278 Mass. 31 | Mass. | 1931
This is an action of tort for personal injuries sustained in a theatre owned and operated by the defendant. The verdict was for the plaintiff. Exceptions were saved to the refusal by the trial judge to direct a verdict for the defendant and to give certain requests for rulings. The judge stated to the jury, without objection, that
The defendant’s manager, called as a witness by the plaintiff, testified, in substance, that the theatre is one hundred ten feet long by sixty-five feet in width, having three rows of seats and four aisles separating the rows from each other and from the walls; that an entrance hall leads along the whole length of the theatre on the south side and is connected with a passageway at the rear of the rows of seats, nine feet wide and nine feet high, extending the width of the theatre; that the lights usually kept binning during the showing of a picture are five fifteen to twenty-five watt lamps in the ceiling of this passageway reflecting a very soft colored light, two similar lights in standing lamps in the passageway, and three similar lights on each long wall of the theatre. He also testified that it was the custom to turn on the “house lights” at the conclusion of the show; that at the time of the accident the amount of light was that ordinarily used in the picture house when moving pictures were shown and was the usual motion picture theatre lighting; that there must be a condition of semi-darkness to enable a person to see the pictures satisfactorily; that there were ushers with flash lights to conduct people to their seats; that the elevation of the seats in the theatre begins in the seventeenth row even with the front edge of the balcony, half way back from the stage, and goes up gradually; that in this part of the theatre the elevation at the front of the seat is four inches running back to nothing or the width of a board at the rear of the seat; that if the step up is four inches in front it may be five inches in stepping up from the aisle toward the rear.
The plaintiff testified that when she entered, the theatre with her sister a picture was being shown and they found their way to seats in the third or fourth row from the rear, in the northernmost tier of seats, without the aid of an usher; that they remained in the theatre for an hour or an hour and three quarters and at the end of a picture at about five o’clock she waited a second or two for another to come on
The testimony of the manager tended to prove that the house lights were on in the theatre when the plaintiff was helped up after her fall. The negligence of the defendant upon which the plaintiff seems to rest her case in her brief is in not furnishing sufficient light in the theatre for the plaintiff to see her way out after the performance was over. The defendant owed to the plaintiff as an invitee the general duty to use ordinary care and diligence to put and keep his theatre in a reasonably safe condition, having
The evidence would not justify a finding that the theatre and the aisles were then darker than was reasonably necessary for a proper showing of the moving picture. The duty of lighting for an invitee depends to some extent upon the use which the invitee has a right to make of the place. The defendant undoubtedly had a duty to turn on the house lights for the convenience of its patrons within a reasonable time after the show was over. If it be assumed
Exceptions sustained.
Judgment for defendant.