Speaker 1: Hello everybody, and welcome to the Surely Can't Be Serious Podcast,
discussing and debating the iconic and the forgotten of eighties
and nineties pop culture with your co hosts James D.
Graves and Jason Colbn.
Speaker 2: Welcome back for part two of the Shirley You Can't
Be Serious Podcast.
Speaker 3: Here's a quick recap in last week's episode, let's just.
Speaker 2: Dive in, and so we got to jump right in.
We're going to talk about airplane. Wait, wait before we
get every time to d Yes, good luck all kind.
Speaker 3: They used to leave the BCR on recording overnight and
they accidentally recorded Zero Hour and this is we could
really turn this into something funny.
Speaker 2: Some of the lines are identical, and they were fascinated
by this weird movie. They decided we're going to buy
the rights to.
Speaker 3: The script first.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, avoid the trouble, and it couldn't have been
that expensive. One of their first choices for Ted Striker
was David Letterman. They were so excited and he was like,
this is a bad idea. And then when they were down,
they're like, you're right, this was a bad idea. She's
performing that song really well, and that in combination with
the girl who's making the fish face because their ivs
come out. Is brilliant. It is the brilliance of the
comedy of his easy. Almost every line in this thing
is perfect. It's one of the most quotable movies of
all time.
Speaker 3: So don't want to help.
Speaker 2: So can you imagine delivering to a child actor the
line have you ever seen a grown man naked? With
absolutely sincerity? How do you do that? You've got nineteen
eighties PG ratings which feature boobies.
Speaker 3: And man, I can tell you a story about the
movies in air.
Speaker 2: Those specific movies, those particular Yeah, tell me, tell me
the movie story.
Speaker 3: Okay, So this was a movie I watched young because
my dad thought it was funny, but he was trying
to keep me from seeing. There's one scene where a
woman is wearing no shirt and shoe just walks directly
front of the camera and then walks off screen. And
that's it, right, right, So basically you have half a
second it's just out of nowhere boobs and then they're gone, right,
And so he was trying to watch this movie with me, Yes,
protect me, protect my eyes from well, you've got to
you've got to know exactly or it's they're there and
then gone and then it's over. Yeah, and it wasn't best.
And so that was my first on screen flash of skin.
Speaker 2: Yeah really like the first time you ever saw naked
boobies on TV?
Speaker 3: Yeah wow yeah, yeah, nice this especially.
Speaker 2: All right, now it's time to jump into Spaceball one
and travel at ludicrous speed, so we can warp ahead
in time to nineteen eighty seven when Spaceballs was released.
Speaker 1: Ah.
Speaker 2: Some people call me space Alboy.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, some call me the game Grip.
Speaker 4: Some people call me marrie'd be of the.
Speaker 2: Puppy Spaceballs one of mel Brooks's wonderful parodies that he
has done. But first, let's talk about what was going
on in nineteen eighty seven. Help us remember what what
we were doing, what we were going through back. Then
we'll do our rapid fire again sound again, Yeah, first
or second, I'll go first, Okay, you go first.
Speaker 3: So this is just current events from nineteen eighty seven
to kind of give you a place in a moment
in time, right right, So, Ronald Reagan addresses the Iran
contra affair.
Speaker 2: Yes, do you remember that? Yes? Yeah, we had the
whole Ali North thing going on. Yep, it was all
very bad. It looked like Reagan either had lied or
didn't know what was going on, and basically said he
didn't know what was going on, right, And people loved
him so much that it didn't matter. They forgave him right.
Also that year, though a little bit later on, to
kind of cement his place in history, he said to
mister Korbachev, tear down this wall. Mister Gorbachev teared down
this wall.
Speaker 3: Huge speech and one that sticks with us.
Speaker 2: Oh. Absolutely, mister John teared down as well. Two years
later it came down. I don't know if you know this,
but like the speech writer had, you know, had given
him the speech. They kind of talked about it, and
the speech writer thought, you know, that's kind of cliche
and corny. I'm gonna take that out and regularly at
it's like putting that back in. Yep, it was his call.
Speaker 3: That's awesome. Here's one listen this one. I don't know
why this one sticks with me, but when Jim Baker
resigned from the pt L after admitting to an affair
with Jessica on Well.
