Looking for a marriage proposal idea that doesn’t suck? My little sister’s now fiancé pulled off the most epic drive in movie theater proposal. I’m sharing all the details from their unique engagement and engagement party here.
An Epic Marriage Proposal Idea
My little sister Tiffany and I are super close. She’s not only my sister, but my best friend. So when her boyfriend, Luke, approached me about helping him plan the perfect engagement, I was so excited.
The first step was coming up with the best marriage proposal idea. My sister had dozens of friends who’d gotten engaged, so we wanted the proposal to be unique, special and most of all, a surprise!
We also wanted it to be local to the Dallas area so that their friends could join them in celebrating at an engagement party after the big moment. As we circled through ideas in our heads, the drive in movie theater came up.
The movies is special place to Luke and Tiffany. They both love movies and it was always a go-to for them on date night.
Best of all, a new drive in movie theater had just opened in Dallas, Rooftop Cinema Club. As we looked up photos online, we knew it would be the perfect spot for an epic Dallas proposal.
Rooftop Cinema Club Drive-in Movie Proposal
The next step was reaching out to Rooftop Cinema Club to see if they would be willing to work with us to create the perfect proposal. Luckily, the team at Rooftop Cinema Club was so kind and immeditely said yes to helping plan the perfect surprise proposal.
My sister and Luke’s calendars for the fall were pretty full as far as weekends go. We finally found a date that would work for them both and would work for our families and their friends too – Friday, October 30th.
Rooftop Cinema Club is a new drive-in theater that shows throwback, classic movies beneath the stars and against the backdrop of the twinkling lights of downtown Dallas.
Throughout the month of October, Rooftop Cinema Club was showing classic Halloween movies. On the evening of October 30th, they were showing two films. The first was Haloweentown and then Nightmare on Elm Street.
Luckily, my sister is a huge Disney fan too (we did grow up under the same roof, aftera ll). So Halloweentown couldn’t have been more perfect.
The basic plan was to have Luke and Tiffany arrive at the theater first and park towards the front. Then, we’d have family parked towards the back so we could surprise her at the end. At the end of the movie, the big question would pop up on the screen.
Rooftop Cinema Club was kind enough to let us play our own video and audio at the end of the movie. So Luke chose one of their favorite songs, “Here Comes The Sun” by The Beatles. Then we put together a short slideshow with photos of the two of them. And finally,”Tiffany, will you marry me?” would show on the big screen. It was the perfect marriage proposal idea for the two of them!
Nailing The Surprise Marriage Proposal Idea
But pulling off the movie theater marriage proposal idea as a surprise proved to be more challenging than expected. My sister knew they would be getting engaged soon, and she also knew they only had so many weekends open before the end of the year.
Luke’s 30th birthday also happened to be on October 29th. So naturally, my sister starting making birthday celebration plans fo that Friday, October 30th.
In an effort to divert her plans, we had Luke’s best friends make up that they’d be out of town that Friday evening. Then when Tiffany asked what me and Cole’s plans were, I said he’d be in Archer City for the weekend working.
She was so frustrated, but we had to keep the night a surprise, so we all went along with it. Luke wanted to make sure there were no doubts in Tiffany’s mind about the proposal happening that evening. So, he decided to do what he’d normally do on any given date night…ask her to go to the movies right at the last minute.
The Big Night – Their Movie Theater Engagement
I’m not gonna lie, not knowing whether Tiffany was actually going to agree to go to the movies that night made me a nervous wreck. By that time, all the plans were in motion and we had more than 70 people RSVP to come to the engagement party afterwards.
The afternoon of Friday, October 30th, Luke texted Tiffany while she was at work, to ask her about going to the movie. Since he told her he’d already bought the movie tickets and it was his birthday weekend, SHE SAID YES!! Thank heavens!
I think we were all much more worried about her saying yes to going to the theater than her saying yes to Luke. 😉 So Luke took the top off of his Jeep, loaded it up with a cooler of beers and they were off! They stopped at Whataburger along the way to enjoy one of their fave meals during the movie.
Luke got to Rooftop Cinema Club early so they could park right in front of the screen, while the rest of us trickled in right as the movie started and parked towards the back of the drive-in theater.
The manager and staff at Rooftop Cinema Club Dallas were all so incredibly kind! They let us know beforehand that the staff would be referring to the engagement as “Operation Benny” in honor of the cab driver in Halloweentown. SO cute! We were told to use that code word if we needed any help or had questions. It worked like a charm!
When the movie ended, the manager came over to where our families cars were parked and escorted us towards the front. Meanwhile, a staff member came over the speakers to “discuss the movie” for a minute to stall. She asked cars to honk for their favorite Halloweentown characters and then said they had “one more surprise in store.”
FINALLY! The big moment was here. “Here Comes The Sun” began playing through the speakers as me and my family, plus Luke’s family approached their jeep and the big screen.
Here’s what happened next, in Tiffany’s words:
“At first, I didn’t think anything of it. But suddenly, “Here Comes the Sun” by the Beatles, one of my favorite songs, started playing & a slideshow with photos of me and Luke popped up on the big screen. From then on, everything went in slow motion. I frantically put my shoes on the wrong feet & stumbled out of the car, shaking from the shock of it all. Luke popped the question & “Tiffany, will you marry me?” came up on the movie screen. I said YES, of course and then I saw our parents, our siblings, our nephews, & my grandparents standing there clapping. It felt like a DREAM!”
LUKE DID IT!! The evening couldn’t have gone more smoothly and Tiffany was TOTALLY surprised!
Afterwards, there were lots of tears, hugs and congratulations as we gathered beneath the big screen to celebrate. But the surprises weren’t over yet.
The Engagement Party
We had tons of Tiffany and Luke’s closest friends and more family waiting back at her friend Lexi’s parents house for an engagement after party.
Tiffany was so happy and surprised that so many of her friends and family came out to celebrate. And also shocked that so many people knew about the engagement but kept it a surprise!
We ended up staying until nearly 3am (Cole and I, at least!) Tiffany was so overwhelmed with having so many of her and Luke’s favorite people in the world in one place.
We also surprised Luke and Tiffany with these amazing marquee letters from Alpha Lit Dallas. They have tons of large light up marquee letters you can rent for special occasions and celebrations like their engagement party.
I love the way their T&L looked outside and it quickly became the go-to backdrop for taking photos.
Shop Gold and Black Engagement Party Decor
For the engagement party decorations, Tiffany’s best friends, our cousins and I put together a gold, black and white engagement party theme that had a little nod to the place they’d gotten engaged…the movies!
We had less than two weeks to plan for the after party, so it was a bit thrown together, but I think it turned out so cute! And most importantly, Tiffany and Luke loved it!
We printed out some quotes about love and marriage from classic movies and put them in gold frames. Then, we added photos of Luke and Tiffany to decorate the tables at the engagement party.
A classic Hollywood film clapper (which I totally meant to write on it chalk, but ran out of time!) plus some confetti with diamond ring and video camera cutouts were the perfect way to add in some movie vibes.
I also added in some film rolls to the gold, black and white ballon arch.
Finally, we added some popcorn boxes as favors to finish the movie theater theme. I love how it all turned out, and most of all, Luke was able to pull off a DREAM marriage proposal idea that Tiffany will never forget.
I couldn’t be happier for my little sister!! She has truly found her other half, her best friend (besides me, of course) and partner in life with Luke.
Cole and I adore him (him and Cole are besties!) and cannot wait for him to officially become a part of the family! SO excited for all of the celebrations to come!
I’ll be sharing their drive-in movie theater proposal video to my instagram later this week – stay tuned!
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Fair-well xx,
