Mr. Russo never expected to spend his old age in St. Mary’s Cemetery searching through lonely dawns for his family.  If anything, he thought they would survive him, not the other way around.  “It ain’t natural,” he would mutter to himself.  They he’d grow angry and impatient with his solitary life.  After all, he had been a man who had cherished his time with his wife and children when they were alive, which had made their deaths harder to bear.  Even now he could recall in great detail the things they had done together, like going to beach or to the movies.

Where Carmela had loved the ocean, Mr. Russo had adored the cinema.  To him movies were magic, pure magic.  On winter weekends, he piled his family into their old station wagon and headed for the matinee at the Paramount Theater.  There actually were three movie theaters in the business section of downtown Plainfield, New Jersey, in the 1950s:  the Strand, the Liberty, and the Paramount.  All boasted air conditioning, screens that stretched from wall-to-wall and ceiling-to-floor, and dazzling arrays of candy, soda, and popcorn.  Yet they were clearly different.  Of the three the Paramount was the oldest, the largest, and the most regal.  Its art deco interior included a second floor balcony with smoking section, which one reached by climbing a high, wide staircase with a gleaming brass banister.  Its ushers wore mustard--colored, mock military uniforms with gold brocade.  The plush, deeply-piled red carpet was kept spotlessly clean and free of litter, which was swept immediately into a brass dustpan whose shiny lid opened and closed at the click of its waist-high handle.

While all this was impressive, what  most captivated Mr. Russo was the interior of the actual theater.  Its high, dusky walls were livid with the terrifying presence of gargoyles, dragons, and all manner of ghostly demons.  In the dimmed lighting of the theater, these plaster creatures loomed from the walls with such ill will and evil intent that to enter the theater was like walking into a lions’ den or worse.  As the lights slowly dimmed and layer after layer of curtain swished open to reveal the larger-than-life roaring lion on the screen, the gargoyles seemed to come fully alive in response, ready to leap from their high perches and pounce.

Mr. Russo loved the gargoyles.  He loved the way they projected from above the private balconies that stood like silent sentinels to either side of the stage.  He loved the high, ornately painted ceiling with its concentrically arranged lights—the huge, milk-glass domes encircled by translucent bulbs —that were so frivolous yet so practical, too.  And he loved the heavy, red velvet curtain and the gauzy, thin one beneath it that made the opening scenes of the movie waver as though the film was not feeding properly through the projector.  It fooled him every time.  Just as he was about to rise out of his seat to complain, that pale shroud of a curtain would part to reveal a clear shot of the thick-maned lion roaring his rage from the screen.  Mr. Russo never understood why the lion was there, but seeing it clearly caused him to chuckle at himself while he eased back into the plush seat, happily munching the buttery popcorn.

Mr. Russo loved popcorn, Raisinettes, and Jordon Almonds.  The hard, candy-coated almonds sometimes got him into trouble with his movie-going neighbors because he tended to crack them loudly between his teeth during the most tense scenes when the theater was absolutely still and quiet. But he never really noticed his upset neighbors, so intent was he on the screen. In his mind, nothing else existed.  In his heart, nothing else mattered.

YES, IT WAS an affair of the heart for Mr. Russo.  He loved every movie he ever saw.  Each one was a kind of miracle to him.  For a couple of hours on a Saturday afternoon he entered a world that was somehow totally foreign and yet completely familiar to him.

Mr. Russo didn’t just watch the movie, he lived it.  When the characters on screen laughed, he roared out loud with them; when they wept, he sobbed in silent misery.  When it was all over except for the credits crawling slowly up the screen—the houselights growing bright, the gargoyles growing visible, the crowd growing thin—Mr. Russo would remain seated, a thoughtful look on his face.  When at last the theater was empty, completely empty, he’d rise reluctantly, turn to his family, and pronounce jubilantly, “That was the best movie I ever seen.”  He said this every time, and meant it, too.