Speaker 2: It sticks with you because she appeared in some magazines
that she probably looked.
Speaker 3: At and the Wild thing video with Sam Kinison.
Speaker 2: Yes, and all of the other heavy metal rockers of
the time, hair band Galore and her dancing around and.
Speaker 3: I thank you move that came in my mind.
Speaker 2: I thought I'd say that.
Speaker 3: Line she look like a church secretary to I can
see I was hired and never saw.
Speaker 2: That one anyway. Yeah, and another on the on the
televangelist thing. Uh, the Supreme Court case of Hustler Magazine
versus Jerry Faultwell happened that year, which is the large
part of the People Versus Very Larry Flint movie that
came out probably ten years later. Another thing that is interesting,
I certainly don't remember it happening, but it was a
shocking event was that the Pennsylvania Treasurer, Bud Dwyer, had
been like convicted of doing these crimes, and he had
proclaimed his innocence the whole time, and he called a
press press conference and then shot himself on live television. Yeah.
So there's And then again a decade or so later,
the song by Filter comes out, Hey man, I shot
You probably recognize the player here he that is in reference.
A lot of people thought it was Kirk Cobain that
they were talking about. Because it was not too long
after Kirk Cobain's suicide. But actually he was talking about
by Dwyer and that was his Hey man, I shot
was what it was all about. Wow, disturbing that.
Speaker 3: That's why I say, all right, how about this one?
This one gets me at the heart. Baby Jessica McClure
falls down the well.
Speaker 2: I knew you would have. I knew you would have.
Speaker 3: If you've listened to our podcast. And if we're staying
in order, we do.
Speaker 2: What Michael Jackson was first, right, yes, so so yes,
you're I remember how moved you were by the man
in the mirror video. Baby Jessica comes out.
Speaker 3: That construction worker crying when he pulls it kills me
every time, A baby Jessica, you big softeeth?
Speaker 2: Okay, so uh Movie news, Platooners least Man TV News.
The first episode of the Simpsons appears on The Tracy
Allman Show.
Speaker 1: Oh Tattering Glow is al there ow Yeah, el last
name alcoholic, honey.
Speaker 3: Check phone cough araw alcoholic. How about the teenager who
landed the plane who flew it from West Germany and
landed it in Red Square.
Speaker 2: I can remember that.
Speaker 3: I'm embarrassed the heck out of the Russians.
Speaker 2: And then the Music News YouTube releases Joshua Tree, the
best best YouTube album and one of the best albums
in the world in history.
Speaker 3: In my opinion, We'll have to get into that later.
That sounds like a good because that same year, def
Lebert releases Hysteria, which is my favorite album.
Speaker 2: Fall Time, Well, I mean, you got to pour some
sugar on me. I guess you still remember the first,
my very first high school dance that I went to.
That was the song that like that was in the
whole night led up to that moment. That was the
final song and when they have played it, that place
went nuts.
Speaker 3: Right when the game.
Speaker 2: For sure. Also in Music News, the very first Rick
roll happens because Rick Astley releases Never Going to Give
You Up.
Speaker 3: Also in nineteen eighty seven, the world population reaches five billion.
Is Nothing rolling right past that? Spaceballs released June twenty fourth,
nineteen eighty seven. Okay, here are the top ten songs
from Casey's Top forty real quick. Okay, all right, Number
ten Just to See Her by Smokey Robinson. Nope, nothing
for You, No Songbird by Kenny g u Maybe You
Keep Me Hanging On by Kim Wilde, Oh for sure. Okay,
how about this one? Number seven on the charts this
week nineteen eighty seven Wanted Dead or Alive?
Speaker 4: Almost it?
Speaker 2: Oh man, the reason I started playing guitar?
Speaker 3: Really?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Absolutely?
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, all right? Number six this week in eighty
seven alone.
Speaker 2: By Yeah I can't remember that. That was the one
where in the video she's she's just up and down
the stage with the guitar, and then you kind of
noticed Quidman and she's not really playing here. It's that
guy back in the back that's really playing the guitar. Okay,
check it out.
Speaker 3: They blow up the piano in the video too. Number
five Diamonds by Herb Albert. Nope, Janet Jackson on vocals
on that one. Number four into Deep Genesis okay, okay.
