-It was my last year of high school and I felt,
well, even if I failed...
-A Seattle author reunites with the English teacher
who inspired him to pursue his passion.
-We had a quest in front of us to figure out
how we ensure the future of this cinema.
-Local movie fans cheer the return
of a much loved theater built on a historic past.
-We're going to be telling all of that rich history.
-It's a perfect blend of baseball and Black History Month
just steps away from T-Mobile Park.
These stories and more next on "CityStream."
♪♪
Hello, I'm Dennis Bounds, and welcome to "CityStream,"
from Seattle's Mount Baker neighborhood.
This is a view of Franklin High School
with the Seattle skyline in the background.
It was here nearly a half century ago
where our first story got its start.
If you are fortunate to have a teacher
who inspired you to pursue your passion,
it's likely you've thought about them from time to time.
Noted Seattle author Ron Chew
had such a teacher right here at Franklin High School,
and he wrote about her in his recent autobiography.
That led to a reunion nearly 50 years in the making.
Producers Randy Eng and Shannon Gee have more.
-To me, the act of writing is about grasping detail,
because out of details comes a picture
and the picture comes alive
if those details capture something very vivid.
-Ron Chew has always considered himself a writer.
As a journalist, editor, author, poet,
even as an executive director,
engaging others through creative expression
is always at the heart of what he does.
-Writing was kind of a theme.
I loved writing, and it was at the core of the skill set
that I used to move my career forward.
-So when Ron decided to start writing his memoir,
he wondered, where did that initial spark come from?
-I tried to go to the core of what shaped who I became,
and one of the pieces of that was this teacher
named Miss Allen at Franklin High School.
-I'm Alice Allen, and I had the honor
of being Ron Chew's creative writing teacher.
I began with a contact with Franklin,
and they were looking for teachers of color.
They were very limited.
There weren't very many people of color in Seattle, period.
[ Laughs ] It was a time of revolution,
and the kids, they knew very few Black people
and almost none from the South.
-They were trying to diversify the staff.
So you noticed that happening.
But to me, Miss Allen was -- she was a good teacher.
She did have a big Afro. I remember that.
-Sometimes it would be big and sometimes it would be short.
And when I would change the cut, some boys in my class --
these were White boys -- would throw spitballs
at it, at my hair.
This really happened. They were very feisty
and they had just gained the freedom
to talk to teachers any way they wanted to.
I mean, they had that kind of freedom about themselves.
So, you know, they thought they knew everything.
And I thought I knew everything.
-In high school, I had no clue
of what I would pursue in college.
Creative writing, it seemed like it was sort of easy.
-I was not an easy grader.
-It was my last year of high school, and I felt,
well, even if I failed, you know, that's fine.
-One of Ron's first creative writing assignments --
to write a descriptive poem that uses all five senses.
-One of the things that made writing good
was the reality that it was able to project the pictures.
-It's really awful now as I think about it.
I mean, it's a kid in high school trying to write,
but it goes, "Open the door and walk out amid the moonlight
frosting in the river through folded ripples of black night."
-Oh, boy. Ooh, moonlight frosting.
Oh, it's like an aura across the river. Oh, my gosh.
-"See the stars blink,
as they cannot find shadows of their own."
-Oh, my gosh, Ron, this is heavy!
-"To comfort and cradle their light in a vat of tiny smiles."
-This is nothing that you can teach.
This is what you inspire. You can't teach this.
-It goes on like that.
But she -- she gave me a good -- good grade.
She gave me an A-plus-plus-plus.
-I gave him an A-plus-plus-plus.
[ Laughs ] Oh.
-For teacher to respond positively to a student
had a huge impact on me.
-A teacher never knows really where his or her inspiration
really stops. You don't know.
-It's kind of like a homecoming.
All these folks I grew up with, worked with, and friends.
It's pretty heartwarming. It's wild. I can't believe it.
Alice was an important part of my journey
to becoming a writer and creating this book.
Without her, I would not have become a writer.
