Last Updated: 6/8/09
Friday, June 12
Food and drink at 6:00 pm. The film begins at 7:30.
$20 in advance, $25 at the door.
Digitas Health at The John Wanamaker Building
100 Penn Square East
(use Juniper Street entrance), Philadelphia
Telephone info: AIDS Law Project, (215) 587-9377
On Friday, June 12, the Secret Cinema will team up once again with the AIDS Law Project of Pennsylvania to present their 10th Annual Summer Movie Party, featuring food, film and fun. The centerpiece will be a screening of the 1959 movie Born Reckless, starring the inimitable Mamie Van Doren as a singing rodeo rider straining to get the attention of a rugged bronco buster, complete with rodeo action, rockabilly music and big shiny cars.
The party is Friday, June 12, at the large, strikingly designed new offices of host Digitas Health, in the John Wanamaker Building, across from the southeastern corner of City Hall.
Food and drink start at 6. The film begins at 7:30.
Admission is a minimum tax-deductible donation of $20 in advance, or $25 at the door. Prepaid reservations are recommended. Best of all, all funds raised will go to the AIDS Law Project of Pennsylvania, a non-profit, public interest law firm that provides free legal services to people with HIV/AIDS and others affected by the epidemic.
For tickets, call the AIDS Law Project at 215-587-9377 or visit the AIDS LAW PROJECT WEBSITE
The timetable of events is as follows:
6 to 7:15 pm: Light food and drink (Secret Cinema tip: Once again this is advertised as "light" to play it safe, but the last several years' supplies of high-quality food and drink -- including premium beer from Flying Fish Brewery -- were amazingly ample! In short, your donation is actually a real bargain if you come hungry!)
7:30 pm: screening of Born Reckless, projected in 16mm film on a giant screen.
A complete description of the film follows:
Born Reckless (Dir: Howard W. Koch, 1959)
"How would you like to win that?" "Yeah...in a ropin' contest!" These two cowboys could only be talking about one thing...iconic platinum blonde Mamie Van Doren, strutting her stuff in a rodeo melodrama filling one tight costume after another, as she (ahem) strains to get the attention of rugged bronco buster Jeff Richards. In between, she does trick riding and sings! That adds up to a great slice of fifties movie fun, complete with exciting rodeo action, twangin' rockabilly music and big shiny cars. The cast also includes b-Western regular Don "Red" Barry and Carol Ohmart (Spider Baby). The hot country and rockabilly tunes are served up by Johnny Olenn and his Group and Tex Williams (famous for his recording of "Smoke! Smoke! Smoke! (That Cigarette).")
If Jayne Mansfield was the poor man's Marilyn Monroe, then Mamie Van Doren was left with third place and being the pauper's Jayne in the blonde bombshell sweepstakes of 1950s Hollywood. Even so, she had an unforgettable, sex-charged presence to anyone who saw her in camp classics like High School Confidential, Girls Town or The Beat Generation. To this day she maintains a popular fan website. Director Koch helmed many low budget genre programmers (Untamed Youth, Bop Girl), and later became executive producer of Frank Sinatra Enterprises.
We last reported being "cautiously optimistic" about Live Nation's announced plans to restore and reuse the Sameric/Boyd Theater. Our caution proved well-founded as Live Nation have now revealed that they are halting all work on the theater's restoration. Anything could happen now, in a city where demolition permits are rather easy to obtain.
The important job of bringing back Philadelphia's last (nearly) intact movie palace still needs to not only be done, but be done right, and joining with this ever-vigilant watchdog organization is the best chance we have to ensure that the right thing gets done.
Official site of the Friends of the Boyd - www.SaveTheSameric.org
Secret Cinema 1999 Annual Report
Secret Cinema 1998 Annual Report
Secret Cinema 1997 Annual Report
Information about the 1998 Secret Cinema "Class Trip" to the Syracuse Cinefest