Number three I Want to Dance with Somebody who.
Speaker 2: Loves Oh yeah, that's my kids still love that song
really even today. Yeah, that's a timeless one right there.
Speaker 3: Okay, Always by a Lenox Star. Number two, Eh, it's
kind of a makeout song of eighty seven and number
one Head to Toe Lesa's a cult jam.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, so onto Spaceball's the mel Brooks movie of
nineteen eighty seven, the parodies the Star Wars movies. How
about we do an oversimplified plot.
Speaker 3: Okay, super light plot overview. Here we go. So planet
Spaceball has run out of air right and President screwb
played by mel Brooks, gets Dark Helmet. Rick moranis to
force King Roland of Druidia, the guy from at Us,
enough to give him the code of this shield that
protects Druidia's air, by kidnapping his daughter, Princess Vespadephian Zuniga,
right on the day of her arranged wedding to Prince Vallium,
who she runs out on, which is hilarious, and then
he hires smuggler all around bad boy lone Star and
his buddy Barf to rescue her from the Spaceballs by
paying him a million base box. Lone Star, along with
the help of Yogurt, learns to use the schwartz and
then he rescues Princess Vespa. They put all the air
back in Druidia, and he defeats Dark Helmet and President
Screw and they get married because he, as it turns out,
is actually Prince were good. Hey.
Speaker 2: Thanks, turns out so you did not mention the actor
who played Prince Vallium. The names on these are great,
by the way, Prince Ballium is always tired, of course.
So the actor who portrayed Prince Vallium was Jim J. Bullock,
who I remember from the Hollywood Squares, no doubt. He
was I think a lifetime member, along with John Rivers
who does the voice for the robot dot Matrix.
Speaker 3: Matrix Yep, Jim J. Bullock, who I remembered from Too
Close for Comfort, Oh yeah, as well as Hollywood Squares,
but I mean definitely daytime television Hollywood Squares.
Speaker 2: So that's the plot of the movie. Just to touch
on a couple of interesting things. First, trivia question, Prince,
we've already talked about Prince Valium, Princess Vespa. You know
what vesta is? No, okay, So it's a motor scooter, right,
It's an Italian motor scooter. But vespa means wasp in Italian,
which I think I mean as many, yeah, as many
Hebrew jokes as mel Brooks puts in, and he even
said in this particular movie is like, I don't know
that I should have put in so many Jewish jokes
but yes, he's the very very white girl is Princess
Wasp and makes sense.
Speaker 3: It's funny she doesn't look jewlish.
Speaker 2: And then of course lone star Hans Solo, definitely Han Solo.
Of course you know the loan and Solo and all
of that. And then lastly, mel Brooks, who who directed
and co wrote the movie, plays a couple of characters.
One is Yogurt, yes, which is the playoff of Yoda.
And then the other one you mentioned a couple of
times is President scrub Do you know how we got
screwb Dude, It's it's Brooks backwards.
Speaker 3: Brooks s K interesting, Yeah, r ob cool.
Speaker 2: So now back to the movie. We have the director
and writer is mel Brooks, who has who did the producers,
who did Blazing Saddles, which is one of the best
comedies of all time. Who did Young Frankenstein's one of
the first movies I ever remember seeing and is brilliant
from beginning to end. I even had a class where
we looked at books made into movies and we looked
at the original Frankenstein versus the book, then the mel
Brooks version Young Frankenstein compared to that movie, and then
the one that had Robert de Niro, which was way
too long. Yeah, but anyway, it's fantastic movie. And then
he goes on for quite a while without much output,
and then boom lo and behold, nineteen eighty seven rolls
around and we get space balls. Yep.
Speaker 3: Did you ever watch the TV show Get Smart?
Speaker 2: Yes? Wait, the old one, right old one. Yeah, that
was mell Rex. Okay, I didn't know that. So he
directed and wrote. The other writers were Thomas Meehan who
was also a part of the producers and he also
was involved with Hairspray and Annie. You can kind of
see a stage musical theme going on with Thomas Meehan.
And then the third co writer is Ronnie Graham, who
you will recognize from the movie as the priest for
the wedding. Was absolutely hysterical.
