, "I believe you got a couple of reels turned around when you were building up this film.

Because somebody came out and said, 'That didn't make sense.

I don't think that, I think there was something not right about that movie.'"

So those things can happen to a projectionist occasionally.

- So.

And you know, 35 years later he is still with us.

And I hope he is still happy with this job 'cause Gary is a good kid and he'll always be a good kid.

He does listen to me, which is a boon for him.

I mean, you know.

And one of the biggest problems that we have with the people that work for us is it is a job.

- This is the jacket that will protect your body if the lamp does actually pop or if you accidentally drop it on the concrete floor.

This is a whole lot simpler process than what it used to be with the film projectors because the lamp is actually encased in a light box they call it.

So this light box is the heart of the projector as far as the light source.

And this is where the carefulness of the lamp, the handling the lamp is what's crucial.

So a new lamp doesn't look much different from a used lamp.

You don't want to touch the glass, the oils from your fingers will heat up that certain spot and that's when you have a lamp failure.

And the nice thing about these light boxes is they only go in one way.

I also check the focus.

Okay, I get a reading on foot lamberts on the white light.

We'll, start out brand new and that looks pretty good.

- [Tyler] Dad at his birthday, 44.

Oh my.

- 29.

- Okay.

Whatever.

44.

- Hey.

- Dad is funloving, hardworking as well.

Also never stops.

Another great pillar of support, love, and biggest protector.

- Yeah, our dad is very creative and smart, and a problem solver and always wants to start some new project.

And he loves our mom a lot.

I don't know why this is so hard today.

- Mom's been there for every step of the road.

Same with dad.

Our biggest cheerleaders.

Our biggest helpers when we need something done.

And yeah, biggest supportive love.

- Gary and I were out of town.

A newish projection person was running the movie.

He wasn't even making it up and so we had it on the platter, but something happened, I don't know whether they stopped it halfway through, but they were trying to move it from one platter to the other.

And you could do that, but you had to do it carefully.

Well, eh, didn't work out so good.

And all of the film went onto the floor.

And the way that works is just like if you pull a ribbon out of the center, you know how it stays twisted.

So the film is like that.

You can't just pick the end of it and start winding it back up.

So that guy, that happened like at nine o'clock at night and he spent all night there.

By the time Candis got there at eight o'clock in the morning, he had 35 millimeter film.

It strung up down the stairs, down the aisle in one auditorium, across the lobby, down the other aisle and back.

And you know, there was, he had done that like 10, I dunno, 20 times.

Film everywhere.

And they eventually got it put back together.

One of the, the manager from Ronan showed up to help and Candis and yeah.

So that was, and I mean so that poor movie, they ended up, it probably, it had hundreds of splices in it by the time it left Polson Theatres.

We did not tell anybody about that.

- My family is the most important thing to me, all of 'em.

I don't do any favorites.

- I feel lucky, very, very lucky to grow up in the home I did with the parents I had, the sisters I had.

It's a good life.

- Yes.

- And to be lucky enough to have it continue to this day, I mean I'm 29 now.

And to still be able to gather at my mom and dad's house with all of my sisters and their families and what a blessing.

- Very blessed that just like Cassie said, that we can all get together.

We all have a good time together.

We laugh a lot.

- It is a family and it's, I actually get excited to come down here and see these guys every day.

They're, I see them more than I see anyone else and friends, families, I see these guys.

So they are my family.

I just get excited to see them and we get to talk about movies 'cause nobody else wants to hear about movies and the business and my job all day long.

So they do, you know, so we all have something to talk about together.

So working with them guys has been great.

We've gotten a lot closer over the years and I've really enjoyed it.

And it's been good.

- I have nine wonderful grandchildren and two great grandchildren and three lovely daughters that produced all these children.

And it was kind of a thing, you know when they decided to get married you kind of take what you get.

That's the way it works.

When they decided to get married, you kind of take what you get.

And all of them, they did well.

They all did well.

- Quit don't touch me.

- Property line.

- What do we have to do with our hands?

They feel awkward.

- I know, yeah, I know.

- I was only 19 when I got engaged and married and I don't think dad said so much about who I picked, but that I was surely a baby and shouldn't get married.

