Speaker 1: Woooo looking really good, Shirley Fans, really good. This is
the King of the K two Chris bamber Bauer here
to introduce your hosts of the Shirley you Can't Be
Serious podcasts d Hoops, Graves and Jason I want my
two dollars, Colvin. Let's blow the hatch and listen to them.
Put their testicles, I mean tentacles all over. Two classic
cult movies, Better Off Dead and One Crazy Summer.
Speaker 2: All right, listen up, everybody.
Speaker 3: Your pop culture knowledge will be gauged, along with a
rating of one to ten on your style. Which will
you judge solely by me and my vast expertise of
eighties and nineties pop culture? Now, then, who would like
to hold my clipboard?
Speaker 2: You make a fine little helper. What's your name? Jeff Johnson?
A film by podcast? Shut up? Geek? What's your name?
J C? Graves? This welcome back to the Surely you
Can't Be Serious Podcast? Everybody. We are here to talk
about two epic movies from nineteen eighty five and nineteen
eighty six, turning thirty nine and forty this year, Crazy
as It May be, Yes, Better Off Dead and One
Crazy Summer.
Speaker 4: Go that way really fast.
Speaker 2: If something gets in your way.
Speaker 5: Turn.
Speaker 3: I can't wait to talk to you about this because
these are very important movies for my growing up experience.
Speaker 2: Where'd you first see these? How'd you become aware of them?
I can tell you that I can remember seeing the
preview for Better Off Dead and thinking, oh my gosh,
I have to watch this movie just because of the
damn shame somebody thrown away perfectly good bye boy like that.
It's a great line. Yes, yeah, I mean, what a
perfect line to put in the trailer. And yeah, so
I was definitely I I'm sure I saw it in
the theater. I know that I saw one crazy summer
because I had seen Better Off Dead, and then I
watched them over and over again on HBO as well.
One hundred percent. I saw him on HBO all the time. Yeah,
I recorded.
Speaker 3: You know, this is back in the days when you
put in a blank VCR tape and record it and
just watch it over and over again.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: My friend group at my youth group at church loved
quoting Better Off Dead.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So the weird thing is is that both of
these movies were not well received when they came out.
And I mean I watched the Ciskel and Ebert and
they were just I mean, it was a bash fast
killing it. It was awful. But you know what, I
remember they did that same thing for spies like us
and I was and I was like, oh, I guess
it's not a good movie. And then I went and
saw the movie. I'm like, Oh, these guys are idiots.
They have no idea what is a good movie.
Speaker 6: Maybe they're all ingredients are there in this movie for
a funny black comedy about suburbia. But better off Dead
never ever finds the right note. And this is one
of those movies where you sit there saying, not only
do I know what's going to happen, but it's going
to be so boring that I won't even be amused
by the fact that I knew it was going to happen.
Speaker 7: I have almost nothing to say about the film other
than it is. I've seen it.
Speaker 2: I know, I've tried.
Speaker 7: I have tried to not remember as much as possible.
You mentioned the garage scene. I just want to repeat
the people and into the pattern of the film. You
see that the window broken once, you see had broken twice.
If he had broken three times, that's the whole pattern
of the movie. What did this director think was funny
that we would think it would be funny that when
we didn't think that it was going.
Speaker 6: To break, that it did break.
Speaker 7: For example, then that director realize that we all know it's.
Speaker 6: Going to break again.
Speaker 7: And doesn't that director realize that that's stupid and that.
Speaker 6: Makes he makes himself.
Speaker 8: For example, the whole idea of the newspaper carrier. Just
to take one little element in the film, this kid
who rides by every day breaking the window is even
in the last shot of the movie, is if he
has some kind of Felinia altered ego.
Speaker 7: Don't use the word Fellini anywhere near this film.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry.
Speaker 8: I really must apologize to Fellini and for doing that.
This is a real bad movie. And I think you
put your finger right on it when you said you
could barely remember it. If I could, if I had
totally forgotten it, I'd be a happy man.
Speaker 3: We're going to talk about because Savage. Steve Holland responded
to the Cisco and Ebert discussion. Oh really in one
crazy summer.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, you'll have to tell me about that. Okay,
you about that now? Before we do. I got to
ask you a question. Yeah, these two movies are really
part of a trilogy. You told me that just a
bit ago, because I was looking and I saw that
there was a third movie that came out after this.
It was eighty nine. Eighty nine, Yeah, and it was
how I got into college. And I was like, oh,
it's got Laura Flynn Boyle in it. From Wayne's World
and from what she was. She was in one of
those lawyers. She was a lawyer and maybe one of
the csis I think, Okay, And then no, she was order,
law and order, that's what it was. Yeah, she was
Jack Nicholson's hot side mama for all. How many girls
could say that though?
Speaker 9: Right?
Speaker 2: But it also had Anthony Edwards in it, Top Gun, Yeah, Goose,
But I never saw it. Is it good? It's good?
Another underrated classic. It is very underrated. As you know.
I'm a big proponent of nineteen eighty nine.
Speaker 3: It is good. It's not better off dead good, but
it's good.
Speaker 2: It's funny.