Not only did he love every movie he saw, he loved every change in the technology of movies he witnessed, from the silent screen to talkies, from black-and-white to technicolor, from two-dimensional to three.  It was the novelty of 3-D movies that transformed Mr. Russo from acolyte to proselytizer.

After having witnessed the miracle of his first 3-D film, The Creature From the Black Lagoon, he spent the rest of the week telling everyone, “You gotta go see this new movie that’s playin downtown.  When you walk in they give you these little glasses with white paper frames and green-n-red cellophane where the glass oughta be.  They tell you not to put em on till the movie starts, but I tried em on right away.  They don’t do nothin but make it harder to see.  So I figure this is all a bunch of bull, but maybe the movie will be okay anyway.  Then the movie starts and everybody’s sittin there with these stupid glasses on that don’t fit right.  Not me.  I left mine off.  Only the picture’s got two or more of everything and none of it looks right.  I feel like I had too much wine cause everything’s out of focus and I think I’m gonna be sick.  Then I remember the glasses and I says to myself, what the heck, and slip them on, not expectin anything.

“What a surprise!  I jumped back in my seat.  One moment I’m about to lose my lunch, the next I’m really in it, not just lookin at it or pretendin it’s me up there on the screen.  I’m in it!  The whole movie jumps out off the screen at me like I could touch it.  I had to restrain myself from goin up on stage and feelin where the movie starts and ends.  It was like I could walk right into the movie.  I’m tellin ya it’s amazin.  You gotta see it.  What?  You don’t have a ride?  Well come with us, we’re goin again on Saturday afternoon.  The matinee’s cheaper, ya know.”

By early Saturday afternoon he had offered so many people rides that there was actually a crowd gathered outside the Russo home:  friends from Asunta Hall, half the Rosary Society, whole families with packed lunches they’re going to sneak into the theater, and kids all by themselves who’ve been attracted by the crowd.  It took Mr. Russo six trips in the station wagon, and he would have been in time with the seventh load, but he got pulled over after running a red light at Park and Second, just within sight of the marquee.

As it was, he never even looked at that last load of passengers:  “Hurry up!  Get in!  There’s plenty of room.  You kids squeeze in the back there.  Don’t worry, we’ll make it on time.”  Later, as the cop was writing up the ticket, Mr. Russo glanced up the street then turned to everyone and said, “Look, there ain’t a parkin space anywhere.  You might as well get out here.  I was gonna drop yous off out front anyway.  G’wan, you don wanna miss the beginning.”  Everyone piled out of the wagon and rushed toward the ticket booth that was built into the front of the theater facing the street.

WHEN MR. RUSSO finally reached the booth himself, the manager of the theater, a balding, middle-aged man with sallow skin and nervous eyes, was standing there waiting for him.  “These children with you, sir?” he demanded of Mr. Russo in an officious tone.

“Mogwa and Ogwa!  How’d you get here?”

“Yoor carr,” Mogwa said plainly. This was unusual in itself, for verbal clarity in response to questions was never Mogwa’s strong point.

“They walked right into the theater without buying tickets.  They don’t seem to understand it cost  money.”  The manager’s tiny black eyes darted from the twins to Mr. Russo and back without once making eye contact.

“Has the movie started yet?”  Mr. Russo was starting to get frantic.

“Two minutes ago.”

“Ah geez.  Here, I’ll pay for them two.  Come on, hurry up, you two, we’re late already.”  He grabbed a hand of each twin and ran into the lobby through the heavy glass doors the manager held open for them.  But as soon as Mogwa and Ogwa got a glimpse of the candy counter in the now empty lobby, they dug their heels into the thick carpet. Their eyes, which were large and set far apart, grew even larger and moon-like.

“Okay, I get the message,” Mr. Russo said. To the girl behind the counter, whose mouth was so full of braces she was forced to smile perpetually, he said, “Give us the large popcorn, a box of Raisinettes, and the Family Size Jordon Almonds.  And please hurry, thank you.”

