Let’s All Go to the Lobby: Retro Movie Oscar Party Ideas

This post is spon­sored by Cost Plus World Mar­ket, but as always, all ideas and opin­ions are my own!

When I first arrived to my first semes­ter of col­lege at UC Berke­ley, I had every inten­tion of major­ing in Inter­na­tion­al Busi­ness. As I brain­stormed some ideas for a fun, elec­tive course, I came across a list­ing for audi­tions to an intro­duc­to­ry act­ing class in the Dra­ma depart­ment. After a quick stop to the book­store, I mem­o­rized a mono­logue, which I then per­formed at my audi­tion, then con­se­quent­ly scur­ried to my dorm room where I cried at the thought of what a fool I had just made of myself! After much delib­er­a­tion, I decid­ed to go ahead and check the post­ed results and was dumb­found­ed at the dis­cov­ery that I actu­al­ly made it into the class! Fast for­ward through a few more act­ing class­es and my uni­ver­si­ty edu­ca­tion took a dras­tic turn when I called my par­ents to declare that I intend­ed to major in Dra­mat­ic Arts… to which my moth­er prompt­ly replied: Don’t you like com­put­ers?! Well, as you have prob­a­bly already deduced, my career path did not lead me to becom­ing a pro­fes­sion­al actress, but my love for dra­ma has remained in tele­vi­sion, movies, stage per­for­mances and, of course, life! lol!

With the 87th Acad­e­my Awards tak­ing place this com­ing Sun­day, Feb­ru­ary 22nd, I’m super excit­ed to have part­nered with Cost Plus World Mar­ket to pro­vide ideas for a movie-themed table with enter­tain­ing essen­tials, as I love watch­ing the Oscars and liv­ing vic­ar­i­ous­ly through the nom­i­nees and win­ners! Since the view­ing of the show is a fam­i­ly affair in our home, I want­ed to come up with a fun and casu­al theme and decid­ed on a Retro Movie Night. I was inspired by the clas­sic ani­mat­ed com­mer­cial por­tray­ing the danc­ing snacks singing Let’s All Go to the Lob­by and must admit I have been singing the song non-stop! Scroll down for some sim­ple tips to cre­ate your own con­ces­sion stand for your Oscar-view­ing par­ty or movie night, along with a super­star fon­dant cook­ie tutorial!

Concessions

For the food, I want­ed to focus on the tra­di­tion­al snacks and good­ies you would find at a clas­sic con­ces­sion stand and what is more syn­ony­mous with movies than pop­corn?! Though Cost Plus World Mar­ket offers a large vari­ety of pop­corn, I picked up sev­er­al bags of movie the­ater pop­corn, along with the cheese and but­ter pop­corn sea­son­ing packs, served in adorable small pop­corn box­es. I love these indi­vid­ual box­es that makes it so easy for each per­son to fla­vor their pop­corn as they please! I also served hot dogs with condi­ments in mini squeeze bot­tles.

If you’re any­thing like me, I think you would agree that a cru­cial ele­ment to view­ing a movie includes sweets! I put togeth­er a tray of tra­di­tion­al can­dies, includ­ing Red Vines, Mal­te­sers, Truf­fle Cups, Kit Kats and Rolos, and also includ­ed Cola Sparkling Can­dy in stor­age tins dressed up as film reels. As soon as I saw the Mes­sage Cook­ie Cut­ter set, I knew they would be per­fect to make some Super­star sug­ar cook­ies, which I cov­ered in fon­dant and added word­ing {tuto­r­i­al below}. This set is per­fect for adding mes­sages, names of movies and nom­i­nees and per­son­al­iza­tion! Uti­lize them on fon­dant or direct­ly onto the cook­ies them­selves pri­or to bak­ing them. And for refresh­ments, I served cher­ry cola in vin­tage bot­tles with paper straws, but feel free to add more adult bev­er­ages for your enter­tain­ing needs!

