Ep. 108: Goonies, Grease, and Gary: Alabama Theatre Updates

Hey y'all, it's me Tara Strong, AKA Ms. Minutes for Bama Geeks. I hope you're ready to watch and if you don't, I will have to prune you. Stay on your sacred timeline. And a very happy Sunday. Happy Father's Day to all you dads out there. How you doing? Hello. What's up? Yeah. We are the Bama Geeks, and we have one of our favorite people in the entire world joining us once again, finally, after a few months of playing Where's Gary? There he is. If you've been wondering, where is Gary? He's right here. We've got him. He's picking blueberries. This episode, Guy Fieri has triple D. This is episode, this is Bama Geeks triple G. We've talked Goonies and Grease and we got Gary. That's right. Yep. So we are thrilled that you're here tonight with us. We thank you so much for joining us. And we already got, oh, look at Skylar. Skylar Davis. Happy Father's Day to y'all. Thank you, Skylar. Thank you, Skylar. We appreciate it. Thank you very much. So, uh, yeah, it's been a really good father's day and it's been relaxing. I've got my son here, uh, with us. Uh, my daughter, this is the very first year, um, that I do not have my daughter with us and, uh, I've really missed her, but she FaceTimed today from Boston. She's in Boston for the summer. Um, she's in college now, so she has spread her wings. That's right. The little bird is flying, flapping her little wings, flying everywhere. She had, she had a lot of major cities. We had her at the beginning of, at the beginning of May, we had her in New York. She immediately went to London after that. And then once she got back from London, she was right into Boston for the summer. So, yeah, but, uh, I hope you're, I hope you all are having a great father's day. If you're, uh, if you're out there watching, um, Really quickly, as always, as we open up the show, hit the website, BamaGeeks.com. That's where you can find out all about us. We've got all the audio episodes, all the video episodes, blog posts. If you want to be a guest on Bama Geeks, we've got a sign-up form there that will notify us that you want to be on the podcast. We've also got ways that you can support us, BamaGeeks.com slash join. If you want to become either a Patreon member or if you want to become a YouTube channel member, all that info is right there. Of course, you can always find us on social media at BamaGeeks everywhere. And if you are on that book of faith, then look us up the bama geeks front porch just search for that ask to join and we'll let you in there and of course thank you so much to our top channel supporters jamie and mike and darnay and jack they have been with us for golly since almost pretty much the beginning for over four years they won Yeah. Day one, Oos. That's right. Pretty much since the point where we figured out how to take money from people. We started before that, but Mark said, should we really be taking money from people? Yes. Yes, we should. And the good news is we don't take a lot, so hey. yeah you guys yeah thank you for your your long-term support of the podcast and yeah thank you so much yeah we certainly appreciate it and uh while we're here tonight we like I said we've got gary w jones he's the house organist from the alabama theater that gorgeous in downtown birmingham So we are going to be celebrating one hundred years before you know it. Already planning. That's right. I'm looking forward to that. Absolutely. Yeah, we're a couple of folks had talked about doing, you know, just a big gala type thing. And I think we're not going to do that. I think what we're going to do is just an entire year, a year long celebration and do a lot of different things. uh which I'm I'm very very excited because we we've talked about a few things already and every one of them is just more exciting than the other so details will be coming out about that I'd love for us to do like a what I would call a grand patron package where you could just come to everything Oh, yeah. But it would be for some ungodly amount of money. I don't know. I've got an empty credit card. Gary, can we be on the red carpet doing the interviews? Can we be pressed? Can we be red carpet pressed? That way, I mean, before in our member episode, we had to go through several layers of backing down Bo because Bo is like larger than life. If we have him on the red carpet, we can let him go. He would be totally Bo. I'll go Joan Rivers on you in a heartbeat. Can we talk? Can we talk? Oh, you little. I love it. I love it. I love it. So basically in twenty twenty seven, you're going to be living at the theater pretty much. You got a bed situated there. You're going to be there. First of all, I already am. You laugh. You laugh. I actually do have a bed there. That's good. Does it surprise me? I'm not laughing. That's awesome. That's good. It comes in handy at the most weird times. You would think it would be Christmas, and it's really not. It generally gets – it's most used during sidewalk because sidewalk is such a big, big, big thing. For them, of course, but for us, because we're, you know, I don't know how they do it. I don't know. They're wrapping up at twelve, one, two in the morning and they're back at six a.m. Right. And it might not be the same people, but for us, it is the same people. So. Well, that's good. Yeah, yeah. Because you got your accommodations there when you need them. Accommodations. There's, you know, dressing rooms and showers and that melts. Yeah. There are some what I call hiding holes throughout the building where you can get better rest. it's noisy downtown at night. It really is. Fire trucks and ambulances going through and just the sounds of the streets. And you would think in that big building you could get, no. You still hear all the creaks and groans of the building. Those ghosts that walk around, right? No, just the one. Just the one, yeah. That great line from Blues Brothers, it goes by so often you won't even notice. Laughter Laughter Oh, well, speaking of old movies, we're going to talk about the Summer Film Series, which is experiencing a heavily reduced schedule this summer. So we'll talk about that and talk about why it's heavily reduced, what's going to be happening this summer at the Alabama Theatre. Um, if you've never been to the Alabama theater, we highly encourage you to go. This place is one of all of our favorite places. It's gorgeous, but it is absolutely gorgeous. And like we said, it's going to be celebrating its one hundredth anniversary coming up in just less than two years now. And, um, uh, If you've got any questions for Gary while we're here, drop them in the chat. If there's anything you want to know about the Alabama Theater. I'm sure he'll tell you what he can. Oh, I'll make it up. Look, look, look, if it comes down to it, I have a wild theory about the upgrades to make Bertha. Okay. I have a very wild theory. All right. You guys want to hear my wild theory? Yes. Are you ready? I honestly, Gary will not admit to this, but I think that they sent Bertha off and they've been doing the upgrades to the outdoor theater so that when it comes time for the celebration, Bertha can shoot fireworks. See, look at him. See? Uh-huh. Not just sparklers, fellas. The full big ones. All right. Look, thunder on the mountain ain't got nothing on this. Like little Edie, big Bertha. I will tell you this. As many folks know, we did send the console off for some much needed upgrades. And we cobbled a temporary console. Did anybody see the temporary console? Yes. And so... That temporary console was not ornate, very plain, three manuals, not four, but it certainly did the job and it got us through everything. The great thing about the multiplexing relay is it doesn't care how many consoles you have. so we we are planning something for mid-january of twenty twenty six to where we'll feature two twin consoles two consoles both will be connected each independent of the other they will each independently control everything and that's uh getting prepared now meaning I in fact I talked to one of the artists today uh when I was in the middle of shopping at aldi So, you know, it's like, please, please pardon me while I'm, while I'm here in the Aldi aisle of shame and we talk to this international artist. But anyway, that's going to be a lot of fun. And that, that's January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January, January one big instrument. Nice. Birth is back. Fireworks loaded. That's right. See? Confirmed. There we go. Swing out trays. There's a launch button. Oh, cool. Gary may never fire them off, but you guys know he confirmed it here. I could. Exactly. I just choose not to. Yeah. Here we go. I would say, without any fireworks, my favorite thing about Big Bertha is even before you play your first note, that initial, just that... yeah it's because you hear it warming up yeah it's the beast coming to life I love it so uh part of the recent upgrades uh we the the original blower is still there the original spencer orga blow uh in the basement and uh a wonderful gentleman came down and did some reconfiguring of the fan blades. And so now she is just super powerful, super quiet, but you still get that. Oh, and there's a, please help me with the correct terminology. When you press