I took this photo of the California Theater from the fire escape of an old building at 8th and Main Street in Los Angeles in 1982.  I used the facade in a painting called "Magazine Stand".  When I came across this photo the other day, I visualized this theater at night, with its neon all aglow. When I was growing up in Bellflower, California, we would go to the Saturday matinees at the Nubel Theater on Bellflower Blvd.  Once in a while, we would go at night.  I still recall the night my friend Bobby's parents dropped us off to see "The Bride of Frankenstein".  My parents wouldn't allow us to see "Frankenstein", even though it had been at the movies since 1931, so I was really worried about watching this film.  It was just as scary as I thought it would be, so I will use the movie poster from that movie as my background in the painting.

Here's a late 1940's photo of the Nubel, downtown Bellflower.

Movie posters were very cool in the 1930's, and this horizontal one is perfect for my painting.

Here's my sketch for the painting, "MOVIE NIGHT". With the movie poster plastered on the 'wall', the theater marquee juts out from it onto the street. The sidewalk contains all the movie treats with popcorn, soda, Milk Duds, M&M's, Dots and Good and Plenty's. There are two people purchasing tickets at the ticket window and their two 'double' tickets are positioned on top of the M&M's bag.

This setup will help me picture the lighting on all the objects.

I am working on a 46"x 44" canvas and have begun the painting by working on the poster wall.

Boris Karloff was the original 'monster' in these films and got top billing.

I've blocked in the basic colors on 'the monster'.