I'm inclined to say no, but other tv shows and movies from the era such as Xanadu had a lot of skating too. Can anyone from back then confirm?
shareYes, even waaaaay up here in Canada, rollerskating was hugely popular, well into the early eighties. But we've always been slow on the uptake.
shareVery popular! The skating rinks where I grew up added video screens after MTV/videos came along.. so then you were watching videos while you skated. It created a bit of a surge in the popularity of skating for awhile.
shareYeah, I found that out from watching "How I Met Your Mother".
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0885872/quotes?item=qt0453933
@germanii i grew up "back" then, lol. um it was popular yes. we had roller skating parties every friday evening at my elementary school. and at one point i lived near an amusement park tht had arcades and a skate hall that was very popular at the time. though with things as they are now, i can see why someone who didnt grow up back then would see it as fantasy. hard to believe but true there was actually life before the internet and cell phones. im grateful i experienced it. ;) and for the record i grew up in small towns, so im not too sure where in this country it wasnt popular?
share[deleted]
Yes it was. Urethane skate wheels, like in skateboarding, had improved greatly allowing better speed and smoother turns. Also, Roller skating at that time was sort of like an progression of disco which had peaked two years prior. If you watch the movie The Warriors from the same time period, a movie about street tough New York gangs, there was a dude on roller skates stalking the Warriors at the train station. He ended up getting his a** beat down which pretty much sums up the demise of Roller Skating by 1981. Just another fad that would die a quick death like Disco and Billy Beer. And the music... well punk rock was right around the corner. But fear not, fruit boots came back in a big way in the 90s via roller blades.
shareI remember Golden Gate park in the late 70s, on a nice weekend there would be 100s if not 1000s and you would see someone with a big backpack mounted blaster leading a group of disco skaters.
MEDINA
SOD
it was only a fad for a few months
sharefad for a few months? I dont think so because I went from 1974 to 1984 and there is still a few rinks open around me here !!!
shareITA, roller skating was huge back then! I'm actually watching this movie now on the MGM channel - I had to check it out because a) I loved Linda Blair in the Exorcist (though I didn't see it till the mid 80s when my parents thought I was "old enough"), and b), I LOVED roller skating! I had a pair of those awesome skates that looked like running shoes (blue with white stripes), and I remember all the kids on my block skating all the time out front. The teenagers I knew all went to skating rinks on Friday nights (I was jealous, I was only 10), but for my 11th birthday (1979), my parents had my birthday party at The Rainbo, the big roller rink on the north side of the city.
And what do you know, Mark Goddard, Don, from Lost In Space plays a baddie here in this movie (I was obsessed with that show when I was little)!
I picked up roller blading in the 90s, but it just wasn't the same to me. Oh cheesy roller skating movie, you remind me how easy life was as a kid...
I bet it was worldwide too as I was going to a roller rink many Saturday's in Australia when I was a kid '79-'81. I remember we had two rinks. One more well lit and spacious and then the tougher, cooler smaller, darkly lit rink that you felt like you graduated to once you were better lol! Plus they played old Kung Fu movies on a big screen in the middle. I think it was called Rock 'n' Roller. They still weren't too cool for Limbo contests though! I'm not sure at the other family friendly rink how many times I heard Sugar Sugar by the Archies but I still remember it so it must have been a lot!
shareit was only a fad for a few months
YES - we went to the skating rink all the time and I have fond memories of it. I had a T-shirt emblazoned with a colorful roller skate. The wheels had little lights with a battery pack. I would turn it "on" so the wheels would light up in a circular motion. And, out on the rink I went! I thought I was pretty cool. Wish I kept that shirt...
shareSays the person talking out his ass. Skating was huge well into the early eighties.
-------------------------
"It's better not to know so much about what things mean." David Lynch