the button, it's not just on, it has to build up to speed. Now there's a term for that. What is it? winding up well no no no it's got to build rpms yeah yeah acceleration it's a technical technical device and a technical term that causes that to happen and and electricity it'll come to me we're going to get twenty minutes into this and I go no but anyway um It's a slow start, and that way it's not kind of jerking everything into place. But that whole, I need to go down there and record that whole power-up sequence because it's very Star Trek-ish, very enterprising. Come on. I imagined it was like Marty powering up the big speaker in Back to the Future. Click, click, click, click. Click, click, click, click, click. So Shane says pressurizing? Well, that's what it's doing. But there's a technical term for the process and the machinery involved. Because we had the same machinery and the same process when we were turning on the fan, recirculating fan for the building. Oh, dang it. I hate when these things. No, I hate when these things escape my brain and it's happening more frequently than it should now. And I'm very distressed. I'm sorry, Gary. We don't speak pipe organ or HVAC. Anyway, that's a great sound and a great feeling because it pressurizes the room as well because it's pulling all that air to get it into the system. Bo, I'm with you. That's a great sound. A colonoscopy? Everyone, step away from the microwave and drink this. It's a slow start. I don't want to dwell on it, but it's a great sound. I'll record it and send it to you guys. And then the same thing happens in reverse. When you turn it off, it winds itself down so it's not just so abrupt. Oh my goodness. I would venture to say. Ninety nine. Ninety nine and a half percent of the people. Can't tell when that blower is running. And. I can walk in the front door and go. Oh who has the organ on? Honestly. That would be a great like TikTok post. Or something like that. I haven't been on TikTok in forever. But like if you just did like. You don't even have to do like the full screen. But like. a shot of like your hands turning on all the stuff. And then all of a sudden you just hear it. You just, yeah, you just hear the sound and then you just like hit the organ and it just like makes the sound. And then you're like, Hey, intro. Come to the Alabama Theater. Something like that. Because, I mean, honestly, you know, my first experience at the Alabama Theater all those years ago, that's what sold me was the organ. Nothing else there. Everything else there is a background noise to the organ. And you would not believe the amount of people I talk to that don't realize that the Alabama Theater has an organ. They have no idea. Well, our dear Glenny Brock says that Big Bertha is the engine that drives that block, drives the theater, rescue the theater, and then subsequently allowed for the road to be paved for the Lyric Theater across the street. And if that organ had not been saved, then... We would not be sitting here talking about all this today. No, I'd be out picking other crops. I'm teasing about this, but it's true. We have a huge... blueberry empire here. Mob land here with blueberries. It's Willy Wonka-ish in perspective. You would be amazed at how many blueberries can be grown in the state of Alabama. And I was out this morning because it rained yesterday afternoon. I was out this morning at six twenty a.m. and it took me two and a half hours to pick this run. Wednesday, we'll pick again. It'll be the same thing. And it's just, it's buckets and buckets and buckets of blueberries. And so if anybody needs blueberries, yell. And if you want to pick blueberries, get with Gary. He'll put you on the schedule. I mean, it rhymes. If you want to pick some blueberries, get with Gary. Kevin's got a whole marketing thing going on. I've got the marketing brain tonight. You pick, you haul off. So, yeah. So, we have gone, boy, have we gone like this. That's the show, man. A hundred years. Organ blower. Blah, blah, blah. Yeah. Blueberries. Yes. That's just, that's Bama Geeks. We go all over the place. We kind of describe ourselves, I mean, you've been on the show a couple times, Gary, you know, we kind of describe ourselves as like the old guys who sit at Waffle House, you know, or Hardee's or whatever, sitting down talking about stuff. We're just all over the place. Jacks. It's Jacks. Yeah, and we've got Jess that hopefully reigns it all in for us, but we, you know. Sometimes. Sometimes. She tries. I try. Look, I've seen that girl go off on a tangent, too. That's right. She fits right in. We all lucked out there, didn't we, Brock? I can tangent with the best of them. Exactly. There you go. I was going to bring this up, though. I meant to tell you, we did pick up a little bit of swag when we were there. Oh, yeah. Those are brand new. We got the new little stickers. There you go. I like that. Meet Me at the Alabama. There's also a matching poster and a matching t-shirt. That's a very new graphic. Those were brand new for that movie. Who did that artwork? I don't know. That is... Oh, man. Oh, man. Yeah, that's my style. Oh, that's going on my backpack. A hundred percent. Yeah. There's a lyric one as well. Oh, okay. It's horizontal. And the Alabama, of course, is the vertical. I don't know who did that. Our Miss Mullins is in charge of all of that. And her able-bodied next door, next sweet neighbor, Caitlin. They do amazing stuff like that up there. We got the window clean too. Window clean. Yeah, I don't have anything on my car. I've had my car now for four years and I've not put anything on it. That Alabama window cling is going in it. Yeah, there you go. It was a vanity license plate for your front that was there for a minute that had that meet me at the Alabama. Those were very short lived. I don't even have one of those. Collector's item. I know one of our Alabama Theatre Oregon Society members has one. I may sneak over and just take it off the front of his car. Gary, what are you doing? Mine. Where'd you get that, Gary? Found it. It already has bugs on the front of it. The answer is always eBay. There you go. I do love the meet me at the Alabama design. I like that a lot. I love that design. I'll see if I can find out who actually is responsible for that, but I'm going to blame Ms. Mullins and me. Because I know you guys have used local artists for stuff like that. Oh, yeah. So I know quite a few artists through other folks in Birmingham. So I was wondering if it was going to be name-dropping somebody that I'd heard of before. No. I'd love to know. I'm pretty sure that they did not do this, but a lot of our stuff has always been designed by Yellowhammer creators. Yeah, there we go. And so... Those guys, though, have gone sort of in a different direction currently, and they're doing less and less of the types of things that we do. And then, of course, we're not doing as much, especially in the summer, as we have in the last few years, this past summer and this summer. We're taking some much needed time to do some serious upgrades in preparation for the one hundred year celebration. If that's not a segue, I don't know what is. Segue right on to that film series right there. Yeah. Do you want to talk about film series first or do you want to talk about the summer upgrades this go-round? I want to talk about the fireworks. On the left swing out tray, launch one and launch two. All they flip up and buttons that you flip it up and then you hit the toggle. Oh yeah. And then toggle. Yeah. It's all very James Bond issue. Flip, flip, flip, flip, flip. Well, Well, the summer film series has been, like we said earlier, greatly reduced because of what's going to be happening. So you're only showing two movies this summer. You've already shown one. Yes. So last summer, we took the entire summer off and we showed... zero movies. And boy, howdy, that created quite a stir. So this go round, we said, well, we've got this block of time. The upgrades that we're doing, the projects that we're doing aren't going to take as much time as last year. So we thought we could get these two movies in. And they're I hesitate. There is a potential of dragging in a third movie in August. But let me tell you what's going to happen this summer. First of all, we showed last Friday The Goonies, and that was so much fun. What an enthusiastic crowd. They were there, and we can talk about The Goonies all you want, but I... I love the Goonies. You see so many elements of things to come with Spielberg movies, Spielbergisms. And it's just a great romp to be able to sit back and watch. And yet, is it a product of its time? Yes, very much so. Is it that whole mid eighties? Yes, very definitely. And I love it. And then, of course, and we knew that would be well attended and it was. And then, of course, the twenty seventh of June, we've got Greece right over your shoulder there, Jess. That's right. And Grease is always a crowd pleaser. And when we were first showing Grease, we were just showing what I call the standard straight Grease. Of course, everybody sings. Right. So a few seasons ago, we said, well, why don't we try? Why don't we try this? Why don't we try and do the sing-along version? Mm-hmm. And that has been the greatest thing that we do. And so that one