It had high wooden panels on two sides and entry and exit doors at the back. The cinema, known as the favourite of Raj Kapoor and Shyam Benegal, used to have a 12-seater box, just a few steps from the photo gallery. It all started with Regal cinema built in 1932 in Connaught Place.
PRINTABBLE CINEMA TICKEY MOVIE
There were several instances when the usher would open the door in the middle of the movie just to check on the men! Some cinemas even priced the box tickets slighter higher than the balcony. Occasionally, a family with husband, wife and children could be seen too, though men, even accompanied by their wives, were not exactly welcomed. Here the women could watch the film without the prying male gaze. The box would be a separate enclosure altogether with its own entry and exit points. Realizing they had a ready audience which needed just a little encouragement, many single screen cinemas in Delhi started building separate boxes for their women audiences. The ones at a considerable distance were ruled out as not many women could drive or risk being out for long hours. The ones in immediate proximity were shunned to avoid being recognised by any neighbour or acquaintance. They would gather in a group of six to watch a film at a cinema, neither too close, nor too far from their homes. The die-hard fans of cinema that they were, women often found safety in numbers. Not only was it considered unsafe, it also had a degree of social disapproval attached to the act. In the years gone by, it was not easy for a single woman to go to watch a film. In Delhi, women have been smarter, and the cinema halls more accommodating towards their female patrons. And the words were spoken by a lady from a generation when ‘good girls’ neither went to watch a movie nor act in it. In her autobiography, A Country Called Childhood, Deepti Naval ends the prologue with her grandmother’s advice for girls in Amritsar, ‘No little girls from good homes ever go out to cinemas on the street!’ That was in Amritsar.
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