This entry was posted on Sunday, April 15th, 2007 at 6:22 pm and is filed under Archive, Film Festival, Oscars. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

The Newport Beach Film Festival is about to have its best year ever. One reason this year is going to be special is the celebration of John Wayne’s one hundredth birthday. John Wayne moved to California from Iowa around 1915 when he was just a young boy. It was while he lived in Iowa that he picked up the name Duke which was his dog’s name. He preferred it over his real first name Marion. He lived in the Mojave Desert with his family in poverty until they finally gave up trying to be farmers and moved to Glendale. Fortunately for Wayne his father taught him football which earned him a scholarship to the University of Southern California playing tackle.

At the recent press briefing on his former boat, the Wild Goose, (see My Entertainment News video) his son Patrick Wayne, shared the story of how his famous father damaged his shoulder body surfing one summer. The shoulder kept Wayne from playing football and he dropped out of USC and started working at the studio full time. That is where he met John Ford who started using him on films. Good thing for all of us because John Wayne had planned to be a lawyer.

For most of his life John Wayne lived in Newport Beach and moored his boat there when he was not cruising on it. This year the Newport Beach Film Festival will show a number of his films and have a special awards night. Along with the films a number of filmmakers, co-stars, friends and family will be circulating and sharing John Wayne stories.

Co-founder of the Newport Beach Film Festival, Gregg Schwenk, told us that this year will also be the biggest turnout of celebrities. One of them that should be on the red carpet for opening night will be Chad Lowe who directed “Beautiful Ohio.”  Another big star from the hit TV show “Heroes” that is supposed to come down from Los Angeles is Hayden Panettiere for the screening of her new film “Shanghai Kiss.” More on these in later news stories.

Gregg Schwenk shared the hot tip with us that the best night is opening night. Stars, a red carpet, the premiere of a big film and then a huge party to launch the Newport Beach Film Festival that will have fifteen Orange County restaurants, a hosted bar and a lot of glamour.

Of course My Entertainment News will have reporters and camera crews to cover the action on the red carpet and at the party, so be sure to click your favorite RSS feed to subscribe so you don’t miss what it is like to party in The OC.

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 15th, 2007 at 6:20 pm and is filed under Archive, Film Festival, Heroes, The OC News, John Wayne. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.