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Saturday, January 18, 2014

Field Report! Calico Jack at The Fairmount Theater in East Haven, CT

Doc here with a Field Report from senior reporter Calico Jack.  he has an update on the Fairmount Theater in East Haven, CT.
 
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FAIRMOUNT THEATER, January 11, 2014
 
Hey there, Doc.  It looks like I’m managing to get another report in for you and for all of your readers who enjoy “this thing of ours.”  This time, I’ve got a report from the Fairmount Theater in East Haven, CT, where I stopped this past Saturday night as I was making my way through coastal Connecticut.



The last time I had spent an evening in Hartford’s Art Cinema, I had a conversation with one of my fellow hobbyists and he was telling me about his recent experience with a couple at the Fairmount.  I was intrigued, since my previous experience there had been a sausagefest, and I decided to give the Fairmount another shot next time I traveled through.
 
I stopped in this past Saturday, slowing down enough before I got there to check the address and to read other reviews here at the Journal.  Those reviews, along with my old memories of the place, left me expecting that my trip to the Fairmount would be a lot like my trip to Bush River Books a couple weeks earlier, but I was pleasantly surprised.

When I arrived around 8:00, I noticed new construction of private video booths near the cashier and a reconfigured entrance, with fresh drywall covering what used to be the left hand entrance to the theater.  I paid my modest admission of $12.00 and made my way through the curtain into the dark of the main theater.  I took a seat and waited for my eyes to adjust.  When they did, I noticed that the theater has changed a lot from what it was years ago. 

Gone are the dilapidated, cloth covered theater seats and, in their place are new vinyl cushioned ones that would make for much easier clean-up.  Also, the rows are much farther apart than most theater seats, providing plenty of room for, say, someone to kneel down in front of one.  The seats have also been repositioned, leaving lots of open space where people could do pretty much anything they wanted and I found myself wondering if the management has plans to install any kind of benches or tables (like at the Berlin News Agency) in the open spaces.  The back right corner of the theater is walled off on three sides and seems like it might also be a perfect place to play out of full view.

All of the carpet in the theater has been removed, which leaves the floor of reasonably attractive, though industrial-looking, smooth cement, which also solves some of the same clean-up problem that the vinyl seats do.  The projector, sound system, and screen also seem to be new, with good results.

There were seven or eight men milling around in the main theater but no women or couples came in while I was there.  Still, I needed to keep moving towards my hotel for the night and decided to finish checking the place out before hitting the road.  Unlike what someone reported a year or two ago, the men’s room was clean and stocked with TP, soap, and paper towels – I assume the ladies’ room was, too, but I didn’t check.  I stuck my head into the gay theater and it was much smaller than the main theater, with maybe 20 seats, and it didn’t seem to have received any of the renovations that the main theater had.  There were a dozen or so guys in there being friendly with one another, so I left them to their amusement.

While it still has a way to go, the renovations at the Fairmount have improved things a good bit.  It looks like it would be a good place for couples to play and could even come to be southern Connecticut’s hot spot.  I’ll definitely have to stop back by in a few months and see what the finished product looks like.  I'd love to read other people's experiences here at The Journal.  If anyone wants to meet up, feel free to email me at facehoser@hotmail.com.
 
CJ

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Doc here again... Many thanks to Calico Jack for his update on The Fairmount Theater in East Haven, CT. Keep them coming, sir.

Thanks,
Doc