Blog 14: Interview 3 Preparation

Laemmle's Playhouse Pasadena where my manager used to work.

1.  Who do you plan to interview?  What is this person's area of expertise?

I am interviewing Israel Lopez, he is a movie theater manager who has worked at Laemmle Theaters for several years now. He was a manager at Laemmle Pasadena and moved to Laemmle Claremont to work with better managers.

2.  Verify that you have called your interviewee to schedule an interview.  What is the date and time of the interview? 

I am interviewing Izzy next Wednesday during my shift.

3.  Phrase an open-ended question that will help you find research resources that would help to answer the EQ.

Your job requires you to always be up to date with the crazy world of film. What kind of websites or news sources do you look at to keep up to date with the news.

4.  Phrase an open-ended question that will help you think about other useful activities you might do to help you answer the EQ (IC2, possible experts to talk to, etc).

In what ways do you go out of your way to make the movie theater experience better for your customers?

5.  Phrase two open-ended questions that help you to understand your interviewee's perspective on an aspect of your EQ. 

How can an independent movie theater manager preserve the movie viewing experience while maintaining profitability? 

As a manager what do you feel is most important aspect of running a theater smoothly?

Blog 13: 10 Hour Mentorship Check-In

movies we played on christmas

1.   Where are you doing your mentorship?

Working at Laemmle Claremont 5

2.   Who is your contact?  What makes this person an expert?

Cassie Gratton, General Manager of Laemmle Claremont 5. She's been working at Laemmle since she was 18 and she worked her way up to have her own theater to manage.

3.   How many  hours have you done during the school year? (Summer Mentorship Hours and Mentorship Hours should be reflected separately in your Senior Project Hours log located on the right hand side of your blog).

I have 150 hours as of now. I didnt do much during the school year because I was meeting with people to try and get a mentorship thing going and once I got a job in august I started getting a bunch of hours.

4.   Succinctly summarize what you did, how well you and your mentor worked together, and how you plan to complete the remaining hours.

I work behind concession to sell candy and popcorn and stuff. I also clean theaters ever once in a while and take tickets. My mentor and I work very well together, in fact out of all the managers in my theater, I work the best when she is there. 

Blog 12: Holiday Project Update

The best part of my job is talking to people about movies. And this one is my favorite of the year.

1.  It is important to consistently work on your senior project, whether it is break or we are in school.  What did you do over the break with your senior project? 

I had work on 12/20/15. 3 days after star wars came out. It was hell. And i had work on christmas. Which was also hell.

2.  What was the most important thing you learned from what you did, and why?  What was the source of what you learned?

I learned that working on christmas is not worth the overtime pay. It sucks and i nearly died. I also learned that alot of people are like me and like star wars. Maybe too many people.

3.  Your third interview will be a 10 question interview related to possible answers for your EQ. Who do you plan to talk to and why? 

I dont have a plan for who I will interview. But there are a bunch of managers at my job that I could interview. Im pretty close with Israel so that would be easy but Lexi or Carlos would also be good to interview. I never really work with Chris but I could interview him as well. My mentor Cassie also has connections with managers at Laemmle Pasadena because she used to work there so I could also ask her to set me up with an interview with somebody from over there.

Blog 11: Lesson 1 Reflection

I just saw "Steve Jobs" and I loved how confident and charismatic Michael Fassbender was,
so I tried to do what he did for my lesson 1.

1. What are you most proud of in your lesson, and why?

People seemed to really like my presentation. I kept them engaged with my humor and amazing fun-loving personality. Not to toot my own horn, but I'm a pretty funny guy, so I'd say I'm very proud of my entertaining presentation. I also believe I taught the class a few things while making them laugh a few times, so I'm also proud of that. 

2. What assessment would you give yourself on your lesson? Explain why you earned that grade using evidence from the component contract.

I would give myself a P because I did all the P requirements but I didn't really go above and beyond because I think my hook was a bit weak, and I didn't really have any props other than my Laemmle book. But if you want to give me an AE, I wouldn't complain because I kind of need it...