Speaker 3: He kills it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he kills it.
Speaker 3: He's so okay cool. It was his name, Ronnie, Ronnie Graham,
Ronnie Graham. Every line he says is funny. Absolutely, when
they say they say I'm sorry, I'll be sorry, be quiet.
Speaker 2: Okay, and then just a little bit of trivia. He
appeared in nineteen eighty in one episode as the ticket
agent of the TV series Angie, which I brought up before,
which starred Robert Hayes from Airpe.
Speaker 3: Oh that's right, we did talk about that. Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so he actually was in that movie as.
Speaker 3: Well, Angie not in My Wheelhouse.
Speaker 2: No, that's okay.
Speaker 3: The song Angie by the Rolling Stones in My Wheelhouse.
Speaker 2: Oh sure, okay, great song, nothing to do with.
Speaker 3: It, all right? Cool?
Speaker 2: Okay actress. Okay, So we've got Bill Pullman. This was
not his first major motion picture, but it was his
second major motion picture. His first one was Ruthless People,
which is funny.
Speaker 3: I actually haven't seen the movie Anny DeVito and Bette Midler.
That funny.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm familiar with the movie, but and you
so you saw his performance in that one.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he kind of plays a moron in that. He's
a he's an inept kidnapper.
Speaker 2: It's kind of funny because he's not real. He's kind
of a goofball, you know guy in this one as well,
and then he kind of comes into his own i mean,
independence state. He's the President of the United States, right,
and I think that's more fitting for him than these
kind of goofy.
Speaker 3: Roles that he was playing at first, okay, and then
we have the incomparable John Canny. I'm a mog half man,
half dog.
Speaker 2: I'm my own best friend. Oh man, Uncle Buck gone
too soon, far too soon. Yes, nineteen ninety four.
Speaker 3: I believe died ninety four.
Speaker 2: This was a great shame, great shame. But John Candy,
who was in SETV, was in Stripes with Bill Murray,
is in The Great Outdoors with Dan Aykroyd. Just a
comedy I kind of the day, absolutely great.
Speaker 3: He plays Tom Hanks' brother in Splash and he's kind
of unappreciated role. And then he's Del Griffith from playing
Trains and Autmobiles.
Speaker 1: I never did introduce myself Del Griffith, American like fixture
director of sales Shower Curtain Ring Division.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a classic.
Speaker 3: He's in Home Alone. I mean he's his fingerprints are
all over the Sure.
Speaker 2: He was in The Blues Brothers as the cop when
he gets the address to get the addressed to Rickley
Stadium and he's laughing because he's been tricked. I love
him and everything.
Speaker 3: He's the security guard at the end of the vacation Mavie.
Speaker 2: Yeah, sorry, folks, Clark's closed motion. Then we have Rick
moranis also of set V fame, who was in Ghostbusters
and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids in My Blue Heaven.
As we mentioned earlier.
Speaker 3: Strange Brew.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, you gotta love Doug mackenzie Mackenzie Brothers. And
then Daphne's Zanniga plays Princess Vespa, and I think maybe
this is kind of her pinnacle role. She was in
The Sure Thing with That's a good one with John Cusack.
I haven't actually seen that movie if you if you've
seen it, and then she was on Melrose Place for
a while as well.
Speaker 3: Yeah, she was the girlfriend in The Fly too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's not one that made my that's that's out
of my wheelhouse. And then just to I've already mentioned
Joan Rivers as the voice of Dot Matrix. And then
I can't I can't let it go without mentioning Michael Winslow,
who is the voice man in all of the Police
Academy movies which we got to hit. I mean, we
should just do like all of Steve Gutenberg's movies in
one episode, I think. But the guy who is just
famous for his ability to do all kinds of sounds
with his.
Speaker 3: Mouth, Okay, so a lot of people will get annoyed
at Michael Winslow because they're wrong. But he has a
laugh out loud moment in this movie where he's doing
the I'm with the rainar sir, Well, don't need that
private We're right here now.
Speaker 2: What is it?
Speaker 1: Now? What is it? I'm having trouble with the radar, sir.
Speaker 3: What's wrong with it? I've lost the bleeps. I've lost
the sweeps lost.
