EDITOR’S NOTE: Footloose was on USA Up All Night on September 15 and December 23, 1995.

Herbert Ross (The Owl and the Pussycat, Steel Magnolias) is directing, Dean Pitchford (the co-writer of “You Should Hear How She Talks About You”) is writing, and America is loving it. Imagine — a town where no music is allowed. How can it be! How could a lack of the First Amendment ever happen in our country?

Ren McCormack (Kevin Bacon) and his mother Ethel (Frances Lee McCain) have come from Chicago to Bomont, Utah. Here, Reverend Shaw Moore (John Lithgow) runs the town, keeping kids like Willard (Chris Penn), Rusty (Sarah Jessica Parker), Woody (John Laughlin), Lulu (Lynne Marta) and his own daughter Ariel (Lori Singer) from dancing.

Ariel’s brother died after a night of drinking and dancing, which is how we got here. So can this city kid come to town and change it all? Of course.

This was almost a Michael Cimino movie, but even after Heaven’s Gate, he had considerable demands. There’s also a world where Tom Cruise or Christopher Atkins was the lead, while Madonna, Haviland Morris, Valerie Bertinelli or Jennifer Jason Leigh would be the love interest.

This is loosely based on a real-life movie story. The town of Elmore City, Oklahoma, had no dancing since its founding. Rev. F. R. Johnson said, “No good has ever come from a dance. If you have a dance, somebody will crash it, and they’ll be looking for only two things — women and booze. When boys and girls hold each other, they get sexually aroused. You can believe what you want, but one thing leads to another.” In 1980, the students of Elmore City’s high school made national news when they requested permission to hold a junior prom. The school board was tied at 2–2 when President Raymond Lee said, “Let ’em dance.”

If you were alive when this came out — I was 12 — you know the songs: “Footloose” by Kenny Loggins, “Let’s Hear It for the Boy” by Deniece Williams, “Almost Paradise” by Heart’s Ann Wilson and Loverboy’s Mike Reno, “Holding Out for a Hero” by Bonnie Tyler, and so many more. Writer Dean Pitchford did more than the script. He also co-wrote the songs.