[ Cheers and applause ]
-In 2020, Ron released his memoir with his teacher,
Alice Allen, right in the middle of page 89.
It didn't take long for word to get back to Alice
that she was in Ron's book, and for once in Ron's life,
a picture spoke louder than words --
this photo capturing the moment
teacher and student were reunited.
-I was kind of excited to see,
like, what does Miss Allen look like now?
I've lost my hair and I'm an old person.
-And I'm on my cane. Would you have known me?
-I would have recognized you right away
because your gestures haven't changed.
Those expressions.
The way you talk, the way you enunciate.
It was all coming back to me.
-I wanted to bring out of kids
all the things that I wanted to be.
I never, in 30 years,
went in there one day thinking it was just a job.
-One teacher can change a life.
That person's encouragement can nudge somebody forward
in a way that can change your life.
♪♪
I'm a living example of that.
♪♪
-Once Ron and Alice reunited,
they realized that they had lived only a mile apart
all this time.
Both still live in the same Beacon Hill neighborhood
that they lived in when they were at Franklin High School
nearly 50 years ago.
From a long overdue reunion
to the return of this beloved downtown theater.
That's next as "CityStream" continues.
♪♪
-This city has a long love affair with the movies,
and beloved movie theaters have existed in nearly every
Seattle neighborhood for more than a century.
So it was big news when the iconic Cinerama Theatre
recently changed hands.
But there's much more to the story,
especially the history of what is now SIFF Cinema Downtown.
Feliks Banel has the story.
[ Projector whirring ]
♪♪
-When you start getting close to the screen,
you start realizing just how huge it is.
Now, this is a single, you know,
piece of fabric 97 feet wide.
-Tom Mara, director of
the Seattle International Film Festival,
or SIFF, is right. The screen is huge.
But that big screen is just one thing
that makes the old Cinerama --
now officially called SIFF Cinema Downtown --
a rare and beloved place for Seattle cinephiles.
-As you know, this is a beloved theater,
and not only folks love it,
but it also plays, I think, a symbolic role
in terms of bringing the city back into a vibrancy.
-To truly understand what this theater means,
you have to go back to the beginning,
to when movies were first taking the world and Seattle by storm.
-This is Seattle, Washington. A city in a beautiful region.
-Like any big American city in the early 20th century,
Seattle was home to dozens of theaters,
on the streets of downtown,
but also in many neighborhoods, too.
The Green Parrot,
the Colonial,
the First Ave,
the Coliseum, and so many others.
As vaudeville and other live entertainment faded away,
it didn't take long for movies
to become the dominant form of entertainment
for the middle class.
-That's interesting.
-But by the time TV arrived in Seattle,
many theaters were beginning to shut down,
since you could now watch movies at home.
Of course, all the movies on TV back then
were in black and white,
and the screens on those old TVs,
well, they were downright tiny.
And that's where Cinerama comes in.
-You are about to see the first public exhibition
of an entirely new form of entertainment.
We call it Cinerama.
-Cinerama was a brand name for a new technology
in the early 1950s to produce Hollywood films
to be shown on bigger and better screens
in theaters with bigger and better sound equipment.
-And this was technology that was developed to compete
with the television,
now, all of a sudden, in people's living room.
-Cinerama theaters require three projectors
and three separate projection booths
that work in synchronization to show an aggregate image
on the giant Cinerama screen.
It was gimmicky but impressive, too.
Cinerama first came to Seattle's Paramount Theater in 1956
and was a hit at the World's Fair
in the Boeing Spacearium.
-The world's largest movie screen.
-On the eve of the fair,
Cinerama announced they would build a showplace
at Fourth Avenue and Lenora Street.
It was the first new movie theater in downtown
Seattle in 30 years.
That three-projector format was cumbersome and died away,
but the theater ran regular movies instead.
Over the years, the place got a little rundown
until late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen bought it.
Allen did a major renovation and the Cinerama survived.
-So now we're at the back of the theater,
coming into the projector room,
and there's a lot going on in here. Come on in.
