legends · 4 min read ·
Closing Checklist
A cinema usher's closing checklist counts more people leaving each night than tickets sold.
**Regent Cinema — Auditorium 1 Closing Checklist (Usher: Dev Anand)**
*Complete after final screening. Initial each box. Hand to duty manager.*
- **Check · Done**
- Lights up, house lights full · ✓
- Walk all rows. Collect rubbish. · ✓
- Check under seats for items · ✓
- Count heads at exit door (compare to tickets sold) · ✓
- Lock fire exits · ✓
- Set alarm · ✓
· · ·
**Head count log (Auditorium 1)**
- **Date · Screening · Tickets sold · Heads at exit · Difference**
- 2 Oct · 20:30 · 41 · 41 · 0
- 3 Oct · 20:30 · 38 · 38 · 0
- 4 Oct · 20:30 · 55 · 55 · 0
- 9 Oct · 20:30 · 30 · 31 · **+1**
· · ·
**Usher's note (D. Anand, 9 October)**
Counted thirty-one at the exit. Counted again. Thirty-one. Tickets sold: thirty. The computer showed one ticket in a seat that had not been scanned. I went back in. The house lights were up. I walked every row. I looked for a latecomer, someone who had come in without a ticket.
There was nobody. The seats were empty, and the aisles clear. But row J was different. Seat J14, near the aisle, had its cushion down, as a seat is when someone has just got up. The cushion was warm.
· · ·
**Head count log (continued)**
- **Date · Screening · Tickets sold · Heads at exit · Difference**
- 10 Oct · 20:30 · 26 · 28 · **+2**
- 11 Oct · 20:30 · 47 · 50 · **+3**
- 16 Oct · 20:30 · 33 · 37 · **+4**
*Each night, after the credits, I count the people leaving. Each night there are more than the tickets.*
· · ·
**Incident form (Regent Cinema, 17 October)**
Customer (Mrs. P. Farrow) complained that a man sat next to her during the film and shared her popcorn without asking. She said he was pleasant, but she did not like the way he watched the screen. He didn't laugh at the funny bits or flinch at the frightening ones. He watched the faces.
When the lights came up she turned to say something. His seat was empty and warm. The popcorn tub was empty too.
*Usher's comment: all seats were sold. The man was not a customer.*
· · ·
**Head count log (continued)**
- **Date · Screening · Tickets sold · Heads at exit · Difference**
- 23 Oct · 20:30 · 29 · 34 · **+5**
- 24 Oct · 20:30 · 51 · 57 · **+6**
- 25 Oct · 20:30 · 40 · 47 · **+7**
**Usher's note (D. Anand, 25 October)**
I stood by the exit door tonight and counted them out one by one. They came out in ones and twos, in coats, talking quietly, faces lit by the foyer lights. I knew most of them by sight. Regulars. But some I did not know, and some had a way of walking that I could not place, as though they had not been out in the daylight for a while.
I tried counting by ticket. Forty tickets, forty-seven heads. I did not stop them. I could not think of how.
· · ·
**Duty manager's reply (A. Kenway, 27 October)**
Dev, I've checked the tickets and I've checked your counts. The system has recorded exactly the number of tickets sold, in every case. I think you are miscounting. You have been working late. Please take the weekend off.
*Comment, in a different hand, pencilled below: He's not miscounting. Count the exit door.*
· · ·
**Head count log (final)**
- **Date · Screening · Tickets sold · Heads at exit · Difference**
- 31 Oct · 20:30 · 31 · 31 · 0
*Usher's note (D. Anand, 31 October): Thirty-one sold. Thirty-one counted. A good night. I checked the doors, locked the fire exits, set the alarm. Every box is initialled.*
*I went back into Auditorium 1 to turn off the exit lights. The house lights were down. The seats were full. Every one. From the front to row J, the whole place was occupied by people in coats, quiet, patient, faces turned to the blank screen. I counted. Three hundred and sixty. They were all looking at me, politely, to see whether I would start the film.*