Speaker 2: That whole scene cracks me up absolutely. So there are
key actors and actresses in this movie. Okay, we wanted
to give a quick shout out to a couple of
people that we love talking to on Twitter. The first
one is Gidget Vaughn LaRue. She is down in Australia. Yeah,
and she has a podcast that she does with Colonel
Kickhead called The Retro Cinema. I've had the fortune to
listen to some of those episodes and she's got some
good stuff going on. So Gidget von LaRue is at
g I D G I T V O N L
A r U E on Twitter. Thank you very much
for all of your likes and shares and comments.
Speaker 3: I love listening to her her voice, so she's got
such great speaking voice and that Australian accent just does
it for me.
Speaker 2: Right, what about soundtrack? We got anything on soundtrack?
Speaker 3: Hey, you got good enough from Van Halen?
Speaker 2: Yeah, of fifty fifty right for the diner scene.
Speaker 3: The diner scene, Sam Hagar on lead vocals, I'll have
the cleavage you have raised your hands by bon Jovie.
Oh wow, so you've got two big rock albums making
an appearance on this movie.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, So I'll go into the special effects real quick.
This is interesting because mel Brooks, before he made the movie,
he sent the script to George Lucas because you know,
obviously he's parodying the Star Wars, the Star Wars trilogy,
and George Lucas was like, this is hilarious. I love it.
Let me know if you need any help. And then
actually Industrial Lights and Magic ended up being a major
finisher for the special effects in the movie.
Speaker 3: Okay, cool, Yeah, here's another little tidbit that you may
or may not know. You can see the Millennium falcon
parked at the diner, yes, which was thrown in there
with George Lucas's blessing. So cool.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, absolutely. And then the I'll give it we'll
do a little trivia question on this one. Can you
tell me a modern car that has an aspect of
Spaceballs employed with it?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 2: Okay, so Tesla the electric cars.
Speaker 3: Yes, are not the rock band.
Speaker 2: Not the rock band Tesla, which I love and played
with Frank Cannon.
Speaker 3: I know that's really cool.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and but no Tesla the car. Yes, I guess
Elon Musk was a Spaceballs fan. And so whenever you
whenever you go into high gear and it's like you're
you're turning on the overdrive for the car, you go
into plaid speed, and I think there may be a
ludicrous speed as well.
Speaker 3: That is That is cool?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it really is. If you search Tesla and plaid
speed out there, you'll see a test drive where somebody's
doing this and it goes to the car gets up,
it goes fast, but then the screen they have this
giant led screen in the middle, it turns plaid just
like in movie. It's fantastic, not the Ludacros speed. Okay,
what do we know who the composer was on this one?
Speaker 1: Uh?
Speaker 2: No, okay, let's quitch get so. The composer on this
one was John Morris, who had a few other things,
but is mostly known for being the composer for Melbrooks movies.
He worked with him on the producers Springtime, for Hitler,
Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein. He was actually nominated for a
Grammy for his work on The Elephant Man. But the
only films of mel Brooks that John Morris wasn't on
were Robin Hood, Men in Tights and Dracula Dead and
Loving It, which brings us back to Airplane because it
starred mister Leslie Nielsen. There you go.
Speaker 3: That's right. Okay, So I would be mad at myself
if I didn't make at least this comment on the soundtrack. Okay,
if you're like me, the soundtrack of Your Youth is
colored with Looney Tunes. Yeah, there's a scene where the
alien pops out of the dude's chest at the diner
and then proceeds to seeing Hello, my honey.
Speaker 1: Hello my baby, Hello my honey, Hello my rack on go.
Speaker 4: Baby, my heart's on fire.
Speaker 2: So the dude is John Hurt from the movie from
the movie Alien, the one who did the scene originally,
And I think he just thought he was supposed to
do a small cameo part and then had that big scene.
But that is one of my favorite scenes. It's coming
up in a second for me. Okay, one of my
favorite scenes in the movie.
Speaker 3: It's hilarious. It's awesome to see the alien again. Yes,
but the guy who's next to him, that's another laugh
outloud moment for me. When he's like one guy's like,
get this guy some one and that guy goes water.
Speaker 2: MI get dis massive hypto bismal.