-And more than 60 years after it first debuted,
the Cinerama is still here, thanks to Tom Mara and SIFF.
-A number of different systems.
We've got the ability to do 70 millimeter.
We've got digital projection.
We have the Cinerama projector there.
We have this main booth.
Then, if you look onto the right-hand side wall,
you'll see another projector booth,
same on the left-hand side.
And those three projectors combine the images
onto this very wide curved screen.
-The technology may be a little complicated,
but the value in saving the Cinerama is easy to understand.
When Paul Allen died in 2018,
the Cinerama's future was in doubt.
Then, in 2020, it shut down and many people
thought the closure was permanent.
So when he took the job to lead SIFF in 2022,
Tom Mara's number one priority was clear.
-10 minutes of day one of my job at SIFF,
it was clear that we had a quest in front of us
to figure out how we ensure the future of the cinema.
-With support from the City of Seattle and King County,
SIFF reached a deal with Paul Allen's estate.
-And, so, we were really inspired
by how the community came together.
-One, two, three.
-And tonight you are here for the VIP preview
of SIFF Cinema Downtown,
the reopening of Seattle's historic Cinerama Theatre.
-Welcome to SIFF Cinema Downtown.
Thank you so much for your championship.
[ Cheers and applause ]
-While movie theaters had once been
strictly a for-profit business,
SIFF's role as a cultural nonprofit
means the future of the old Cinerama
is not only about the bottom line.
-We're an arts organization.
People care about art, people care about film,
and people want to come together
and be captured by the big screen.
-The more we can do to encourage people
to be here in person,
to go to cinemas, to really help the arts thrive, the better,
I think, our culture and our communities will all be.
♪♪
-The big screen, comfortable seats,
an incredible sound system,
and -- okay, okay -- the famous chocolate popcorn, too,
all add up to a unique cinematic experience.
But for Tom Mara, it's about the people, too.
-I just know, for one,
I'll always have fun hanging out in the lobby
and just watching people come in
and getting ready for the lights to go down,
which I think is one of the finest moments in life.
When the lights start going down,
you get ready for your adventure.
-And the transformation of Cinerama
to SIFF Cinema Downtown
is one adventure that movie lovers in Seattle
will be thrilled to enjoy for decades to come.
♪♪
-SIFF Cinema Downtown is open for business
and the chocolate popcorn is fresh and hot for each showing.
The theater will also be a big part of this year's
Seattle International Film Festival coming up in May.
And right now, Black History Month is winding down,
but this space honors Seattle's historic Negro League
baseball stars year round.
That's next on "CityStream."
♪♪
-Now that the Mariners spring training games have just begun
and Black History Month is winding down,
our next story combines a bit of both.
Decades before the Mariners debut in 1977,
the Seattle Steelheads were part of the first professional
Black baseball league on the West Coast.
As Brian Callanan reports,
a new establishment across from T-Mobile Park honors
our long-forgotten baseball glory.
-You could call Steelheads Alley just another bar,
but that's like trying to catch a home run off
the bat of Ken Griffey Jr.
You're not even getting close.
-I don't think there's anything like this
that's happening anywhere else in the US.
That's Rodney Hines, co-owner of Métier Brewing,
whose beers are featured at Steelheads Alley
and the Hatback Bar & Grille,
the new and eagerly anticipated taproom and restaurant
that opened this season in the old Pyramid Brewery
building across from T-Mobile Park.
-Hello, hello, hello.
-But along with every meal here,
you'll get a big helping of history.
-And you're going to get your curiosity
sparked about the Negro Baseball League,
about the Latino All-Star Game,
about women who've been left out
who are now playing professional softball.
You're going to learn all of that.
-This space celebrates the Seattle Steelheads,
part of the first professional Black baseball
league on the West Coast,
the West Coast Negro Baseball Association.
-We're going to be telling all of that rich history.
-Hines, one of our state's very few professional Black brewers,
teamed up with the Mariners,
local artists, and historians to build a unique space
that tells the story of the Steelheads
and other almost-forgotten teams of our region's past.
