OGDEN -- Someone pushed a button, and the Mighty Wurlitzer organ at Peery's Egyptian Theater boomed out "Hooray for Hollywood!" as workers on the stage spread massive piles of deep-red cloth.
Nobody was at the keyboard, but no ghosts were at work, as the organ has computers attached to it.
But what the workers were doing may rouse spirits. Van Summerill and the Egyptian Theater Foundation sure hope it does.
The yards and yards of plush deep-red fabric trimmed with gold makes up a new "waterfall" curtain for the theater.
Purchased with $70,000 in RAMP and George S. and Delores Dore Eccles Foundation grants, they have no other purpose than to make the experience of watching old movies at the Egyptian more authentic.
That experience is why Summerill, a founding member of the foundation and one of the theater's biggest fans, is so excited.
He saw a waterfall curtain at the Egyptian the first time one was installed, back in 1951, and remembers it as being downright amazing.
You need a definition: A "waterfall curtain" does not involve water. It involves a lot of fabric hung in such a way that, when the curtain is raised, it looks elegant.
In this case, the curtain is pulled up by half a dozen ropes inside the curtain that lift it from the bottom, creating rows of scallops, or waves, along the front of the curtain as it rises and falls.
Summerill was 9 years old the first time he saw one.
"In the early '50s, TV was playing havoc with theaters," he said. "And you had the new kids on the block -- drive-ins -- and community theaters like the Country Club" on what was then the far reaches of the city, 40th Street and Washington Boulevard.
"Fox's answer to that was to do multimillion-dollar refurbishments to all these theaters," he said, referring to the company that owned a chain of movie theaters at that time.
The refurbishments involved the installation of new projectors and sound systems, new decor and spiffy new curtains.
Moviegoers would settle in with their popcorn. The lights would dim. The waterfall curtain would slowly rise and, behind it, was another curtain on which the projected MGM lion would roar.
That title curtain would then split down the middle, opening to the sides, and the theater would show the cartoon, the newsreel, the coming attractions and whatever else.
Then the curtains would close, then they would open again, and then the feature would appear on the screen.
"It just adds a little class, and that's what movie palaces were," Summerill said, and what the Egyptian tries to re-create.
The Egyptian already had two curtains, a standard cloth curtain and the fireproof curtain, which has ancient Egyptian designs painted on it.
The waterfall curtain and new title curtain are being installed this month behind the existing two. By agreement with the donors and the foundation, the theater can only use the waterfall and title curtains when showing vintage movies.
The original curtains from 1951 didn't last long. The original title curtain was taken out 18 months later when the theater's stage was remodeled for the installation of a Cinemascope screen, which was much wider.
These new curtains will be used for the first time at a special movie showing Dec. 3, almost 60 years to the day of the grand opening of the 1951 curtains.
The film? The foundation is hoping to show "An American in Paris," the best picture of 1951, that stars Gene Kelly.
That would be another flash from the past for the Egyptian, Summerill said, but he then admitted that, in 1951, "An American in Paris" didn't show at the Egyptian.
"It opened in the Orpheum, across the street," he said with a smile -- but that theater has been gone for nearly 30 years.
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