You’re driving along winding country roads in a car full of your best friends. The windows are down; you’re blasting the radio. Or you’re at the wheel, and your excited children are in the back seat ready to fall asleep with their teddy bears — though they’re adamant that they can stay up all night. Or you’re 16 years old, you’ve just got your driver’s licence. Your high-school crush is riding shotgun, and there’s nervous energy in the air. You pull into a field surrounded by the golden rays of a summer sunset, park your car in front of the big screen, and tune your radio to the right station, anxiously waiting for the sun to go down so the movie can start.
If you grew up in rural Ontario, chances are you remember summer nights at your local drive-in theatre. When COVID-19 closed indoor theatres across the province on March 17, drive-ins seemed like a ready-made alternative, perfect for social distancing. “Everybody kept contacting us on Facebook and email and phoning and saying, ‘Well, you should be able to open because of course we're sitting in the car, and we won't get out,’” says Kevin Marshall, who has owned the Skylight Drive-In in Pembroke with his wife, Kathy, since 2014. “It seemed to me that, under the provincial regulations, a drive-in really was the best and safest way to go, and I figured that the government would get to that point, too.”
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