Speaker 3: It got buried between Roadhouse and Indiana Jones in the
Last Crusade and then here comes did Poets Society and
Riggs and Murtau and James Bond and it just got
that Summer of eighty nine was so big, it just.
Speaker 2: Had no chance.
Speaker 3: Okay, So, but it is definitely worth a watch, and
it's very funny.
Speaker 2: I like it a lot. So was this one that
was in the HBO rotation as well or in VHS VHS.
I'm gonna say I can actually remember that the when
I saw the picture, I was like, oh, I kind
of remember this from the from the video store, you know,
whatever it might have been.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's funny, it's definitely worth a watch. Yeah, I
will tell you this How I Got into College. Also
has Diane Franklin, Oh nice, Yeah, Taylor Negron, which we're
going to talk about here in a minute.
Speaker 2: And Curtis Armstrong is in it as well. Yeah, it's
no John Cusack, but right, well obviously, well we'll talk
about why on that one in a minute. Right, So
if you don't know, not only do do both of
these movies have John Cusack in them, but they were
both written and directed by a guy named Savage Steve Holland.
Now his parents did not give him the name Savage.
That was in fact a nickname. And uh, do you
want another story this? Please tell? Okay, So he was
an artistic little kid, you know, not a not a
WrestleMania kid like you might expect with that name. But
he's playing soccer as a little kid, and some kid
on the other team falls over and he accidentally kicks
him in the face. Now, this kid had a loose tooth,
which he then kicked it out, and of course, with
you know, even when you're it's a loose tooth, there's
still blood. And so this kid has lost a tooth
is bleeding, and Steve, little Stevie Holland just starts crying
because he thinks he's murdered this little child, and they
and so Savage was a joke. It was like calling
a big guy tiny, because he was anything but savage.
He was just this you know, tenderhearted little kid who
couldn't stop crying because he had hurt some other little kid.
So the name Savage stuck. I love it. I love it.
What can we talk?
Speaker 3: I mean before we dive into the drama involving Better
Off Dead? Yeah, why don't you tell us a little
bit about his history and how this movie came to
be made?
Speaker 2: So this is it's a great story. I mean, he
he's very much like the Curtis Armstrong character in One
Crazy Summer, like the Atac character, he's a softer guy
who has this kind of you know, heavy tough dad.
But he when he was a kid, he fell in
love with the idea of making movies when he saw
a Planet of the Apes. He loved Woody Allen and
how Woody Allen would put animation and other kind of
weird comedy things in his movies. And so he would
they had, you know, like the old cam quarters like
you had, And he would make movies with his little
sister as the star of the movie. And would you
like to guess the little sister's nickname, Squid? That is correct, Yes,
the little sister in One Crazy Summer is named after
Savage Steve Holland's actual little sister.
Speaker 3: While we're here, that little girl says two words in
One Crazy Summer. Actually, technically she says one word twice, right.
Speaker 2: Right, right, she says Bosco, which is of course the
name of the dog. Yes, right, the uliest dog in
the world.
Speaker 6: Right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he're some ugly kids in this neighborhood. That's a
great scene. But so he's making movies with her, but
he's having her do her own stunts, and she's getting
hurt and she's like, I'm done with this. I'm not
doing this anymore. And so he realizes that he's got
to draw. He's so he does stop animation with his
cam quord and he's animating pictures just like, I mean,
both of these movies, your main character is an artist
who's doing cartoons, right.
Speaker 10: Very autobiographical these two movies, right, And so he's doing
that and he applies he wants to be a film director,
of course, and so he applies to Cal Arts to.
Speaker 2: Get into their film directing school. And as you might expect,
his family was like, is this really a good idea?
Are you going to be able to make any money
doing this? I mean, you're just a guy who draws
dumb pictures. And his dad says, listen, if you get in,
I will support you. If you don't get in, you
have to go to military school. So once again, just
like backac in One Crazy Summer, right, Well, he gets in.
He's not you know, he's not like the best student
in his class. He's not a George Lucas or Steven
Spielberg from his class. But he makes this kind of
dumb little black and white movie based upon a birthday
party he had when he was eleven years old, and
he literally calls it my eleven year old birthday party. Right.
I look for this on YouTube. I cannot. I can't
find it either. But he makes that movie, and then
he gets out of film school and the only job
he can get is with this brand new show that's
even just like a sequence on another new show called
Entertainment Tonight.
Speaker 3: Wait a minute, this is the et Entertainment Tonight.
Speaker 2: When it very first started, Yes, and they would have
little animated bits that they did, and Savage Steve Holland
was the guy who would animate those things. As it
turns out, the producers of a new game show see
some of the animation that he has done with this
Entertainment Tonight show. Right, do you know the game show?
I do? Can you tell the crowd what the game
show is? That is called Press Your Luck? And if
you don't know it from the name, you'll know it
from Nomy's No Emmy's no w Emmy. Stop all right, players,
just what we've all been waiting for?
Speaker 5: The big board over eighty thousand in cash up.
Speaker 2: They're waiting for you to take it away.
Speaker 7: One prize worth more than five thousand dollars.
Speaker 5: However, the bad news is there's some Wammies, both Tammy
and Wemmy are up there looking to take away.
