Knight Rider Festival to feature nearly everything but the Hoff
After this weekend, every pop cultural icon from the ’80s will have officially been celebrated. The Knight Rider Festival — featuring a car show, live music and appearances by actors associated with the cheeseball TV series — screeches into the Fremont Street Experience on Friday and Saturday.
“It’s going to be great,” said producer Paul Casey, who expects 5,000 to attend the free event. “There are so many people who believe in the ‘Knight Rider’ theme.”
Appearing on NBC from 1982 to 1986, “Knight Rider” featured a sentient talking car that fought crime with its driver (David Hasselhoff). Casey — a Las Vegas-based singer who played Elvis Presley in “Legends in Concert” from 1994-98 and performs at “The Dukes of Hazzard” conventions — dreamt up the idea for a festival last year, after NBC commissioned a sequel series.
“Obviously, nobody brings back a TV show unless they feel there’s gonna be a resurgence,” Casey said. (That series has yet to be picked up for next season; many TV experts think it will be canceled.)
Q&A’s and autograph sessions will be offered with series creator Glen A. Larson and, among others, actors Catherine Hickland and Rebecca Holden (from the original series) and Justin Bruening and Deanna Russo (from the sequel).
More than 30 versions of KITT, the Pontiac made famous in the original series, also will be displayed.
“People love that car,” Casey said. “It’s like the car of the future, which is funny because it’s the car of today, if you think about it. Some of the things it did 20 years ago, cars do today. They calculate fuel economy, they talk to you …”
Pretty much everything “Knight Rider” will be on hand except Hasselhoff. Although originally announced by Casey as a participant, The Hoff apparently has something better to do: taping the fifth season of “America’s Got Talent” in New York.
“I just got a confirmation from his manager,” Casey said, “and this is sad.” (Hasselhoff’s New York-based personal publicist, Judy Katz, said her client never committed, saying only that he would make it “if he can.”)
When asked how a “Knight Rider” convention can take place without the man who played Michael Knight, Casey responded by naming a litany of “historic figures” from the series who would attend — none of whom anyone but a “Knight Rider” fanatic would recognize.
Then again, “Knight Rider” fanatics are the target audience.
The car show runs all day Friday and Saturday, with live music from 8 to 11 p.m. Celebrity Q&As and signings are slated for 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, with a stunt show at 5 p.m. Saturday.
For more information, visit www.knightriderfestival.com.
Contact reporter Corey Levitan at clevitan@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0456.