Eagle’s Bob Curtright lived ‘wonderful life’ through movies and theater

For decades, people have looked for Robert “Bob” E. Curtright’s stories, particularly movie and TV reviews, in The Wichita Eagle.

Wichitans recognized the byline, but far fewer knew the person.

Those who did become friends were often touched by his gentle kindness and thoroughness.

Mr. Curtright died early Sunday at the Harry Hynes Memorial Hospice. He was 72.

Services are pending.

He was born on Aug. 27, 1944, in Kansas City, Mo. He spent his childhood in Louisburg and received his bachelor’s degree in 1966 from the University of Kansas school of journalism.

Mr. Curtright started working at The Eagle in 1976.

“Bob was very smart and had a great curiosity about the arts, film and theater,” said one of his editors, Fran Kentling, a former administrative editor for The Eagle and now editor at the Active Age newspaper.

Co-workers remember Mr. Curtright as having had a mind for details and being able to enthusiastically recall every famous Kansas actor, actress and movie scene.

“He could go to a movie or theater and find something,” Kentling said. “He was pretty positive about everything he did – even when he was saying something negative. He didn’t let things that needed to be said go unnoticed.”

On Jan. 30, 2011, when Kansas was celebrating its 150th anniversary of statehood, Mr. Curtright wrote for The Eagle that “It seems like a long way from the highways and byways of Kansas to the dreamy streets of Hollywood, but from the earliest days of Thomas Edison’s ‘flickers’ more than a century ago, Kansans of every talent stripe have been trekking westward to make movie and TV magic.”

He was a fan of Louise Brooks, a silent-screen star from Cherryvale and Wichita, Piqua’s Buster Keaton and Cherryvale’s Vivian Vance. He would excitedly and cheerfully talk movies with those who knew the arts – and those who didn’t.

Before he became The Eagle’s movie critic, Mr. Curtright worked at the Coffeyville Journal, where, as a recent college graduate, he was part of a team that helped convert the newsroom from typewriters to computers.

“He was a jack of all trades and covered police, everything – there wasn’t anything he couldn’t do,” said Pam Brunger Scott, a longtime friend.

When Mr. Curtright was hired by The Eagle, he shared a computer with fashion writer Bonnie Bing.

“I’d let him have the computer in the mornings. He would go to the movies in the afternoons, and I would then write like crazy,” Bing recalled. “It was always so cute. He would say, ‘This works out really well.’ And I’d say, ‘You know, Bob, it really does.’ ”

During the 1980s, Mr. Curtright served as president of the Television Critics Association. The Eagle sent him to Los Angeles to write about upcoming TV shows and movies. Mr. Curtright retired as a full-time reporter in 2007 but continued as a freelancer covering local theater. His last byline appeared in The Eagle on Oct. 9.

His last story for Active Age was also in October.

“He did a wonderful story on the Tallgrass Film Festival and was getting excited about that and its future,” Kentling said.

In recent weeks, it was apparent Mr. Curtright’s health was failing, family and friends said. Complications with his heart kept him returning to the hospital.

Kentling and others recalled Mr. Curtright’s passion for Christmas. He collected Christmas trees and displayed them throughout the year in his house.

“It was his favorite time of the year,” Kentling said. “One of his favorite films was ‘It’s a Wonderful Life,’ and for Bob, who loved theater and television, his was a wonderful life.”

This story was originally published December 11, 2016 at 8:38 PM with the headline "Eagle’s Bob Curtright lived ‘wonderful life’ through movies and theater."