TCM Fan Favourites This Saturday

Many of you might remember last November when Turner Classic Movies debuted a new segment, Fan Favourites, in which fans were able to introduce some of their favourite films. The first batch of fans featured in this segment included Aurora--better known as Citizen Screen (who introduced Meet Me in St. Louis), TCM Party co-founder  Paula Guthat (who introduced The Lemon Drop Kid),  Miguel Rodriguez of the Horrible Imaginings Podcast (who introduced The Thing from Another World), and TCM Party regular Joel Williams (who introduced Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid).

This past January TCM announced in posts on Google+, Instagram, and Facebook that they were looking for four more fans for their next Fan Favourites segment. While the first time Turner Classic Movies asked fans to submit ten different films they would like to introduce, in January TCM asked fans to select one film and tell why they chose that film. In my case, I replied to their post on Google+ and explained why I would choose A Hard Day's Night (which should come to no surprise to those who know me well). Much to my surprise I was chosen as one of the four viewers for Fan Favourites almost immediately.

For those of you who are wondering how the Fan Favourite introductions (complete with a chat with Ben Mankiewicz) work, they are done via video chat (in my case, I was in my home and Ben was in the TCM studios in Atlanta). Prior to the actual Fan Favourites shoot I had two video chats with Courtney, Associate Producer at Turner Classic Movies, and Mardy, the sound engineer at TCM, to work out any technical difficulties.  As to the actual shooting itself, the introductions were shot in the order in which they will appear, which meant that I went on second.  For the most part I think everything went fairly smoothly, although I did stumble over one or two questions. I have to confess I was a bit nervous. While I have no problem talking (I've been told the problem is getting me to stop talking), I have never liked how I look on a camera (which is why there are so few photographs of me). I am still worried about how I will look on screen! Anyhow, Ben Mankiewicz is very easy to talk to and made the process much more pleasant than it might have otherwise been!

For those of you who want to watch this batch of Fan Favourites, here's the schedule for this Saturday, April 11 2015:

12:15 PM Eastern/11:15 AM Central Footlight Parade (1933) introduced by Christina Rinaldi
2:15 PM Eastern/1:15 PM Central A Hard Day's Night (1964) introduced by me
4:00 PM Eastern/3:00 PM Central The Way We Were (1973) introduced by Donna D'Andrea
6:15 PM Eastern/5:15 Central The Defiant Ones (1958) introduced by Steve Zeoke

For those of you who participate in TCM Parties on Twitter, I imagine there will be a TCM Party going on throughout this Saturday's Fan Favourites. I know I will be on hand with my usual trivia for A Hard Day's Night!

Anyhow, I want to thank  Noralil (who is in charge of social media at TCM), Courtney, Mardy, and Ben. I hope that they will make Fan Favourites a regular segment, as I know many of my fellow TCM fans would great at introducing their favourite films!