Speaker 2: Your money, big bucks, stop, stop at our whom He
drew the as on that show, every single one of them.
And if you if you don't remember from the show,
if it's been too long, when they hit a whammy,
there would be a different little scene of that whammy
crawling across the screen, you know, laborating and doing something,
bowing the yard, any number of things. And here's the
other thing. He had to do it in twelve frames,
like he had twelve frames to create that little story.
And that's what he did with Wayman, and it paid
him pretty good money, which will come up here in
a minute, right right. And so with this dumb little
black and white movie that he's got, he somehow somehow
gets it as an opening for like the premiere of
Eating Raoul. Okay, okay, so you remember the movie Eating Rawulf,
Well they have the premiere and his his show is
like the opening little short, right, some sad clown and
the eleven year old birthday party thing right right, And
he meant for it to be sad, right, so sad,
but it ended up being really funny, kind of like
killing yourself should be sad, but he made it funny,
that's right. And so he has this dumb show that
he does right, and he gets home. Back in the
days when people had answering machines, he gets home and
he has three hundred and sixty messages from people who
have loved the show. Right, that's insane. Later that evening,
same night that he's like on cloud nine because everybody
has loved a show and he's gotten all these voicemails
about how much everybody loves his show. His girlfriend breaks
up with him right that same night, and so he
goes back and he's like, I thought this was love.
I don't know what I'm gonna do. I don't think
I can go on living without her, and he literally
starts contemplating suicide. He thinks about hanging himself in the garage,
and he's like, I should at least call Henry Winkler.
Henry Winkler, Henry Wad the Fonds is one of the voicemails,
one of the guys who's seen this premiere. He's one
of the voicemails on his answering machine, and so he
calls him up and he's like, listen, I loved it.
I've got a spare office at my office. You can
use the Xerox machine. You just come in and you
just write whatever you want to write. And so he
just kind of shows up. He's still kind of bummed
out about his girlfriend breaking up with him, and Henry
Winkler is like, so, what are you going to write
about it? He's like, I don't know. He goes, well,
you can do that the clown thing with the birthday thing,
and he's like that was kind of the whole story.
He's like, well, what's going on in your life and
he's like, well, I'm kind of suicidal because my girlfriend
broke up with me. And Henry Wrinkler is like, great,
right about that?
Speaker 9: Right?
Speaker 2: Well, so that is how we got the script for
Better Off Debt.
Speaker 3: It's crazy. So Henry Winkler when he says, hey, come
to my office that's on Paramount Campus, Yeah, that gets
him through the gate.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, at this point, he's much more than
the Fonds, Like, he is a producer and one of
the shows that he produced stars a young actor named
John Cusack. That's called the sure Thing. Sure Thing, Now,
I love the sure Thing. Yeah, I haven't seen it.
Speaker 3: Okay, it's a Rob Ryder movie. It's got Daphnine Zuniga
from space Ball.
Speaker 2: Spaceball. Yeah, it's got Nicolette Sheridan. She's the sure Thing,
right right. Anthony Edwards is in that as well, okay, perfect? Yeah,
oh yeah he is. I know he's for you. Yeah.
He's the guy who's he's talking to on the phone
saying you need to come out here too. He's the
guy saying, yeah, that's she's the sure Thing. Yes.
Speaker 3: And then you've got John Cusack, who's the leading man
in that movie.
Speaker 2: First leading performance. Yes. So he's got this script. He's
got this little black and white movie that he's done.
But they can't get this script sold to anybody. They're
showing it to all kinds of producers and directors and
stuff like that. And so he's thinking, well, maybe if
I just like write a do a short that's kind
of a piece of this better off Dead idea, maybe
I can do something with that. And so he knows
Henry Winkler, the freakin' fund, the freaking Fonds, who's helping
him out here, right, and he's like, Henry's like, yeah,
I'll play a part in this little short film of yours.
And so he's like some evil ice cream salesman or
something in this, okay. And then in the process of
trying to to get this film made, he's met several
film directors, including Amy Heckerling, Amy Heckerling, Fast Times, Richemont
High just got done directing it. She loves his stuff,
and she's like anything I can do to help, And
he's like, hey, Amy, I'm gonna make a short film.
Will you be in the short film? So he has
her act. Okay, Okay, so he has her act and
so what he does is he makes this short film,
this first date short film that's kind of a shorter
version of The Better Off Dead right, and Amy Heckerling
is the star. Now here's the beautiful part about this.
She is dating a big time movie producer, and so
whenever it's like, hey, my girlfriend's not directing but starring
in this short film, he calls all of his producer
buddies up and they all watch it together. And then
all of a sudden, the offers start to come in.
Guys from the breakfast club I think end up picking
it up, but they don't end up shooting it. It's
like up and down, as scripts tend to go. But ultimately,
this guy named Michael Jaffe, who's produced a ton of stuff,
he calls Savage Steve Holland and says, hey, I want
you to doctor a script for me. You know, I'm
trying to make one of these high school movies that
everybod's so excited about. And so Savage Steve Holland meets
with him and he's like, hey, you know, if you
if you're talking to me because you liked my script,
why don't you just make my script? And he's like,
I don't know, I just can't see it. And Savage
Steve Holland, being the artist, he's like, oh, well, it's
okay because I've already got it storyboarded out, and he's
got the whole storyboard and that's how he ultimately finds
the producer for Better Off Debt. That's fantastic.