Grease sing-along, when there's a song on the screen, the lyrics appear across the bottom. It's not obtrusive or distracting and everybody knows those songs anyway. So it just makes it a lot of fun for everyone. So we did Sing Along Grace and that was such a success. Then we subsequently did a few years ago, the Sing Along Mamma Mia and then carried it over to Christmas so that one white Christmas is the Sing Along White Christmas. And you would think that that's just so corny, except when you get white Christmas singalong, when you get two thousand people singing. Yes. You know. It's amazing. I mean, we've got people standing in the aisles doing the sisters routine. Oh, nice. It's a romp. It's so much fun. We really enjoy that. So those two movies we're doing. And then right after that, we're having Brad Williams, the growth spurt tour on July. I think that's the twelfth. to look here real quick I should have been more prepared yeah that's uh yeah saturday july twelfth and then on sunday july thirteenth we we go down and I mean like like like you pulled the plug it's down deep pressure rising so here here's what's happening during that downtime for the the two weeks in July into the first parts of August. In in nineteen twenty seven, when the building was built, Alabama Power dropped that quadrant of power distribution into our basement. Now, why? I don't know. But, you know, if you go backstage, there's a basement and then there's a basement below that. And then there's another basement below that. And then there's a room below that. Oh, wow. We got levels. We got levels and levels here. Paris Opera House, Phantom of the Opera levels. Yeah. So there's a room and I call it the room of death because it is. And trust me when I tell you, we have this thing so sealed off and secured. It's hard for us to get in there because if you go in that room, there's several things. One is there's four hundred and forty volts coming in to the building. I can't even. I can't even guess or imagine. I know someone who could tell us how many amps are flying around in there, but here's what I can tell you. That is the break off for the grid for the rest of the surrounding areas. When it goes down, you know, everybody's going down, Pazitz, McWane, the whole nine yards. oh okay um and so why it's in our building I don't know it just I guess was logical at the time and they did it because they could and yeah whatever so here are a couple things about the room number one is everything is exposed so if if you were to touch kevin I could charge my car on that room if you were to touch something in there you would never know it it's just it would you would be it would be over uh when you go in if you have like earrings jewelry or a tongue piercing it vibrates like wow that much craziness and that feeds up a level into the electrical room. And I, I, I promise you, I know I am prone to over dramatizing and over exaggerating something, but I promise you that I'm not exaggerating one bit. And that is, it is the room where the switching is. And it's the old Frankenstein three poles. Oh man. Oh, and I, oh, uh, Again, again. So those are currently, when I first started at the Alabama, those were exposed and you didn't take anybody into that room. And only recently, very recently, have they been enclosed in a plexiglass cover. So if you were to accidentally fall into it, you would hit the plexiglass and it wouldn't be the end of the world as opposed to previous to that. It literally was the end of the world for whoever happened to be there. Yeah. Wow. All of that. Some may say, regrettably, all of that is coming out and modern switching is going in everything up to code, everything very, very modern electrical switching so that the power distribution now is one hundred percent safe. for anyone at any time and I think that's a great testament to our board of directors and the executive management of the alabama in in something that nobody will ever see and nobody will ever know about unless they're tuned in here tonight and and nobody would really appreciate except It is a safety concern and we want everything safe for the next hundred years. Yeah. Yeah. And I will say this. We don't borrow money to... Shane said, and someone just got the idea for their supervillain origin. They're going to drench in some kind of chemical that fall into the electrical. Or the next Mission Impossible movie. But we don't borrow money to do these projects, these big projects. Last year's this one. Mm-hmm. It's all paid for by butts in seats and concessions. Yeah. And a little bit of merch. That's fantastic. A little bit of merch. So, you know, you paid for it. You funded it. They're right there. And we're lucky. And trust me, we never, ever take for granted the fact that it could turn on a dime. We're so very, very lucky that we can fund these projects, pay for them outright. We're not having to borrow money or we're not having to plead, you know, oh, we need money for this or we need money for that. I mean, when was the last time you really heard us ask for money? We're very fortunate. We're very lucky. We don't take it for granted. All these things are paid for and it's a pay as we go thing. Like we plan these things out. I mentioned that Ms. Mullins is on vacation and when she gets back, there is a big board meeting with her and the executive committee and they're planning now the projects for the next five to ten years. Wow. And just that amount of careful foresight and thoughtfulness for, you know, planning ahead. Yeah. It just it thrills me because I know that as I age on up there, I'm still going to have a place to go to work and you're still going to have a place to come and pipe organ to listen to. Oh, my God. Let me tell you this real quick. I ran into an old acquaintance that I hadn't seen in about ten years, and I'm just not going to be indelicate about this. He is an opera snob, fanatic. Okay. And I ran into him and he said, oh my goodness, I haven't seen you. How long has it been? Ten years? And I said, yeah, I think it's been about ten years. He said, are you still playing that old organ? Oh. Bro. He's still playing that old organ. And all I could say back to him was, are you still singing those old tunes? Yeah. That did not go over well. And I was so smug and self-satisfied after that. That will live rent-free in your head for at least another third of years. So originally on my tombstone, it was going to read, he had the right of way. But now I think I'm going to change it. He played that organ. He played that old organ. Yeah, that old organ. Take from that what you will. I mean... Don't get me started on the organ jokes. How's your organ, Gary? Oh, it's big and red and huge. We can do this all night. Rise is on demand. It's okay, Brock. We're after the seven minutes. We're all right. We're talking about Big Bertha. I know. Big Bertha. Google's AI bought that, huh? Kevin, you mentioned the fireworks, but one of the... The reason the console got sent out was for mechanical upgrades, which have been super, super helpful. And again, I would venture to say that most of the public couldn't see or recognize those mechanical things. As an organist, it's like getting a Buick Graham National. You're just like, wah, crazy. But she got some cosmetic touch ups and a wonderful father daughter team in northern Shelby County that does specifically Art Deco restorations. But he's like, you know, I think we could tackle this. And he came in and just you talk about a facelift. He did such an amazing job. and she just she's always been very very photogenic and even on the day that she went out she was still so pretty in a picture now you know that at ten foot once you got up close you could see a little bit of wear and tear yeah now that all that's been done it is like factory fresh it's just incredible beautiful beautiful work And she glistens. Aesthetically, it's very pleasing. So we got lots of good things going on there. All the keys have a little more bounce to them now. So that was phase one of the project, was some rebushing of keys, leveling. You've got four manuals, sixty-one keys per manual. And you've got, believe it or not, not just the The common suspects there that you would think would be worn out. Those things get worn out over time and decades of use. And I don't know if anybody notices or watches me play, but I am all over the thing. And you're not just there in dead middle C position. You are everywhere. Because it is... It is a unit orchestra. Wurlitzer never called it an organ. They called it a unit orchestra. And you're there to make the orchestra come alive for you all over the place. And so after decades and decades of use, much of that needed to be readjusted, reworked, rebushed, refelted, whatever. There is a unique feature on most theater organs that Wurlitzer devised. It's called second touch. And what that means is when you press a key, it hits a, let me do this like this. So you can see when you press a key, it hits here, a stop, and it makes a contact. And whatever you have on first touch is playing currently. And then if you press a little harder, it presses through a spring onto a second set of contacts. And you get a second sound on top of, so it's great. It's great for doing counter melodies