Richard Skipper Celebrates Drive In Movie Day with April Wright!

Drive-in Movie Day is celebrated on the anniversary of the opening of the first patented drive-in movie theater. On June 6, 1933, Richard Hollingshead opened this drive-in theater, Park-in Theaters, in Pennsauken Township, close to Camden, New Jersey. The year before he had experimented in his driveway by putting a 1928 Kodak projector on his car hood, pinning a sheet to trees, and placing a radio behind the screen. He thought about ways to combat rain and how to space cars so everyone had a view. When his theater opened he charged 25 cents per car and 25 cents per person, but made sure no group paid more than a dollar. Four hundred cars could fit at the theater and the screen measured 40 by 50 feet. The first film shown was Wife Beware starring Adolphe Menjou. I will be joined by April Wright! April Wright is an American writer, director and producer. Her debut narrative feature as a writer and director, Layover, won the Silver Lei Award for Excellence in Filmmaking at the 2009 Honolulu International Film Festival. We will discuss her film, Back To the Drive-In: The drive-in theater was a staple of post-World War II American life, especially teenage life. It even showed up in horror films where teenagers necking in their cars by the flickering light of movie screens were menaced by monsters and aliens. The drive-in was on the decline for many decades, but had a brief resurgence during the coronavirus pandemic because the open-air setting satisfied the urge to go see a movie without risking exposure.