Speaker 3: So I just want to go back over this because
he really is at the bottom floor on so many
events like crisscrossing eighties pop culture. So you've got entertainment
tonight number one, You've got Pressure Luck, which was an iconic.
Speaker 2: Eighties game show The Fawns.
Speaker 3: You've got the freaking Fawns in the early eighties. Who
is a superstar at the time, Amy Heckerling, who is
about to make maybe the most influential teen movie of
all time, which probably gave us that run of teen
movies that we got in the eighties, and then office
on paramount and things are starting to happen.
Speaker 2: What going to start happening to me today? I mean,
it's incredible just being there at that correct time, you know. Yeah,
And so of course Henry Winkler, having produced The Sure Thing, says, hey,
I got the perfect kid to star in your movies.
Speaker 3: So I know the studio was nervous with John Cusack
because the only thing he had been in that they
had seen up to that point with sixteen Candles.
Speaker 2: Right where, he's a nerd. He's like the brothers and
the twins that are just he's Farmer Ted's right hand man,
who's a geek, a sidekick. He's a sidekick, right right.
Speaker 3: And you and I were laughing about the quote when
farmer Ted knocks over that giant pile of beer cans.
He turns around, he says, come on, I can't bring
you anywhere this week, right, And then John Kyszack turns
to his brother and.
Speaker 2: Says, real smooth Cliff.
Speaker 5: Very nice.
Speaker 2: We're five minutes and I'm gonna loss.
Speaker 9: Real smooth Cliff.
Speaker 2: He leaves, and that poor Cliff brother is just standing
there now that he was in he was in better
off dead. I know you told me this the other day.
Who is he? So in the scene where you've got
the you've got the math class where he's talking and
it's just this no math that any human being would understand,
and everybody's just entranced and they're all excited and laughing
and volunteering and stuff. He's like, all right, now, if
you'll get it, get out your assignments that I gave
to you, answers to this paltry little problem that I
gave you.
Speaker 3: You.
Speaker 2: Remember, there's a kid who like gets out this full
sized suitcase, opens it up and has a dot Matrix
printer in it. That's brother Cliff from sixteen.
Speaker 3: Sixty candis Yes, side note, Yes, I got into a
college major where I shouldn't have been for a while, yeah,
which required me to take math for majors. Right, And
I looked around in my calculus for major's class and
realized it was like that class, everybody was on top
of it.
Speaker 2: Not this guy. Yeah, I can't identify with that I had.
I had honors calculus my first semester in college, having
never had any calculus at all, not pretty calculus or
and I was like, okay, because I could figure it out.
That's what I did in high school. I'll figure it
out right. It was fine. And then the professor first
day of class, he's like, now, I know a lot
of professors will give you partial credit for your work
even if you don't have the answer right. I don't
do that. If you get the answer wrong, the whole
thing is wrong. It doesn't matter how good your work is,
because if you get it wrong. When you work for NASA,
the shuttle flies into the sun, does nobody's gonna give
you credit for your most of your work being right
if it flies into the sun. I'm like, I'm not
going to work for NASA. And then he asked to
date your girlfriend. Yeah, so this is a little awkward.
That's a funny running joke throughout Better Off Dead. It's
great name.
Speaker 9: This is a bit awkward. I've heard a few things
and well, I was wondering if you would mind if
I took out Beth.
Speaker 2: Which, by the way, in real life Savage Steve Hollins's
girlfriend broke up with him.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he became suicidal. I heard him mention that he
went into his garage strung up a noose and when
he tried to do the.
Speaker 2: Act, the wire broke.
Speaker 3: He landed on the trash can, busted the trash can,
the pipe started leaking water on top of his head,
and his mom came out and yelled.
Speaker 2: At was she the one that knocked him over while
she was a vacuumating right, exactly?
Speaker 3: So serious thing, funny event, Yeah, you know, yeah, so
I think that's hilarious.
Speaker 2: Yeah, all right, she was. I mean, we can't really
switch over to one game. This is like a sequential thing.
This is a nice deal when we have the same director, writer,
same star. This is one thing happens and the next
thing happens. And so the only jump that we're going
to make from Better Off Dead to One Crazy Summer
is they were in the middle of shooting One Crazy
Summer when they watched Better Off Dead for the first time.
And this is what we were alluding to before and
John Cusack gets up in the middle of it and
walks out to me.
Speaker 3: This is the biggest story of the entire two part podcast,
the fact that John Cusack hated Better Off Dead so
much that he didn't speak to his director the entire time.
Speaker 2: He makes one crazy summer right, like he confronted him
after seeing Better Off Dead and says, you've ruined my career.
I can't believe you did this, which to me, I
don't know, like, how are you filming the scenes in
Better Off Dead? And you don't know what's going on? Well,
not only that they're watching dailies together, right, it just
doesn't make any sense. Savagete vall and said they would
go back to their room together, watch dailies together and
laugh their asses off. So I heard John Cusack talk
about this, and you know, he has said that in
all movies that he watches, he's embarrassed by the movie.