and, uh, post horn jabs and, uh, little glockenspiel tinkles so that you can, uh, Oh heavens. So that you, you can, you can really, really, uh, have a lot of fun adding stuff that you normally. You would need a third hand, except your third hand becomes the second touch because you're pressing through. And if you rehearse enough and are patient enough and can work out enough, you can make it really effective. So that is the one thing that goes out of adjustment more than anything, because that's a very, I don't want to say cantankerous system. It's just, it's very sensitive. Yeah. Needs adjustment. Look at him go. I know. Look at that guy play that. I know that guy. He's everywhere. Well, it's been quite a few years ago, but I remember going to a concert where you actually had a guest organist there as well, that was there and was playing some stuff as well. I forget what his name was, but he was amazing. It could have been any number of folks if it was a concert. Yeah, it was a concert, yeah. So Tom Helms does Phantom of the Opera for us every October, the last Sunday in October. It's his original score. It is the nineteen twenty five Lon Chaney classic, putting in a shameless plug for that. But the great thing about that is that is precisely and exactly why that organ was built and why that building was built. The film accompanied the film with the Mighty Wurlitzer. And then at Sidewalk, the incredible Nathan Avakian for four years now in a row, and he's coming back again this year, does the International Youth Silent Film Festival. And Nathan has such a wonderful approach. He can take an old silent film and accompany it. And so that's the way it used to be. Now the International Youth Silent Film Festival, they create these three minute shorts, these silent shorts, and he accompanies though. Now the trick there is, They are selecting a genre. He is presenting them with a score and they create a film around the score. So it's actually done in real time. Sweet. So he's doing that. And then Nathan uses an incredible amount of studio technology to create rhythm tracks and orchestral tracks that he uses his iPad and plugs into the sound system. And so it's like Bertha and Friends at that point. So Nathan, whereas Tom Helms is absolutely flashbacking us to nineteen twenty five, Nathan is flash forwarding us to, you know, twenty twenty five. And it's like the most incredible thing about that old organ is it can do today okay here's a great example um the the last sidewalk he did a solo number and the first three notes in I was like oh my god he's not and he was doing uh a britney spears song oh three note three notes he's in three notes and I I scream from the audience it's brittany You can see him up there going, Gary, there's kids in here. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. You can censor me or X me out or never invite me back. We've got to keep Gary away from the Tito's for at least the first twenty minutes of the performance. My point is the organ is many, many things. It can do many, many different things, both ancient and future. The last thing I ever expected to hear come out of the Wurlitzer would be Britney Spears. I can imagine how you felt in that moment. Goosebumps. It's incredible. Can it do it? Yes. Can it pull it off? Absolutely. It's all because Nathan is a genius. Wow. That's amazing. Now you've got to top that and do like, Thirty Seconds to Mars or something like that. That might actually top it. I'm going to do Beyonce. He says, I'm going to keep playing that old organ. That old organ. And we're going to keep one-upping each other. There you go. There you go. That's right. And now selections from Lemonade. Now we'll be playing Fergie. I think we need to start talking about Grease. Let's do it. Let's do it. we can yeah we can talk about grace grace is the and it's the sing-along version and we're looking for a wonderful crowd and it'll be a lot of fun and just come on down dress up we had uh so many folks in costume uh not last year but the year before when we did it uh the best the best costume I've got to find this picture I've got it in my phone somewhere um this this lady woman, girl, female showed up and she had, let me just, I'll come back to it. I asked her, I was like, where did you come up with this? And she said, I got every bit of this at the Dollar Tree. She had on an aluminum smock. She had aluminum curlers. in her hair. She was a beauty school dropout. Beauty school dropout. That is great. It was perfect. It's like you couldn't have paid hundreds of dollars and come up with a better costume that she probably did for twelve bucks. Yeah. A lot of people, you know, want to do pink ladies or the T-Birds, but that's a lot of pink ladies and T-Birds. And that's always great. It's always fun. And, you know, you get groups of pink ladies and That's awesome. But to get a beauty school dropout, come on. That's, that's incredible. Yeah. I always liked the niche costume. Yeah. That, you know, they're just unique to something that not everyone is doing. No. And I mean, who would have thought of that? Right. Exactly. I was going to ask you if people did come show up and dress up and everything. Oh, yeah. Definitely. Definitely. Definitely. Definitely. That's good. You know, grab grab grab your pink lady jacket or your Thunderbird jacket and come on. And if you're more clever than that, so much the merrier. Absolutely. Now we're going to have seventeen beauty school dropouts, which I think would be a hoot and a half. I mean, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's not like it's a bad thing. No, no. That'd be great. So we'll be having that one and then Brad Williams after that. And then we take our little break to do all this fun electrical stuff and get all that switching brought up to much more modern standards. Yeah. So when you do take out the Frankenstein switch and everything, you guys are going to have like a little museum area set up, you know? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. You know, I am a pack rat by nature, and there's a lot of good fun stuff lurking about the building. We're loath to throw anything away. There are a couple of great storage areas, one in the first basement and then one up on the fourth floor. There's storage up there that's got a lot of good fun stuff up there. and uh those are things you just really don't really want to get rid of um now I'll tell you this uh there uh back in when we did the first major restoration they took the old peter clark lighting system out and that was the the you know the the wizard of oz control board with all the Stuff that you cranked everything up and cranked everything down. And that actually got redistributed to three or four theaters across the nation that still utilized that system, had no plans to upgrade or no funds to upgrade. And so they were able to take and repurpose that equipment. So sometimes we let stuff go, but it's not going to the dump. It's going to be repurposed and used. That makes sense. I think that's a great thing, you know, Nice. There's a very bizarre, tight-knit group of theaters. There's an organization called the League of Historic American Theaters. How's that for a name? It sounds like a, yeah. Everyone refers to it as LHAT, League of Historic American Theaters. They have an annual conference that moves around. Several years ago, I got to attend and it's just amazing because here we are in our little theater in our little town and we think that we're just so alone in the world and nobody has the same problems we do and nobody does have to worry about this or worry about that. All of a sudden, you find out that there are hundreds of very small, very medium, very large theaters across the country that are in the same boat. And so I don't know if it's Misery Loves Company, but the networking there is incredible. And so we have cultivated so many good relationships and friendships in nearby theaters and neighbors. We have some wonderfully fine, fun friends in our sister theater in Tennessee, in Knoxville, the Tennessee Theater. And then the Tampa Theater, of course, the Fox Theater in Atlanta. And I mean, we talk amongst ourselves frequently. And of course, here's another thing, too. It's like if there's a touring show, what sold you know what what were what were the hot items at concessions you know what you need to expect yeah that's just marketing that's that's yeah the thing is is you know so many people are not willing to share that and then and then you get this funky little group and it's like you know here here let me take my shirt off and show you everything This is way more dramatic than I thought it was. I thought you guys were sharing numbers. I thought you guys were sitting around going, let's talk knob and tube wiring. Well, they're showing their knobs. You do find out what's going on in different markets and that old adage, will it play in Peoria or whatever that old saying was, you do find out what is hot currently. all of a sudden you're seeing a movie that will rotor through. And I know right now in the Southeast, Greece is big. And again, we're back to because it puts butts in seats. And that's what we do. That's what we're there for. I wax on about the olden days where we showed several obscure