-The fact that there is a bar that's dedicated to a team --
like I'm getting emotional just thinking about it --
but there's a bar dedicated to a team
that was playing in a Negro baseball league.
Like, we should see more of this happening across the US.
-But just making this happen in
Seattle was a bit of a miracle in itself.
-There's some great stories that are told here visually,
but it's the tip of the iceberg.
-That's superstar baseball historian Dave Eskenazi,
whose collection makes up a majority of the photos
and artifacts you'll see in the 150-item
Steelheads Alley display.
-Their story actually starts in 1944.
The origin of the Steelheads
is they were originally the Harlem Globe Trotters
traveling baseball team.
-The barnstorming bunch joined
the West Coast Negro League in 1946, but not for long.
That same year,
the Brooklyn Dodgers signed Jackie Robinson,
which broke Major League Baseball's color barrier.
-And then, just hordes of talented players
would follow him to the Major League,
so that spelled the demise
of the West Coast Negro Baseball Association.
-A challenge which Eskenazi and others
helped turn into an opportunity,
by adding to this display
other pieces from the past of Pacific Northwest baseball
dating back to the 1890s.
-There's so much great baseball and athletic history
from underrepresented communities in this region,
again, going back 120 years.
-And for Karen Jones, the history is personal.
-Well, I got my little scooter
and nothing was going to keep me away.
-I couldn't -- I can't wait to get down here.
-Karen's grandpa was none other than Powell Barnett,
who she'll proudly tell you was a musician
and the founder of the Seattle Royal Giants,
another Negro league team displayed at Steelheads Alley.
Plus, later he founded the Northwest Umpire Association.
The Seattle park that bears his name
is less than two miles away
from the site of the old Sick's Stadium,
where he umpired games for Seattle Rainiers baseball.
-I didn't know being with him in my younger age
was going to lead to something of this great legacy.
-And it's a legacy that Karen hopes to keep adding to.
-Here we have Jackson Street names him the man of the year.
Its history and people need to know about it.
-She's brought articles and photos of her grandfather,
not only to Steelheads Alley, but to an archive in Seattle
known as the Black Heritage Society of Washington State,
located in the MOHAI Resource Center.
-History does not repeat, but it rhymes.
So it continues. It builds.
-The president of the BHS,
Stephanie Johnson-Toliver, is a fourth generation
Seattleite who oversees a massive collection
of Black history,
mostly at this archive in Georgetown,
but also right in front of fans at Steelheads Alley.
-So that when they look into these photographs,
they'll want to go a little bit deeper
and find out more about the history of Black baseball.
-When you do, you'll see players
who survived segregation and racism
and fought for integration and acceptance
on and off the field,
challenges that represent a lot more than just a game.
-It's inclusive history.
We're just a part of a broader and bigger history,
a national history, not just a Washington state history,
but it informs the nation.
-It's part of the Pacific Northwest's past
that present day Mariners fans are lining up to see.
-Heroes of our national pastime
triumphing against the odds. Sound familiar?
-The pitch from Acevedo.
A drive deep to right field, down the line.
The Mariners win this game 2-1!
-Steelheads Alley is here to add a few more highlights
to make sure we never forget.
-I think it goes back to knowing history
to give us guidance for the future.
You know, if we're not collecting the history,
who's going to do it?
-There's a lot of stories that they've started to tell
in this space, and there's a lot more to come.
♪♪
-From America's pastime to the world's longest-running
comedy variety celebration,
fans of Seattle's Moisture Festival
don't have long to wait.
This year's event begins March 21st,
runs through April 14th,
and it promises to dazzle and amaze.
Producers Kathy Tuohey and Valerie Vozza
attended last year's festival
and they say, yes, it's a zany good time.
-How we going? Is it rolling?
Do we need to do the snap, snap, begin?
♪♪
-Moisture Festival is a festival of comedy, variety,
circus arts, neo vaudeville,
every kind of thing you can imagine on the stage.
It's the longest-running festival
of its kind in the world.
