Saturday, March 19, 2016

Are You Being Served?

In the interest of full disclosure, I've never actually watched this movie:

But only because it looks absolutely horrible. "Serving Sara" came out in 2002 and the other day I scanned through it to pull these stills. So, with that complimentary introduction, let's get started!

Our first stop is what I like to call "the dome thingy outside Comerica Bank Tower" in downtown Dallas. In the film it was a steak restaurant:



But the most recognizable Dallas location is Pioneer Plaza (also in downtown). It's featured in a foot chase scene with Bruce Campbell and a sweaty, bloated Matthew Perry.




Campbell then runs past the Pioneer Plaza Cemetery and the Confederate War Memorial (which is in the opposite direction that he was running in the Plaza...movie magic!) on his way into the Convention Center.



And then some other stuff happens and then the movie ends. Roll credits!

In the interest of maintaining some educational content in the blog, here's a video segment we shot on Pioneer Plaza:



Friday, March 4, 2016

And Now These Messages...

As many of you may remember, the state of Texas celebrated its Sesquicentennial in 1986.  In case you don't remember, a Sesquicentennial is a celebration of 150 years.  The entire year was a great big Texas Party and you couldn't look anywhere without seeing signs of the celebration...even on TV as Miller Lite produced at least one commercial in the "Lite Moments in Texas History" series:


I assume there were others but so far this is the only one I could find.  It highlights the famous Spindletop Oil Well which kicked off the Texas Oil Boom and it stars a comedy legend:


Rodney Dangerfield stars as a Texas oil tycoon who is upset that his well is coming up dry.  A swift kick to the rig is all it takes to get that gusher gushing.  Who knew oil exploration was that easy?!


And with that, good Ol' Rodney goes from down and out to full-on tycoon mode as he showers his special lady friend with some greenbacks!  And thus, we have learned a little bit of Texas history.


And that was a good representation of the mood during the year of 1986: good natured Texas celebrating with a tall, frosty glass of history.  You can watch it yourself to relive the glory: