The new story of Marcelo Birmajer: The indiscreet usher

Some trades have faded imperceptibly, others have changed, and some persist without a soul. Already I don’t remember when was the last time I saw an elevator operator. Film and theatrical ushers continue to carry out their duties, but they are no longer emblematic characters as they were in the 20th century.

In my childhood, each cinema had its name and its usher. The viewer went to see a movie at the Alfil cinema, or Los Angeles (which only showed Disney films). The Lorca and the Gaumont still maintain that modality, with a specific cinematography.

Virtually every neighborhood boasted its own cinema, with name and usher. The cinemas showed a certain personality, as De Gaulle claimed to have a certain idea of ​​France.

the usher it was part of the ceremony: He could also become a candy seller, shouting his wares in a wooden box, with the interior lined with red, sweets, candies, chocolates. I think chewing gum was prohibited.

He knew existed in the neighborhood of Once, in an absolutely unlikely corner, in via Lavalle, reaching the Pueyrredón, a cinema called El Bastión. There the usher was nicknamed Shire. I don’t know the origin of his nickname.

In Flores there was one, to which minors under 18 used to bribe to see the prayers of Isabel Sarli, called Ant, probably due to her stature and bad manners.

But Shire, the nickname, escapes me. Even Shire for a collective bribe allowed us to observe the mystery of female beauty. It was strange to access that transcendental knowledgea day when we ran away from school at lunchtime, amidst the fabric stalls and the commercial hustle and bustle of El Once.

But this is how I found that none of the aspects of life are completely separate from each other, any more than the different parts of the body are. And while this connection between the very dissimilar aspects of human life and the universe does not prevent each of us, in the darkness of the cinema and of his own existence, he finds an atrocious and incurable lonelinesswithout ancestors, without parents or love.

Comarca suffered from what today we would call toc, a compulsive condition of the psyche: endings of the film unintentionally revealed, individually, to certain spectators. Spoiled, the young people would translate. I didn’t do it on purpose, I repeat.

On two or three unfortunate occasions I have been able to testify that it was the same kind of verbal outburst as an offender with a syndrome. Was a man with this difficulty the best person to work as an usher? Certainly not. But he had saved the life of the owner of the cinema, Igor Abrans, during the Second World War.

I never knew under what circumstances, or whether they were Jews, or from which part of Europe they came. Were a male partner – not in a sentimental sense –dysfunctional: Abrans the owner of the cinema, Comarca the indiscreet usher.

A man and his girlfriend came to see Heaven can waitwith Warren Beattyand Shire whispered to the woman: “They will end up together, but in another body.”

It is today that I have no idea what it is Star Wars. I think I’ve seen every movie since its first release in the 90s: unsuccessful. But I vividly remember the night Shire revealed to a group of teenagers, before directing them to their row of seats: Darth Vader is Luke’s father.

In February ’82, when they released the film It will be Justicewith Paul Newman and Charlotte Rampling -the most memorable proof of my adolescence-, the roll of the end was missing. For some reason, they only received the first two parts of the film. Igor appeared on the scene and asked us to wait half an hour, in or out of the room, because the missing scroll would arrive shortly; and he went back to his office.

But Comarca, as if to give free rein to his pathology, to a demon that was consuming him from within, bent down in the middle of the stage, standing on the ground, and said to all of us, in the shadows: «He betrays him. “.

Some spectators left the cinema snorting, others booed him, someone threw a chocolate paper sandwich at his head. Shire walked impassively down the ocher carpeted corridor between the leather-upholstered armchairs, like an Hollywood actor mistakenly made it to the Oscars podium and went away thinking of something else.

I was one of those who remained, despite the truth. Somehow that evening I learned that it is not enough to surprise the viewer with a twist: in the plot there must be an emotional, lasting meaning that resists its anticipated revelation. At least that’s what an author should feel.

Shire’s leaks against onlookers were random: not always, not at all, and no one in particular.

His pathology has been mythologized and branched out over time. There were those who went to the cinema with the sole intention of meeting the indiscreet usher, and he ardently hoped that the surprise of the cinematographer would be ruined: often, paradoxically, frustrated. To every disorder of the soul of an individual corresponds the symmetrical adaptation of another.

People who reported that they were going to go to the cinema and not, notably went to El Bastión so that Comarca could skip the epilogue and complete their alibi. They have succeeded or failed in a similar proportion.

Many years later it was all over, when I was already a thing Roque Narvaja sings in an incomparable, major way, going out to donate blood, the acquaintance who had summoned me wanted me to greet his relative, interned a few floors above.

In the same room, separated only by a screen, Comarca lay dying. I suspect that only Igor Abrans could have been at her side holding her hand; it was not the case. Saving someone’s life seldom gets equal payback. If the rescued person dies first, the debt naturally goes unpaid.: I can ruin that ending without guilt.

I got closer. Time, now that his personal film passed the headlines without music, had allowed him to retain the recognizable features of his face. Like the ambitious seeker of a buried treasure, as if I didn’t care about his departure, when in reality it was quite the opposite, I appealed to his great failure as if it were a merit: -County-I asked him in a low voice -, how will my life end?

He recognized me. We had seen each other hundreds of times, it had destroyed two or three illusions, it had become part of the country of my past.

“This is just the beginning,” he whispered. And she died.

wd