Speaker 3: Good times, Sorry, mom, I just kissed.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So the yeah, so the Looney Tunes that you're
referring to is the frog because in this version of
the alien popping out of his chest, which I'll go
ahead and say, we're gonna come on, come up to
five best lines or scenes in just a minute. But
maybe my number one favorite is oh no, not again.
But as he bursts out of his chest, he then
puts on the straw hat and our top hat and
has the cane and starts singing, Hello, my baby, Hello,
my honey, just like the frog from the Looney Tunes cartoons.
Speaker 3: Yes, so funny. Okay, we're bouncing around a little bit, sorry, a.
Speaker 2: Little bit so we but we've hit soundtrack, we've hit
special effects, we've segued nicely into the five best lines.
I've already said my number one of oh no, not again.
What do you got what's your number one?
Speaker 3: Okay, well I didn't really I didn't really rank them.
There's so many. But so I really like the priest
who when he's he's talking and he's like the guy
says I'm sorry, He's like, oh be sorry, we quiet, Yes,
we already talked about that.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So number two for me, what is the whole
spiel on when they're watching the VCR tape?
Speaker 3: When does this happen in the movie?
Speaker 2: Now you're looking at now, sir, Everything that happens now
is happening now?
Speaker 3: What happened to then? When just now?
Speaker 2: Wear it now?
Speaker 1: Now?
Speaker 3: Go back to then?
Speaker 1: When now? Now?
Speaker 3: No, I can't why we missed it? When just now?
Speaker 2: When will then be now soon?
Speaker 3: Just missed it?
Speaker 2: That is one that that that my wife and I
replay quite frequently.
Speaker 3: That's a that's a funny one. Yeah, okay, how about
this one? This part cracks me up. When he says,
will you get the introduction of a dark helmet? You
hear the breathing sort of Darth Vader ish, and then
you can tell you, and then he throws open the mask.
He's like, I get breathe in this thing.
Speaker 2: Yes. So that's Rick moranis and part of his brilliance.
I think he may have improvised that particular scene. But
one scene that I am sure he improvised is number
three on my list, which is the dolls scene. So
he's playing with the Princess doll and his own doll,
and that scene is completely improvised. It was not scripted
at all. And Rick Moranis is brilliant part.
Speaker 3: And that's so funny.
Speaker 2: You need it on the Preacher, Sir knocked on my door.
Speaker 3: Knocked next time? Yes, sir, did you see anything?
Speaker 2: No, sir, I didn't see you playing with your dolls.
Speaker 3: Again, good, well, you knock next time.
Speaker 2: I'm sure I didn't see you playing with your dolls.
Speaker 3: I've not seen you play with your dolls. Uh that
you stole that one from me. But so again, the
laugh out loud moment with Michael Winslow when he's talking
into the speaker and he starts, sorry, roll the radar
and he comes up to me and he's like, what's the problem,
and he continues to talk without the microphonet the microphone
down and then he puts it down. He continues to
talk and then he like rips the thing out of
the I haven't rolled the radar, sir. Yes, So that
part cracks me up every time.
Speaker 2: Fourth best line in the movie for me. That's the
kind of thing an idiot would have on his luggage.
Speaker 3: That's the combination of my life. That's a good one,
all right. How about this one when they're replaying the
stuff on the VCR. Yes, and it comes to the
sudden stop, dark helmet flies through the air and smashes
it and he says, let's get past this part. In fact,
don't ever play this part again.
Speaker 2: Good stuff. And then last, I don't know that it's
still funny to me now, but the line that I
remembered forever is calling the desert okay, because when they
were actually coming the desert, I was like, this is hilarious.
But I was thirteen at the time, so man, we.
Speaker 3: Ain't okay for me. The number one line, though, has
got to be I see your schwartz as as big
as mine. Yes, you know that that's the That's the
line from the movie, and that's the one that we
repeated to each other all the time at school.
Speaker 2: What does that make us? Absolutely nothing.
Speaker 3: I think it's funny how Rick moranis every time he's
got his helmet up and he's like he sort of
talks like he's like, well, what what happened? You know,
he's but every time he puts his helmet down, he's
like room store. You know, his voice changes.
