As the sun sets behind the Davis Mountains of west Texas and the temperature in the high desert begins to fall, work is just beginning.  An astronomer begins to open the doors of a giant white domed observatory to begin their night’s work. Below the mountain tops three huge telescopes, the parking lot of a visitor’s center is filling up as hundreds of people slowly walk to an open-air amphitheater, awaiting the dark and the beginning of a star party.  As the twilight turns to night, the Milky Way and a sky full of stars appear, brilliant in ways that most people in cities and suburbs have never seen.  This is just another night at one of the gems of the astronomy world, the McDonald Observatories.  The Stars in Their Eyes will be a film about year in a place that no one who works there or visits ever forgets.

Initial funding from the Hobby Family Foundation.

The film is being directed by Dr. Paul Stekler, a nationally known award-winning filmmaker and the former chair of the Department of Radio-Television-Film at the University of Texas at Austin. All of his documentaries over four decades have been broadcast nationally on PBS. After the finished film airs, The Stars in Their Eyes will be given to McDonald Observatory for their use at their Frank N. Bash Visitors Center and online for observatory support.