Part 1:
The Dawnings of a Melodious Slut

Like millions of others, I am enamored by the pop music star Madonna. Unlike most of her fans, however, it's not her music which attracts me. I do not own a single one of her CD's. I don't own anybody's CD's. I don't have a compact disk player. All of my favorite tunes are on records, those black vinyl circular dinner plate-sized things that recording companies eschewed a decade ago in their blind rush to the newer technology. Perhaps if they reissued...

Ah. but who am I kidding? My favorite LP's were dug out of bargain bins even back then. My eccentric tastes have always run toward grandiose instruments that lacked the pomposity of classical music. That usually meant movie soundtracks from obscure films that only an aficionado (a.k.a.: cinema geek) would appreciate. I play those melodious tones whenever I write or do art work. They energize my spirit, composing a platform from which I can create. Why instrumentals? If I'm pounding away on my computer keyboard while prerecorded lyrics are being crooned, I have a tendency to subconsciously add such verses to my tales. ("How in the hell did the phrase, 'I did it my way,' end up in a story about dangerous Christmas toys?")

Plus, I am too impoverished & too stubborn to purchase a CD player myself and my thick-skulled relatives cannot take the hint as to what I want for my birthday. That kind of gift manipulating used to work in my childhood but now that I'm barreling towards the Big Five-Oh, those talents don't seem so charmingly cute anymore. "Cloying pompous ass" is how my father describes me when I'm in such a grasping mood. Maybe that why, when I requested an electronic unit that held shiny disks for my last birthday, the senior Corrington presented me with a battery-powered coaster holder. Dear old Dad's not senile... and cheaper than I am.

Speaking of getting off the topic...

In researching these impertinent ramblings, I went to the video store to rent one of Madonna's earlier flicks, Shanghai Surprise. None of the clerks had ever heard of the film but the manager had... as the blood draining from his face gave testimony. His reply to my request was that if I wanted to get rid of unwanted houseguests, I should let an open can of mackerel spoil in my kitchen... or light my farts. Both would stink considerably less than Shanghai Surprise. His thinking was faulty. I had no houseguests. Exposed mackerel would attract every pussy cat within a quarter mile radius. Flaming my flatulence could blow out a wall in my home and perhaps set a neighbor's house ablaze. [Corrington men have always had a distinctive air about them.] When I assured him I actually wished to see Shanghai Surprise, he found my thinking faulty... as he had his clerks throw me out of the store. Banning Shanghai Surprise wasn't censorship. It was a public health issue... as in mental health. Apparently, the flick could permanently lower I.Q. points. Kind of makes me wonder if I'm the only person in Joplin, Missouri who hasn't seen it.

The first time I crossed paths with Madonna was not via her music or videos but through her movies. Since I was a theater projectionist at a multiplex back then, it was unavoidable.

The year: 1987.

The movie: Who's That Girl?

The premise: A delightful romp about a brainless bleached blond slut, fresh from prison, who wrecks a conservative man's life. It ranks (and I use the term 'rank' as in 'rancid' or 'repulsive') as one of the five worst movies I have ever seen. My credentials as an expert of stinky cinema? I got my projectionist's chops working drive-ins, running everything from Roger Corman cheapies to beach blanket musicals. Biker flicks, Black exploitation films, badly dubbed Italian Hercules epics and women-in-prison soft-core porn. I have run them all... and at a great sacrifice to my sanity, I might add. But Who's That Girl? floats to the top of that putrid heap, not unlike a turd found in a wedding reception's punchbowl. It was the only film I ever ran that cleared the house 75% of the time before the final reel was played. In civilian lingo, the film would start with an audience of 100 to 230 paying patrons. Twenty minutes before the movie ended, everyone had already walked out in disgust.

Giddy girl teens didn't believe the doddering old movie critics who declared Who's That Girl? was pure box office poison. Madonna was not only their idol, she was one of them. Madonna could do no wrong. So the addle-brained adolescences plopped down their money and got a painful lesson in life: Sometimes geezers know what they're talking about.

