New retiree Kevin O'Connor and wife Donna

 KEVIN O’CONNOR MOVING OUT OF THE SPOTLIGHT

After a lifetime in show business, travel film Presenter Kevin O’Connor has stepped out of the Downey Theater spotlight into retirement’s great beckoning Green Room.

Asked what he would do now, he replied with his usual humor, “Whatever my wife wants me to do.”

(Theater staffer Noreen Kimura has taken over the Downey travel film series.)

Kevin has spent the past 26 years at the Downey-owned theater where, among other attractions, he has showcased 250 travel adventure films. At the same time he has been on call to use his manager skills —when needed—at the Music Center—a net of four major music and theater venues in nearby downtown Los Angeles.

We travel film artists have always looked forward to a Downey gig and working with Kevin, his professional staff, and appearing before the theater’s always warm, receptive audiences. There was also another plus—receiving the usual delicious bag of chocolate chip cookies when we headed out the door. More about the CCCs later.

Kevin has fond memories of his links with the film artists who walked out to stage center. “Thayer Soule was a great filmmaker and gentleman,” he said. “I was thrilled when he included Downey among the handful of theaters where he chose to show his farewell film.”

Also standing out in his memory is the concern he felt over the innovative filmmaker and Academy Award winner Ken Richter, who, in the finest tradition of “the show must go on,” made his final appearance at Downey despite a serious illness. “We were really worried about him.”

Show business tradition was no stranger in young Kevin’s life. His father, Norman O’Connor, was the last outdoor ringmaster for Ringling Brothers Circus before opening his own press agency. His mother, Shirley Horn, was also involved in promoting the Girl Scouts of America.

“I remember as a kid we had a circus lion living in the house with us,” he recalled. “He was just a cub but loved my mother. I think he thought she was his mother. After the lion left our home and became full grown, he killed a man.”

His father grew up in Vincennes, Indiana, a next-door neighbor of Red Skelton. Kevin fondly remembers his father taking him to one of the comedian’s rehearsals, and when Red spotted them, the comic yelled loudly, “Normaaaannnnnn.” “I was delighted,” he smiled.

In his younger days Kevin had various showbiz jobs, including working as a page for the Bob Hope Show. He later joined ATPAM—the Association of Theatrical Press Agents and Managers—and performed promotion and management duties for Broadway and other shows touring Southern California.

Downey’s popular cookie project began a couple decades ago when Kevin contacted the Otis Spunkmeyer Co. to supply the Downey kitchen with ready-to-bake cookie dough and the oven to bake them in.

On travel film days the kitchen staff always bakes 14 dozen cookies for every show, selling 13 dozen to hungry intermission audience members at a buck apiece. The remaining dozen is given to the lucky film artist as he or she heads out the door.

Incidentally, there never was a real Spunkmeyer, just a name dreamed up by the 12-year-old daughter of the founder of the international company based in San Leandro, California.

Film Artists don’t worry. Kevin may have left, but the cookies, the staff and audiences will remain.

—Hal McClure