After a sold-out run at the prestigious Newport Beach Film Festival in California last October, Tucson filmmaker Josh Dragotta's documentary "Cabali and the Tiki Mug Obsession" is getting its hometown premiere.
The film is one of three documentaries on tap for the winter leg of the 2026 Film Fest Tucson, which kicks off Sunday, Feb. 22, with "Man On the Run: Paul McCartney."
"Man On the Run: Paul McCartney" looks at the former Beatle's life, including time he and his late wife Linda spent living in Tucson. It screens at 6 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 22, at Marroney Theatre, 1025 N. Olive Road on the University of Arizona campus.
"These three that we're doing, they're sort of exciting. They're all documentaries, and they're really sort of interesting," explained Herb Stratford, the festival's founder and curator. "They're all Arizona premieres. We will have the directors at two out of three of them. ... And one of them is a Tucson filmmaker."
Josh Dragatta’s documentary “Cabali and the Tiki Mug Obsession” recounts Doug “Fini” Finical's journey to build a tiki bar in Oro Valley for his vast collection of mugs. The film will be screened March 29 as part of the 2026 Film Fest Tucson.
This will be the first time "Cabali" has been screened since Newport Beach, where it made its world premiere. The film has also been selected for the Vero Beach Film Festival in Florida, April 9-12; Stratford has been programming that event for the past four years.
This is the second year that Film Fest Tucson has been year-round, with events in the fall and winter/spring instead of being presented over a single weekend.
Stratford said "we pivoted" from the single weekend format so that he could focus his attention on his historical renovation of Teatro Carmen in downtown's Barrio Viejo.
"We haven't abandoned that format of a weekend. We just pivoted away from it just while we could finish the Carmen, because then that's our venue," he said.
Stratford's company, Stratford Art Works, began work on the theater at 380 S. Meyer Ave. in 2019, but the project was delayed because of the pandemic.
The $9 million project includes creating a 300-seat theater and events space with an adjacent restaurant and 6,000-square-foot patio on the corner of South Meyer and West Simpson Street, which could open as early as this summer.
Stratford, who also spearheaded the six-year restoration of Fox Tucson Theatre from 1999-2005, said the main Teatro Carmen theater is still about a year off, which could be perfect timing for the 2027 film festival.
This year's festival is a collaboration with Arizona Arts Live, the entertainment presenting arm of the University of Arizona.
Films will be screened at 6 p.m. at the Marroney Theatre, 1025 N. Olive Road on the UA campus. Tickets are $24.50, $14.50 for students through ticketmaster.com.
The films
- Morgan Neville's "Man On the Run: Paul McCartney," Feb. 22: This is a look at McCartney post-Beatles breakup and deeply devoted to wife Linda, who studied photography at the University of Arizona and convinced McCartney to have a home in Tucson. The couple spent idyllic family time at their home on the far northeast side.
Tucson gets "Man On the Run: Paul McCartney" five days before it hits Amazon Prime Video.
The film explores McCartney's second act fronting his band Wings, which included Linda. The film is based on never-before-seen archives of the couple's home videos and photos, many of them from Tucson, and new interviews.
Tucson Film Fest was able to get the film before its Feb. 27 release on Amazon Prime Video.
"I've known Morgan Neville for 10 years, and so I was able to get the McCartney doc early, and actually, Morgan recorded an introduction to the film for us," said Stratford, who has been programming film festivals for years, including California's Sonoma Valley and Mendocino film festivals. This year marks the fourth year that he has led the Vero Beach (Florida) Film Festival and Long Beach (N.Y.) festival.
- Josh Dragotta's "Cabali and the Tiki Mug Obsession," March 29: This will only be the second public screening of the Tucson filmmaker's film that follows Doug "Fini" Finical's 3½-year journey to build a speakeasy behind his Oro Valley restaurant, The Landing, to display his 1,000-plus tikis.
Initially, Finical, who, with his partner Scott Mencke, also owns Fini's Landing in the Foothills, intended to build a little bar. But his plans soon outgrew his budget and timeframe.
Dragotta used the time to take a deep dive into tiki culture, visiting famous tiki makers in Hawaii and legendary bars on the island and in California.
- Craig A. Williams and Tyler Measom's "If These Walls Could Rock," April 26: Based on Williams' book of the same name, the film opens the curtain on the famed Sunset Marquis hotel in Los Angeles, where rock stars turned the cliche of trashing hotel rooms into a nightly occurrence.
Morrissey did an interview in his pajamas during a stay at the storied Sunset Marquis hotel off Sunset Boulevard in LA. The exploits of Morrissey and other rock royalty who stayed at the hotel are chronicled in Tyler Measom's film, "If These Walls Could Rock," which comes April 26 to Film Fest Tucson.
The film recounts the famous rock stars (the hotel's unofficial mayor Billy Bob Thornton, Morrisey in his PJs and Green Day dying its room green to create a jungle) and their infamous parties swirling around drugs, sex and, of course, rock and roll that gave the once seedy hotel its reputation and more than a few good tall tales to tell.
The Linda McCartney Retrospective is at the Center for Creative Photography until August and highlights McCartney's photography and life in Tucson.
Becky Senf, Chief Curator at the CCP, talks about the importance of the exhibition, some of the images and McCartney's photography journey through Tucson. Video by Pascal Albright / Arizona Daily Star
But the film also looks at the property's redemption as a quiet luxury escape for celebrities looking to avoid the glare of paparazzi and autograph-seeking fans.
