The Bituminous Coal Queens of Pennsylvania is a 2005 documentary film directed by David Hunt and Jody Eldred about the fiftieth annual "Pennsylvania Bituminous Coal Queen" beauty pageant which took place on Sunday, August 17, 2003 at the State Theatre Center for the Arts (Uniontown, Pennsylvania). The film is produced by Hunt's wife Patricia Heaton, and prominently features actress Sarah Rush, who was herself a Coal Queen in her youth. Heaton describes the film as "an homage to small town America".
The film follows the past and present contestants and winners of the annual beauty pageant sponsored by the bituminous coal industry of Greene County, Pennsylvania and was shot over a 10 day period in August 2003. The movie's budget swelled from $45,000 to $350,000 after the licensing for the various song snippets that appear in the contestants' acts.
A memorable character is the pageant's stage manager, who is easily offended when the contestants make requests and suggestions. He has since been fired.
| Name | Act | Representing |
|---|---|---|
| Dana Bukovitz | Tap dance | Frazier High School |
| Alyssa Corfont | Tap dance to "Fame" | Waynesburg Central High School |
| Elizabeth Gessner | Piano and voice performance of "Change the World" | Geibel Catholic High School |
| Mary Hawkins | Dance | Jefferson-Morgan High School |
| Christine Henry | Dance | Mapletown Junior-Senior High School |
| Jessica Levo | Voice performance of "I Enjoy Being a Girl" | Carmichaels Area High School |
| Abbey Lion | Dance | Laurel Highlands High School |
| Ryann Over | Dance/lipsync to "All That Jazz" | Uniontown Area Senior High School |
| Malana Piatt | Baton performance to "All That Jazz" | Bethlehem Center High School |
| Michelle Tanner | Voice performance of "The Rose" | Albert Gallatin Area High School |
| Laura Yost | Xylophone | Clay-Battelle High School |
Famous quotes containing the words coal, queens and/or pennsylvania:
“In those days, the blag slag, the waste of the coal pits, had only begun to cover the side of our hill. Not enough to mar the countryside nor blacken the beauty of our village. For the colliery had only begun to poke its skinny black fingers between the green.”
—Philip Dunne (1908–1992)
““Your strength, that is so lofty and fierce and kind,
It might call up a new age, calling to mind
The queens that were imagined long ago,
Is but half yours....””
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“The Republican Party does not perceive how many his failure will make to vote more correctly than they would have them. They have counted the votes of Pennsylvania & Co., but they have not correctly counted Captain Brown’s vote. He has taken the wind out of their sails,—the little wind they had,—and they may as well lie to and repair.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)