Texasville

TICKETS

There are so many things to love about this movie. For starters, it’s directed by Peter Bogdonavich and co-written by Bogdonovich and Larry McMurty, getting the band back together for a return tour. The rest of the extraordinary ensemble cast from The Last Picture Show is here, too, 20 years later, and continues McMurtry’s ongoing exploration of what it means to be Texan.   

The summer is 1984 and there is a Friday Night Lights–meets–The Big Chill feeling in Anarene, Texas, as it prepares for its centennial celebration. This is fully mature McMurtry, exploring time, place, love, loss, and, most of all, friendships of the deepest order. All of the characters remain yearbook-picture fresh in memory, which adds yet another layer of meaning. The two decades have wrought many changes, and revelations, too. The romance between Dwayne (Jeff Bridges) and Jaycee (Cybil Shepard) has matured into something Cary Grant and Katherine Hepburn would be proud of. Join us for more Texas time travel. 
 

Join us this August as we pay tribute to the acclaimed novelist and screenwriter Larry McMurtry, Texas’s most famous literary and cinematic son, who passed away in March 2020. Through his books, screenplays, and the films adapted from his books, some feel that McMurtry, more than anyone else, shaped the way that the world sees Texas. 

Guest host and McMurtry devotee Bud Kennedy of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram will kick off our exploration of McMurtry’s cinematic works, including Hud, The Last Picture Show, Texasville, and Lonesome Dove. Film scholar and SXSW co-founder Louis Black will join remotely. 

McMurtry grew up on a ranch in North Texas with only an oral tradition of storytelling, never seeing a book until he was six years old. His stories jumped through many media—print, film, television—and in each he excelled, garnering 13 Oscars, 7 Emmys, and a Pulitzer in 1985 for his novel Lonesome Dove. 

It has been said that what the South was to William Faulkner, Texas was to Larry McMurtry. His passion for the land and people made it impossible for him to fully inhabit the self-proclaimed role of "western revisionist." Even when he depicts Texas at its worst, he only makes you love it, and him, more.

Screenings will be held in the Modern’s auditorium. Tickets are $10, $8 for Modern members, $7 for Modern Reel People members.  

A Tribute to Larry McMurtry Schedule:

Lonesome Dove
July 31, Part I noon & Part II 2 pm
August 1, Part III & IV 4:30 pm

Hud
August 7, 2 pm

The Last Picture Show/50th Anniversary 
August 14, 2 pm

Texasville
August 15, 4:30 pm