BijouBlog

From its inception in 1970 all the way to the present, one way to find out information about The Bijou Theater, including the movie schedule and showtimes has been to call and listen to a pre-recorded voicemail message.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s,   the voicemail became well known to a much wider audience than just potential Bijou customers after being featured on radio shows hosted by Steve Dahl and Howard Stern, respectively. It was a staple on Steve Dahl’s Chicago morning show that he co-hosted along with his partner Garry Meier from 1981 to 1993.

Recently, one of our Facebook page fans asked about Chad Douglas, one of the true mystery men of porn, who came to prominence in the 1980s. 

I remember my Dad taking my brothers and me to see the movie Earthquake and hearing the sirens from The Towering Inferno in the adjoining theater. Remember those seventies disaster movies? I wonder why they were so popular at that time, but when one thinks how they were made before the days of computerized digital special effects, the time and effort that went into making them is awe-inspiring. 

I attended Chicago's forty-fourth annual Gay Pride Parade, mostly to wait for the Leather Pride float sponsored by Touché (it was practically at the end of the line-up; I wonder why?) Standing with a friend in an area away from the crowds at the barricades where we could both smoke, I noticed less gay bar floats (the older, at this point, community fixtures like Baton and Sidetracks showed up; more welcoming religious organizations (they pretty much marched together en masse, a stunning effect which should silence the holy haters like the Westboro Baptist Church); more schools including Nettlehorst, a local primary school; less politicians (though the really key figures like the Governor and the Mayor showed up, pretty much a given these days); but, overall, many groups, even nonpolitical ones, emphasized marriage equality given the recent decision on DOMA by the Supreme Court.