---
title: 'The Rialto, Your Friendly, Family Neighborhood...XXX'
---

### The Rialto, Your Friendly, Family Neighborhood...XXX

Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2005 16:34:49 -0800 (PST)
From: GH JUNKKIE <gh_professional@yahoo.com>
Subject: "The Rialto" PT 1

"The Rialto, Your Friendly, Family Neighborhood...XXX"

By Mr. gloryholeJUNKIE
gh_professional@yahoo.com


As a little kid, I grew up going to the local cinema. And most of the
movies I went to see, I saw either alone or with my best friend from
school.

Yeah, there were color televisions, refrigerators with automatic icemakers,
moon landings and other "modern age" attractions when I was little. But
kids taking in a movie each and every day by themselves during summer
vacation and after classes during the school year helped to make the local
movie theater into what was essentially the neighborhood daycare center.

Especially for we city latch key kids, mostly under the age of twelve all,
the local cinema became something of a second home. Going to the movie
theater was cheap, safe, close to home and air-conditioned. And by the time
that the last matinee show let out the time, or especially after a full
afternoon double feature, most of our moms and dads would be home from
work. For way before "KiddieKare" centers became a regular part of the
working mom/daycare landscape, there was the local movie theater.

Ours was called "The Rialto". It must have been built in the late
nineteen-twenties. Its fantastical Venetian motif made it the coolest place
in the whole neighborhood - especially to us kids.

Being forty or fifty years old, the theater was already sort of ratty
around the edges by the time I was going there as a little kid. But it was
still exciting to sit in the uppermost balcony section where no one could
see you. And yet, from up there, one had the best view of the entire
place. From way up there, one could really experience the recessed, ornate
loges, marvel at the elaborate but dusty chandeliers and ogle the vast
expanse of magical, painted ceilings.

When I'd go to a movie with my parents at The Rialto, we almost always
wound up sitting on the main level and always sort of in the
middle. Parents and older people hardly ever ventured up into the
balconies. And many times, if entire families went out to see a movie
together, the sets of parents would let their kids all sit together
upstairs, leaving the adults to have a more peaceful movie experience in
their main level seats.

Although I liked going to a movie with my parents, I found it far more
exciting to go there alone. Alone, I could wander all over the place and
change seats at will. I could even go into the huge bathroom off the lobby
for as long as I wanted without my mom or dad coming to get me.

Not that anything was ever happening in the bathroom. I mean, once or twice
I'd flush all the toilets at one time to hear the thunderous whooshing
noise. After all, The Rialto was a family cinema and nothing else ever
happened in the bathroom there. Instead, being alone in the bathroom was
simply the thrill in the idea I could go in and run water for as long as I
wished. I was always known to be an adventuresome kid. My mom said I was
too adventuresome for my own good sometimes. I never quite knew what she
meant by that.

Well, to be truthful, sometimes in that big bathroom, without even trying
very hard, I was able to spy an older man's penis as it hung out at the
urinals. I could see them in a line if I looked just the right way into the
huge mirrors over the sinks. The first time I saw one, I was shocked and
raced back to my seat in the balcony. I wasn't even trying to see one.

But then, the next time, I knew exactly where to stand to get the best view
a grown up's penis through the mirrors. The men whose penises I spied
weren't even doing anything. They were just dads or granddads taking a fast
piss during the movie. They'd then zip and return to their families in
their seats - never even knowing that a little boy had been looking at
their penis the whole time.

And whenever I'd see one, maybe once a day, it was super exciting when it
would happen. Because even by the age of seven, (and even though no one
knew it), I loved grown ups' penises. And that was sort of funny because
all I really knew of them was what I'd spied through the mirrors in The
Rialto's huge bathroom.

And it was almost as much fun to go to The Rialto sometimes, even though it
wasn't too often, with my best friend, Brian. From the time we were in
first grade, we'd go take in a movie by ourselves after school whenever the
snow was falling or on a summer vacation afternoon during a heatwave.

We went there together one time and saw "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" (even
though I'd seen it twice that week already). And as the second grade came
to an end that same year, we went together to see "Dr. Doolittle" (which
I'd already seen three times).

The theater was only four blocks from my house and seven blocks from his,
so it was just the place to go. We'd even sometimes play the spy game I
made up in the big, lobby bathroom. We'd take turns having to go in, sneak
a peek at a man's penis and then tell the other what it looked like or how
big it was.

But usually I went to the cinema alone. I was at The Rialto alone so often
that Mrs. Lipinski, who worked the ticket window, would usually let me in
for free if she knew I'd already seen the movie playing. And this
college-aged guy, Andrew, who worked behind the Concessions counter, would
give me a free box of Junior Mints sometimes. He didn't do it all the time,
but he seemed to do it whenever he thought he could get away with it, I
suppose.