But then you know, that's just the way that it is.
It's just you find the things that are wrong on
it with it, and you tend to focus on those things.
And he said, not about these movies, because I doubt
that he's probably watched them again, but he says I've
I've seen myself in movies and thought, oh my gosh,
I've done so terrible in this this is such an
awful movie. And then years later i'll see it again
I'll be like, oh, actually, that was kind of a
good decision. And so it's just it's human nature, you know, especially,
I mean, you just got to think about it. You
were a young kid. I mean he's early twenties, he's
like twenty, Yeah, on the cusp of maybe being a star,
and you do this kind of goofy movie. It could
scare you, it could. I mean, if I was twenty,
I could see myself being scared that. I get his fear.
Speaker 3: I do, because it's it's a one of a kind movie. Yeah,
it's goofy, it's absurd, it's oddball.
Speaker 2: But it's so.
Speaker 3: Sweet, right, and so cute. Yeah, it's basically irresistible. But
I can see where he would be, you know, uncomfortable
with it. Yeah, But to point the finger at him
and say, you tricked me, you deceived me, Yeah, and
I hate you and don't freaking talk to me again.
Speaker 2: Right, it's twenty yeah, but that was also forty years ago, right, Yeah, No,
I get that, and I think that he's kind of
he's eased up on his reaction to it. But I
mean that doesn't mean that he's going to go make
friends with savage Steve Holland.
Speaker 3: Again, that bothers me. You know, I've got something for you. Okay,
and wait, wait real quick before we go there.
Speaker 2: Okay. So he bawls out Savage Steve Holland, and then
he follows this movie with Hot Pursuit right five point
seven on I it's not good. I've seen it. And
this movie that I've never heard of with him and
Tim Robbins called tape Heads. I'm not seeing that. I'm
so five point seven, like, I mean, he wasn't picking
good ones. Anyway.
Speaker 3: Let me throw John Cusack a bone before I fix
in a tear him down, right, Okay, So he does
two movies I love Better Off Dead. I love I
think it's eighties iconic, it's hilarious, it's fun, it's sweet,
it's genuine, all these things. One Crazy Summer is also
those things. He does those two crap movies. He then
does say anything Right eighty nine, which you covered recently, Right,
I just did that with Document seventy seven. I did
it with Amber Lewis and Dayton Johnson. We had a
great time discussing one of the most romantic movies of
nineteen eighty nine. In fact, I'd love to cover it
some time, maybe against When Harry Met Sally, two of
the best romantic comedies of eighty nine.
Speaker 2: Nice.
Speaker 3: He is so awesome in that movie, and he's not
at all nerdy, goofball, It's sweet, genuine, it's yeah, it's.
Speaker 2: Just a great movie anyway. And then he does eight
min out after that, right, eight min out was in
eighty eight, which is previous to that. Oh okay, so
he did eight min out and then he did say anything, yes, okay, gotcha.
Speaker 3: But I mean, four years later, you're still playing a
high school kid, which right, yeah, of course by Jay
Fox was twenty five and back in the future. So
before I give him all this crap, I'm just gonna say,
is John Cusack the greatest actor of all time? Because
he makes us believe that he is a lovable loser
in all of these movies when maybe he's not so lovable,
and he's definitely not a loser.
Speaker 2: He's definitely not a loser. I will tell you. I mean,
I've I've heard him interview in podcasts as a as
an adult. I mean this was four years ago, you
know that. And he's he is a man with humility
who has said, I'm the luckiest guy in the world.
It's crazy that I am this lucky. He's also very intelligent.
He is. I don't necessarily agree with the things that
he says all the time, but he's you can't say
that he's not well thought out. It's not educated, and
somebody who speaks with humility and respect, And so I
tend to think, hey, you know, he was a dumb
kid when he was twenty, so was I Maybe he
grew up a little bit, all right.
Speaker 3: So on that note, I want to I want to
tell you something funny. Yeah, okay, So in say anything,
he's pursuing the unattainable girl, right right and better off dead.
He gets dumped by his girlfriend and stumbles upon this
French exchange students and it's great fun. In one crazy summer,
he stumbles into a romance that he didn't expect to happen.
So I'm partially kidding, of course. Let me give you
a list of women that he has dated in real life.
Oh okay, okay, So this lovable loser thing is not
who he is, right, Okay, he has dated keep up now,
Uma Thurman okay, Lily Taylor say anything?
Speaker 2: Oh got youa? Yeah, Claire for.
Speaker 3: Lannie okay, Maul Rats, yes, okay, Alison Eastwood Clint Eastwood's daughter,
who's a babe?
Speaker 2: Okay? Meg Ryan Wow, never can amble? Okay, Minie Driver
all right.
Speaker 3: Jennifer love Hewitt Okay, right, yeah, Janice Dickinson the first
supermodel okay, yeah, Brooke Burns okay, major babe all right,
Gina Gershawn, oh hello, Jamie Gertz, Wow, Rebecca Romaine, Pamela Anderson.
Speaker 2: Gilbert, Oh my gosh, Ryl Crow okay, Susannah Melvoine, Oh wow?
