The Flick

As concession workers and movie theater cleaners, Sam and Avery deal with The Flick’s fast food offerings at all stages of the consumption process: from the moment they’re purchased by customers to the moment they’re left behind on the surfaces, seats, and floors of the theater. The play is wryly disdainful of the movie theater food, finding dark observational humor in the gross floor-adhering lettuce of a Subway sandwich, as well as the woman who—upon facing a near death-by-falling-ceiling-tile—is easily appeased by a voucher for six free sodas and popcorns. Though Sam and Avery poke fun at this culture of easy appeasement and disposable consumption, The Flickemphasizes that they usually end up as the butt of their own jokes, using pilfered “Dinner Money,” eating the very food they make fun of, and—of course—cleaning the left-behind food waste. In this sense, The Flick’s food—and its treatment—can be considered as a metaphor for the sensation of figurative waste Sam and Avery experience in their lives.

The play articulates its perspectives on waste through Sam and Avery’s philosophical discussions of “inside” versus “outside” food. While Sam believes “outside” food is the greatest offense to a theater cleaner (as it involves the act of sneaking something in), Avery points out that in some senses, “inside food” is a deeper insult to the service they perform as theater workers, a kind of deliberate laziness demonstrated by people who have seen the theater worker scoop the popcorn, sell it to them, and give it to them.