Decor

Once I set­tled on a retro movie theme and the con­ces­sions, I then focused on the decor. Serv­ing items and dish­es make a big impact on your table. The pop­corn box­es and glass bot­tles played per­fect­ly into the motif, which I then paired with red and white alu­minum trays and a sim­ple white rec­tan­gu­lar plat­ter. I used the large pop­corn serv­ing bowl to dis­play some favors and activ­i­ties, which inci­den­tal­ly is ide­al for gift-giv­ing! The back­drop was a sim­ple insu­la­tion foam board, accen­tu­at­ed with wall let­ters spelling out the word EAT. I pur­chased adorable retro movie clip art from My Grafi­co to design food labels, as well as tags for the pop­corn box­es and movie reel tins, then print­ed out larg­er ver­sions of the danc­ing snacks to embell­ish the back­drop let­ters. I also made a lit­tle CONCESSIONS ban­ner {click for the free print­able!} for the front of the table with red and white twine. Adding col­ored twine to items, includ­ing the box­es, bot­tles and even the hot dogs adds that extra detail to your dec­o­ra­tions. Final­ly, I added some film reel cas­es I had for some added interest!

Activities

In the inter­est of keepin’ it real, I think we all admit that every now and then, there is a lull dur­ing the Acad­e­my Awards pre­sen­ta­tion, am I right?! While the open­ing num­ber and sub­se­quent begin­ning awards are fun and excit­ing, the show has a ten­den­cy of slow­ing down just a bit every now and then, so why not pro­vide some fun lit­tle activ­i­ties, espe­cial­ly for the kids! The View Mas­ter Clas­sic is per­fect to sup­ply some enter­tain­ment, while also adding to the retro decor. I also designed a free print­able Oscar Bal­lot for the 2015 show so that every­one can par­tic­i­pate on cast­ing their votes before­hand and keep­ing up with the win­ner through­out the show! And last­ly, I just had to get the Sil­ly Sip­py Straw Glass­es, which was such a hoot and worked perfectly!

How cute is the inside of the large pop­corn bowl with this message?!

Hope you have REEL good time watch­ing the Oscars this year with your retro movie themed par­ty! Scroll down for the sim­ple tuto­r­i­al for the Super­star sug­ar cook­ies and be sure to enter the World Mar­ket Movie Lovers Sweep­stakes for a chance to win the following:

♥  Free movies for a year {2 tick­ets per week for 52 weeks}

♥  $1,000 World Mar­ket gift card

Superstar fondant cookie tutorial

 

Materials Needed:

♥  Sug­ar cook­ie dough {pack­age or from scratch}

♥  Rolling pin

♥  Parch­ment paper and flour

♥  Mes­sage cook­ie cut­ter set

♥  Red fondant

♥  Fon­dant rolling pin with 1/8″ guide rings

♥  Can­dy pearls

♥  Water/edible glue and brush

♥  Ball tool

♥  Clear pip­ing gel

Pre­pare your mix­ture for your favorite sug­ar cook­ies {uti­lize a pack­age or from scratch}, roll the bat­ter out with a rolling pin onto parch­ment paper sprin­kled with flour and uti­lize the large star cut­ter to cut out your cook­ies. Bake in the oven as directed.

Step 1:

Roll out red fon­dant on your work sur­face with the rolling pin and 1/8″ guide rings. Uti­lize the star cut­ter to punch out a large star the same size as your cookie.

Step 2:

Begin plac­ing the pearl can­dies around the perime­ter of the fon­dant star and press­ing them down into the fon­dant, uti­liz­ing the ball tool to help. If nec­es­sary, apply a tiny bit of water/edible glue with the brush to make the pearl can­dies stick to the fondant.

Step 3:

While the Mes­sage Cook­ie Cut­ter set comes with pre-made mes­sages {i.e. Hap­py Birth­day, Thank You, etc.}, it also pro­vides loose let­ters to cre­ate your own per­son­al­ized notes. Pick out your desired let­ters and insert them into the hold­er, ensur­ing you are plac­ing them in the cor­rect order to be stamped! Press your mes­sage into the fon­dant, then glue the fon­dant star to the sug­ar cook­ie with the use of some clear pip­ing gel.

 

Merci Beaucoup!

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