As the girl scooped up the popcorn into the largest bucket, Mogwa pointed at the black licorice and Ogwa at the red.  Their heads, which were bigger and somehow blockier than most kids their age, bobbed decisively.  They both grunted loudly.  Mr. Russo was about to argue with them, but instead he said impatiently, “Never mind, miss.  Just give us a bunch of that licorice, please.  Now can we please watch the movie?”

Mr. Russo was grabbing Mogwa’s free hand and reaching for Ogwa’s when he noticed that the boy had it behind him, tugging at the seat of his trousers.  An unpleasant odor permeated the popcorn-scented air of the lobby.  “Oh god, we’re never gonna see this movie.  The Men’s is over here.  Come on, hurry up before you have an accident we both regret.”

When finally they were finished in the Men’s Room — “Okay, okay, don’t start cryin on me, I’ll help you, I done this kinda thing before, ya know”—Mr. Russo headed towards the balcony stairs but noticed a braided gold rope across the stairway.  He started to duck under it with the twins when an usher rushed up and said, “Sorry, sir, the balcony is full.”

“But my wife’s up there.  She saved me a seat, I know she did.”

“There are no available seats, sir, and certainly not for three.  We’ve never had a matinee sold out like this before.  Quite a crowd turned out this afternoon.”

“I know, I know all about it, believe me.  But ain’t you got any seats left at all?”

“Front row only, sir.”

“I’ll take em!”

The usher escorted them to the closed double-doors on the main floor where a uniformed ticket-taker neatly folded their tickets, tore them precisely in half, slid one-half into a narrow slot in the waist-high booth before her, handed the other half to Mr. Russo, then gave each of them a pair of paper glasses.  “Don’t put them on until you’re seated.  Enjoy the show.” 

Again Mr. Russo grabbed hold of Mogwa and Ogwa’s hands.  It had been a long time since he held had hands with young boys.  As he felt the warmth from their palms enter his own, he thought of his sons, Dominic and Carl.  When was the last time he had held their hands?  Was it Atlantic City?

IN THE SUMMER of 1938 when Dominic was eleven and Carl was four, the Russo family had traveled by train to Atlantic City for three days at summer’s end.  For years Carmela had saved for this trip, which was a life-long dream come true.  As a girl growing up in the small seaside town of Point Pleasant, she always had heard of the grandeur of Atlantic City:  Convention Hall, Steel Pier, the Miss America Pageant, salt water taffy and picture postcards, the rolling chairs in which guests were wheeled along the sixty-foot-wide, five-mile-long boardwalk.  She had wanted to go there on their honeymoon in 1927, but they had been too poor.  So she had saved for almost twelve years, adding sometimes a dollar a year or nothing at all during the depression years, but always saving until finally, in 1938, there was enough for a small room in a clean guest house a few blocks from the boardwalk in Atlantic City.  They had arrived the week before school started.  The weather had been glorious, full of clear skies, hot days, cool nights.

In the mornings they would rise early so they could ride rented bicycles on the boardwalk.  Up and down in the heavy fog they would ride, Carmela and Mr. Russo on a tandem bike, the boys on bikes fitted to size, Carl’s with training wheels. For hours they’d ride, cheerily greeting the other cyclists, until the sun would burn off the morning mist and the boardwalk would close to bicycle traffic for the day.  Then, after an early lunch, they would spend the rest of the day on the beach, glorying in the sun and surf. Carl had been young enough to be wary of the ocean’s pull.  At the water’s edge they would hold hands as the waves would wash up on shore and, in the backwash, suck their heels down into the softened sand.  When it would reach the point where Carl was in sand up to his ankles, he’d wail, “Help! Help!”   Carmela and Mr. Russo would yank him free.  Then he would wildly kick his bony legs in the air, swinging back and forth in the firm grip of their handholds as the dread waves washed underneath him.  Dominic, holding tightly to his father’s other hand, would laugh uproariously at his little brother’s silly antics.

Then in the late afternoon they would return to the guest house where they’d shower in an outdoor stall before going to their room.  They’d pull down the shades on the open windows, then nap in the dim light as the drawn shades gently flapped in the cool ocean breezes.  After dinner they’d head back onto the boardwalk for the evening.