But I did it anyway and it turned out pretty darn well.

Not only do I have a great husband, but the theater has a good attorney.

- Yeah.

Yes.

- There you go.

- And we still operate as a family unit without fights, without scraps.

- Then, Becky was born and I kind of quit working, did some part-time working.

Then we had two more children and I did a lot of bookkeeping from home and going in and working at the theater when I was needed.

And then the girls were big enough to help at the theater and we all worked there as a family.

- I can remember going with dad a lot of times to say the drive-in and he would be working on things and I could help him and tag along and yeah.

And I wouldn't have gotten that if he would've been working at a job somewhere, you know, else.

- I find it interesting that that's how we look at it when it really slave labor.

- Well yeah, that too.

- There were times where I would sporadically help out, especially in the younger years.

I never had a traditional job at the theater, but I remember a time where early middle school, late elementary, early middle school and there was a, some kind of conundrum happening in Cut Bank and Dad asked me if I wanted to go with him to help out for a little while and we ended up, him and I working the concession stand in the movie theater for a few days.

Just us two.

I colored a lot of signs and tried to make things pretty there and did a lot of crafts in our downtime.

But that was an interesting experience.

It was fun, nonetheless.

- But I do think that it was a great advantage to have.

Dad usually did nighttime work but, and if he was working in the day, it was stuff we could go with him.

And mom did daytime work, some parent was always available and we never had to fend for ourselves or look for childcare or anything like that.

We just were at home.

- [Ayron] And then it was time for the girls to grow up and leave home and we had a lot more theaters and a lot of bookwork and it took most of my time to just be in the office.

- When people would ask me if my mom worked when I was a kid.

I was like, "No, my mom doesn't have a job."

And I look at it now as an adult and we all knew that from about eight o'clock in the morning 'til about one o'clock in the afternoon, mom was busy downstairs at her desk doing theater things.

But she was always available unless she was talking to Barry the booker and then you did not interrupt.

- Ever.

- Ever.

- The guy who had booked the movies at the theater retired and he told my parents that they really should be booking those movies themselves, not hiring somebody out to do that.

They had enough theaters to do it and to make the studios, you know, happy.

So my mom said, "Well hey, if you wanna come to work at the theater, you could, you know, take the place of that buyer booker."

Mom pointed out to me what a nice life it had been for her and dad and for us kids.

And she was right.

It gave us the flexibility to spend time with you kids when we needed to.

We could always come to sporting events.

I said "Sure."

Because especially in the summertime, I was working dawn to dusk because it was mostly construction type work and it was kind of a bummer.

We didn't see very much of each other.

So, I started working at the theater.

Lydia must have been about two, it was in 2000.

- Yep.

- Running the theater together has allowed us something different that a lot of people that we know never got the opportunity for.

Or I suppose in the olden days a farm family was similar where, you know, instead of me staying in engineering and doing something totally different that Gary didn't know anything about and then him running the theater and me not knowing anything really about what's going on there, you know, we've gotten to share that.

And that was, I think a change in our relationship because then we started seeing each other all day every day.

You know, we worked at the same office, we didn't do the same things and it's not like our desks were right next to each other, but we worked together a lot, you know, and I guess that's what we've been doing for the last 25 years and we've gotten pretty good at it.

- I enjoy doing it very much with her.

I enjoy the people that came to the movie.

It's when people ask me, "Geez, I bet you really enjoy the movie theater business."

Well what I enjoy mostly is the fact that people are choosing to come to the movie.

What I care about the most is their experience when they come to the movie.

That it's a friendly, clean place.

They're being entertained and there's only so much you can do about the movie itself for them to enjoy the movie.

But the environment that they're in is what I really care about the most.

- I think people just love coming here.

We get compliments all the time.

I mean, on a daily basis people come in and tell us how beautiful this place is and how the energy in here is so great and how they just love coming here and people on their first times that come in will come back again.

You know, I'll see 'em for their first time here and then I'll see 'em a week later.

It's really neat that they enjoy be just being here.

Like, you know how comfortable it is.

- Ayron would always say that it was a party every night and the whole community was invited.

I think when you walk into the theater, you go back to being a kid again and it really feels great.

