RON HOWARD SIGHTING

This is a little late in the breaking news department, but two weekends ago our Embry-Riddle University golf team hosted a tournament at beautiful Pelican Bay in Daytona Beach. Representing the University of South Carolina Beauford was Reed Howard (who played a heck of a tournament and wound up finishing second overall to his teammate). Reed is the son of Hollywood trifecta extraordinaire (actor, director, producer) Ron Howard. You know Ron. Trust me on this one.

Perhaps you remember Opie from the Andy Griffith television show. Or Richie Cunningham on Happy Days - you know - the Fonz's main man. He was in the George Lucas film, no not Star Wars, the one that didn't have prequels or sequels: American Graffiti. He's kind of a big deal when it comes to directing, too. Maybe you've heard of Apollo 13, A Beautiful Mind (it kinda sorta won some Oscars), Tom Hank's bad haircut in The DaVinci Code, Frost/Nixon (in my opinion one of the more overlooked films at the Oscars this year along with Darren Aronofsky's The Wrestler). You don't have to be super old to know about Cocoon, though it might help, or remember that other film he did with Russel Crowe - something about a Cinderella?

Well, we got to talk to this living legend for a few seconds. He's got a new film that's coming out in April, bringing him back to work with Dan Brown's novels and his character Robert Langdon (played by Tom Hanks again). Angel and Demons looks phenomenal if you take the couple of minutes it takes to view the trailer.

Mr. Howard had said that he was going to donate an autographed movie poster of Angels and Demons to Embry-Riddle for our annual Blue & Gold Gala (unfortunately we haven't heard anything from him since the tournament, but we know he's probably a pretty busy guy). The Gala will be held on Saturday June 6th at the ICI Center. It will hold both a silent and live auction, and the money raised is used to help provide scholarship opportunities for the student-athletes at Embry-Riddle. Call John-Mark Adkison for more details at 386.323.5033.