Key City Drive-In Theatre


Bill Crider said if I really wanted to show some love that I'd have posted that handbill for the drive-in movie theater mentioned in my blog about ideas.

Well, Bill, here it is. I erred on the date. My memory said 1962, but it's actually 1967. In case you can't read the small print, here's what it says.

KEY CITY DRIVE-IN THEATRE, 1750 N. Treadaway -- Abilene, Texas. AUGUST 1967.

Open Nitely 8:30. Feature starts at 8:55. Admission: $1.20 per Carload. All Features Will Be Shown Only Once Nitely -- Come Early and See the Complete Show.

The movies were all double or triple features. I'll list them and their stars. From July 30 through Sept. 2 they were:

Namu, The Killer Whale -- Robert Lansing
The Russians Are Coming -- Carl Reiner and Eva Marie Saint

The Racers -- Kirk Douglas
The Hunters -- Robert Mitchum and Robert Wagner

Honeymoon Hotel -- Robert Goulet and Nancy Kwan
North To Alaska -- John Wayne

Boy, Did I Get A Wrong Number -- Bob Hope and Elke Summer
The Fortune Cookie -- Jack Lemmon

The Trouble With Angels -- Rosalind Russell and Hayley Mills
Alvarez Kelly -- William Holden and Richard Widmark

The Invisible Horror -- Lex Barker and Karin Dor
Terror Of The Mad Doctor -- Gert Frobe and Senta Berger

Way...Way Out -- Jerry Lewis
The Flight Of The Phoenix -- James Stewart

The Young Racers -- Mark Damon
Road Racers -- Sally Fraser and Alan ??
The Green Helmet -- Bill Travers and Ed Begley (that's senior, not the reality show guy who is saving the planet by powering his toaster with a stationary bike)

None But The Brave -- Frank Sinatra and Tatsuya Mihashi
Two On A Guillotine -- Connie Stevens and Dean Jones

Claudelle Inglish -- Diane McBain and Will Hutchins (He was Sugarfoot on TV.)
Susan Slade -- Troy Donahue and Connie Stevens

Ever see any of these? I think only the John Wayne and Jimmy Stewart flicks are still shown. I see them on TV from time to time. Stewart's Flight of the Phoenix was so much better than the remake with Dennis Quaid. Why it was grouped with a dumb Jerry Lewis (apologies to the French) I don't know.

The hot young stars of that era like Diane McBain, Will Hutchins, Troy Donahue, and Connie Stevens were shoved into one movie after another. None of the movies held up over time. Neither did the hot stars for the most part with the possible exception of Connie Stevens.

Ah, fame is so fleeting. Can you say "flash in the pan?"

4 comments:

  1. Thanks! This is great. The picture enlarges just fine when I click on it. Ah, to be in 1967 again!

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  2. Well, it's DriveInTown...so (even) then-aging films such as BOY, DID I GET A WRONG NUMBER (that No One ever wanted to see, at least once they saw any of it) are cheek by jowl with elderly or at least second-run films such as CLAUDELLE INGLISH and NORTH TO ALASKA, from '61 and '60 respectively. But one was Exploitable the other was The Duke!

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  3. And 1959's ROAD RACERS boasts the fifth-billed Alan Dinehart III, who also went by Mason Alan Dinehart when playing the Brazos Kid on THE TEXAN but was AD for his turn as Bat Masterson on WYATT EARP.

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  4. Glad the picture enlarged with good resolution.

    Todd, thanks for the insight. I had no idea some of the films were that old. At first I was chagrined because I've done nearly a 1000 DVD reviews for a client and felt I should kinda know that. But then I realized most of the reviews were for fairly recent movies. The entertainment biz cranks them out really fast. Fast and forgettable.

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