We are the party givers and they're here to celebrate, have fun, cry, laugh, you know, whatever it is that they're going to.

And sometimes I have to remind myself when you're doing spreadsheets and budgets and all that kind of stuff that that's what we create.

But, it really is a wonderful thing.

- I enjoy seeing people come into the movie and just enjoying the fact that they're coming to your place night after night and walking out with smiles.

- Gary and Becky are very supportive in a lot of things and I just think they're great people.

- Oh my gosh, they're lovely people.

And I think that I just really appreciate how much they've invested in our community by, you know, improving the theater and we love watching the movies there.

- So that was our life, working at the theaters in one way or another until Becky and Gary began to take it over.

And then we worked less and less there and started spending our winters in Arizona and our summers back on the lake at our home and enjoying our kids and grandkids and the great grandkids.

And that's been about the way it's gone.

- My mom is a rock star as well.

Such a voice of reason and kindness and an example of always finding the good in people, things, situations, even if the situation's not perfect.

- The amount of love that they have for all of us and our kids is just the best thing in the world.

- Yeah, we spent a lot of time with Mimi and Papa when we were younger, when mom and dad would have trips that they would go on, especially theater related conventions and going to fix broken things.

And we would always watch a movie at Mimi's house after we took our baths, got in our PJ's, we'd get to watch a movie and eat popcorn, but Mimi was always up for a fun adventure or make us strawberry toast on homemade bread and we'd pick strawberries in the garden and walk along the beach in the wintertime when the water was down.

And better grandma, I think, than anybody could ever hope for.

- I don't know where they learned how to be such good parents and good businesspeople, but they sure did.

- Yeah, they did.

- While always so great at saying, "This is what we did."

Not saying, "You need to do this."

- Yeah.

- But this is how we handled it.

You guys can handle it however you want, but this is what we did.

- Yeah.

But this worked.

- Yeah.

- Yeah, this worked.

- We do talk about the theater business a lot at the dinner table and when we're driving down the highway on vacation.

- And cut.

- They do have to be available to their employees and their theaters in the non-traditional working hours because that's when they operate from four to 11:30 PM and that's when we are out of school or we are home as a family.

So, we learned a lot hearing in the background from work calls and getting to know what it's like run a movie theater from a young age.

- Yeah, a downside would be being forced to learn a business as a child.

- A lot of people ask us, "Oh my gosh, how do you guys work together?"

It's like, "Well I don't know.

It seems pretty easy."

- And it was really kind of nice to be in the theater business because when everybody else was out playing on the weekends, we had to work.

But then on Tuesday and Wednesday we didn't have to work.

So the streams and the campgrounds and everything were our canvas to paint any kind of picture we wanted to on.

- So Monday night after the theater, in the summertime, dad would come home and we would be all packed to go camping.

So we'd all pile in the truck and hook onto the camper and get to a campsite on Monday night.

And we of course we were the only ones there 'cause nobody else camped during the week.

- Every time I think about Becky, I think about fishing in the Swan River and we would be wading across the river.

I have a creel, a rod.

- He has me, holding me, all of our fishing gear, - [Howard] Cassie on my hip.

And Becky in the left hand tiptoeing in the water so it doesn't go over her chin.

- And Becky like this.

And we were all under five.

- And the water was.

- And the water was here.

- And we're wading across the river.

And I've often thought we are really lucky that we didn't all... drown.

- Dang it, if every single time he would come behind us and catch a fish out of the same hole that we got nothing out of.

- That's true.

- That is true.

Geez.

- But anyway, Becky was a joy and she was a little chatty Cathy, but, she turned out pretty good.

In fact, all of our girls have turned out pretty good.

- Oh he's just a great dad.

He, anything you would want from a dad, my dad is it.

I got the best one.

- My dad, I'm gonna cry.

- Oh.

- Oh.

- Is one of the only people I know besides my mom who...um, Heidi Stern one time said, "You know, I would love to have that be what happens with my dad.

Whenever he sees you or your sisters, his whole little face lights up like the sun just came out on a stormy day and-" - It did.

- It did.

Yes.

And how you all just love each other and are so kind to each other and, that's your world.

- Yeah, Papa was another source of love, another source of teaching, taught me things about life.