movies as part of the summer film series and we can't afford to do that anymore. It would be lovely to show X and it would be lovely to show Y and it would be wonderful to show Z. If they're not breaking even and making us money, we can't continue doing that. Understandable. That's why, you know, again, we're never, ever going to take for granted the holiday film series because that thing is just, it has a life of its own. Yeah. And we really try not to tamper with it. And we get accused sometimes of being repetitive and showing the same old things over and over, except we've tried several times to throw something in new and try something different. But evidently, I mean, people keep coming back. It's better not get rid of Die Hard, okay? No, he won't. We talked about Die Hard at the last broadcast. We will never get rid of Die Hard. That's just sweet. That's the craziest movie we show. I love it, and everybody loves it, and it's insanity. yeah and I I as much as and I think it's just this whole like you talk about the old theaters I don't I don't know what it is and it's just I guess the nostalgia part of it but I i I love coming into those environments, these historical theaters, these historical places that, you know, Alabama is almost a hundred years old. It's just, there is, I cannot describe it. But when you walk through, when you get in that, when you get inside that building, you just, you just feel, it just hits me in the feels. I just feel a certain way. It's the aura. It's the aura. It's got an aura. There is an energy and it has a tendency to do a couple of different things. One is it will transport you to a different, I don't want to say dimension or realm, but it takes your mindset and places it in a different place. Yeah. And they're looking around at the decor and the decor. It's just like I can sit there and look at it and then see something, always see something I didn't catch before. And I'm always looking for that, too. It's just just taking it all in. I'm a beauty of it. I'm there every day and I cannot tell you how many times I will see something that I have never seen before. And if I'm there every day, I can imagine if you're visiting on a fairly frequent basis that you see something. Yeah. I mean, and most of it is just right there in plain view, except sometimes. Yeah. There's a lot going on. I love old architecture and things like that. And it's just it's the perfect. It's like I said, I just it's like the or that's the best way to sum it up. And then when you play movies like Grease, it's it still touches that part of a younger part of you that. You get caught up in everything in your adult life and the frantic and the anxieties of an adult and the things you do. But when you can go and just take a moment and go to a place, nostalgia is just all around you. It's just surrounding you. And you feel good in that moment. You're able to escape. You're able to have a release and just enjoy those moments. It's a great brain break. It is. It's a fantastic brain break. I do have a marketing question. I was super curious about this the last time I was up there. You guys had added an extra concession area down in the lower area down by the restroom, like right next to the restroom, which I mean, that's awesome. It's down there. I was wondering how successful that was. Did that actually work out well for you guys? So first of all, I'm going to correct you. It is not next to the restroom. Okay. Okay. It is inside. the common lounge, the lounge just between the men's lounge and the ladies' lounge, and then beyond that is the restroom. Yes, there is a bedroom. Okay, I am very sorry. Gary is wanting to let you know they're not selling mixed drinks right by the bathroom door. That's what he's telling you. That common lounge was designed in either courting couples or dating couples or whatever, married couples, whatever. That is the point where you come into the common lounge and you break off and the gentlemen would go to the gentleman's lounge and the ladies would go to the ladies lounge. And then they would wait there for their opportunity to go into the actual restrooms proper and do their business and come back out. The ladies lounge has an extended lounge area. That's a power room. So they could do that. And then you come back out to the common lounge and go back upstairs. So how did it do that? Okay. Logistics are out of the way. Years ago, I wanted to do this. And our previous front of house manager was like, you're not putting liquor and selling cocktails down in the bathrooms. And I said, no, I'm not. And I tried to explain to her. The same thing he just said. It's the cycle. Wait, wait, wait. That's a lounge, okay? Common lounge. So, recently... we revitalized this area. So let's take a sold out show. For example, we have the main bar and it has five stations. And then above that is the mezzanine bar. It has two stations. And above that is what we call the balcony or dress circle bar. And it has two stations. And that bar is in the elevator shaft. It was supposed to have been originally in nineteen twenty seven, the top of the elevator. Oh, OK. And in nineteen twenty seven, several things happened. They were running way over budget and way out of time. They built the Alabama in eight and a half months. That's from the first shovel of dirt groundbreaking to the doors opening eight and a half. We can't get permits in eight and a half months. Yeah. And and so a couple of things happened that the they said, well, we need to cut this from the budget. We need to cut this out. So the elevator got nixed. So the handicap restroom on the ground floor, that is the ground floor elevator entrance. And then the Coca-Cola syrup room below that is the basement. And then when you go up to the mezzanine level where the offices are, that was the mezzanine port of entry and exit for the elevator and then you get up to the balcony bar and that was the top floor And that never happened. And so that got built into a two station balcony bar. And then even above that in the what we call the loft, which is the room, which is my favorite room in the building, by the way, because the view looks out onto Third Avenue and you've got the vertical right here in your face, like the big A is right here at you. And if any of you have never been there, please let me know the next time you're there and I'll take you up there. It's phenomenal. And so that room also has now a two station bar. And the whole point of this is, If you've got that many people, you need to distribute them throughout the building. And so a couple of things. One is there's always going to be a line at a sold out concert or sold out movie. I'm sorry. There always is. Unless you have two thousand bartenders for two thousand people, you're going to have to wait. It's true of anywhere, anytime. What I want to see, and this is what I want to know, is that line moving? And if it's moving, then it's going to be a line. I don't care if it's moving. I'm happy. And when you distribute people throughout the building, that really gives you a great opportunity. In the days prior to the restroom expansion renovation, which happened in twenty twenty, you would have a line going down to the ladies room. It would go all the way into the ladies lounge, into the ladies powder room, into the ladies restroom and back all the way up to the staircase. Now, I don't want this to be sexist or anything like that, but it just takes ladies a moment longer than it does gentlemen. No, that's true. That's facts. Because, you know, there's more to do, and let's face it, I can walk out to the alley and come back in and I'm done. Yeah. Ladies don't have that opportunity or well, nice ladies don't. Yeah. So what would happen is as, as a couple, you would go down and lady standing in line and the guys are there. Now guys, you know, your lady's in line to use the bathroom. You do not leave. Yeah, of course. There's none of this. I'll meet you upstairs. No, sir. You'll stay right here until I'm done. And I was like, what if we could sell a beer or two while they waited? They're going to be so drunk when they come out. Here's the marketing plan. So you've got someone there. And they're waiting for their party to reconvene. And it's like, hey, you want to get a drink? Don't you want to get her one too? And then, of course, he's standing there with two. He's going to drink both of them. Go back to the restroom. Go back to the restroom. And so that – That one bartender with that one station will do with a very, very limited menu. It's a very small, very limited, you know, top ten, top twenty items. Right. Not a full menu. Just grab and go. Grab and go. Yeah. That one bartender will do generally as much or more than the number one station at the main bar. And so now you want to get our Miss Mullins excited and make her do this. She's a numbers gal. So I show her the numbers. Here they are. That bar far exceeds any expectation. Yeah. And so I laugh and joke about it. Yes, it is a great marketing thing, but we always go back to patron satisfaction. And that is one thing that we found that the perception of that is that we're really trying really hard and we really are to make sure that everybody's getting served. Honestly, the original concept of that