Monkees fans will have nary a trace of doubt in their minds Sunday when Mahoning Monkeemania hits Lehighton’s Mahoning Drive-In Theater on Seneca Road, located just off Route 443.

The retro theater, celebrating the Prefab Four on the big screen, will show two episodes of NBC’s 1966-1968 TV series “The Monkees.” The 35 mm prints for “The Spy Who Came in From the Cool” and “The Card Carrying Red Shoes” come from the 1973 ABC Saturday-morning rerun period.

Mahoning Monkeemania will also feature The Monkees’ surreal and psychedelic “Head.” Late “Monkees” co-creators Bob Rafelson and Pete Schneider produced the 1968 satirical musical-adventure film with Jack Nicholson, the latter who co-wrote the screenplay with Rafelson.

Micky Dolenz, whose schedule prevented an appearance at Mahoning Monkeemania, endures as the sole surviving Monkee. Davy Jones, Peter Tork and Michael Nesmith died in 2012, 2019 and 2021, respectively.

Monkeemania

Aside from screenings, Mahoning Monkeemania will Include a live Monkees DJ set, video introductions from Monkee-related luminaries, vendors and authors of Monkees books. Gates open at 6 p.m. Sunday, with screenings starting at dusk. Information is available at mahoningdit.com.

Mark Nelson, Mahoning Drive-In general manager, “tried to build the kind of event I’d travel a long distance to see, where fellow Monkeemaniacs can socialize, pick up some cool merch and enjoy their music.”

Between 1966 and 1970, The Monkees released nine studio albums, with four following between 1987 and 2018. Songwriters such as Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart, Gerry Goffin and Carole King, and Neil Diamond penned some of the group’s biggest hits, such as “Last Train to Clarksville,” “I’m a Believer,” “Pleasant Valley Sunday” and “Daydream Believer.”

Nelson, who first saw “The Monkees” as a child in the late 1970s, “fell for the catchy tunes, wild jokes and visual style, unlike any other old or new TV shows on the dial at that time.”

About the show

The off-the-wall show - winner of the 1967 Outstanding Comedy Series Emmy - chronicled four young men’s adventures trying to make it as a rock ’n’ roll band. The show’s boldness and anarchy included characters breaking the fourth wall and engaging in musical montages/romps.

“While others were rushing to develop post-‘Help!’ TV series to capitalize on the Beatles’ popularity,” Nelson noted, “it was Rafelson and Schneider’s take on the ‘band sitcom’ that made it to air and took the world by storm.”

Referencing the show’s theme song, Nelson took one particular lyric to heart.

“When they sang ‘We may be coming to your town,’ my kid brain took that as a promise. When I’d accompany my mother shopping, I’d keep my eyes peeled for the Monkeemobile.”

Some 40-odd years later, the group’s 2021 Farewell Tour played Tarrytown, New York, about 10 minutes from where Nelson currently resides. “It took a few decades, but they finally made good on that promise.”

Nelson, who has seen all ages attend Monkees concerts, has attended 19 to 20 Monkees reunion shows, plus several solo-member shows. He met the guys briefly at public appearances and signings in the 1980s, as well as backstage a few times over the last decade.

Authors attend

Among the authors attending Mahoning Monkeemania, Michael A. Ventrella of Stroudsburg has penned two Monkees books with cultural historian Mark Arnold. “Long Title: Looking for the Good Times - Examining the Monkees’ Songs, One by One,” released in 2017, preceded 2020s “Headquartered: A Timeline of the Monkees Solo Years.”

“While other kids wanted to be astronauts or firefighters, I wanted to be a Monkee,” said Ventrella, who’s seen all Monkees live, though never all four members simultaneously. “Being in a band, having wacky adventures? That was the life for me.”

In college, Ventrella’s “new-wave” band lived in the same house on campus, practiced in the basement and wrote songs. “That was as close to being a Monkee as I could get. Although our wacky adventures were never as fun.”

While The Monkees’ first two albums mostly included instrumentation by Los Angeles session players - common for the time - Ventrella considers controversy tied to such a practice silly.

“People thinking the TV Monkees were a ‘real group’ is like getting upset that William Shatner didn’t really fly a spaceship. And, of course, they did in fact end up doing albums and concerts on their own, playing their own instruments.”

Fred Velez, a Red Lion author attending Mahoning Monkeemania, has also penned two Monkees books. His two “A Little Bit Me, A Little Bit You” titles, published in 2014 and 2020, tell The Monkees’ story from his and other fans’ perspectives.

Becoming a Monkees fan in 1967, Velez “was immediately attracted to the Beatles-like comedy and how good their songs were.”

Through the years, Velez, who recorded a Monkees-related Christmas album, has enjoyed multiple Monkees meetings. In 1989, he attended The Monkees’ Hollywood Walk of Fame star ceremony and concert - the latter the first with the foursome since 1968 - in Los Angeles.

At the ceremony, Velez took a photo with all Monkees “at the insistence and invitation of Peter Tork, which I will always be grateful to him for.”

Another highlight came when Jones, seeking a fan’s point of view on The Monkees, invited Velez to his home to help work on one of his books.

Acoustic set

Mick Lawless, a musician residing in Milford, Massachusetts, will perform an acoustic set at Mahoning Monkeemania. Listening to his elder sister’s Monkees records when he was 7, “those pop vocal and melody hooks were ingrained into my brain very early on.”

Around age 19, Lawless started delving into The Monkees catalog and, in 1986, saw his first Monkees concert. Since 2004, he and his band Loose Salute - named after a Nesmith solo record - have paid homage to Nesmith and The Monkees. Lawless and his band, from 2008 on, provided backup for Tork and Dolenz on multiple occasions.

Lawless, who has his own internet show on Live365’s Monkee Mania Radio, met Nesmith in 2018. “He knew who I was and what I was doing with his music. Such an easygoing moment. It was almost like being with family.”

Nelson, hoping Mahoning Monkeemania fares well enough to warrant a second installment, likens The Monkees’ story to that of Pinocchio.

“They were a TV band that became a real group, touring and recording off and on for decades, far outliving their planned obsolescence as a teen-idol TV phenomenon with a shelf life of a year or two. Their music and legacy seem to be more respected now than ever.”

As for The Monkees’ lack of Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction, “some fans are very upset about them not being inducted,” Nelson said. “But really, if you love the music and it makes you happy, who cares what anyone else thinks?”