The K-cinema offered a double-bill of old and new Disney movies on Sundays, and parents would drop their children off at the theater while they went shopping for blue light specials at the nearby K-mart. Call it Disney Day Care.
Although the preadolescent audience didn't fill the theater to capacity, without parental supervision the place was a mad house. Kids were constantly switching seats and chasing each other up and down the isles. More popcorn was thrown than consumed. According to a post on cinematreasures.org, "One of the jobs of the ushers was to keep kids from literally climbing the walls of the auditorium, portions of which were cinderblock laid on its side so the holes were part of the decor and perfectly sized for the placement of small hands and feet."
As a patron of the K-cinema I can remember seeing The North Avenue Irregulars, The Cat from Outer Space, the three Kurt Russell/ Medfield College films, Pete's Dragon, Swiss Family Robinson, The Parent Trap, Mary Poppins, That Darn Cat, The Word's Greatest Athlete, The Apple Dumpling Gang, Freaky Friday, and Candleshoe. Those last two movies featured the tough, but cute Jodie Foster. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSxbnnZ4IzE&feature=related
Even though I liked Jodie a lot, she wasn't my first onscreen love.
On the Sunday my heart flipped the double feature was 1968's The Love Bug and the new Herbie Goes to Monte Carlo.
Since birth I've been a fan of anything that rolls, but Herbie the Love Bug was cooler than my Big Wheel, my bike, and my skateboard combined. Herbie wasn't a big race car, or a flashy muscle car, but he could do wheelies, skip across rivers, and even drive upside down in tunnels. He was an endearing underdog who was both brave and funny, but he was sensitive enough that you could hurt his feelings, too. He was everything I wanted in an action hero.
Also, unlike other movie stars, there were Herbies everywhere. This was '77, and even though it was the last production year for the standard Beetle in the US, you couldn't throw a dirt clod into a parking lot without hitting a Bug (not that I ever did that). I didn't play "Slug bug"; I played "There's a Herbie!"
Mom must have picked up on my Herbie obsession because my next birthday was Herbie-themed. I received two books,
A snap-together model,
And a phony nickel twice the size of my palm.
I know the nickel doesn't fit the theme, but I thought the huge coin was really neat.
A year later my family moved 15 miles from from Inwood to Rock Valley, and for the next seven years I would sneak peeks at the VW Bug parked in the high school lot. The car belonged to the high school principal, Osborne Liaboe, and it looked just like a Herbie. I didn't ever dare to get too close to it, though. You can't be caught messing around with the principal's car.
Fast forward to a summer Saturday in 1990. My parents and I were getting ready to take a trip to Minnesota to visit Bob's parents at their new lake cabin. Because the ATM hadn't been invented yet, Dad got up early so he could be at the bank as soon as it opened. When Dad returned with some cash he walked over to the phone hanging on the kitchen wall and told me he had just seen Ozzie put a "For Sale" sign on his old bug. He then lifted the phone's receiver and offered it to me, "Why don't you call him to see how much he wants?"
My heart jumped and I started sputtering, "No, no... I, I, I, I can't call my old principal! That, that guy hated me!" and I pushed the receiver back to him. Dad shook his head and started dialing. "No. He didn't hate you, Brent. He was just doing his job."
I jumped out of the room in a fit of excitement and fear. I was excited at the prospect of buying the Bug, and I was scared that the car would already be sold or that Ozzie would want too much money for it. I was stiffly standing around the corner trying to listen to Dad on the phone, but my heart was pounding too hard for me to really hear anything.
All I was able to process was the end of their conversation. "...if you think that's a fair price, then okay. We'll swing by and pick it up in a few minutes." Dad hung up the phone and poked his head around the corner to where he knew I was hiding. "Okay, bud. You owe me $800."
I was stunned. Just 14 years after seeing the original, I had a Herbie of my own.
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