♪♪
All shows are here at Broadway Performance Hall.
Yeah, this is mine. No costumes.
We've got four weeks of shows.
The first three weeks of shows are variety arts.
The final week, fourth week, is burlesque shows.
And then, closing night of the fourth week
is another variety show to close out the whole festival.
In 2004, the first festival was held in a tent
in a parking lot in Fremont.
-One of the key things about this festival
is I was at a festival in Berlin.
It was a comedy variety festival there.
And, so, I came back and talked to Maque daVis and Tim Furst,
said, "Why don't we try this in Seattle?"
And, so, we didn't know it was going to last 18 years.
After that first year,
we were invited to relocate to Hale's Palladium,
and now we're here at the Broadway Performance Hall
on Capitol Hill.
Sometimes we just shake our heads and go,
"How does this even work?" How does it even work?
-It works because of our over 250 volunteers.
The people you see at the box office.
-Welcome. Glad you're here.
-All the way up through the lobby, our concessions,
all the crew working the shows,
all the people working backstage with our artists
to make their experience amazing.
-This gonna work for you?
-That is all volunteers.
-So nice to finally meet you.
-Works are going out.
Heads up.
The yellow balls. It's white --
-Purple, purple, blue. -Purple and blue.
White, blue, white, red, white, purple, white, green.
-No, no.
-The balls will glow. -Yeah.
-Jen Wensrich is the heart and soul of Moisture Festival.
She holds all the keys and all the secrets,
and she knows everything there is about this festival.
It would not happen without her.
-This year, we have 156 artists performing.
And one of the reasons they come here is for the camaraderie.
-Because they're always performing in different places,
you know, this fair or that theater or that cruise ship,
but they never get to hang out together.
And this festival lets them all hang out together.
"Where have you been? Where have you been?
Tell me where I can get a gig," blah blah blah.
You know, they have fun together.
The other thing about the camaraderie
is that the artists and the volunteers all share a meal
at the end of the show.
The volunteers get to know the artists.
The artists get to know these people in Seattle
who come and work long hours to put these shows on.
-Ron Bailey, he is --
he's become our Scottish leprechaun.
And he always has a smile, always has a laugh,
always has a clever thing to say.
He is the artistic heart and soul of this organization.
-Don't talk about RB.
Ron Bailey should never be mentioned in public.
You should keep that private.
We only talk about him in the restroom.
-Oh, yeah. Yeah. -Hey.
I just cover this bass and that bass
and do whatever is necessary.
And I'm also a musician, so every now and again,
I'll sing a little song.
♪ Why do they call it the Moisture Festival? ♪
♪ I want to give you my two cents ♪
♪♪
The live show bands really are a key part
of what makes this thing happen,
and each week has a different show band.
♪♪
So when you have a live band accompanying the artist,
that's a beautiful thing. A beautiful thing.
The last week of shows at the festival are burlesque shows.
If you've never been to a burlesque show,
they are so much fun.
I mean, it's basically sexual humor and it's not lewd at all.
It's not lewd. There's so many creative approaches
to how one takes this off and puts that on.
♪♪
-Shall we go in? Come this way. Walk this way.
Come on, come walk this way. Walk.
Keep coming! This way!
It's right up here. Come on.
Up the stairs. Careful, careful.
♪♪
[ Applause ]
♪♪
-You know, it's hard to describe, really,
why I love this kind of entertainment so much.
I believe in laughter, and I believe in appreciating
some of these bizarre skills we see on the stage.
[ Whistle ]
That combination of appreciation of an art form
and laughing together.
That's what keeps me excited about this.
[ Chuckles ]
♪♪
-Once again, this is the 20th anniversary
of Seattle's Moisture Festival.
The antics begin March 21st and run through April 14th.
We'll be right back.
♪♪
-That wraps up this edition of "CityStream."
If you'd like to see more outstanding
Seattle Channel programs, go to our web site,
SeattleChannel.org and search for feature shows.
I'm Dennis Bounds. Thanks for watching.
♪♪