The first night, just as they had been about to climb the stairs onto the boardwalk, a motorcade had pulled onto the street and up to the side entrance of a large hotel there.  They had turned to see Miss Nebraska emerge from a fancy car.  Next came Miss Delaware, then Miss Georgia.  A small crowd had gathered and applauded as each contestant arrived for the beginning of the week-long beauty pageant.  Mr. Russo had been critical, saying things like, “I wouldn’t want any daughter of mine doin this.”

Carmela had been surprised.  “Why not, Gaetano?  Don’t you think they’re beautiful?”

“Sure, like a bunch a cattle up for sale to the highest bidder.  Mooo!” he’d lowed until Carmela had shushed him.

The next morning as they had ridden bikes on the boardwalk they had passed several contestants being pushed in the rolling chairs with wicker awnings over them.  “Prima donnas!” Mr. Russo had snorted, and Carmela had laughed.

The second night the Russos had seen more contestants arriving, but they hadn’t waited with the rest of the crowd because they’d been headed for the show at the very end of the Steel Pier, which went 2,000 feet out into the ocean.  Arriving early, they had gotten front row seats in the bleacher-like stands that faced a giant round opening in the pier.  The sky had been cloudless all day; now as the night darkened the stars became slowly visible.  Sitting there in the open air so far from shore was like being far out to sea on the deck of a large ship.  From their seats they had looked into the hole to see the ocean fifty feet below as the incoming swells slapped against the supporting pilings.  On top various diving platforms and ramps surrounded the opening.  A sailor in Navy whites had sat down next to Carl and struck up a friendly conversation with him.  When the show had begun, it had been something like a circus on the sea, with loud, cheery music, an amicable master of ceremonies, and daring tricks and difficult dives from high towers by attractive young men and women.  Even horses with smiling riders dove from successively higher towers.

In the middle of one act, which the emcee had been describing in excessive detail, the friendly young sailor next to Carl had stood up suddenly and shouted, “That ain’t nothin!  You’re just makin a big deal out of it!”   At first the emcee had tried to ignore him, but the sailor had been persistent in his criticisms.  Finally, in exasperation, the emcee had challenged the sailor to do as well, “if you dare,” thinking that would shut him up.

Instead the sailor had shouted back, “I’ll do better than any of them,” and climbed over the low barricade separating the audience from the performing area.  He had caught his foot on the rail and nearly fell.  As he had approached the hole, he had weaved dangerously close, nearly falling into the sea, walking as though drunk.

“Now wait a minute young man—”

“Aw shudup,” the sailor had slurred in return,  “you talk too much!”  He had begun to climb the narrow ladder that led up to the highest diving platform, which was fifty feet above the pier, only he kept slipping on the rungs, each time nearly falling off.

“Maybe you had better come down from there!”

Ignoring the emcee the intoxicated sailor had continued climbing.  Halfway up nature added a spectacular backdrop as the full moon rose out of the ocean, sending a broad highway of silver moonlight across the rippling surface of the sea.  Backlit by the giant face of the moon, the sailor had climbed ever higher.  When finally he had reached the tiny platform, he had stood for several moments weaving back and forth, silhouetted against the moon, apparently regretting his earlier bravado.  “Careful now,” the emcee had warned as the sailor had continued to weave back and forth,  about to tumble in his drunkenness off the platform.  “Does anyone in the audience know this man?  Talk some sense into him, please.”

Carl, who had been squeezing his father’s hand tightly, terrified for his new friend who teetered high above them, had stood up and shouted, “I know him!  Come down,  come down!”

“OKAY!” the sailor had shouted back, but when he had turned on the platform to climb down he had leaned too far to one side and, flapping his arms frantically in a futile attempt to regain his balance, had fallen off the platform, his “okay” echoing all the way down.  The crowd had gasped and some had screamed in terror, little Carl among them.  But then the falling sailor had tucked into a tight ball and performed a perfect three-and-a-half somersault into the sea.

