Good morning.
We’ll have a high of fifty-nine and a one-third chance of showers for Saturday. Sunrise was at 5:23 AM, and sunset will be at 8:21 PM. Moonrise is at 9:08 PM, with a waning gibbous moon having 100% of the its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1977, Star Wars opens:
The incredible success of Star Wars–it received seven Oscars, and earned $461 million in U.S. ticket sales and a gross of close to $800 million worldwide–began with an extensive, coordinated marketing push by Lucas and his studio, 20th Century Fox, months before the movie’s release date. “It wasn’t like a movie opening,” actress Carrie Fisher, who played rebel leader Princess Leia, later told Time magazine. “It was like an earthquake.” Beginning with–in Fisher’s words–“a new order of geeks, enthusiastic young people with sleeping bags,” the anticipation of a revolutionary movie-watching experience spread like wildfire, causing long lines in front of movie theaters across the country and around the world.
The trailer’s a true curiosity, but it’s stilted compared to the film, and misstates the setting of the film’s events, ones that took place “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away….”
Google-a-Day asks about a musical: “What musical made its world premiere in October 1986, at 57 Haymarket, London SW1Y 4QL?”