Maritime Museum to celebrate ‘Big Wednesday’
By Santa Ynez Valley Star Staff · Tue Mar 17 2020
Staff Report
The Santa Barbara Maritime Museum will celebrate the 40th anniversary of the big-wave film “Big Wednesday” with Denny Aaberg and the release of an updated “Big Wednesday” novel in a special event starting at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 20.
Aaberg, who wrote the novel with John Milius, will sign copies of the new edition, which will be available for purchase.
“I spent the last two years revising and fleshing out the original “Big Wednesday” novel, which came out in 1978,” Aaberg said. “The novel is really a story about old Malibu, its waves, and its characters, and what it was like surfing there in the 1950s and 1960s. The 40th anniversary edition … contains a lot of history and love stories that were either cut out or not included in the Warner Brothers feature film. … I believe, after years of working on it, it is the novel John Milius and I always wanted it to be.”
The evening, sponsored by The Brittingham Family Foundation, will include a series of film shorts that include footage and images that can’t be seen anywhere else, according to a museum spokesman. For example, “Little Wednesday” and “Denny’s Big Wednesday Scrapbook” feature never-before-seen images from Aaberg’s personal collection. Greg MacGillivary’s documentary “Hollywood Don’t Surf” has never been released in theaters or on DVD. Aaberg will be showing a 25-minute section of the documentary, which is about the making of “Big Wednesday.”
The program will begin with a reception featuring music by The Wrinkled Teenagers, with Aaberg, Simone Reddingius and Tony Humecke performing a set of classic 1960s surf tunes and upbeat originals.
The evening also includes: