Dad and Damon

Responding to my post yesterday about Damon Runyon, my dad sent me an e-mail that included this bit:

My parents saw Broadway shows once or twice a year. My dad was always somewhat reluctant, but dutifully tagged along. Being a night owl even then, I was usually up when they arrived home and I can recall my shock one night when Dad returned ecstatic over the show and, of course, it was the original Broadway production of “Guys and Dolls.” I had forgotten that, but the memory was resurrected when the movie came out about five years later when I was a freshman in college. I was home for vacation and a buddy of mine from Hempstead and I took dates to see it. I had read the Runyon short stories by then and was mesmerized. When I returned to Ithaca and saw it was playing in one of the movie houses there, I firmly established my credentials as a movie nut case by seeing it seven times in three days. I only did that two other times, for The Court Jester and A Place in the Sun.