Ahoy There Maties! Welcome to Newsletter #69 of the Official Gilligan's Island Fan Club. One of the best Comedians in the world just passed away. Like Gilligan, John Ritter was just good clean fun. I never heard him swear on tv and never heard anything bad about him in the tabloids. He was truly a good-natured person at heart. We'll miss you and thank you for all of the laughs. The Gilligan's Island Musical will be here in October. If you missed the Ohio showing, come see this one in Birmingham, Alabama at the historic Virginia Samford Theatre. Contact our Alabama Promoter Frank Thompson at centrestage@webtv.net or Kim Dometrovich at plantgirlkim@charter.net for more info. Tickets can be obtained by phone by calling the theatre box office, at 205-251-6805. NOTE! Dawn Wells will be attending opening night! WOW! OCTOBER Thurs.9@ 7:30 Fri.10@ 7:30 Sat.11@tba Thurs.16@7:30 Fri.17@7:30 Sat.18@2:30 AND 7:30 I just received my Bobble Head and I must say I was quite surprised at the quality of this product. I thought it was going to be a cheap plastic toy but it wasn't. It's made of a strong resin and will make anybody happy. Order yours now in time for Christmas. It's only $14.95! As cheap as it is, it will be worth $1,000 to the person that opens it up for Christmas! You can get yours here: http://www.classictvshop.com Have you tried to watch an episode of Gilligan's Island lately only to search for something that just doesn't exist anymore? Where's Gilligan's Island?! Well, you can still watch it, BUT it's only on at 3:30 in the morning! Who gets up that early? And who knows how to program those darn VCR's? The only thing we can do is contact www.tvland.com and give them our two cents worth. As for the Gilligan's Island DVD? The ratings on the DVD collection went from 108th placew to 36th!!! WOW! This went unnoticed by Warner Brothers and they are going to release the first season in 2004! You folks really kicked it up a notch and we couldn't have done it without all of you voting. If you haven't voted yet, please vote at: http://www.tvshowsondvd.com Halloween is coming so get your shirts now before it's too late. http://www.gilligansisle.com/shirt.html Dawn Wells (Mary Ann) will be appearing in a convention called Adventurecon October 3-5 at the Gatlinburg Convention Center in Tennessee. She, along with other celebrity guests, will be meeting with fans, signing autographs and selling merchandise. The website is at: http://www.adventurecon.com. You can contact Tammi Sharp at tsharp39@comcast.net or Phone/fax 865-220-0847 for more info. And now for some e-mails from YOU!!! By the way, I purchased the dvd of the first reunion movie for gilligan's island... through a turn of circumstances, I ended up with an extra copy of it... not a pirated version, but two legal copies... If you or someone else would like one, I would be happy to send it out for 10 bucks (safely packaged within an inch of it's life)... I'm pretty sure the 2nd copy is still in the original wrapper... I just checked and I was wrong, the extra video that I have is not in the original wrap. There's no good reason for it to have been opened, but unfortunately, it was. But it is brand new. Probably what I'll do, is that who ever buys it, I may offer to make them a set of vcd, or svcd, or mpeg disc copies as a "back up" to the dvd. the vcd's and the svcd's are often playable on dvd players or computers, and the mpeg discs are of course playable on all computers... Merle Southard zanmerle@hotmail.com Allow me to introduce myself. I'm the Managing Director of Live Bait Theater, a small theater that premieres new work by local Chicago playwrights. Each year we hold a benefit auction of celebrity doodles (sketches on little pieces of paper) - in the past we've had everyone from Katherine Hepburn to Pat Sajak. This year, we have Ginger's doodle. Tina's been incredibly generous to us and given us doodles for a number of years, but this year I thought I would let you know personally. If you or anyone you know might be interested, the event is Sunday October 12, 2003 and kicks off at 6:00 pm. It is here in Chicago at Live Bait Theater, 3914 N. Clark Street. I heard last week that the survivors of the show will be appearing live to promote the Gilligan's Island slot machines....any word on when and where? This is pretty exciting. I heard it in a station in Phoenix (AM 1230). Even Tina Louise will be there!!!!!!!! I am so excited!! Stuart Lee Cassriel Whitman [Ed Note: I haven't heard of this yet] DAWN WELLS: Can be seen in a new movie---She has a fine, lovely cameo appearance as a spokeswoman of power, in the new Jeff Daniels Indie film "Super Sucker", a comedy that pretty much pokes total humiliation at vaccum cleaner salespeople, and door-to-door marketing. Despite the title, the film IS a MUST-SEE (and not just because our very own "Mary Ann" appears in it)... My hubby and I laughed our socks off the entire film. Bailey G. (MI) Until next time, "Smooth Sailing." Willy Gilligan President/Webmaster Official Gilligan's Island Fan Club http://www.gilligansisle.com