Update: The SAFE and Family Friendly drive-in movie nights at Canterbury Village in Lake Orion have been postponed, due to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s orders, according to a Facebook post. All tickets purchased to the sold out shows will be valid for the new dates in mid May, or a refund will be issued. Purchasers will receive an email from Big Tickets.

See more here.

Drive-in movies were at the height of popularity in the 1950s and early 60s. Now with the coronavirus pandemic’s social distancing guidelines, the idea of watching movies with your family from your car is making a comeback.

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That’s exactly what will be happening at Canterbury Village in Lake Orion starting on Thursday night.

“The response on Facebook has been unbelievable. We posted on the Canterbury Facebook page and in two hours we had like 8,000 likes,’’ said Dan Newman who owns AV7 Productions in Rochester Hills. “Just my post from last night, it’s been shared almost 2,000 times, it’s ridiculous.’’

Newman’s production company usually works festivals and concerts.

But, of course, those have all been canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic.

“I own a sound, lighting and video company and we’ve been shut down since the first of March,’’ Newman said on Monday. “We had a bunch of equipment sitting around. We said what can we do to get this stuff back to work? We do all the events at Canterbury with Keith Aldridge and the Canterbury family.’’

So it was a good fit.

“I’ve actually never been to a drive-in, it’ll definitely be a new experience for some, for others it will be something they grew up doing and they want to take their kids or grandkids,’’ Newman said. “That’s why we’re doing a lot of kids and family movies, plus being outdoors we’re not going to show R-rated movies.’’

Movies on the agenda include “Onward”, “Star Wars” and “Knives Out.”

First, they got all the permits from the city of Lake Orion.

“Obviously we have our social distancing guidelines set up, we got the movies licenses last week, so we’re going to open up this coming Thursday,’’ Newman said.

All ticket sales will be online starting at 6 p.m. on Monday. The link is at the Canterbury Village Facebook page. No drive-up tickets will be sold.

They have marked off a vacant 5-acre lot into 150 oversized spaces. They provide enough room so if someone wants to back a truck or RV in, and watch the movie from there they’ll have plenty of space.

The LED video wall screen, set up on trusses, measures 32 feet by 14 feet. The sound system will be through an FM station in your car.

Concessions such as pizza, chicken wings and popcorn from Canterbury’s C-Pub can be ordered by calling in and will be delivered to the cars on a golf cart.

Restrooms are also available with attendants to enforce social distancing.

“We’ve been in the production business for 20-plus years so we’re using our existing production knowledge,’’ Newman said. “We’ve been doing events but the drive in is definitely new.’’

The plan is to have two movies each (5 p.m. and 8 p.m.) on Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights and also a Saturday matinee. If the interest is there, they could start having midweek shows.

Update: The movie nights at Canterbury Village have been postponed, due to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s orders, according to a Facebook post, https://www.facebook.com/canterburyvillagelakeorion. All tickets purchased to the sold out shows will be valid for the new dates in mid May, or a refund will be issued. Purchasers will receive an email from Big Tickets. Refund requests should be sent to support@BigTickets.com.

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