John Travolta's Directorial Debut Is Here — and His Daughter Ella Bleu Steals a Scene

John Travolta makes his directorial debut with Propeller One-Way Night Coach, now streaming on Apple TV — adapted from his own 1997 semi-autobiographical novella about an 8-year-old boy’s first flight in December 1962
His daughter Ella Bleu Travolta plays a flight attendant named Doris; his siblings Margaret and Ellen Travolta also appear in the film
The film had its world premiere at Cannes — where Travolta received a lifetime achievement award and went viral for his beret — and its domestic premiere at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York
The New York Times called it a “time capsule of midcentury pleasures” that “doesn’t soar, but does reach a comfortable cruising altitude”; the film runs just over an hour and had a $20 million budget
Cinematographer Paul De Lumen, an assistant film professor at the University of Tampa, shot the film and accompanied Travolta to Cannes

John Travolta has been many things on screen — Vinnie Barbarino, Tony Manero, Vincent Vega. On Friday, he becomes something new: a director.

Propeller One-Way Night Coach, Travolta’s debut behind the camera, begins streaming on Apple TV this week after a run that took it from the Cannes Film Festival to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The film is based on the novella Travolta published in 1997 — a semi-autobiographical story about a boy named Jeff who, on a December night in 1962, boards a cross-country flight from Idlewild Airport in New York to Los Angeles with his mother Helen, a working actress chasing a promised shot at Hollywood.

Jeff, played by newcomer Clark Shotwell, is an aviation obsessive who keeps flight schedules in a Buster Brown shoe box and watches planes from beneath the flight paths near his home. The overnight journey becomes the adventure he’s always imagined. Kelly Eviston-Quinnett plays his mother.

The family casting is hard to miss. Ella Bleu Travolta — John’s daughter — plays Doris, a flight attendant who walks the aisle toward Jeff while “The Girl From Ipanema” plays, and per the New York Times, “may well be the youngster’s first love.” Margaret Travolta plays the boy’s grandmother; Ellen Travolta appears as a friendly passenger. All five of Travolta’s siblings are in the film in some capacity.

The Cannes Moment

The film screened at Cannes earlier this month, where Travolta received a lifetime achievement award from the festival — and drew just as much attention for the beret he wore on the Croisette, which quickly circulated online. He piloted his own plane to the festival. Cinematographer Paul De Lumen, who shot the film and is now an assistant professor at the University of Tampa, made the trip with him.

“To go with him and to experience the festival with his team was so beautiful,” De Lumen told Fox 13. “Cannes is the top, top festival for filmmakers.” De Lumen, a 20-year industry veteran, said he and Travolta shared a unified vision for the film’s perspective: “It was so fun getting in that mind frame of looking at the world through this child who’s on this great adventure with his mom.”

The domestic premiere followed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York before the film’s Apple TV release.

What Critics Said

The New York Times described the film as a “time capsule of midcentury pleasures,” noting its lingering shots of engines and fuselages, a soundtrack of cocktail-lounge standards, and period details including the Eero Saarinen-designed TWA Flight Center. The review acknowledged that “some viewers may find ‘Propeller’ a tad affected” but said “the wistfulness of this memory film is precisely what charms, because it’s steeped in a fondness for a bygone moment that’s so palpably personal to Travolta.” The verdict: it “doesn’t soar, but it does reach a comfortable cruising altitude.”

The film runs 61 minutes and carries no rating.

John Travolta’s Directorial Debut Is Here — and His Daughter Ella Bleu Steals a Scene

The Cannes Moment

What Critics Said