Describe your typical day at work
I’m famously in back to back meetings all day, which sounds awful I know! And while I should probably get a grip on that and run my day differently, because there is still an entrepreneurial heart to Vue, those meetings are as varied as can be. In one morning’s meetings I can be coming up with names for a new cinema concept, designing a cinema bar, reviewing creator content for tiktok, trying to adjust something that’s not on brand, planning a conference speech, hanging out on zoom with all the Heads of Marketing across Europe, averting a potential comms crisis, interviewing candidates, editing a brand sizzle or pitching for more budget. I’m lucky enough to get the odd agency lunch somewhere fancy to break the day now and again, often spending that time discussing how many more lunches we used to have back in the day – it feels so much busier now! My team also know that a favourite part of any work trip is airport drinks on the way home when all the meetings are done.
The moment you fell in love with the Big Screen?
I cannot recall my first cinema trip, it wasn’t a staple of my childhood (I remember picnics, …. so…. many….picnics - explains why I have pretty much avoided sandwiches since.) But I have a strong memory of the excitement and thrill of managing to get into ‘Interview with a Vampire’ in 1994 with my best friend when we were possibly a few years too young – eek sorry! As a marketer in the making I just loved the cinema ads back then – I remember them vividly and can still say the lines and sing the jingles from ads for Bacardi, Studio Line, Wrigley’s, Levi’s and many more which were made for cinema first and foremost. The most iconic ads, on the biggest screens, with the best sound - there is still no better showcase.
The best thing about the cinema experience?
It’s got EVERYTHING! It’s aspiration for teens who imagine themselves as the stars they see on screen, it’s a well earned break for parents (I may have had a few sleeps on our lux recliner seats), it’s the close up details when watching NT Live theatre productions, it’s a lifeline to necessary escapism for Medicinema patients, it’s sitting next to a group of lads jumping out of their skin in A Quiet Place and laughing at their own fear, it’s offering tissues to grown men in business suits weeping at Top Gun Maverick in Cinemacon (a personal favourite moment!) It’s having to wait for opening night and real anticipation rather than everything on demand. It’s what you talk about in bars, at school, at home. It simply connects.