The Fabulous Palm Springs Follies opened its "Get Your Kicks!" season on Tuesday. The entire season (through mid-May) uses the music and history of Route 66 as its inspiration. The Desert Sun in Palm Springs, Calif., interviewed Route 66 advocate and Follies technical adviser Jim Conkle about the production and the Mother Road. Some excerpts: … Continue reading Palm Springs Follies opens Route 66-themed season
Category: Theaters
Preservation Conference tour heads into Kansas
The Joplin (Mo.) Globe ran into a group from the National Preservation Conference in Tulsa that was touring Oklahoma's eastern end of Route 66, plus the Mother Road in Kansas. Among the sights taken in were the Blue Whale of Catoosa, Okla.; Afton Station in Afton, Okla.; a stretch of the old 9-foot-wide highway, the … Continue reading Preservation Conference tour heads into Kansas
Notes from the Preservation Conference
I attended a couple of Route 66-related seminars and took a stroll in the exhibition hall on Wednesday during the National Preservation Conference at the Tulsa Convention Center in Tulsa. Here are a few news items that should be of interest to roadies: -- I ran into Albert Okura, owner of the Juan Pollo restaurants … Continue reading Notes from the Preservation Conference
Road report of “Rhythms of the Road”
The Joplin (Mo.) Independent filed this report of Green HD Productions' taping of "Rhythms of the Road" at the Coleman Theater in nearby Miami, Okla. It's part of a 13-part music television series; the producers have long been associated with the RFD-TV cable channel.
Musical TV series to be shot on Route 66
Greene HD Productions is taking to the Mother Road next month to shoot a 13-episode television series called "Rhythms of the Road." From the news release: Combining the successful Johnnie High’s Country Music Revue series aired during the past two years on the RFD TV cable network and Greene’s work on the award-winning Route 66 … Continue reading Musical TV series to be shot on Route 66
Notes from the road
The Motel Safari in Tucumcari, N.M., has added another mural image, courtesy of local artist Doug Quarles. It's a 1953 Flxible Clipper bus. Motel owner Richard Talley also passed along this news: On another note, we just had our first celebrity guest check-in! No, it wasn't Sir Paul!!! During the annual Rattler Reunion weekend, a … Continue reading Notes from the road
An oldie but a goodie
St. Louis Post-Dispatch movie reviewer Joe Williams talks about some of his favorite theaters in the area. Some have enormous screens, others screen IMAX films, one has couches, and another serves beer. Yet none of these are my favorite theater. With apologies to my many friends in the film-exhibition business, my favorite theater in the … Continue reading An oldie but a goodie
Notes from the road
There seems to be some activity at the long-abandoned old Route 66 town of Spencer, Mo. We heard from Gary Turner up the road at Gay Parita that someone has bought the town's handful of buildings and plans to revive it with a gift shop and maybe other things. When we drove by on Sunday … Continue reading Notes from the road
Coleman Theatre tries to finish what it started
Here's a story from KSN/KODE in nearby Joplin, Mo., about residents of Miami, Okla., trying to finish the restoration of the historic Coleman Theatre, which sits on Route 66. The interesting angle is that they are trying to finish the job that George Coleman Sr. started in 1929: "[Coleman] loved theater; [he] built this whole … Continue reading Coleman Theatre tries to finish what it started
Design proposed for downtown Miami
The Miami (Okla.) News-Herald reported that landscape architecture students have made their recommendations "Miami Beautiful" -- a revamped downtown area. The students clearly took the "Miami Beautiful" name from the historic Coleman Theatre Beautiful in downtown. According to the project material, the concept features Main Street as “center stage,” while the parking lots and alleys … Continue reading Design proposed for downtown Miami