The Howell Premiere of The Couch

The theater is on Grand River in Howell. It's where I grew up seeing first run movies a few weeks after they premiered in the fancy theater on Grand River in Brighton. It had one screen and good popcorn. 

One of my most favorite memories of the theater is going to see SPEED with my Grandpa Jim Boutell. I was 16. I hadn't seen a lot of R-rated movies (there was no internet or Netflix back then!). But Grandpa picked me up in his truck (I think Angela was there, I can't recall) and we headed down to the theater. We settled in to watch the film. I can tell you exactly where we were seated. And then Grandpa headed out for a moment. And then he came back - with a huge trash bag filled with popcorn. They were going to throw it away, he said. And so we settled in and ate. And ate and ate. And I saw a knife shoved in a guy's ear and I was hooked...

And then on a Tuesday night in December I got to see the title of something I wrote up on the marquee of the Howell Theater. It was so cool. And then I got to witness a couple hundred of my closest family members and friends settle in with their own popcorn and enjoy something I wrote -- up on the big screen. I still can't really believe it happened. 

Wesley crew

My parents high school crew & mine!

It was quite the night. We filled the theater. People who knew my parents long before I was born came. Friends I haven't seen since I graduated from college arrived. A large contingent of my Wesley family showed up, from my WMU days. Family drove in from across the state. Friends of my family who I didn't even know knew I wrote a web series showed up. A dear friend from when we were babies brought her daughter to have her first experience in a movie theater. I really was something. 

We showed the entire series and people clapped and seemed to enjoy themselves. And that's what it was all about. Encouraging people to come out and spend some time with some interesting characters and share in their stories and enjoy themselves. I love that it happened. I love that I helped that to happen. In the theater I grew up in. In the same theater I saw SPEED in. How cool is that???

So thank you to everyone who was there with me that night. Thank you to everyone who wished they could have been there that night. Thank you to my friends who have encouraged me and loved me every step of the way. I wish my Grandpa could have been there but I know he was watching along with us, munching on the free popcorn the theater still sets out at the end of the night. 

And if you haven't gotten a chance to see The Couch yet, or want to see it again, just click right here. You can have that theater experience right now!