When I bicycled over to the TIFF box office to pick up my flex pack tickets, I expected to just grab the tickets and head out. It turned out to be the beginning of a 24 hour wait.
I was happy having received nine of my first choices, and while I was already at the box office, I asked about purchasing tickets for an opening night gala screening. I’m a huge Madonna fan, and this year I decided to score tickets to the opening night of her new film, W.E.
I was told that gala tickets went on sale the next morning at 7 am, but that people usually lined up long before that.
“How long before 7 am?” I asked.
“There are three dudes up there now,” the TIFF volunteer replied.
So I biked home fast and got a lunch, umbrella, and pillow together. I was determined to get my first gala ticket.
By the time I arrived at the line there were about twenty people sitting outside one corner of Metro Hall, along King St. W.
I found out there was a signup sheet to register our place in line, so nobody could butt in if you left for a washroom or coffee break. One young film student was elected to keep track of the first fifty people, and pacts were made about taking breaks. I knew I was going to be in line for 19 hours.
I soon learned that the first ten people in line were a “family” (think The Ex) of scalpers spanning three generations . Apparently they were there last year in the same place for the same reason.
At first that made me concerned, but a film student who remembered them from last year assured me that, even with them, I should be guaranteed my gala tickets since I was within the first 50 in line.
So I camped out and observed the scalper family while I chatted with my neighbours and discussed our favourites this year. Some of the scalpers would come over to chat now and then. The large leader of the family was happy that there was a list, for it reinforced that his group was first should any of the regular movie buffs decide to stampede past them once the doors opened.
Around dinner time it started to rain, forcing the group to huddle closer to the building under the protection of any available overhangs or canopies.
Fortunately the rain only lasted an hour, and most of us in line kept ourselves and our belongings dry with plastic bags and umbrellas.
Parts of my urban camping trip were quite enjoyable, like when drunkass Lastcallers wobbled over to our group at 3 am and asked, with embedded Canadian politeness: “Pardon me but… what are you guys out here for?”
“Justin Bieber tickets,” I explained, poker faced.
Through the early morning hours the line stretched longer and longer around the jagged perimeter of Metro Hall’s main building.
Eventually we ticked off the hours, 5 o’clock came, and we were allowed inside and down to the concourse level, 10 at a time.
Downstairs, an unexpected surprise awaited us: two lines were going to be formed, one for members, and one for the general public.
I was not entirely surprised by this new development, but the family of scalpers were. We lined up against one wall of the shopping corridor while a second line formed parallel to ours. Members who were further back in the line and who had not been outside for 18-24 hours were pulled out of the main line and were now suddenly ahead of us. And they were going to be let into the box office first.
I watched with some amusement while panic and recalculation erupted among the scalper family. They weren’t expecting to be sidelined by TIFF members at the last minute, and they were pissed.
I was partly chuckling to myself, and partly upset along with them, for this meant that I too had to wait. At quarter to 7 am, I decided to ask a girl in the membership line who I had been talking to all night about films if she would pick up one ticket for me to W.E. I would be annoyed if I waited in line for 19 hours and wasn’t able to get one ticket to my first gala premiere screening. She agreed, and I gave her money. I was very relieved and grateful at 7:15, she came back to the line–where I had not advanced at all–and gave me my ticket. (Thank you Rose!)
Fortunately, the general public didn’t have to wait until all of the members had been processed. TIFF volunteers alternated back and forth between the two lines. There were, however, more wickets open for members than there were for the general public, so their line did move faster.
This year, the general public (and scalpers) got sTIFFed. Fortunately, when I eventually got to a TIFF employee, I was still able to buy two additional tickets to the gala opening of W.E. Shortly after I made it to a ticket agent, nearly everything had sold out. Remember, I was only 20th in line. Behind me the line stretched into the several hundreds.
I had a lot of time to think about TIFF tickets and strategies in the 19 hours I waited in line for gala tickets. I don’t like that scalpers scoop up all the available tickets so that they can sell them to the affluent and make a profit, and I also don’t like that with TIFF’s new membership arrangement, the more you pay, the more you’ll see.
People who tried to access the 7 am sale online also got sTIFFed by the festival servers crashing.
But I did like that the TIFF Membership and their “four ticket maximum per person” restriction basically squeezed out and limited the rip-off monopoly potential that could be claimed by scalpers. At the end of the day, a TIFF membership is cheaper.
Next year I intend to split a $300 membership with a friend. Each membership is allowed to submit two film packages, so we would be able to either share a package, or submit two different ones. That’s the only way I’m going to have a decent shot of seeing 10 preferred films in the future.
But this year, The People`s Film Festival just got a little less democratic.