As he had climbed up the ladder from the ocean below, the crowd had cheered mightily.  Reaching the pier the sailor had bowed dramatically and run off backstage as the emcee had said, “Ladies and gentlemen, another round of applause for our star diver, David Rintell.”

“You mean he wasn’t a sailor?” Carl had asked his father, still uncertain.

“Naw.  People ain’t always what they seem. Your new friend there, he’s the star of the show.”

Carl had beamed then, proud to have been befriended by the star and not at all resentful at having been so completely fooled.

Mr. Russo had squeezed his son’s hand, cherishing his sweet innocence.

The next morning after their bike ride they had bought a large box of salt water taffy to share with family and friends back on the Avenue, then they had taken the noon train back home, filled with the grandeur of Atlantic City.

MR. RUSSO FELT a tug on his hands, and then he realized that Mogwa and Ogwa were pulling him through the open doors to the theater.  They followed the usher into the dark where they could make out nothing for several seconds except for the narrow beam of the flashlight, which they followed blindly at first. As they walked down the long center aisle, their eyes began to adjust.  While the movie on the screen made little sense without the glasses, during the brighter scenes it gave off enough light to illuminate the entire theater. What Mr. Russo saw as he walked down the aisle surprised him.  He never before had studied an audience in the act of watching a movie, and doing so both amused and disturbed him.  He saw row after row packed with people of all ages and descriptions, sitting perfectly still as if in a trance, their heads tilted up at exactly the same angle, their faces revealing identical expressions.  Everyone was wearing the silly, ill-fitting spectacles, which further diminished their individuality by making them look absurdly alike.  Mr. Russo paused for a moment, first scanning the audience, then looking up at the blurry screen, then back to the audience.  He never before had noticed how machine-like people could be.  When something comical happened in the movie, everyone laughed. When the action moved to one side of the screen, all simultaneously turned their heads.  It was if they were one being or the separate appendages of the same creature.  He was fascinated by it, troubled, too.  On the one hand he saw how connected and alike we are; on the other he fretted over how easily we could be manipulated.  “It’s like we don’t got no dignity, we give it all to the screen.”

“Pardon me, sir?”  The usher thought Mr. Russo was speaking to him.

“Oh, uh, nothin.  Just thinkin aloud.”

“This way, please.”

Mr. Russo and the twins resumed walking hand-in-hand down the aisle.  The closer they got to the front, the more fully was the theater illuminated by the screen.  Mr. Russo noticed that during rapid scene changes the light alternated quickly between darkness and light, creating a flashing effect.  It was just such a moment that made Ogwa look up from the red glow around the head of the flashlight, which he had been following faithfully since entering the theater.

In the lightning-like flashes from the screen Ogwa got his first, terrifying look at the gargoyles, dragons, and demons looming off the walls.  He instantly froze, his body becoming rigid, pulling Mr. Russo and Mogwa to an abrupt halt.  When Mr. Russo turned to see what was wrong, he knew right away that Ogwa was about to become more verbal than he’d been his entire life.  He knew why, too.

“They ain’t real, Ogwa!”  He said it aloud, looking directly into Ogwa’s terror-filled eyes, knowing all the while it wouldn’t change anything.  After all, Mr. Russo had just witnessed grown adults, his own friends and their whole families, sitting entranced and mesmerized by a reality no more real than the one that now had Ogwa in its omnipotent grip.  Realizing that words wouldn’t work to block out the source of Ogwa’s panic, he did the next best thing he could think of — he grabbed the white paper glasses from Ogwa’s hand and thrust them over the boy’s bulging eyes, blocking from sight the intimidating vision of the dread beasts.  Sensing that Mogwa was raising his own head to see what Ogwa had been staring at, Mr. Russo shoved the glasses on him, as well.  At the precise instant that both boys entered the astounding world of 3-D, they emitted low moans of amazement.  Mr. Russo hurried them to where the usher patiently waited at the very front row of the theater, then eased them zombie-like into their seats.  The twins craned back their heads to stare open-mouthed in stupefaction at the gigantic, three-dimensional scene unfolding before their very eyes.

