Some pics of the work today - lots of radio/whistling/thuds of rubble and planks being heaved around.....this is all hard hats and face masks stuff so I stayed outside. But last week as I was going to the station saw Mick making the morning coffees on the table by the front doors and he showed me round to admire the completely clear foyer. It's now possible to get a sense of what it was like to walk in in the heyday of the Capitol.
And there's the original booking office hatch, and the manager's cosy office and the huge business like safe for the takings. Easy to imagine what it was like in there on a dark rainy St Albans Sunday afternoon in, say, 1942 - the sound of the film sound track in the background, the sturdy radiators chugging out heat, the manager and his staff all smoking like chimneys, tea and chocolate biscuits (or were they rationed?) And while we can imagine them they would never have imagined us doing this. In their darker moments they might have thought the cinema would still be here but showing films with German stars & Wagnerian sound tracks...
It's so atmospheric even in this raw state. Maybe particularly in this state. Maybe when we have the glossy new wonderful Odyssey we will lose touch with the old warhorse of a cinema we are so close to at the moment....
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