PEABODY — The best movie seats under the stars are coming to Peabody’s North Shore Mall.
The Peabody Area Chamber of Commerce (PACC), in partnership with the North Shore Mall, premier sponsor North Shore Bank and Salem-based Creative Collective, is hosting a pop-up drive-in movie night at the mall Friday, Aug. 16 (8 p.m.).
The featured attraction is “Rudy”, a 1993 movie about Daniel “Rudy” Ruettiger, a student whose improbable dreams of playing college football for the University of Notre Dame came true senior year.
“We weren’t able to do our big Summer Shindig Carnival this summer, so we were looking for something to do to raise money as that is normally a strong fundraiser for us,” said PACC Executive Director Julie Daigle. “Employers aren’t really sending employees to events anymore with COVID and you need permission if you have anything with more than 10 people, so it’s been really frustrating because we thought we didn’t have anything we could run to bring people in to be together and raise money at the same time.
That is until PACC enlisted the services of John Andrews, founder and owner of Creative Collective in Salem. Daigle said his response to PACC’s concerns that it didn’t have any viable options, was simple, ‘You are wrong.'”
Dailge said Creative Collective is in charge of production. The company has run several successful outdoor movie nights, the most recent the City of Salem’s Summer Drive-In Series’ showing of “Edward Scissorhands” Friday at Salem State’s O’Keefe Center.
“Julie came to us looking for an event that would be fun and a good moneymaker, so we just thought we had seen the success of other pop-up movie theatres we had done in the last five years and thought this would be perfect,” Andrews said. “We have the projectionist, we have lighting guys, we have sound guys, so it’s a perfect partnership. Also, we have worked extensively in Peabody and are looking to get more Peabody businesses to buy into us.”
Daigle said the City of Peabody has been on board from the get-go, saying “The Mayor (Ted Bettencourt) thought it was a no brainer as the city has no events planned until at least September.”
The movie screen will be set in the parking area near the Barnes and Nobles Bookstore. While there are 800 total parking spaces there, only 200 will be available to maximize social distancing and other safety precautions. Movie goers will be required to stay inside their vehicles except when using the restrooms.
It’s Daigle’s hope that the evening will give a shot in the arm to nearby restaurants that have been hit especially hard by the pandemic.
“The reason this is so good is that we need to stay active in the community and help the local restaurants and other businesses,” she said. “People can combine the movie with going out to dinner or getting takeout, so even if we don’t make any money, it will be successful for local businesses.”
Daigle said the chamber is already working on a second pop-up tentatively scheduled for August 30. Andrews will be filming a pre-show video Tuesday featuring messages from Daigle, Bettencourt, North Shore Mall Manager Mark Whiting and, if available, a North Shore Bank representative.
“Working with everyone has been great. l love this and they are interested in doing another, and so are we,” she said. “It’s been a treat working with everyone who have all made it so easy. We had a meeting with the city departments last week and we all feel that anything that helps out the business community is what we have to do to support it.”
Anne Marie Tobin can be reached at [email protected].
Extra if you need it…
And now, a spoiler alert for those who may not have seen the movie.
Ruettiger fought against all odds not only to gain acceptance into Notre Dame,but to become a walk-on member of the Irish scout team. In the final game of the 1975 season, he sacked Georgia Tech’s quarterback on the final play of the game, prompting his teammates to carry him off the field on their shoulders. Notre Dame lore is that he was the first – and only – player ever carried off that field.