Ferguson Center

October 12, 1978

David Muscari

The summer of 1978 was notable for several reasons. A bomb exploded at Northwestern University credited to the notorious Unabomber; Pope John Paul succeeded Pope Paul VI as the 263rd Pope; the first rainbow flag appeared at an LGBT event in San Francisco; and Universal Studios released a small-budget film called “Animal House.” Created by a group of National Lampoon writers it starred John Belushi, Tim Matheson, Donald Sutherland, plus a host of young, up-and-comers. After the picture’s release respected film critic Roger Ebert unexpectedly named it one of the year’s best films. Chris Miller was a writer at “National Lampoon.” He and his colleagues reportedly leaned into their real-life experiences in various college fraternities. Miller attended Dartmouth and claimed he stayed true to many of the details that occurred in his fraternity, shoehorning them into the film.  We booked Miller for a speaking engagement at The University of Alabama in the large ballroom of Ferguson Center. After picking him up at the airport and spending the entire day together, Kent Öztekin and I grilled the poor guy on the finer points in the film. He was forthcoming and seemed to be having a great time. In turn, we were his two-person focus group as he quizzed us on everything from reactions to the movie to our lack of knowledge about James Brown’s earliest music. The ballroom was filled with young fraternity and sorority members, decked out in the uniforms of the day: Sperry Topsiders, button-down shirts, khakis, and Add A Bead necklaces. Kent introduced Miller to the rowdy crowd. The seasoned New York writer started by reading excerpts from a Lampoon story, which was the basis for sections of the movie. “Pinto’s First Lay” was raw, to say the least. Kent and I stood just off-stage in the wings. Miller looked our way and “winked” after reading the first few raunchy sentences, letting us know there was plenty more to come. It was probably not what the Greek crowd expected at all. About 15 minutes into the story, much of the room had already cleared. Miller wrapped up the evening with a short film, which took the audience behind the scenes of “Animal House.” He talked glowing about the experience and took questions from a less-than-half-full house.