At This Texas Theater, the Show Gets Rowdy and the Crowd Gets Messy

[SecularMotion]

MIDLAND, Tex. — It was early in the show when members of the audience grabbed fistfuls of popcorn and threw them toward the stage. They chucked more popcorn as the evening went on, onto the floor of the crowded downtown theater, up in the air and at the people around me. The behavior was not only expected, but encouraged.

On Friday and Saturday nights in the summer, Midland sets its West Texas manners aside.

This is when thousands of people pack the Yucca Theater each summer for a raunchy, corny vaudeville-and-dancing melodrama during which members of the audience boo, cheer and toss popcorn at the stage and at one another. It is a 67-year-old Midland tradition called Summer Mummers, and it has quietly become one of the rowdiest and messiest experiences in American theater. Buttery popcorn is sold, thrown and occasionally eaten in bulk — in grocery store paper bags cut in half. The organizers claim Summer Mummers sells more popcorn in its annual three-month run than any local movie theater sells in an entire year. This summer, popcorn sales were expected to hit $110,000.

Midland is a conservative oil town with a button-down business culture, the kind of proper place that is the hometown of both former President George W. Bush and the former first lady, Laura Bush. That is why, in the middle of the show, I looked around slack-jawed: Adults were dumping bags of popcorn on the heads of friends and strangers, the way football players pour Gatorade on coaches.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/02/us/texas-summer-mummers-theater.html

[Brickbat]

1. This sounds like a fucking nightmare.

[Aristus]

2. Crazy the way the rubes amuse themselves out in the provinces...

[SwankyXomb]

3. At some point even they get tired of milking the bulls.

[LanternWaste]

6. Speaking as one who had fun at Mummer 2010, it's true: we're not quite as evolved

Speaking as one who had fun at Mummer 2010, it's true: we're not quite as evolved nor genteel as those who's amusement consists of criticizing how other people amuse themselves.

Yours sounds way better...

[KittyWampus]

10. Sort of like the "rubes" who go to a Rocky Horror Picture Show viewing at midnight?

[blogslut]

4. "Melodrama" goes way back.

Hate to break it to you kids but this is how it was done during Shakespeare's time.

[ret5hd]

5. Kinda reminds me of Rocky Horror Picture Show.

[Aristus]

7. Now, THAT'S a party!

[ret5hd]

8. Not sure I get you...you seemed so disdainful earlier.

[Glassunion]

9. I was going to say the same.

I do look good in my thigh highs though.

[Buns_of_Fire]

11. Ah, the good old days when you could watch a movie

and get hit in the back of the head with a piece of flying toast. Now THAT'S entertainment!

[SecularMotion]

12. Throwing popcorn in Florida can get you killed

Retired Florida cop will use ‘stand your ground’ defense after gunning down moviegoer who threw popcorn at him

Reeves told investigators that he feared for his safety when he was struck in the face with an object that was later determined was popcorn, but his defense attorney suggested may have been a more dangerous object.

http://www.rawstory.com/2015/10/retired-florida-cop-will-use-stand-your-ground-defense-after-gunning-down-moviegoer-who-threw-popcorn-at-him/

[Separation]

13. When reading the OP title I immediately thought of the Rocky horror Picture Show

I used to go them all the time when I was in high school back in the 90's. I also remember my first time going and my friend "outing me as a virgin".

Thrown popcorn ppshh try getting hundreds of whip cream pies with cherries cleaned up.