The human brain is fascinating in that it can forget what you had for breakfast, while remembering the TV theme to Davy Crockett after 40 years ("Davy/Davy Crockett/King of the wild frontier). My brain also managed to remember the name of one of the midnight shows at the drive-in after all these years.Wanda, the Wicked Warden was on the marquee outside the Hollywood Drive-In in Sandoval, Ill., one day. Driving by – well, I probably was riding by – the title caught my interest. The alliteration was probably what made it stick in my head as much as the visual imagery it conjured up. Those campy, late-night shows always had the best (funniest) titles.
It popped into my head again the other day and I Googled it. Wow – up pops a poster for Wanda the Wicked Warden! I can't believe it! Not only am I not nuts in remembering it, the poster was hilarious.
At Sam's Club last week I got even more drive-in camp: four boxed sets of movies that were no doubt first-run at the drive-in. Remember how horrible those were? Virtually no production values, terrible acting, laughable sets and non-existant plots. They were just something to do when you had nothing to do on those hot summer nights, especially if you're weren't so much interesting in the action on the screen as in the car.
I feel sorry for the folks who missed the days of the drive-in. It was so different than seeing a movie in the theater. Dancing hot dogs and hamburgers on the screen and sometimes dancing on the cars. I saw The Rocky Horror Picture Show for the first time at the drive-in. What a blast! Dancing in the cars, dancing in the aisles, toilet paper flying everywhere ... those were the days.
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Ah, yes, the drive-in. We had one in the Bay, but I think it wasn't as popular as it might have been because of the extreme heat here in summer. At least I don't remember being all that keen to sit melting on the hood of someone's car, not even for an energetic canoodle (you could do that inside the air-conditioned theater, too). But you're right about the God-awful features with even worse titles. I believe they were produced exclusively for drive-in screening.
ReplyDeleteBTW, doodle. You're on a roll here. Keep up the good work.
ReplyDeleteI remember going as a kid in Biloxi, my parents would buy a mosquito coil to burn to keep the bugs away. ARGH! Of course we fell asleep about half way through, or passed out from the smell of those things! Thank God we grew up and went on to better things like stuffing everyone we could into the car and trunk on $5 car load night!
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