The usher withdrew as Mr. Russo sat down beside Mogwa.  He slipped on his own glasses and sighed.  “There’s no business like show business.”  He said this aloud and was shushed immediately by a tiny five-year-old sitting on his other side.

Mr. Russo shrugged his shoulders and dropped his head back to watch the movie.  Before that moment he’d never sat closer than the mezzanine, so he was amazed at the intensity of the visual experience at this range.  If before he had felt as if he were in the movie, now it was as though the movie were wrapped all the way round him.  He felt encased by it, as though it were a vibrating chrysalis of multi-colored lights and all-encompassing sound.

The back of his neck was beginning to stiffen uncomfortably when he noticed a strange shadow on the screen.  Soon it was joined by a second shadow, which dipped and rolled then reached arm-like tentacles out over the surface of the screen.  The looming shadows danced wildly across the movie, making it recede into the background.  Instead of being larger-than-life, the people in the  movie suddenly looked silly and inconsequential, fake even.

As he watched the shadows in the foreground,  Mr. Russo laughed at himself, for he’d had the absurd idea that someone had given in to the same urge he’d had the week before when he’d wanted to go up on stage to enter the three-dimensional scenes of the movie.  “Now that would be somethin, wouldn’t it?  Hey Mogwa, gimme some of that black licorice, will ya? . . . Mogwa? . . . Mogwa!”

He tore off the glasses and found emptiness in the two seats next to him.  He looked up on the stage, already certain of what he’d find, then bolted from his seat and sprang onto the high stage immediately in front of him, his arms outspread as if he were going to tackle someone.

No one who was there that day ever agreed completely about what happened next, but the projectionist in the booth at the rear of the theater said he started the curtains closing when he saw three people on stage.  As a result they somehow got entwined in the gauzy curtain, which caused one of them to stumble and fall, bringing down the other two with him.  All three fell heavily against the screen, which then broke from its moorings above to cascade in gentle, rippling waves down upon the struggling trio.

IT TOOK THE ushers nearly ten minutes to untangle the kicking and screaming prisoners from the screen.  Later Mr. Russo wouldn’t talk about it, and of course Mogwa and Ogwa had little to say.

In the end the theater manager gave free passes to everyone present, even to Mr. Russo and the twins, once the situation had been explained. But Mr. Russo put off using them. “I ain’t got time today,” he told Carmela on the following Saturday.

Week after week passed, and still Mr. Russo found some excuse not to go to the matinee.  He’d sit in his chair on the tiny front porch, rocking in silence, a grim and dissatisfied look on his face, musing over something that he wouldn’t discuss.  Sometimes Mogwa and Ogwa would join him, each sitting on either side of him, watching him intently, following his every move. They sat as if they were waiting patiently for him to make some decision, to reach a conclusion they knew ultimately he would adopt.

Exactly six weeks of long and silent Saturdays had passed when Mogwa broke the silence by handing Mr. Russo an advertisement from the Plainfield Courier News.  It was invitation to join the Saturday bowling league. The league met at the new 70-lane alley that had opened on Route 22 that fall.  Mogwa pointed at the photograph on the long, empty alleys and said something that sounded like “Go.”  Mr. Russo stared at the photo for a long time, then Ogwa stood up and took Mr. Russo by the hand and walked him to the station wagon.  Without a word Mr. Russo got in and started the car as the twins climbed in back.  Two hours later he was back, beaming.

“It’s beautiful,” Mr. Russo told Carmela, “you should see it—fully air conditioned and sparkling clean!  Nothin like the old, smoke-filled dens downtown.” 

To Mr. Russo bowling was magic, pure magic.  He loved the thunderous sound of the ball as it rolled down the alley, the way the machines gathered the scattered pins and automatically reset them in perfect order.  He loved the special shoes and assortment of balls that stood like sentinels in  long racks. He even loved the score sheets and red line of light that crossed the start of the alley to catch a foul.