And Mr. Gregory, the theater maintenance man knew me, too. One time, when I
was with Brian, we saw him in the alley behind the theater and he let us
both sneak in through a side door back there. It was super cool because we
had to climb the high metal fire escape to get to the door that Mr. Gregory
showed us he sometimes kept propped open when he was sweeping. And from up
there, that door opened directly into a super dark, curtained area right
off the uppermost balcony!

So as I said, I was a movie buff even as a little kid. My parents always
gave me money. But when I could, I'd also sneak into the movies. It was
pretty easy to do and I mostly just did that for the thrill of doing
it. And, as I said, if I was lucky, Mrs. Lipinski or Mr. Gregory would just
let in, without even sneaking. But most times, I paid at the window and
even had to buy my own candy at the Concessions counter.

Even though I could go home any time I wanted right after school, having my
own key and all, I would opt to do that only if I had a lot of
homework. After all, it was more fun to be out and about. Why sit in an
empty apartment watching reruns on t.v. when I could spend the afternoon
watching Kurt Russell in a Disney movie or sneakily exploring a vast, old
movie palace...and sometimes catching sight a grown up man's penis!

But then something changed at The Rialto and it changed radically. But
because I'd been away with my parents for nearly a month during the school
vacation between the second and third grades, I didn't even know it had
happened.

We spent three weeks in August at a cottage on a lake. It was a great
summer vacation. I even celebrated my eighth birthday there by catching a
humungous fish. And I think we only went to see one movie the entire time
we were at the lake. We saw it at an old-fashioned family drive-in but all
I remember of it was that we all got bitten by mosquitoes even bigger than
the fish I had caught.

That Labor Day weekend, back in the city, I started school the day right
after we returned from vacation. And my dad also had to return to his job
that same Monday, too. Only my mom had two extra days off.

The first day of school was fun. All my friends were there and we were
third graders. The first and second graders looked so little to us. But
immediately I knew that school would be more difficult in the third grade
because we actually had to do Math the first day back. We never before had
to do so much actual schoolwork on the first day back from summer vacation!

After school, I raced home, knowing my mom would be there. I wanted to
spend as much time with her before she had to go back to work that
Wednesday. I was in such a hurry to get home, I didn't even take my usual
route that normally took me past The Rialto.

So I didn't notice anything out of the ordinary until the following
day. After school on Tuesday, I wanted to get right home since my mom and I
were going to make some cookies for the rest of the week. But this time, I
went home using my usual route. I wanted to see what was playing at The
Rialto since I figured that would be where I'd spend the next afternoon
after school until my parents got home.

But as I turned onto 67th Street, a rather busy street, I immediately
spotted something different looking about The Rialto's marquee. It was no
longer white with midnight blue and gold trim. It now looked as if someone
had painted it all a medium flat gray. What I did see, on the marquee, were
the words, "Candy Does Brooklyn", a title which didn't even make any sense
to me. And as I got nearer, I saw that the box office kiosk window was
boarded over and painted black.

Upon closer inspection, nearer the front doors, the decorative images of
towers and canals were gone. Instead, there were numerous silhouetted
drawings of women with their legs spread and with three gigantic printed
across them - three giant yellow "X"s.

I thought it looked sort of like The Rialto was closed or, worse, was going
to be torn down. Maybe the triple yellow Xs meant the place was to be
demolished and the workmen just drew pictures of naked ladies for fun. My
heart sank. Where would I go every afternoon if The Rialto were no longer
here?

But then I saw a man in a trench coat, suit and tie step up to a new and
nearly hidden ticket window that had been cut into the entry wall along
side the main doors. I hadn't even noticed it until the man asked, "Candy
takes 'em all, I hope?", as he slipped some money to someone through the
little ticket slot. Then, another man's voice, coming from the ticket slot,
replied, "Twenty minutes in and the bitch's already done fifty-nine
guys...and tomorrow starts 'Tammy, The Subway Slut'....120 minutes and just
about as many fuck her in that one."

I couldn't see who the ticket person was but it sure wasn't Mrs. Lipinski
talking.

I walked past the theater and went home, all confused. Even though I was
only eight, I knew those men had been talking about something very exciting
to them. And being a curious boy, I understood, even if vaguely, that it
was about something extremely sexual.



TO BE CONTINUED
gh_professional@yahoo.com


COPYRIGHTED TO THE AUTHOR.
COMPLY WITH ALL LAWS IN YOUR AREA.

