Theatres reopen in Chennai: Filmmaker CS Amudhan writes what ‘theatrical-experience’ means to him

A year after bingeing content on OTT platforms thanks to the pandemic, filmmaker CS Amudhan writes why he is rooting for theatres

As theatres open this week, what does your mind conjure up when the word ‘theatre-experience’ crops up? If it is buttery popcorn, cold-coffee and comfy reclining seats, you are a 2K kid. For my generation it is fighting for black-tickets, stainless-steel tumblers chained to drums, sugary ice-cream cones and stinky urinals. And yet it never lacked for magic. Those days every theatre stood for something, those days before the corporates took over. Albert was Superstar, Alankar was Jackie Chan, Woodlands was pretty girls, Pilot was the King of sound, Devi was family, Sathyam was film-aficionados, and Motcham and Parangimalai Jothi were …ehm...well educational if you get my drift. How much we learnt.