Speaker 2: So there here's an interesting bit of trivia. Do you
remember what happens when he goes to he goes to
the control station and he's about to like the it's
the destroyer or whatever that he's and they're like, no,
that's the coffee machine. You remember that?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Okay, So mel Brooks was notorious for not allowing anyone
to have coffee cups on his sets because just as
a month or so ago, we learned sometimes those things
slip into scenes like they did in Game of Thrones
one of the final episodes. And so the bit then
for this movie is Rick moranis is walking around for
a third of the movie with a styrofoam coffee cup
in his hand because he goes to the coffee machine first.
Speaker 3: Yes, I always have my coffee, went, Yes.
Speaker 2: I always have coffee when I watch radar.
Speaker 3: You know that. Of course I do, sir.
Speaker 2: Everybody knows that. Okay, all right, so you get it, yep.
And we've hit our actors. So now we're on to
six degrees of Kevin Bacon. You want to give it
a shot, I've already done Rick moranis you're not allowed
to use him?
Speaker 3: Okay, if I can't is Rick Marass. I'm gonna go
the John Candy route. Okay, good, let's go John Camp.
I'll skip stripe since I could go John Candy, Bill Murray,
Bill Murray goes. Yeah, all right, so let's go John
Candy and Tom Hanks and splash. Okay, Tom, there, Paula
thirteen boom, look as you go.
Speaker 2: Two movies. I'm not even gonna try to compete with you.
Speaker 3: Yes, Oh that was so good.
Speaker 2: I didn't even know.
Speaker 3: I didn't yeah me, Yeah, that was perfect.
Speaker 2: I was over here going like, okay, how do I
get to John lyth Gal? Yeah? Yeah, you're like Tom Hanks.
Dang it, you're so good.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 2: All right, So let's talk about the movie.
Speaker 3: Okay, babe, God.
Speaker 2: I gotta say, in a large part this movie did
not work up for me. I'll movie watching Okay, it's
been twenty years probably since I've seen it, and whenever
the especially whenever we see Bill Pullman's character for the
first time, the hamming is almost like bad stage acting,
community theater stuff, and I just I was kind of like,
let down.
Speaker 3: Let down he's talking about when he's like Marv.
Speaker 2: Right when he yeah, when they're when they're trying to
negotiate with Pizza the hut.
Speaker 3: Oh Okay, Okay, So yeah, I was.
Speaker 2: I was disappointed at that part. Now, the movie is
still great. N't get me wrong, it's a classic. It's
it's always going to be a classic. But I was
surprised on the rewatching that I was like, this is
not this is not as good as I remember it being.
Speaker 3: Okay, Okay, so here's I got a couple of problems
with that.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 3: Bill Pullman, in my opinion, is not good looking enough
to pull off the hero.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 3: He's also I didn't buy him as the president and independency.
Yeah I'm not, you're not. I'm not. He's kind of
in between on everything. He's a little too goofy and
a little not funny enough.
Speaker 2: Huh.
Speaker 3: So I'm not a big Bill Pullman fan. I also
thought that mel Brooks's parts in This President's Scrub, and yeah,
we're kind of the least funny characters in the movie.
I love John Candy, I love Rick moranis in.
Speaker 2: This Absolutely those two guys are the movie.
Speaker 3: I think. I think John Rivers is funny. I think
Daphne zu Nigga is good as the princess. Right, But
I if you would have said give me more barf
and give me more dark helmet, I'm I'm totally important.
Speaker 2: Absolutely totally agree. There are some classic lines, and I mean,
you can't. We're criticizing something that is iconic, so don't. Yeah,
that's right, we still love it. Yeah I would. I
would watch it again with the kids. Absolutely, but it's uh,
it's not It's not what I remember it being. So
here's a trivia thing. You know, we talked about lights
and magic being involved with it. You remember the scene
when they're when they've hit the self destruct button, yes,
and then like that's the the F bomb comes out there,
which is just a shocker. I watched Beetlejuice the other
day with the kids. It's just I was just like,
how did I not remember that? No kidding, So these
are These are a couple of rare like Airplane was
the rare PG movie that had boobies. These are Those
two were a couple of the rare PG movies that
had the f bomb in them. Right. But anyway, they're
all escaping in the escape pods, right yep. So there's
one scene it's really it's still like a flash, but
you see the escape pod shooting out and you're like, wow,
they did a really good job with that. Well, it
turns out that was actually a deleted scene from one
of the original Star Wars movies.