You know, golf and fishing and chess, taught me how to play chess.

Don't know where I would be without Papa.

- Papa always had some story to tell us and it was halfway true most of the time.

He was always just fun-loving and always wanted to give us advice about something.

Usually it's pretty good advice and it's wise to follow it.

They came to all of our sporting events, all of our extracurriculars.

Papa was always the loudest in the crowd most of the time.

We'd always have to hang around afterwards 'cause he'd be chatting with somebody about the good old days.

- [James] And we're measuring 1900 grams of brown sugar in the silver bowl.

Six sticks of butter.

- Thanks again for joining us and enjoy the movie.

- What's memorable to me for the movies is childhood nostalgia with the Disney films that would come out.

And now I get to share that with my children as I'm raising them as I have two girls who absolutely love princess movies.

And it's a night out in our town, especially our community, being small, and we love supporting something that's been a generational piece with Polson Theatres.

- I guess what I like about movies is they kind of transport you to a different place and you can just kind of completely forget about your day or anything and just kind of almost become somebody else, just in the movie.

- Movies do that, they really do stir something inside.

It's almost unbelievable sometimes what they can do, you know?

And I watch everything from scary things to dramas to biographies and I don't know, I think they just really do bring out emotions in people.

You know, they go to another place and they don't have to deal with their life for a moment.

- Our family loves movies.

We watch movies on Friday nights to kind of let out the steam of the week and action adventure.

- Keep driving, unless you want a little of the same.

- Yeah, it's kind of a nice thing we do to hang out together.

Usually get some popcorn going and yeah, just, it's fun.

- Really good movies to me, I'll have to watch four or five times and every time you watch it you pick up on something new and learn something new, so.

- I like movies because sometimes they're funny and so hilarious.

- Same with me.

My favorite part is a pink horse.

- The pink horse?

- When they land on the moon and take off, I just think it's so cool.

- I was part of that world with the actors and the scenery and the way that it's edited and the movies I've been loving.

I've been watching some older ones when I was younger, like "Jurassic Park" and "The Mummy," like those storylines where I felt like movie magic almost.

That's why I like movies.

- I was lucky 'cause I worked with a lot of the maestros.

My best time was spent with the true storyteller of the maestros, Steven Spielberg.

He was a joy, he was smart.

He was just a great, wonderful storyteller.

Just he knew story and for those of us on the other side helping him put his films together, it was just a sense of excitement always.

- Well I've always been a fan of movies.

I watch movies on TV and one of my favorite movies was "Sound of Music' and I also like "Jesus Christ Superstar."

But other than that, you know, I am a John Wayne fan.

- That you'd have been blown up with a well, I'm not sure about you yet, but I am sure about the Cherokee kid and I saw him come up here.

[Tyler] I love movies.

I like to lay down and watch a movie and do nothing for two and a half hours and eat popcorn.

- My favorite movie is probably, I don't know, probably "Titanic."

- When people ask me that, I always say the one that has, that grosses the most money.

- But I like all kinds of movies, you know, then you're just lost in the movie for two hours.

It's not hard for me to enjoy a movie.

As long as they have a good story, I like 'em.

- Yes, the story.

- If they're too scary, I don't.

- What I like about the movie industry and going to watch movies... as I've been in the business for as long as I have, you really do look back on the films that you can quote that have a particular quote that you still use with one of your kids.

- To this day, I think there's still a few times where we might quote something and then it's beaten to death for the next few days.

Used as the main punchline by everyone in our family.

- Yeah, we get lost in it, we can be thrilled by it, scared by it, we can be motivated by it.

And as I said, I think it's the greatest form of storytelling there is.

- But that's what movies do.

They definitely stay with you.

The ones that matter to you, they hit you in the heart and- - And bring people together.

- They bring people together.

- I think movies were not just a large part of our childhood, but I think our family bonded over movies quite often.

- It was almost 10 years before we bought the second one.

Originally, it was no forceful buyout or anything.

It was kind of when they became available and it was one of those things where the single entity no longer made a living so we had to expand.

- During that time, we operated the Advertiser to make more money and we kept thinking we wanted to just be in the theater business.

