Before I'm a "former employee", I want to share these photos of the work we did at the theater last summer when we hand-painted movie quotes on the walls. (By "we" I mean the theater manager and myself, though Jessi did help later.) These photos were taken early on, and we filled in much of the blank space since, but you get an idea of what it looks like. We will still add more sometime in the future, but it was such a huge undertaking that neither of us has the fortitude to get out the supplies again just yet.
I know I posted some time ago about words used in the decorating around my house. In the photo, the very top example is one of the labels painted in the playroom. There are several around the room, and the technique I used for those is the same as used at the theater. I didn't get photos of the process, but I want to share how it was done in case this is something you'd like to do yourself in your own home.
First the theater employees made a list of quotes - a humongous, long list because we're all movie geeks, okay. All of us who work at the theater love watching movies. Then we quote them. During our everyday conversations. Yeah, we're cool like that.
When the list was ready (65 quotes, btw), I typed up and printed out each quote in an outline font. This saved lots of ink since we didn't need solid letters, just the outline shapes. Took lots of paper and scotch tape, though.
Each quote was painted in the same paint, but we used varying fonts and sizes. If possible, I matched the font to the movie poster/logo. In order to do that, I had to download several fonts, but got them free at dafont.com. Easy.
To get them onto the wall, we taped up graphite paper, the placed the quote over top and traced with a dull pencil. Sometimes we got them crooked or we got extra lines on the wall - a little all-purpose cleaner and elbow grease usually took care of it. When the quote was traced to our liking, we used interior semi-gloss latex wall paint and small brushes to hand paint each letter.
Once they were dry, Jessi outlined each letter with a narrow-tipped gold paint pen. Gave it a "finished" look.It's been a little over a year since we put away the brushes and paint cans, but we're still getting compliments about the walls in the lobby. People wander all over trying to figure out which movie goes with the quotes, and often we have to help them out. I usually tell them who the actor was who said it, then if they still don't know, I'll tell them. I have been amazed by the number of people who have never seen "Raiders of the Lost Ark" ("It's not the years, honey, it's the mileage) or who have never heard "Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine" (Humphrey Bogart in "Casablanca"). One of the most asked about is "I'm older and I have more insurance" - do you know what movie that is from?
Just for fun, and in case we could use it in the future, why don't you leave me a comment with a quote from your favorite movie? Tell you what - you leave me a quote and I'll put your name in a drawing for a fun prize - a movie theater-themed prize no less. Kind of a fun way to wrap up my last week working there, don't you think?