3. If you could go back, what would you change about your lesson?  How can you use that knowledge to give a better Lesson 2?

I wouldn't change anything, I think my presentation was fine. I would however take the feedback I got and use it to make my 2nd presentation even better. I will try and sound a little more professional and memorize my bullets so I'm not always looking at my paper.

Blog 10: Interview 2 Reflection

Me and mah boy, Gregory Laemmlizzle 

1. Please explain how you are spending your mentorship time (Is it at a workplace or somewhere else?  Are you shadowing?  Are you able to do tasks that are meaningfully related to the topic?  If so, what?  Are there other people who are experts in the location?  Etc...)

I work at Laemmle Claremont 5. I work mostly in concession and clean theaters. My mentor is the General Manager, Cassie Gratton. But there are also a few other mangers at the theater who I can observe. I don't know their last names but there is Carlos, Izzy, Lexi and Chris.
2.  How did you find your mentor?  How did you convince this person to help you?  

I contacted the owner of Laemmle Theaters, Greg Laemmle, in the summer, by facebook. And he responded. I met with him during the summer and we agreed that my best bet was to mentor with the Manager of my local Laemmle theater. 

3. How would you rate your comfort level with your mentor at this point in your relationship?  How does this relate to the time you've spent so far at mentorship/with this person. 

I'm pretty comfortable with her, I guess. She's very serious, because she needs to be at times. But she's also very cool. She comes over to concession sometimes and talks to me about my project. 

4. What went well in this interview?  Why do you think so?  What do you still need to improve?  How do you know?  How will you go about it?

I think my interview went pretty well. The only thing I had an issue with was understanding him at times. He's obviously far more educated than I am, and he went to Berkeley, which is like nerd central. But other than that, I think it was  pretty good. I had fun.

Blog 9 - Advisory Prep 3

Me at work/mentorship

1. State whether or not you currently have a mentor, and what the status of your interview is with that person (I have completed the interview, I have scheduled the interview, I have not scheduled the interview, etc). 

Yes, I have a mentor. Her name is Cassie Gratton and we've been together for about 2 months.... but she's a bit shy, so she didnt really want to get interviewed again. So, I decided to interview Greg Laemmle, the owner of Laemmle Theaters. Im scheduled to interview him on friday 10/22 at 3pm

2. At this point, your research is probably guiding your studies toward more specific areas within your topic.  Name the area or two you find most promising and explain your reasons.   

"Managing a Movie Theater" is already a pretty specific area of my topic. So I think that's fine.

3. What kinds of sources do you think will help you in the next month to gain more research depth?  Where will you go to get them?

I dont know, I dont really like the article sources because my topic doesn't have a lot of written material to research. I want to find some YouTube interviews with different managers or maybe even an indie movie about managing a theater-type business.

4. Write down a possible EQ.  Please don't worry about wording other than ensuring that it provides the option for multiple correct answers.  At this point, the senior team is most interested in understanding your thought process.

How can a movie theater manager ensure the future success of their theater?

Blog 8: Independent Component 1 Proposal

1.  Describe in detail what you plan to do for your 30 hours.

I plan on making a short documentary that shows what goes on in a movie theater on a given day. I haven't talked to my mentor about it yet because I just came up with it but I think it could be cool. It would be in the style of "Troops", the Star Wars fan film from a few years ago. I would just silently follow people around all day and see what they are working on. Or maybe something like the pilot episode of "The Office" where the camera man just follows Michael Scott all day as he interacts with certain people.

Troops: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvswNDAAZCU

Michael Scott in The Office Pilot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuZy9d8ob88

2.  Discuss how or what you will do to meet the expectation of showing 30 hours of evidence.

I will take pictures of my planning and editing. I've never made a documentary but I'm sure a lot of planning goes into it. 

3.  Explain how what you will be doing will help you explore your topic in more depth.

 I think this would be very educational for my project because I wonder many times what the managers do in the box office.