You remember her? Uh yeah, the sister of uh the
other Melvoye from from Princess band Revere. Yes, Wendy Melvoyne,
thank you?
Speaker 3: Uh Shoshanna Gross Does that mean anything to you?
Speaker 2: I think I know who that is too. Yeah.
Speaker 3: She was Jerry Seinfeld's high school girl, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
smoking hot?
Speaker 2: Yeah, any spears okay, yeah, probably in the heyday and
not right now. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.
Those are famous women that he has dated d Gum,
So he is the luckiest guy in the world. I mean,
he's he's doing well for himself. Yeah, absolutely, yeah. Okay,
So obviously we know that John Cusack is the star
of both of these movies, but you have you have
some other overlap in it. Curtis Armstrong is, yes, one
of the overlaps, and then Taylor Taylor Negron. Taylor Negron
is in both the Laura Waterbury's in both of them. Okay,
Rich Little is in both of them. He's he's he
was in Better Off Dead? Where was he in Better
Off Dead?
Speaker 3: Allow me to educate you on the cast of Dead? Okay,
all right, yeah, so I just want to talk about
it a few of these okay, real quick, Okay, John
Cusack is Lane Meyer. How he almost got the part
of John Bender in Breakfast Club? Okay, How different is
his career if an eighty five he goes John Bender
rather than Lane Meyer.
Speaker 2: Very different? I think, so too, right, Yeah for sure? Okay,
David Ogden Steers is his dad. Mash Mash. That's it, Like,
that's that. I'm like that. I immediately go to Mash
all right, quick trivia question, Yes.
Speaker 3: What world famous animated character did David Ogden Steer's voice.
Speaker 2: He was the clock in Beauty and the Beast. That's right,
Disney's Beauty in the Beat. That's love it, love it
to see you out in the bout Madmoiselle. I am
Cogsworth the household.
Speaker 3: This is a chante Chevy points for d Thank you,
good job, all right.
Speaker 2: And then you have Diane Franklin, who is Monique Juneau. Yeah, hey, yes,
something is wrong.
Speaker 4: How you say, doc head?
Speaker 5: He is an unlessh sex fiend Ricky.
Speaker 2: He will not leave me alone. He sinks because I
stay here. I am his love. God. This is astre No.
We know that she is the one of the princesses
in the Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure.
Speaker 3: Yes, she was in an earlier teen comedy called The
Last American Virgin.
Speaker 2: Okay, did you ever see that? I haven't seen it.
Speaker 3: Pretty influential movie in the early eighties. Heartbreaking scene at
the end, kind of a crusher at the end. Okay,
And she's talked about this many times, but I mean,
if you watch that movie, at the end.
Speaker 2: You're like, oh, oh my goodness. Okay, So don't give
it away, don't spoil it for me. Her French accent
she had done just prior to in a movie called
Second Time Lucky. Okay, oh that was the one you
sent me the picture of she looked good. Well, yeah, okay.
Kim Darby plays Jenny Meyer. That's his mother.
Speaker 4: In honor of our special guests, I've created dinner Mondu. First,
we have French fries and French dressing and fronch bread
and to drink.
Speaker 2: Peru. Do you know something about this?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: She was the little girl in True Grit. She was
the little girl in True Grit. Yeah. That to me.
I was bowled over by that. Yeah, that's awesome, the original.
Speaker 3: True Grit Wayne, Right, Okay. Now, Curtis Armstrong plays Charles Dumar.
Speaker 9: Listen to Styalin Kid.
Speaker 3: He's a funk.
Speaker 9: Now you show rock, you show him.
Speaker 3: Hawsteer really Steez, right, his best buddy who got the
job because savag Steve Holland liked him.
Speaker 2: In Risky Business, Yeah, he had been in He had
been in Risky Business in eighty three and Nerds was
eighty four eighty four. He played Booger in Revenge of
the Nerds. Right, Yeah, we had which is funny because
we had just when I when I talked about One
Crazy Summer with Jeff Johnson from the A Film By podcast,
we had just gotten finished with Nerds versus Animal House. Yeah,
and I have some overlap with Animal House as well. Yeah,
but yeah, so guys, that was a Patreon episode for
a film Buy, but it's free, So I would encourage
everybody go over to a film Buy. You just put
your email in and you get that free episode with
some other free episodes that they have. They do like
a best of eighty six. I think they're trying to
get eighty six of the movies. They just dropped their
eighty sixth. Nice episode. Definitely go check that out. Okay.
Speaker 3: The girl who plays Beth in Better Off Dead, Yeah,
that's Amanda wiss Yep. Her claim to fame is she
is the first person killed by Freddy Krueger in the
original Nightmare in Elm Street.
Speaker 2: I knew I recognized her face from something.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's back when those movies were actually scary. Yeah,
she's climbed along on the ceiling. He's killing her and
she's they're freaking out. They're watching her on the ceiling
or like cuts start happening.
Speaker 2: On her body.
Speaker 3: And I first time I saw that, I was like,
oh my gosh, that Beth and I can't remember what
her character's name is, but she's the first person killed
by Freddy Kirker.
