Fat City : Moviegoers Indulge Tasty Popcorn Habit Despite Threat to Health

He walked to the movie concession stand, warily eyeing the popcorn bin and its hot-buttered temptation.

“I don’t know if I should,” said Brian Greene of Ventura, shaking his head. “It might kill me.”

“C’mon, you eat Big Macs, don’t you?” Chris Pendergraft challenged from behind the counter at the Buenaventura theaters in Ventura.

“Yeah,” Greene said, hesitating. “Give me a medium. And can I get some extra salt on it?”

Saturated in fatty coconut oil, sopped in butter, movie popcorn remains the irresistible big-screen delicacy. Despite media reports this week exposing popcorn with a fat content higher than hot dogs and even McDonald’s Big Macs, moviegoers are still ordering tons of the stuff.

“It’s the same thing as when they said barbecuing hamburgers causes cancer,” Deby Raynor of Oxnard said as she walked away from the concession stand with a medium-size bag of popcorn.

“Everybody’s talking about it, but we’re in denial,” said Westlake resident Jill Pincus, on her way to a matinee of “Bad Girls” at The Oaks mall in Thousand Oaks.

Pincus and a friend, who declined to give her name on the grounds that she did not want her doctor to know about her coconut-oil consumption, had already purchased dual bags of buttered popcorn.

Both women said they hope that the theater would come out with a “skinny” version of popcorn.

That may happen, according to United Artists spokesman Bill Quigley. UA, the county’s largest theater chain, uses coconut oil to make popcorn in 98% of its venues, including the theater at The Oaks.

A report released Monday by the Center for Science in the Public Interest identified coconut oil as the chief culprit in the high fat content in movie popcorn.

The heavy oil leaves enough saturated fat in a small, unbuttered bag of popcorn to satisfy the recommended daily allowance for most adults, the consumer group reported. Theaters could cut calories by simply using low-fat canola oil or even air-popped popcorn.

Pacific’s Carriage Square Theater in Oxnard is already cooking its popcorn in canola oil. The choice was made partly for health reasons and partly for convenience, said Milt Moritz, a Pacific vice president.

Canola oil comes in liquid form, packed in easy-to-use bags. Coconut oil often arrives in solid chunks and must be melted before it is used.

In addition to offering the canola-popped variety, Pacific Theaters and its 300 screens statewide plan to make packages of air-popped popcorn available, Moritz said.

“They will definitely have a choice, and it will be interesting to see how it goes,” he said.

Quigley said UA would consider making a change if consumers demand it. “We take this seriously,” he said. “We’re keeping track of concerns and interest.”

At the same time, Quigley pointed out, moviegoers have historically come back to the staples: popcorn, candy and soda.

“I don’t think we should be defensive about what we’re doing,” he said. “We don’t sell this as health food. It’s a snack.”

Some theaters will no doubt continue cooking in coconut oil for a simple reason: Fat tastes good.

“The reason they use it is because of the taste,” said one manager, who did not want his name attached to his comments. “That’s the reason theater popcorn tastes so much better than home-popped popcorn.”

At some theaters, cooking methods are a closely guarded secret. The Century 8 theaters in Oxnard, for instance, referred all questions about cooking oil to corporate headquarters, which referred all questions to the National Assn. of Theater Owners. The national group, naturally, had no idea what kind of oil the Oxnard venue uses.

At Buenaventura theaters, one enterprising concessionaire had no shame about the coconut-oil kernels he cooks. Pendergraft has even perfected his own super-fatty concoction, which he calls gourmet popcorn. It involves obscene amounts of butter flavoring and seasoned salt layered throughout the bag.

“It’s kind of like a taste of heaven,” Pendergraft said. “It’s probably 15 Big Macs, but it’s excellent.”

He is not planning to give it up any time soon.

“I don’t take drugs; I don’t drink,” he said. “I can have popcorn.”

Phyllis W. Jordan is a correspondent and Mary F. Pols is a staff writer.