Case in point:

I was in the multiplex theater's hallway next to Kenny, the doorman. Kenny was typical of most part-time employees: A college student with no money and a limited social life (because of a lack of money). Being a theater doorman was superior to most other part-time jobs, though. It meant staying indoors during inclement weather and never having to say those dreaded words, "Do you want fries with that?"

On that day, Kenny was assigned to tear tickets, direct the people as to which theater to enter and (the fun part) kick out underage teens trying to sneak into R-rated movies. If the teenybopper punks gave Kenny any lip about getting the boot, I would swagger over like a pompous ass (not an acting stretch), listen for a moment, then announce in my most villainous voice, "Kenny, hold these guys. I'm calling the police." When the terrified juveniles invariably asked why such extreme measures, Kenny would tell them that they were breaking city and state ordinances (true) and that the theater chain liked to make examples of those who broke the rules (sort of true, if you included a law student at the home office mailing out quasi-legal papers to the teens' parents). In ten years of projecting, I had to call the police only once. Without fail, the panicked kiddies would beg for a second chance, sometimes on bent knees.

As for the one time I did call the cops? It turned out that the underage felon who called my bluff was also wanted for Grand Theft Auto. When the police located his stolen vehicle in the mall's parking lot, its trunk was loaded with freshly harvested marijuana plants. The idiot protested that it wasn't his vehicle... but he had stolen a car whose owner had carelessly left her keys in the ignition... and he was arrested with her key ring in his pocket. Plus, bits of dirt & marijuana leaves were found on and within his shoes & jeans. Plus, his fingerprints were found all over the vehicle and various gardening tools in the car's back seat. Plus, the 'suspect' had a list of names, addresses and telephone numbers in his wallet, all to individuals with criminal records... or those about to receive criminal records. And the topper? Beneath the hemp plants in the trunk, wrapped in towels, was a stolen [and recently sawed-off] shotgun covered with the kid's fingerprints... along with the equally fingerprinted hacksaw.

The police called the apprehension a slam-dunk. There hasn't been such an artless arrest made at a movie theater since Lee Harvey Oswald got nabbed.

The district attorney charged the kid as an adult, Since the vehicle's tag were issued in Kansas, the youth had crossed state lines, making it a federal case. Then the DA offered to reduce the indictments if the punk rolled over. That baby-faced crook spun like a bit in a drill press. Rumor has it that the kid plea bargained his case down to ten years in a minimum security state pen. I also heard that, after mouthing off to the inmates' unofficial hierarchy, he became a real lady's man at those impromptu prison after lights-out dance parties where one doesn't face your partner.

Couldn't happen to a nicer guy. Understand he can now sit on a chair holding an upright soda bottle and his permanently spread butt cheeks will never touch the glass. His prize for being Miss Congeniality, I guess. Heard that his eyes are now forever bugged out like Homer Simpson's, too.

Kenny and I didn't have to testify or even pick the punk out of a lineup. A major disappointment because that would have been a great excuse for missing a day of work. Your boss can't fire you if you are assisting in a criminal investigation. Instead, everything was done behind closed doors in a judge's chambers. Hidden deals contrived by lawyers with special interests. Justice served at the carry-out window.

Ah, but so much for another accidental stumbling into crime fighting. I try to avoid being a masked vigilante because it is too dangerous, what with those flying bullets and such. Then there are the problems with the costume. Tights chafe the chunky thighs of a man of my weight. Plus, I look unattractive in them, especially if I don't shave my legs first. All those little hairs sticking through the fabric and all? Yuck! As for a cape, screw it. It snags on everything. Besides, ever since Batman started to constantly modify his costume's disguise (nipples on his breastplate?), who can keep up? I don't have that kind of money and Joplin is too small a market from which to draw financial support. However, most of my friends... as well as perfect strangers... do insist I wear a mask. Anything that hides part of my face cannot be all bad.

Yea, I've lost it. My mind, that it. If located, file it under 'Tangent,' sub-file 'Off On A.'

