In response to my article under the title “Movie about Canada’s Big Band leader  – Moxie Whitney” in our Jan. 28th edition of iNews Cayman, I received a very nice email from Paul Whitney who is making the movie called MOXIE.

He told me some very interesting details about Moxie and his close Cayman connection.

Moxie and his wife Jennifer left Toronto in 1973 and moved to Cayman with their son Paul. They lived here for about 5 years before music brought him back to Canada.

Moxie and partners owned the old Royal Palms Hotel. In fact he brought in 25 Royal Palms from Miami and then renamed the hotel as it used to be called La Fontaine… after the fountain that was in the middle of the parking lot. He had originally thought of buying the Pageant Beach Hotel until someone mentioned La Fontaine on a beach seven miles long. Then they renovated the pool, as the water seldom worked in the rooms. Every time the water went off Moxie would offer free rum punch to his guests in the pub downstairs. Paul thinks that’s where the term ‘stinking drunk’
came from!

Moxie was an amateur projectionist and loved the movies. When he discovered there was no movie theatre here he brought down a 19mm projector, some old movies, draped a table cloth over a tree branch and showed the films. That was in Matilda’s Corner.

It was so popular, he and some local businessmen built the first indoor air conditioned theatre. He also built the condominiums, Island Pines, right next to the Royal Palms. Sadly the Moxie’s Royal Palms Hotel burnt down in 1991 after it was bought by new owners, the Kirkconnell family. Moxie also went into partnership with Sam, a local fisherman and a great sailor, but they only caught one fish together (the one in the picture).

Moxie also worked at promoting Cayman talent in Canada that included the Barefoot Man (George Nowak).

Don’t forget Paul is looking for investors in his movie about Moxie. The fundraising website is www.indiegogo.com/moxie-1”indiegogo.com/moxie-1