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The Americans had developed a Opening Night Below: Sir George Knox performed the
material whose light reflective qualities The Rowville Drive-In was Grand Opening Ceremony – July 1956.
were far superior to the painted screens officially opened on a cold July (12th)
used then in Australia, but the Village night in 1956 by Sir George Knox. This
executives were unable to obtain ceremony was followed by a parade of
government approval to import this entrants in the Dandenong Hospital
product. Beauty Queen competition. Two
So they set about designing their hundred pounds of the opening night’s
own and, after many failures, came up takings were donated to the hospital’s
with an aluminium alloy etched-and- building appeal as well as to other
fluted strip they named Lustre Light. Dandenong and Ferntree Gully charities.
Hundreds of these strips, each six feet The evening’s “smash-hit, double
long by five inches wide, were tongue feature show” was Rear Window
and grooved together to create the huge starring Grace Kelly and James Stewart
Rowville screen that measured 40 feet plus Betty Hutton in Red Hot and Blue.
high and 82 feet long. Admission prices were four shillings
for adults and one shilling for children.
A special double-page advertising
feature run in the Argus on the day of
the opening spoke glowingly of the
Drive-In’s “sylvan setting”.

CINEMARECORD 2010 11