So we thought if we bought these small theaters, if each one of them could make a profit for us and add 'em all together, then we could make a living out of 'em and not have to work someplace else.

- Well we had a great run and it's not over yet.

- And we were, and we've been so happy to have Becky and Gary be interested in it and do such a good job.

- Well and from a family business standpoint, I guess I feel really lucky because I see other families that, you know, second and third generations are taking over and it doesn't go near as smooth as it did for us.

Mom and Dad spent a lot of time with Gary and I training us and showing us how to do things and then they would let us do things our own way too.

Yet, they still were part of what we were doing and made us feel like they weren't just leaving to Arizona and didn't care what happened.

So I feel very lucky from that standpoint that, I mean I think that's why it's successful is the way that they transferred, I guess the operational portion of the theater to Gary and I.

- I worried a little bit when Howard and Ayron were gonna step away.

I thought, "Well what's gonna change when Gary and Becky kind of more take the reins?"

And you know it, things got better.

And not better necessarily that they were bad before, but I mean in a different way, everything moved together and it's been wonderful.

It's been the best 33 years.

- Candis has been, I would say, with Gary the center of Polson Theatres since my parents have been kind of retiring and moving away from the theater.

Candis has done everything.

She started in the office and then she came and filled in at the in town theater when Gary needed some extra help.

'Cause she's pretty much the institutional memory of the company, especially when it comes to personnel.

We couldn't do it without her.

- I enjoyed the work so much of the bookkeeping, but with talking to managers and doing things like that, I really wanted to learn more about it.

And that's when I went to work at in the evening with Gary and kind of became his assistant manager.

- You start 'em out down selling tickets, working behind the concession counter and eventually with young adult help, you want them to learn how to thread the projectors.

- I am not mechanical at all.

And so when he had to show me how to splice movies together and say, "Well this side is one extra and this side isn't, and then you put 'em together."

I mean I had the most awful time.

- Candis's mechanical ability was a bit of a challenge.

But I tell you what, she learned how to thread those projectors.

And so of course then she just becomes that much more valuable.

- We have worked together with the managers and with our HR stuff for a very long time and I think that we really do mesh well too.

Yeah, it's, it really is like a family in our office.

Becky and I, I think we have a great relationship.

Not only do we have a great working relationship, but I think we have a great relationship outside of work too.

I think we get each other.

- Well, here's my book.

You know, theoretically it really should be doing this on the computer, but it's easier to write it all down.

- When one of us is having a bad day, then the other one is singing "Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah" over here or you know, vice versa.

And I tease her because we have something that we're kind of trying to figure out numberwise.

And she gets out her X's and her Y's and all that kind of stuff and I'm just like, here, you know, it's like this many patrons and you take that and there it is.

You know what I mean?

And we come up with the same number, you know.

But for all her charts and all her things that she, I wanted to get her a coffee mug that says, "This needs a chart."

You know?

And I think we enjoy the work that we do together and it works really well.

We love it.

- She's invaluable.

- Yes.

- We couldn't do it without her.

Plus she's a lot of fun and she makes us happy.

- Just recently I've started to book the movies and that actually has been probably my favorite thing.

Booking the movies is a huge puzzle.

- The biggest challenge is the film companies.

Not because of what they charge, but the time.

The time element is really difficult for independents because they require that you play such and such a movie for so many weeks and in the small towns you just can't do that.

- Right now the screen count for Polson Theatres is 22.

We can have 22 movies or we could also stack movies and there can even be more than 22.

So, it really is a puzzle.

You have this movie coming out this date and this movie coming out this date and we have this theater and that theater and only so many screens.

So every Monday can be very challenging depending on what the movies do, what the film companies may decide we can do.

And I just really enjoy the challenge.

- She works those relationships and she learned how to do it from Ayron and Becky who both had- - She does it better than me.

She's a great organizer.

She cares about the theater.

She loves the theater.

Yeah.

Wouldn't wanna do it without her.

- Candis, even one day she was like," I love you guys."

And I'm like, "Oh, we're to I love you now."

- Yeah, I had lots of stuff to say when I was on the couch.

When you get up here, it's a little different.

[Becky] We started on the plans for an expansion probably five years before we ever started construction.

First we had to choose a location.