Speaker 2: Wow. Okay. Now, then Aaron Doser plays Roy Staalin.
Speaker 6: Where looking really good today, Buddy, looking real good.
Speaker 2: He is the ski guy that steals Beth away from him.
Is the best douchey bully like he he he's Johnny
from a karate Kid level good seeing a boyfriend? How
did this guy not get more John Lawrence parts? Well,
I don't know because you told me. Like he he
came into the audition as that guy, right, Yeah, like
saw savage Steve Holland in his in his Hawaiian shirt.
He says, he said, who's the chubby kid? And like
showy magnum.
Speaker 3: P I over here exactly right, So listen to what
he was up against. They were they were looking at
Charlie Sheen for that part. They were looking at Chad
McQueen we talked about in The Karate Kid.
Speaker 2: He played Dutch in The Karate Kid. Steve McQueen's son.
He just passed away. I think this past year.
Speaker 3: Yeah, what's the matter, I mean, not here to address you.
That guy was awesome in the Karate Kid and he
could have been super scary.
Speaker 2: But listen to this.
Speaker 3: So here's what Roy excuse me, Aaron Doser, not Roy Stallin,
the actor who played Roy Stallin, said they had hired
somebody that he wouldn't name, okay, which tells me it's
somebody famous, which is probably one of those two guys.
He couldn't make pig noises.
Speaker 2: I thought you were gonna he couldn't ski. He couldn't
make pig noise.
Speaker 3: He couldn't make pig noises. And as you know, in
that part in the humiliating scene where Blaine is thrown
out of the kitchen, he's like, we you looking really
good today?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 3: He couldn't make pig noises, and so they fired him
because this.
Speaker 2: Dude could do it. Wow. I thought that was hilarious, man.
So I think the best part about this is what
happens to him later in life. No, he doesn't get
any more starring roles. What happens to him tell me?
Speaker 3: He becomes a ski instructor for Boston College, their their
ski team.
Speaker 2: He's a coach. That is fantastic. Asked me if he
could ski before he did Better Off Dead. Could he ski?
He could not. He couldn't ski.
Speaker 3: What he and Cusack went up a few days early
just to get acquainted with skis.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, that is crazy.
Speaker 3: Better Off Dead leads to a coaching position in a
Division one program.
Speaker 2: Wow, how about that? That is crazy. I thought that
was fantastic. Oh gosh, Okay, okay. Now Damien Slade plays
Johnny Gasparini. Is he he's the kid, He's the newspaper kid,
two dollars cash, I don't have a dime, didn'tess for
a dime.
Speaker 3: So that kid got the job because he played that
as a serial killer.
Speaker 2: And I mean it's that part of the movie is
he's like the Stocking monster from a horror movie. He
really is. He's the unstoppable killing him. He's like the terminator.
He really is. It's fantastic and maybe maybe the most
memorable line from the movie. If you see John Cusack
on the street, you might just say, I want my
two dollars. That is the line. He might punch in
the face too, because I'm sure he hears it a
million times a day.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so Damian Slade was twelve years old. Now get this,
Here's the Here's the Kicker.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I don't know if you know this or not.
His lines were looped. Okay, did you hear this story? No,
his lines were looped. This is according to Die and
Franklin by actor Yano Anaya. Okay, does that ring a
bell to you? Was he in another movie that I know? Yes?
Was it? Uh? Never ending story?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 2: Okay, then tell me. He played Michael Anthony in the
Hot for Teacher video number one.
Speaker 3: As the kid as the kid. Okay, young Michael Anthony
Hot for Teacher. He also plays Grover Dill in a
Christmas story The Toady.
Speaker 2: Oh, okay, wow, I didn't know it was the same
kid as the as the Hot for Teacher video.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Wow, that's awesome. And he's one of the little
Newspaper boy gang right yeah, when it's when it yet?
And what a great scene that is, Like I didn't
like they have their dramatic lighting coming up from it's
so absurd.
Speaker 3: It's so absurd, but it's it's so funny. I just
don't know how they pull it off, right.
Speaker 2: Scooter Stevens.
Speaker 3: The award for Best Name goes to Scooter steven who
plays Badger his kid brother in the movie.
Speaker 2: Oh right, not a single line in the whole thing.
Speaker 3: Doesn't say one single word, and manages to pick up
trashy women everywhere.
Speaker 2: Yep, I want that book. Sorry, just kidding, just kidding.
He builds a laser, a space shuttle and picks up
trashy women in the entire movie. That's whatever a twelve
year old boy wanted to do.
Speaker 3: At that point, I think, all right, this, I'm hoping
to blow your your your socks off here a little bit.
Speaker 2: Okay, Yugi a Kamoto, Yes, plays ye suk Ree? How
would cow sell? Yes?
Speaker 3: Language lessons inspired words? Now do you recognize that actor? Okay, yes, well, shoot,
that's right. He is in He's in Karate Kid too.
He's the main bad guy, the main Yeah, he's the
main bat that Daniel has. And then he comes back
again in Cobra Kai like season two or three, I think,
and and it's.
Speaker 2: He's he's a great part. He's a great part in
that series too.
