Panel emphasizes importance of “A Christmas Story” film, fans at fan-con keystone event

CLEVELAND, Oh—Actor Zack Ward who played bully “Skut Farkus” in the film 1983 “A Christmas Story” had one of the more laugh-out-loud moments Friday night at Cleveland’s Music Hall.

“If you see a kid with yellow eyes and green teeth, call 911 and get that kid some orange slices!” he said.

It was one of many uproarious and delightful moments during a moderated panel discussion Friday night—the anchor event to the “Ralphie Comes Home” weekend fan convention fundraiser for the Greater Cleveland Film Commission.

“Behind the Camera: A Christmas Story – Official 40th Anniversary” fan convention runs through Sunday, November 12 at the Cleveland Public Auditorium and includes fan experiences with cast members. Details about the event can be found at clevelandfilm.com.

The long-awaited reunion featured Ward, lead actor Peter Billingsley (“Ralphie Parker”) and nine other cast members from the film—along with legendary NBC personality (and former WKYC weather anchor) Al Roker moderating—sharing memories and stories from the making of the movie.

The panel shared a lot of “inside scoop” surrounding the 40-year chemistry of the actors: how director Bob Clark and writer author/humorist Jean Shepherd related and diverged; the late-blooming success of the film 20 years after its release, thanks to the TBS cable network’s 24-hour marathons and a lot more.

Billingsley expectedly took the lead with a lot of his commentary and reflections, which included a quorum/consensus that the movie continues to resonate for audiences new and old because it is intergenerational and recalls a halcyon era with its backdrop.

Thanks to a huge cult following and 80s nostalgia, “Ralphie” had a theater full of presents to unwrap Friday night. He’d been hopeful something resembling a panel family reunion would happen someday.

“I said if we’re gonna do this, we’re doing it in Cleveland,” Billingsley said, alluding to their time filming in Cleveland and the impact that’s had on the city and the film’s fans. “And here we are.”

Fans in attendance went bonkers.

“A Christmas Story” chronicles Ralphie’s life in the days leading up to Christmas, his many attempts and setbacks to secure a Red Ryder BB-gun gift and more. It is seen now as an iconoclastic childhood odyssey. Cleveland.com’s Josh Duke was able to talk to Billingsley prior to the panel event (see above).

The film was adapted from Shepherd’s “In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash.”

While “Story” launched to a tepid box office tally, it has gone on to become a cherished holiday classic with a counterculture all its own, thanks Ted Turner’s TBS network.

Today, fans travel from across the country to visit A Christmas Story House & Museum and screen the film the way folks would “It’s a Wonderful Life” a generation ago.

Scott Schwartz (“Flick”) recalled pranking director Clark by sending nightly room service (including steak) at the Cleveland’s Stouffers Inn on the Square while filming. He would later get pranked in reverse by the director during a “triple dog dare” take where everyone went to lunch.

As the cast would later explain, the scene where “Flick” gets his tongue stuck on a frozen flag pole to the gaiety of his pals, the whole scene was underexposed on film and had to be reshot at the end of filming.

The actual tongue-sticking effect came thanks to a suction tube situated on-pole, off-camera.

Yano Anaya (“Grover Dill”) recalled his experience with thousands of “Story” fans and how these interactions “changed my perspective on how much a film can change lives” and how much it means to people.

“Everywhere I go, people smile at me like they’ve known me forever,” Anaya said.

“And we’ve never met!”

The overriding theme of the event—captured for posterity by the film commission’s cameras—that “A Christmas Story” is “a gift that keeps on giving,” for fans and cast alike.

Al Roker perhaps said it best at the midpoint of the panel, hinting at the current events, changes that have happened with new media since the turn of the century and the energy that the film draws from bygone eras—the 1940s the film is set in and the 1980s it was released in.

“It seems like we need this movie now more than ever.”

Billingsley offered sincere and genuine gratitude on behalf of the panel at the close.

“I just want to say thank you,” he said to the audience. “The feeling is mutual.”

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