Were we gonna stay downtown or were we gonna move out of town?

Could we get enough room downtown to make construction downtown work?

So there was all of those kinds of questions.

Probably the bigger challenge was would it work in the long run?

Could we go from two auditoriums to six auditoriums?

And all that money later, could we make enough money to make the payments?

And then more globally was the theater industry, the exhibition industry gonna survive in the long term, you know, with streaming and more television channels and video games and all the things that people have access to now?

So those were big concerns.

The other thing was our age, you know, making that kind of an investment.

Us in our fifties and my parents in their seventies and eighties, it was a big decision.

But we also knew that Polson was a great movie town.

That people loved the theater.

And not only did they give it lip service that they loved the theater, but they actually supported the theater.

Polson is a wonderful movie-going community.

People like to come to the movie here.

- Well, the thing about a small town atmosphere is that you know almost everybody in the theater.

Secondly, you're not always scrambling for a seat.

There's such a certain feeling that you get going to a small town theater.

Everybody's there for the same reason.

- So in the end it was like, well if we don't do it, somebody else probably will and then we'll be mad.

So we just dove in and you know, then you get halfway through a project like that and you've already spent so much money, there's no looking back and you just have to go.

So, it was exciting.

It was exciting to build that.

- Welcome to the Showboat Stadium Six.

- Thanks for coming out to see a movie in our new theaters.

We're so excited to share this beautiful new facility with you.

- What I've learned in life is you just keep banging away because if you don't, and that applies to everything.

If you don't do it, the sixplex in Polson I think is a perfect example of this.

If Polson Theatres didn't do it, somebody else is going to.

So you just have to stay one step ahead of the crowd.

The blue part of the new part up here wasn't there, originally.

There was a big marque that stuck out here and it, the name of the theater was the Park Theater.

It was a big elaborate, lot of lights, and we started out with nothing and worked into something really great.

This whole thing is all new from here clear out back to the alley and there's three auditoriums on this side.

This lobby area and the preparation area and everything is all new.

This was all added from here on out.

We have restrooms.

Then we go into another hallway and this is auditorium five and six.

I'm very happy with the new sixplex in Polson.

I would never have thought that it would've worked, but it does.

So it is a business of faith.

You have to have the faith, otherwise it just don't work.

That's all there is to it.

- We always come first.

- Yes we do.

We always come first.

- Always come first.

And that was something growing up, I think we all knew that we did always come first.

I don't know if we knew it specifically, but- - I just, I think they've been an excellent model of how to live life well.

- Yes.

- We all get along well and it's just wonderful.

And that's kind of the way that I feel about my theater business.

I want my theater business to go on in perpetuity because it's my children's legacy.

- The hope here is that some, either our kids or some of my sisters' kids, will want to come into the business someday.

And Tyler did very briefly.

- I managed in Whitefish for about a year.

I had taken a break from school and was living in Whitefish.

And I slowly learned the large toll it takes on a singular person managing a business.

It was a treasured experience.

- And he had worked at the theater before, so he knew what it was all about.

He managed up there and both his dad and I think that he could be a good, you know, good addition to the theater.

- Our daughter could, Lydia could definitely run the theater business as well.

- The horizon holds the start of a new life with a wedding.

And after that, we don't know yet.

Our plans are to live in Missoula, Montana and build a good life there and be close enough that we can still be involved in our family business here in Polson.

I think that we were very fortunate to have both in a professional aspect and a personal aspect, our parents model for us what it means to be a hard worker dedicated to both your business and your family.

And to just show us how to be as people and to contribute to our communities and be valued by yourself and others and enjoy life.

- My takeaway is just that this has been a very wonderful ride and I hope it continues.

- It's been a challenge, but it's been a work of love.

And Ayron and I were not only working partners for 60 years, but we're best friends and that's important.

Life is not a bowl of cherries, but it's close.

And life is gonna be just what you make it be.

Nobody is going to tell you how you should do it because you're gonna go ahead and do it your way anyhow.

So... experience is a great teacher.

Don't give up.

You have to keep going and you have to look up, not down.

And life will be a bowl of cherries for you.

I don't know, other than it's all been good.

And one thing about being in the theater business, there are no dull days.

So, am I done now?