Speaker 3: Star Wars had his fingerprints on this, which was pretty cool.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, to have the blessing of the person
you're parodying, you can't beat that. And and like said,
mel Brooks is iconic and brilliant and blazing Saddles and
you Frankenstein are some of my favorites. Spaceballs is going
to be lower on the totem pole compared to those movies.
Speaker 3: I would say this is the third best mel Brooks movie.
Speaker 2: I haven't seen the producers, but yeah, I was not
a big fan of History of the World or the
producer or.
Speaker 3: Dracula didn't let me. Never even saw that one I
go blazing saddles Young Frankenstein Spaceballs.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'd be on board with. Oh, but High Anxiety
I almost forgot, so yeah, you got to watch Anxiety.
So High Anxiety was mel Brooks's parody of Alfred Hitchcock movies,
and that was the one I watched over and over
his kid, that one solid I will it's been again
a couple of decades since I've seen it. I would
rewatch it again and said I'd have to decide between
it and Spaceballs. Okay, but this kind of what goes
on with Spaceballs that I think is the key to
the difference between Spaceballs and Airplane for my final judgment here,
which we're moving into. Yes, is what I talked about
before they had the guys an Airplane that were all
serious actors delivering serious stuff even though it was hysterical.
And the conflict between this very serious delivery from these
very serious actors and the hysterical language and stuff going
on in the movie was what made it so funny.
With Spaceballs, You've got some comedy geniuses here, but you
got some people that were really kind of hamming it
up a little bit, especially Yeah, Bill Wolman, is. Yeah,
they're playing for comedy, a lot of it. Colonel Sanders
is a great guy. He was on Hill Street Blues.
He was a serious actor, but you could tell he
wasn't playing serious role. He was kind of hamming it up.
Speaker 3: What's the matter, Colonel Sanders Chicken. Yeah, this movie is
great and it's a lot of fun. And as a
Star Wars fan, I'm a big Star Wars guy. It's
fun to see you know, your favorites poked fun at
and I love it. It's funny. There are some laugh out
loud parts, but not like Airplane Nope, not for me.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 3: Rick Morans and John Candy knock it out.
Speaker 2: Of the park though. Absolutely.
Speaker 3: Rick Moranas in particular was brilliant through this whole movie. Yes,
I'll tell you another scene that I like that we
kind of we haven't really talked about. Yeah, is when
they're fighting with their schwartz and they slash a TV
like a cameraman. Yes, and he's like, that's it breaks
the fourth wall, and.
Speaker 2: Well, and that's exactly the same scene you know I
talked about earlier. They have the scene where like they're
jumping through the closing doors and then it turns out
they've captured their stunt senda, which is again that kind
of breaking of the fourth but that same scene where
they're fighting and Lone Star goes over and does some
kind of acrobatic You when you watch that in high definition, Yeah,
that's not Bill Pullman at all. You see his face
and I'm like, oh, there's that stunt double again.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he does some weak stuff to transition on that.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Okay, so I think we've reached the end of
our show.
Speaker 3: Final judgment, Love Spaceballs, love Airplane, Airplane.
Speaker 2: More definitely Airplane is the winner on this one battle
of parodies. Airplane wins. Condolences and respect to Spaceballs winner Airplane. Yeah.
So thank you guys. If you've listened all the way
to the end of this, we appreciate you. Send us
some stuff on Twitter. You can catch us at.
Speaker 3: At Shirley podcast on Twitter, Yes, and at Suley podcast
on Facebook.
Speaker 2: Very good. We love to hear your comments. Have we
completely missed it is? Spaceball is a better movie in
your opinion? I know a lot of people out there
who believe that it is.
Speaker 3: Well, let's hear from you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, come at it. Tell us what you think. We'd
love to hear it.
Speaker 3: Give us something great, and maybe we'll mention you on
our next podcast.
Speaker 2: Jason, it's been fun again.
Speaker 3: Good see man, it's fun.
Speaker 2: See it all right. All music, images, and movie clips
are used for the purposes of commentary and education in
conjunction with the fair Use Agreement under the US copyright law.