Monday, June 6, 2011

A Night with the Classics

Last week I didn't want to do the dishes.  So I left them in the sink soaking and headed out to the historic Kentucky Theater in downtown Lexington. I picked up my friend Carrie, both of us needed a respite from the activity of our lives. 

If you know Carrie, you know she likes to be at the movies well in advance so that we can get through concessions and find a good seat.  If you know me, you know that I tend to be skidding into the parking lot, running to the ticket counter and hoping Carrie saved me a seat. 

Carrie has been a good influence, I now have time to go through the concession line, then race to my seat in the dark.

But I was good last week.  I didn't know how bad traffic would be downtown, and I was coming from a new direction, so I gave us plenty of time.  Thank goodness...

There was a long line at the ticket counter.

Then there was a really long line for concessions.

Then we couldn't find seats because the place was packed.

We found our seats and got to know our neighbors as we listened to the movie organ music that was playing, creating an atmosphere that took movie goers back to a time when going to the movies was an occasion to be relished.  The theater manager came out and gave us a brief history of the movie we were going to see, The African Queen with Katharine Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart.

The movie started and everyone was enthralled.  You didn't have the teenagers in the back texting or the couple in the corner canoodling...everyone was actually watching the movie.  We laughed and gasped together and in the end we all clapped. 

This was what made movies the experience that people relished.  There wasn't a lot of high tech special effects, but yet it kept everyone engrossed.  Mr. Bogart did a great job as a gin-swilling riverboat captain, Charlie Allnut. And Katharine Hepburn...wow...she always does a great job and her character of missionary Rose Sayer was no different.  It reminds us that love comes in the strangest places, at the strangest times and with the strangest people.  Who would have thought the African River with man-eating crocodiles and huge mosquito's would bring about love.  Oh, and they blew up a German warship...

I am glad the Kentucky Theater brings us the classics each summer.  In two weeks I will be leaving my house super early so that I can avoid the long lines and get a great seat.  They are playing Breakfast at Tiffany's...I can't wait to see Holly Golightly on the big screen.

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