‘Star Wars’ fans rail against Burbank theater as malfunction disturbs ‘Last Jedi’ screening
Moviegoers who flocked to an AMC theater in Burbank cried out in terror Thursday night after a technical issue silenced a showing of “Star Wars: The Last Jedi.”
After months of anticipation, fans who attended the 9:45 p.m. showing at the AMC Burbank 16 were left without any dialogue for the first 10 minutes of the latest entry in the “Star Wars” saga. According to social media, the trailers that preceded the movie played just fine up until that point.
Audience members voiced their displeasure online.
“Killed all the excitement dead for a good chunk of the first act,” a user going by the handle Bitter Script Reader said on Twitter. “Why was no manager or projectionist monitoring the start of the film?”
An hour after the glitch patrons were informed the movie was not going to be restarted. On Twitter, Jason Arrecis said AMC attempted to placate the crowd by offering free movie passes or watching the film in a different theater.
However, many in the audience streamed into the theater’s lobby to vent their frustrations. In a video posted on YouTube by Lynly Ehrlich, people could be seen shouting at theater staff to restart the movie, peppering their comments with expletives.
A video uploaded to Twitter by Carolina Bonetti shows what appears to be an AMC employee cussing her out after she asked about the theater’s response to the technical issue. After shouting a string of expletives at Bonetti, the employee told her “we don’t need you here.”
Around 10:20 p.m., the Burbank Police Department was called in to help deal with the crowd.
“Officers arriving maintained order and helped with de-escalating the situation,” Burbank Sgt. Derek Green said. “There was no physical violence and no arrests were made.”
Twitter: @Andy_Truc