That particular day at the theater seemed to offer no such excitement. The projectors were already cleaned and loaded for the next set of shows. With the booth's platter systems, all the projectors needed were the push of a few buttons to start them. Only one film was in CinemaScope, requiring a single change of lenses after the opening trailers. Dolby sound per theater was down to a single push of a button at the right time, too. That left occasional monitoring once the shows were running. And the shows were not to start for another ten minutes.

Kenny also had it easy. No choking crowds. No jerks. The only times he left his post were to open doors for those either overloaded with popcorn & soft drinks or in wheelchairs. Then I would stop leaning against the trash can to step in and tear tickets & direct traffic. A simple little system. Mostly Kenny and I would smile at the passing patrons and discuss how dreadful the lobby's background music was.
A giggling girl wandered up, waving a color-coded orange ticket. "I'm going to see my idol, Madonna," she squealed.
Having already seen too many patrons try (and fail) to get their money back once that flick had started, Kenny woefully asked, "Are you sure?"
"Oh, yes!" she bubbled. Digging though a music store's plastic shopping bag, she produced a 45 record (a black vinyl disk the size of a salad plate) still in its printed paper sleeve. "I just purchased Madonna's latest hit!"
Some people are gluttons for punishment, I thought.
Shrugging his shoulders, Kenny tore her ticket and directed her towards the auditorium of doom.
I went upstairs to the booth to start the various movies. Once that lens was changed from flat to Scope and the Dolbys were kicked in, I checked all the film gates and rollers. Smooth sailing. Sound and focus? Right on the money. My metallic babies hummed along, each with their own special tone. My ears told me as much about the projectors as my eyes. Everything topside was fine. I then grabbed my jumbo mug and headed downstairs to mooch a Coke from the concession stand.
I relieved Kenny from his post so he could relieve himself in the rest room. That duty consisted of me standing there, sipping soda. (Damn. I miss that job.) Just as Kenny returned, that same young woman came out of the Who's That Girl? auditorium. Gone were her giggles or any trace of a smile. Instead, her entire physique displayed a bottled-up seething anger that was truly frightening to behold. Her jaw was clenched tighter than a vise. Her brow almost Cro-Magnon with its intensive scowl. The whites of her eyes burned blood red. She approached us... and we stepped backwards.
Although furious, she calmly removed her 45 record from its plastic bag and handed the sack to Kenny. "Hold this, please. Thank you," she barely muttered. She withdrew the 45 from its record sleeve and handed me the printed paper. "Thank you," she echoed again. Then, facing the trash can, the young woman exploded. Repeatedly and insanely, she smashed the vinyl record against the can's lip while screaming, "You traitorous fucking bitch! I believed in you, you stinking lousy whore! I wanted to be like you! I wanted to pattern my life after yours! And this is what you do? Die, bitch, die! Burn in fucking hell! Die, bitch, die!"
Kenny and I wisely dived into safe corners, covering our heads. We weren't sure which was more dangerous, the psychotic girl or the vinyl shrapnel flying everywhere. We also weren't going to look up to check.
After a minute, the girl's tirade was over. Her hands were bleeding from cuts produced by the vinyl shards and there was a gash in her cheek. Brushing her hair out of her eyes... and leaving a streak of her own blood across her forehead ... she calmly murmured in a distant voice, "Have a nice day," and quietly exited the lobby.

Nobody stopped her from leaving. A quivering Kenny got the dust pan and broom to sweep up the shattered vinyl. I spent the remainder of that day up in the projection booth, pretending I wasn't cowering. At quitting time, Kenny and I had the girls from the concession stand walk us to our cars. Kenny and I were only males, after all, and ill-equipped to deal with the mad fury of a single teenage female.

Although that was my first encounter with Madonna's image, it didn't spark any physical sensations on my part... unless you include nausea and fear. It did heighten my awareness of self preservation, however. Also, the destruction of Madonna's 45 was the foreshadowing of the demise of all vinyl records, at least in my memory.