Big Fan
6/25-6/27
Ray Ruggeri was already a movie fanatic when he saw Chinatown (with Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway) in 1974 and asked the theater owner if he could buy the poster. Fifteen bucks later, Ruggeri owned his first bit of movie memorabilia, and a thirty-year hobby was born. That’s a hobby and a business — Ruggeri (who is also a jazz singer) makes his living by buying and selling vintage film posters. “The Chinatown poster is now worth about $400,” Ruggeri says by phone from his Chicago home. His most valuable piece is a 1942 Casablanca half-sheet, which has been appraised at thousands of dollars. “The bigger the film and the stars, the more sought-after the poster,” Ruggeri says. “Value is really in the eyes of the beholder, although the truly valuable stuff, like posters from Universal horror films of the 1930s, can start out at $200,000.”
Ruggeri stops at Kansas City’s Frame Gallery (4501 Belleview, 816-756-3341) on Friday, Saturday and Sunday to display and offer for sale 300 pieces from his collection. (He also will lecture on collecting movie posters at 12:30 p.m. Sunday.) If there’s time, Ruggeri will also appraise posters — but only if they’re truly rare and unusual. “So many people think they have original posters, and they’re actually reproductions or duplicates or forgeries,” Ruggeri says. The other great misconception, he adds, “is that you can buy a really rare movie poster, like Gone With The Wind, for a couple hundred bucks.”
Movie posters are more than decorative; they are often the last relic of a film that no longer exists. “Half of all films made before 1960 have vanished,” Ruggeri says. “The poster sometimes outlives the movie.”— Charles Ferruzza
Good Blues
6/25-6/26
We would expect an event that calls itself a street festival to capture the essence of its city. For Kansas City, Kansas, said event would be colorful, unpretentious and fun. Happily, the Kansas City Kansas Street Blues Festival fits the bill. The celebration, which takes place on Third Street between Garfield and Parallel, is scheduled from 2 to 8 p.m. Friday and from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday. Performers include local institutions Jay McShann, Millage Gilbert and Tuttie Gadson, but this year’s free festivities also branch out to include gospel and reggae, such as the band Green Card. For a full schedule, call 913-328-0710 or see www.kckstreetblues fest.com.
— Annie Fischer
Live and Uncut
MON 6/28
Skateboard demos usually work like this: A sticker-covered van filled with road-weary team riders pulls up to a board shop, and the skaters roll out over a hodgepodge of beat-up old ramps and other tired obstacles. DC Shoes isn’t down with that. When this skate team arrives at the Circuit City parking lot (8440 North Madison Avenue at Interstate 29 and N.W. Barry Road), it’ll be hauling a trailer full of the team’s own rider-approved ramps and rails. Escapist skate shop co-owner Adrian Frost says the tour started with more than 12 riders, including Guinness World Record-holder Danny Way, but it’s anybody’s guess who will survive the nine stops before DC Shoes hits Kansas City at 4 p.m. Monday. For details, call 816-436-2504. — Michael Vennard
Ciao!
6/25-6/27
Festa Italiana, a three-day celebration of Italian culture and cuisine at Crown Center (2450 Grand), kicks off with a 5 p.m. happy hour Friday and lasts all weekend, culminating in an outdoor Mass at noon on Sunday. Other activities include a bocce tourney and the big-band stylings of Grammy-nominated Frank Stallone — apparently Sly’s brother got all the talent. And if the Festa Italiana Queen Pageant doesn’t satisfy your craving for eye candy, you can ogle the fashion sampling of Halls’ Italian designers or the collection of Italian race cars on display at Union Station. Daily tickets are $5 for adults and $3 for children. Call 816-274-8444 or see www.festaitalianakc.com for more information. — Fischer
