A Captain Trips Outbreak In Phoenixville

The Stand
Colonial Theatre - Phoenixville, PA
Yesterday, I met up at the Colonial Theater with some friends from the Mahoning for an incredible screening that I never thought to be possible.

The Stand is a book that I have been obsessed with since I was a teenager, and the six hour mini-series that aired on ABC in 1994 was my introduction to this universe.

A common topic of conversation on the lot at the Mahoning Drive-In Theater is our dream bookings.  In other words, if we had the ability to book a double or triple feature on the big screen and there were no restrictions on what we could do, how would we book it?  What movies would we choose?  What would we call the event?  What special guests would we bring out to the lot?  What would the t-shirt and poster look like?  What special themed food or drink items would we have available for the night?  You get the idea.

One of the ideas that always came to my mind when these discussions come up is the original 1994 mini-series of The Stand.  I rarely mentioned it though because it seemed so unlikely to happen that I felt like that answer didn't count.  First of all, it's not technically a movie; it's a 366 minute long mini-series.  Secondly, because it was made for television, there aren't any film prints available.  With the exception of VHS Fest and the rare one-off screenings where a print of a movie damaged or unavailable, the Mahoning's focus is presenting films on 35mm.  Finally, it's over six hours long.  Granted, the Mahoning is no stranger to triple features and dusk-til-dawn screenings, but even if they did decide to show something that was made-for-tv, I couldn't imagine that they'd dedicate a full night to it.  It wasn't even one of the ideas that I sent to Mark and Virgil when they asked the Patreon members what they'd like to see.  It just seemed too unrealistic to suggest.

I can't think of the right words to express how happy I was when it was announced late last year that Exhumed Films was hosting an event at the Colonial Theater in Phoenixville where they would not only be showing the entire miniseries on the big screen, but its director Mick Garris would be in attendance to introduce The Stand, meet fans and sign autographs, and to have a Q&A at the end of the show.

Mick Garris has a very impressive resume in films and television.  Some of his earliest work was directing and producing "The Making Of" documentary shorts for movies such as The Howling, Videodrome, and The Goonies, the latter of which he worked on with Stephen Spielberg which led to his work on Amazing Stories where he worked as a writer, director, and story editor.  His work in film includes writing the story that became the 1987 classic Batteries Not Included, as well as writing the screenplay for The Fly II, directing Psycho IV: The Beginning, and writing and directing Critters 2: The Main Course.  However, his most well known project is Disney's 1993 Halloween classic Hocus Pocus, which he wrote the story and the screenplay and served as co-executive producer.

Mr. Garris was a frequent collaborator with Stephen King in bringing his stories to the screen.  His first work with the author came in 1992 when he directed Sleepwalkers.  This was followed by The Stand mini-series, which aired in May 1994.  He also directed the 1997 mini-series adaptation of The Shining, which stays much more true to the original novel than the Stanley Kubrick film, and the 2011 mini-series adaptation of Bag Of Bones.

The thing on his resume that absolutely blew me away is when I learned that he was one of the zombies in Michael Jackson's iconic music video for Thriller.  He's the last zombie to come up out of the ground in the graveyard scene, and he's the tall zombie standing next to Michael on the left in the final zombie scene, right before Michael leans down to his date and asks "what's the problem" when everything goes back to normal.  How freaking cool is that?!

In addition to all of this, Mr. Garris is a very kind and generous guy.  He flew out from California for this event at the Colonial Theater, and at a time when people with much shorter resumes charge $20 and up for an autograph or a photo, he met fans, signed autographs, and took pictures for free.  He didn't even have 8x10s to sell.  Very cool!

Show poster designed by Jason Cortez

He signed this very cool poster that I picked up from the Exhumed Films merch table.  The artist, Jason Cortez of Sons Of Thunder Studios, has designed a few posters and t-shirts for the Mahoning over the years.  I've always liked his work, but this poster is my favorite.

It's not often that I'll ask a guest at an event that we're visiting if they wouldn't mind signing a second thing for me, but these tapes are pretty special to me.  I didn't discover The Stand until a few years after the mini-series aired on ABC when I was working for a video rental store called Blowout Video.  Employees were allowed to rent two tapes per night for free as long as they weren't on the new release wall.  I got to see a lot of movies for the first time while I was working here, and this was one of them.  I loved the mini-series so much that I bought the novel in paperback shortly after returning the tapes.  It was the first Stephen King book that I ever read, and to this day it's my favorite.  I've read quite a few of his books since then and have become a huge fan of his work.  It all started with these VHS tapes.  They opened the door to a whole new world for me.

We all settled in to seats in the front row before the start of the show.  Mick Garris came to the stage to introduce the movie.  There was a ten minute intermission between each of the four episodes which gave some time to stretch our legs, get some popcorn, and hit the restrooms without missing any of the show.  After the credits rolled, Mr. Garris came back to the stage for a Q&A with the fans.  I asked the first question, but I'll talk more about that later because it led to a pretty awesome discovery.

This was absolutely one of my favorite experiences that I've ever had at an indoor theater, and one that I never thought would happen.  Part of the reason that I write about things like this on here is so I can look back on it years from now and remember some of the fun things that I've gotten to see and do, but something tells me that I won't forget this show.