was, you know, maybe we just do water and maybe some popcorn. You know, I just I just want a bottle of water and I don't want to wait in this line with cocktails. And all of a sudden it became that top twelve, top twenty. Yeah, that that is that is the story of the lounge, the common lounge area. We call it a mini bar. Yeah. I think it was a great idea, especially like during the holiday season, you know, the holiday film series, you just got, you got opportunities just to grab this really quick. And I just, I just need this core product really fast. So heading back on your logic though, do you have guys stumbling upstairs? No, we give them the water we were talking about. Come on, man. Get with it. We never over serve anyone. That's right. Now, what your friend does with it, I can't tell you. The same concept applies at the Lyric. I don't know if you've been to a show at the Lyric, but there's the main bar there. And then if you're going up to the balcony, there was this crazy little utility closet. And I'm standing there going... Wait a minute. Hey, there's a space there. There's an empty space there that's not being utilized. And so we created what we call the disco bar up there. And we outfitted it with a disco ball and lights. Oh, nice. And it is a disco mini bar. And again, it is a limited selection, the hottest items. And of course, you know, demographically, we changed that menu based on the type of show and the type of audience that we're expecting. And this goes back to sharing information with our sister theaters. So we kind of know what to focus on up there. And again, that one disco bar with one bartender will do as much or more than the number one selling bar at the main bar with a full bar. Did you guys pick up that idea from other theaters or have you just kind of shared that with other theaters? Like be looking for broom closets. You're not using it. Convert them in the disco. I, I, I generally always give credit where credit is due, but those are mine. Have you shared that with other theaters? And have you seen their adoption as well? You can, you can do this. You can, you know, the, let me tell you that elevator shaft bar, when, when I took over concessions was still raw, uh, concrete from nineteen twenty seven had never been finished out it was hideous it had been somebody over the years had painted the walls this hideous hideous blue we called it the blue room it was it was the ugliest place on the planet and and I'm standing there going now wait a minute there's an empty room going right to the balcony So, yeah. With Blue, you had that moment you could have made at the TARDIS. From Doctor Who. There's nothing in the Alabama theater that is blue. And why that room got painted blue, I don't know. It's red and golden green. You know, those good Spanish, Moroccan, Moorish colors. And how that wound up blue, I don't know. But now, walk up there next time. Walk up there to that bar. It may not be open for Grease, but, you know, it's still there and intact. And I can walk you up and show it to you. It's just... It's beautiful. And there's a rhyme and a reason to which bars get opened. As you hit certain numbers, you're always going to start out at the main bar. And then as you hit the next number level, you're going to open the mezzanine and then you're going to open the balcony and you're going to open the loft. And then we open the lounge bar downstairs. Rock really appreciates being able to get his diehard eggnog really fast. I know, right? And there again, the concept of us serving eggnog was so foreign to everyone. And last year was the, not, not, not twenty twenty four, but twenty twenty three was the first season. And I talked to my rep and I said, look, I'm willing to try this. I'm willing to do this. You know, can you help me out? As in, like, I don't want to be stuck with eighteen cases of eggnog at the end. What are we going to do with this eggnog? But it's perfect for the Christmas. It's it's absolutely perfect for the holiday season. Well, we ran out the first season and I was I was calling the rep going to it. is there any more floating around in the city? Cause it's, it's an allocated item. It's a, you have to order it in May. Right. And you know, it's just, they produce it and then they send it out and it's done. And he was like, you know, hang, hang on. I'll, I'll check. So that rep, Ulysses was driving around six counties gathering up a case here and a bottle there for us. Yeah. Cause it's like, even at the grocery stores, it's like, we've got it. It's here right now. And then when it's gone, it's gone. Yeah. We're not restocking. So, so yeah, that, that Christmas eggnog is, is a hit. yeah it's good all right understandable kevin here here's a great uh story I always uh share because this is this is one hundred percent purely not me uh I stole this idea shamelessly and give them all the credit that credit is due but has has anybody been to the theater and had one of our little fruit and cheese boxes no No. No. Wait, that's a thing? Yeah. Is it? No. Oh. What? Jess only ever gets popcorn. Well, I had two boxes at Goonies, by the way. It was fantastic. It's the world's best popcorn. It is wonderful. We'll talk about that in a moment, too. So the little fruit and cheese box, it's a little clam with three different cheeses. Oh, what? And it's got red grapes and white grapes and apple slices and crackers and strawberry. And if we can get them, which is hard to do, believe it or not, dried apricot. I can eat healthy there? It's crazy. And we sell a gazillion of them. We really do. You should add blueberries to that. You got the blueberries. Yeah. In season. Let me tell you, the other night at the, what was it? Oh, Black Jacket Symphony at the Alabama. By God, we did a blueberry bramble, courtesy of Uncle Gary. So the fruit and cheese came from a trip that I took to New Orleans. And it was the summer that the Sanger Theater reopened after Hurricane Katrina. And they had done that multi-million dollar restoration. And Wicked was playing. And I've seen Wicked, gosh, a hundred times. And so I went to the box office and I got up to the ticket booth and I asked the lady, I said, look, I'm from out of town. I'm not here to see the show. I'm really here to see Wicked. the restoration of the building, can you just please sell me the cheapest ticket regardless of seating or obstructed view or whatever? And she was like, oh, honey, sure, blah, blah, blah. And she got me in on some ridiculous ticket price because I wasn't going to stay for the show. And I went inside and I was just admiring the theater and admiring the beauty. And of course, I was, you know, it's it's me and it's new Orleans. And so I got to have something to drink and I get up to the bar and I'm standing there and I'm just going to order my standard stock stuff. And I'm looking at the menu and I'm like, and it has a little fruit and cheese thing. And I'm like, fudge. And I thought, well, I don't, I've eaten already. I don't want this. And so I bought one and I took it and I deconstructed the thing there in the lobby and took four hundred pictures and From the Sanger Theater in New Orleans and brought it to the Alabama. And now it is one of our top selling snacks. Okay. I'm trying this next time I'm there. Yeah. Yeah. We make them fresh the day of. We sell a boatload of them at Sidewalk. And it's just a good alternative to candy. Yeah. And it's just nice and something fresh, fresh fruit. And it's normally up there on the menu. It's on the menu. I guess I'm focused on the popcorn. I've never seen that. Popcorn's on my brain because of the smell of the popcorn. Yeah. I know. I know. I am getting that. I'm definitely getting that next time we go. Yes. Fruit and cheese tray and eggnog, Brock. There you go. There you go. Well, that's a Christmas. I'm for it. I'm all for it. So we talked about, Jess, you got two boxes of popcorn. We pop that corn in house. And I have to tell you, and these are decisions that we consciously make. In the world of popcorn, if you can possibly imagine, there are about nine different grades of corn, of kernels of corn that you can purchase. from the absolute rock gut bottom cheapest thing that you can possibly produce and put out the door. And I've had some of that. Yes, you have. Thank you, Shane. And so we have always opted for the highest level premium grade corn. It comes from Gold Medal and it's called Maxi Pop and it is the nicest corn. It's all that good, fun stuff, you know, non-trimmed, low. You can tell. Yeah. And then there are about six different grades of popping oil. And we always opt for the best oil, which is called tasty pop. And that and a little bit of flavor call, and you've got magic. And it's all popped fresh. I love this behind the scenes info on the popcorn. I do. And there are, we have the old machine that we've had there forever and we still use, we use it at Christmas because we run, we have to run two machines at Christmas. And then we have a nicer, newer, higher capacity machine that we're currently using. that really, really just pushes out the corn. And so a lot of folks are like, well, gosh, Gary, what are you gonna do when the building doesn't have electricity for these four to six weeks in July and August? and and the answer is um