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Wesleyan has part in "Friday Night Lights" CONTACT: Leslie Eikleberry, Director of Public Relations, 785-827-5541 ext. 1127 Updated October 9, 2004 Kansas Wesleyan University has gone Hollywood. A scene in the much anticipated “Friday Night Lights” includes two football recruiters from Kansas Wesleyan visiting with one of the high school players. In reality, a graduate from the high school featured in the movie did play football for the Kansas Wesleyan Coyotes. In the scene, two actors playing Kansas Wesleyan football recruiters pay a visit to the home of the Odessa Permian star quarterback Mike Winchell, played by Lucas Black. Black counts among his credits roles in “All the Pretty Horses,” “Sling Blade,” “Ghosts of Mississippi,” “Crazy in Alabama,” “The X Files,” and “Cold Mountain.” The recruiters also can be seen in at least two other crowd shots at games. The movie opened nationwide Friday (October 8) and is playing at the Central Mall 8 Theatre in Salina. A summary of the movie from Universal is as follows: From Oscar-winning producer Brian Grazer and Imagine Entertainment and based on the best-selling book about high school football by H.G. Bissinger, "Friday Night Lights" chronicles the entire 1988 season of the Permian High Panthers of Odessa, Texas, with football players, coaches, mothers, fathers, pastors, boosters, fans and families struggling with ongoing personal conflicts while the team fights for a state championship. A town for sale, Odessa, Texas, has seen better days--the financial bust evident in its boarded-up shops and broken lives. Yet one hope sustains the community where, once a week during the fall, the town and its dreams come alive beneath the dazzling and disorienting Friday night lights...when the Permian High Panthers take to the field. In a city where economic uncertainty has eroded the spirit of its inhabitants, nearly everyone seeks comfort in the religion of the Friday night ritual, where the unfulfilled dreams of an entire community are shifted onto the shoulder pads of a team of high-school athletes. "Friday Night Lights" captures the frenzy of a small town that reveres its school team and their weekly games. Cast members include Billy Bob Thornton, Jay Hernandez, Tim McGraw, Lucas Black, Derek Luke, Lee Thompson Young, and Connie Britton. Johnny Johnson was the player from Odessa Permian who actually played two seasons at KWU after coming from West Texas State. While at Kansas Wesleyan, Johnson: Johnson's name still appears
in many of the top ten rushing lists at Kansas Wesleyan, including: For more information about the
movie itself, please go to the official web site:
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