we take and we completely and totally disassemble that popcorn machine now it gets cleaned on a regular basis health inspector jeff cove blah blah all these places during this downtime it gets taken down to I mean the raw base as disassembled as it can be and scrubbed and cleaned thoroughly a deep sanitation yes a deep deep deep clean yeah And I always think that it's the thing to do, but I'm also like, should we really do that? Because it's like a grill. Yeah. Seasoned. Yeah. It's not as seasoned. Yeah. But I don't know. I'll tell you this. Ice machines... mess around with that yeah well we have we have multiple ice machines throughout the building and they're they're cleaned on a rotational basis meaning trust me when I tell you you can trust the ice at the alabama in the lyric theater there is no bio slime or anything growing there our I'm not going to mention any names but our jefferson county health inspector said this is one of three places in this city that I will actually use the ice from well yeah our our team is so you know uh just conscientious of the fact that these are the things that need to be cleaned on a regular basis and then you do these massive cleanings um You know the amount of people that don't realize that if you buy one of those little ice machines or whatever in your home, they don't realize you need to clean them? Yes. I'm like, do you not understand all the stuff that's in water? that could just get nasty, you know, and not just that, but everything that gets, it's just, it's, it is. And it's, it's, it's not just what's in the water. It's what the water will grow. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so, yeah, we're, we're very conscious. Yeah. I know. I mean, that's something I'm kind of proud of that. I work in an environment that I know that everything I touch and eat is safe. Yeah. Yeah. I've got good folks there that get that, you know, no hands in the ice. Well, I'm not coming anymore. yeah we've got one of those little ice machines we clean that thing all the time yeah yeah and and I I think um uh there there are there are so there are you know solutions and sanitizers that you can use uh but I got I I got grilled by the health department you know how are you clean what are you what are you cleaning this with and I was like oh my god I'm about to confess something and I'm either gonna get written up or or hugged. A shutdown. A shutdown. Historic theater closes due to, no. Due to ice issue. Ice issues. What are you cleaning this with? And I said, well, I clean this like my grandmother cleaned and that's with distilled vinegar. Hey, that will kill everything. Oh, my gosh. Yes. So we take the machine down, let it melt down, clear it out. And then I'm literally inside the thing. every cubic inch with distilled vinegar and uh we do we we start with a little dawn but then it gets the the vinegar yeah dawn makes everything better you know better yes all the the ice bins up front where you get your cocktails all those get cleaned out with vinegar and I just And I got the hug is what I got. You know, it's becoming a lot more obvious while they give you a place to sleep there. Yes. Gary, clean the ice machine. We got mild slime on level seven. No, but I just, I just think, you know, with our team, I, I, I think we're proud of both theaters. We're proud of the environment. We're proud of, and not in a, you know, showy prideful way. We're just, we're happy to share. And we're back to patron experience. We want that patron experience to be good. And Brock, if you walked into my concessions kitchen, you know, with a white glove, I'm like, come on, because I don't have anything to hide. It's all clean. It's all ready to go. Well, I mean, I've never, and anytime I've ever been there, I have never encountered anyone that represented the theater that wasn't positive, that wasn't jovial. I mean, jovial, like they're like super happy to be there. It's not like going, and granted, I'm going to get us in trouble here, but like going to AMC and going to one of those theaters and the kids, you're like, can I get some popcorn? And they literally have the popcorn machine going back there and they're like... I guess I should put some of that. Oh, wait, we got it going. Okay. Give me just a minute. You know, I I'm, I'm exceptionally lucky in that. And this is weird. Generally in a restaurant or bar or concession environment, your, your turnover rate is fairly high. My, my turnover rate is nil. I mean, it is. Yeah. Because the Tito's. We have such an enthusiastic team and they really work so well together. And I'm lucky in that for the first time, basically in my entire career, I'm in an environment where there's not one single solitary person that's coming in the door that I don't roll my eyes and go. I'm genuinely happy when everyone comes in. There's not a single person that I'm not unhappy to see. Yeah, we've mentioned it several times, is that just the experience we get from the staff when we go. And it's just, it's... and and that's that that's you know executive staff that's that's concession staff it's uh ushers it's just it's everybody was just we we're all there with that common mission that common goal experience exactly and it shows you know are we perfect no no is there room for improvement always uh do we listen to suggestions well if they're not too terribly critical yeah But yeah, some of our best suggestions come from patrons and we really listen to everything and everybody. And I know I'm sounding very cliche right now, but trust me, I've had people that I've worked with where I see them walking down the sidewalk and I literally cross the other side of the street so I don't have to pass them. And I just don't have to do that. That's why you did that to me. Okay, fine. It's like, oh God, it's good. Okay. Well, I was glad that y'all showed Goonies and we got Brock a chance to go see Goonies for the first time. Yes. First time Brock. That was on his movie list. So if you've been keen about the podcast and Brock's movie list, you can put a check mark by Goonies. Brock has seen Goonies. Goonies has been seen and in the best possible environment. So your thoughts of the movie? Loved it. Oh, we need to hear it. Loved it. What's your favorite part? Oh, golly. Yeah. It has to be one. What was your favorite? The absolute favorite. And why was it the trouble shovel? I really, I'm a sucker for Rube Goldberg machines. That was really cool. Wasn't it? I I'm a sucker for those. I can't tell you how many videos I've watched online. So seeing, seeing them, you know, open up the gate for him in that manner was really, really fun for me. How excited he gets when it starts. Yeah. Yeah. And, and the reaction, the reaction of the kids when they first see the pirate ship, you know, just, I, I didn't know, I don't know the backstory of everything, but Jess leans over and she said that was their honest to goodness reaction, seeing it for the first time. Yep. That was really cool. Yeah. I couldn't wait to kind of, you know, put that little piece of trivia in his ear once that happened, you know? Yeah. I love things like that. Yeah. What did you rank the movie out of ten? Out of ten? I'd give it a solid eight and a half. That's very fair. I really liked it. It is a product of that era. It is very eighties. But that's my favorite time. As we said, you get to see a lot of Spielberg-isms as they're coming into play. Oh, here... uh my mom last night it's like ten twenty three I am dead dead to the world and she texted and of course I I put my phone on silent when I go to bed but she has an override so she can you know something's happening she's ninety one and she texted me last night it's ten twenty three and she said I'm watching temple of doom Yes! Short round! So apparently Temple of Doom was on last night on some streaming platform. And she was so excited to watch that. And that is a great, perfect Spielberg-esque It has all the components. This is kind of a little fun trivia for you, Brock. Neat thing about it, of course, was it Ma Fretnelli? Yeah, Fratelli. Our good friend, that was one of the little things in Ghostbusters, one of the Ghostbusters comics, Dan, he did a little quick scene. Everybody always wondered where was Winston during the courtroom scene. Well, he was chasing the Scolari brothers' mother who looked like my frat nilly. So that's kind of a neat little thing he did. That's his little throw into the eighties. I was thinking like that. Oh, that's great. That's a great hat tip. Yeah. Yeah. The, the night before we went to, to see the Goonies at the Alabama, um, My son, I went and got him. So he was here a day early. And he had never seen Encino Man. Oh, wow. Nice. So we introduced him to Encino Man. We introduced him to Encino Man. And it hit me. Okay, Sean Astin's in that. Yes. What's his name? Yeah. He, he was in there. Um, and so we, we get over to, to see the Goonies and I'm elbowing and I'm like, you saw these guys last night and then see no man. He's like, Oh, okay. Yeah. We, uh, yeah, that was in that movie in so long. Now you're going to make me go drag that thing out. Oh, it's on YouTube. Yeah, we found it on YouTube. Well, I have it on Laserdisc, Jess. Laserdisc, yes. But I was really glad that Brock got to check that off of his bucket list. I made the joke to him. I was like, if you didn't catch that line of dialogue, just ask me. I'll tell you what they said. Seriously, I could sit there and almost quote that movie. Recite. Word for word. Yeah. Yes. I love it. So Shane says, what about the Goonies Jurassic Park connection? There's a, I'll have to show you that. There's a little meme kind of about that. So I'll show you kind of how. Well, yeah, but there's certain elements of clothing that they're wearing that directly ties to Wayne Knight's character in Jurassic Park. Okay. Yeah. There's kind of like, they've made it like a Goonies Jurassic Park connection and that. Yeah. Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah. Shane also says the start of the Link trilogy of movies. Yep. When Brendan Fraser, Fraser, whatever. I heard him correct somebody sometime. But yeah, it started off in Cino Man. Then he's in Son-in-Law. And then where am I missing... Did he show up in Biodome, maybe? I don't know. Did he show up in Biodome? I haven't seen Biodome, by the way. What was the one where the family in the bunker, they think it's... Blast from the Past? I loved that. In the Army now. Yes, yes, yes. Guys, I mean... It's weird. You look anywhere in twenty twenty five. They've announced that they're doing Goonies, too. And the other day they announced they were getting Spaceballs, too. That still blows my mind. That blows my mind. I never in my life would have thought we'd have gotten something. I mean, Goonies, too. That's something. But you're rebooting Malcolm in the middle. Yeah, I saw that. Yeah. What the heck, man? Nostalgia. I'll be watching. Oh, yeah. That's Bo's drug of choice. Exactly. It's fun. I love it. I can't get enough of it. I'm glad you enjoyed the movie, Brock, man. That is a classic. It's a good core eighties movie. I mean, it's not maximum overdrive. Not everything can be maximum overdrive. Not everything can be that good. Okay. Yeah, I had, like I said, I've seen bits and pieces of it off and on throughout the years, but I've never sat down and watched it beginning to end. And I loved every moment of it. Oh, man. That was so good. Yeah. So, so good. I'm glad we got to see it. Like I said, I'm glad we got to see it at the Alabama Theater. That's. I tell you being able to see it for the first time on the big screen, four years later. And I mean, and we saw it, you know, one day shy of the fortieth anniversary. That was really cool. I'm sure that was intentional. Yeah. Right. It tied together. Yeah. I told him, I was like, this is the first time that I've seen it. Like, other than when I went to see it, when it came out, this was the, this, the first time he seen on the big screen and, you know, almost what, forty years now. So, yeah, it was, it was amazing. Just, you know, getting me right there in the feels. So, yeah. But, I mean, I wore my parents out on that movie. When it was available to watch at home, I wore it out. I just loved it that much. Oh, the old Betamax. The Betamax. My uncle had a Betamax, by the way. We had the VHS, so we never went Betamax, though. Awesome. Well, I know we've been here for about an hour and a half, and we've absolutely loved hearing all the wonderful stories and updates and everything. We're doing Phantom of the Opera this year again? Yes, the last Sunday in October, two o'clock. Tickets will go on sale for that as soon as we get back from the uptick of the summer projects. Yeah. Nice. Always a great, fun pleasure. And then y'all have the Whose Line Is It Anyway show coming in November. Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of great shows coming up in October and November. Fun stuff. Fun stuff. Yeah. So be on the lookout. And you'll be announcing the holiday film series before too much longer, right? Before too much longer. We really like to get that in. Traditionally, when we were doing the summer film series, we would announce it at the first opening of the summer film series. And of course, now that we're doing these little projects, we will hopefully get that announced sometime in July. And I know it sounds silly and corny, but We want to get that out there because people plan and they do these whole big family soirees. And I'm at the point now where I'm getting the grandchildren. Yeah. Folks that have been coming. So it was, you know, when I first started, you know, it was parents and my contemporaries and people that were just a little bit older than me and then their kids and now their grandkids. Yeah. And it just is so meaningful to me now that I've got, you know, parents kids grandkids grandparents and all and they're just you know I've got one group that started out about twenty twenty five years ago and it was maybe three or four of them and now they're up to like forty Whoa. It's all family. And they're coming in mass. They're coming, you know, all together. And it's just. It's just building. It's building those traditions in your family. Traditions. And so it's just so much fun to see those kids grow up. I love that. I love that. The only other Central Alabama entity that I know that has that same, like needing the build, the build is the Heart of Dixie Railroad Museum with their, you know, they do those trains where they have the Santa. Yeah. And you get those as soon as they announce those things, they're sold out. They're sold out immediately. They're just out. And I know you guys get a lot of that as well. As soon as you announce them within a certain close amount of time, you guys get sellouts on a lot of these shows as well. So last last season, the first movie sold out within thirty six hours. National Lampoon's. That's just that's insane. Is it Christmas Vacation? I'm not saying. Of course it was Christmas vacation. It was Christmas vacation. We really need to go see that at the Alabama. Yeah, we do. Yeah. That's it. Yeah. And of course, we have multiple showings of that, but that's crazy. This was the first year this past December that we came so close to selling out that silly kids cartoon matinee. Wow. Yeah. Really? And we're standing there going, thank you very much. Please come on in. Right. Like you said, butts in seats. Butts in seats. Cokes and popcorn being sold. Yeah. Cokes and popcorn. Tito's handmade vodka. Booze by the bathroom. Come on now. Common lounge. Which just happens to be by the bathroom. Happens to be by the ladies lounge and the men's lounge. I'm going to go to my dying day defending that bar. I'm never going to defend that bar. No one on this. Approve it. No, no one on this podcast is saying it's a bad idea. We're just talking about the proximity to the back. Exactly. It's not a bad idea. You got something to put in. Yes. It works. I was just curious how the cells are doing. And that sounds amazing. I mean, it's working. Frightening. It's the Tito's circle of life. That's right. Well, guys, this has been so much fun. Of course. Yeah. We love you so much, Gary. And thank you for continuing to come on here. And we'll definitely have you back. One of our absolute favorite people. If you enjoyed this episode and you want to see more of Gary, give us a like. Leave us a comment if you're watching this after the fact. You know, leave us, tell us your favorite movie. What's an old classic movie that you would like to see at the Alabama Theater? Leave that in the comments. if you're watching afterwards and uh like I said leave us a like uh if you're listening to the audio version of this on on itunes or spotify anywhere please give us a we'd love a five star rating if you don't mind and leave us a comment on there tell us what you think and uh Yeah, and don't forget BamaGeeks.com. That's the website that will be able to give you any information about the podcast. You get to see all the videos, listen to all the audio, see some blog posts. We might have some more things on there. If you ever want to leave us a voice message, down in the right-hand corner of that website, there's a little microphone. You can click that, drop us a voice message, and we might play it on a future episode. Yeah. Social media everywhere. We are at Bama Geeks on Facebook. Make sure you check us out. The Bama Geeks front porch. We are all in there quite a bit and we've got a good little community in there. And of course, thank you. to our OGs, our longtime supporters through Patreon, Jamie and Mike and Darnay and Jack. If you want to see your name on that list, bamageeks.com slash join. We appreciate all the support. We appreciate everybody just hanging out with us tonight. And we've had a good crowd and, and, We're going to have Gary back. Gary brings the people. Absolutely. And don't forget June, the Greece sing along. Are we, are we going Jess? I don't, I mean, I would love to. Yes, I would love to. Okay. We go together. That's right. You're going to sing. We go together. There you go. All right, guys. Thanks. Well, thank you so much, Gary. And for Bo and Jess and Kevin, I'm Brock. We're the Bama Geeks. We'll see you again in a couple of weeks where we might be discussing another fortieth anniversary of a little movie. Oh, I don't know. Set in Hill Valley, California. We've got a special guest for that one, too, as of right now. So make sure you join us two weeks from tonight and we will see you in the future.