Speaker 3: He goes from this he's a goofball funny Howard Cosell
impersonating Chinese guy to danielssn's nemesis.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and he kills it because he's I mean he's
a tall, good looking guy. He's tough, and he didn't
fall for no crane kick, by the way, right does
he falls for the but the and and here's another
here's another interesting crossover for the movies. Right, that's not
his voice doing the Howard co Cell voice. He is
lip syncing to who to Rich Little? Who was? I mean,
if if you grew up in the eighties, you know
who Rich Little was because he was the guy who
did all the impressions. He was constantly on HBO doing
stand up William Nelson, yes, and all the and Howard
Cosell and John Wayne and all of those. But he
is also the DJ in One Crazy Summer where they
do in the big radio giveaway of a million dollars.
Weren't you just ask me a minute ago? He was
in both movies. He's he is, he is in Better
Off Dead. His voice is in Better Off Dead is
Howard Cosell. And then he's the radio guy in One
Crazy Ses That's correct, Yes.
Speaker 5: Okay, excuse Smiths as trolley us applying madam morphosis off.
Speaker 7: The lamee myer.
Speaker 5: I think the clown's more expecting to say hair and
probably mount perhaps she'll can't tell us what what brought
on such an unchesteding accelerate thing. Faint language lessons why
which lesson inspired words from a man who knows how
to escape?
Speaker 2: Now, then Laura Waterbury plays Missus Smith, missus, oh, missus
Smith Ricky's mouth. Well, as we're discovering on our household,
you don't need words to speak the uh.
Speaker 4: The international language, you know, love.
Speaker 3: Yes, Ricky's mom, Gee, Ricky, I'm really sorry, mom, blew up.
I guess you won't be able to eat any spicy
foods for a while.
Speaker 2: She is awesome and better off that she's really good. Yes. Oh,
and by the way, how about a real world foreshadowing
of somebody putting all of their testicles all everybody? Sorry,
what is it?
Speaker 7: No?
Speaker 2: I think it's testicals. It's actually testicles. So are we
here yet? We're here? We're here, We're here now, say
Dance Nighter now infamous Dance Snider. He was like top
dog at Nickelodeon, did all those shows with the Manda Bynes.
So I I saw, you know, obviously I saw this movie.
Knew him from that, Yes, and then I loved Head
of the Class, which was he was on one of
the smart kids in the Head of the class. He
was the chubby guy who was friends with the cool
guy and they're all geniuses or whatever. And then later
on in life, I'm like, oh, yeah, he's direking movies
for Nickelodeon. Cool, that's exciting. He was a superstar Nickelodeon, right,
And so then that Nickelodeon documentary whatever you want to
call it, comes out. I didn't even see it. I
haven't seen it. I just heard about what happened. And
then my kids, I mean, my daughter is thirteen. She
watches the reruns of those shows, like The Victorious is
one of the shows, and I Carly and Sam and Kat.
She watches all of those shows, and I see that
his name come up as director is one of those shows.
I'm like, oh, I recognize that name. Where do I
know that from? And I look him up. I'm like, oh,
it's the guy from Head of the Class. Oh my gosh,
what in the world. He is the guy who was
sexually inappropriate with all of these young mostly female like
asking for massages. And I don't I don't know how
bad it got, but definitely not politically correct in today's
world at all.
Speaker 3: Go if you, especially if you've got kids thinking about
acting being in the entertainment world, go watch that documentary.
It will open your eyes.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So, I mean, I know that girl from Sam
and Kat is. Yeah, she's not not happy about that
old experience. And you said a man to binds. I
mean she was. She went way off the deep end.
Yeah she she That's a whole another podcast, right right, right. So,
so Dan Snyder, Ricky Ricky Ricky in Better Off Dead
becomes the director that is the source of all of
the turmoil at Nickelodeon. Okay, let's separate that for just
one second. Okay, let's look at it, because.
Speaker 3: He is hilarious and better Off Dead and I enjoyed
that performance for a lot of years before I learned
about the Nickelodeon stuff.
Speaker 2: He's we could still like oj and Naked Gun, can't.
Speaker 3: We absolutely totally nordburg But like he does funny things,
like he snorts jello and he makes you know, he
puts his tentacles all over Monique and uh, just he's
really funny. And of course he has the ski pole
sword fight at the.
Speaker 2: End of the movie. Yeah, you shouldn't upset mother. Here's
the one thing. Okay, So they they redeem his character
a little bit because after John Cusick wins the sword
fight with Ricky and Ricky is laying on top of
his mother, right, he gets his hand up by a
nerdy girl. Right, yeah, mister golden opportunity. It should have
been the girl that John Cusack was forced to go
out on a date with, that was the daughter of
his dad's off firm partner who had the yes, was like,
you can pay this, you can pay this. How about
you just getting will you take a check? Yes? If
it was her, it would have been the perfect button.
But it's just random geeky girl that we've never seen before.
You know what.
Speaker 3: You're exactly right. That would have been the girl with
the horrible intent on her face.
Speaker 2: I love that. That's so funny. Okay, I got one
more name for actually, I got a couple names for you. Okay.
Speaker 3: So Taylor Negrin plays the Mailman. Yes, right, yep, he's
in one of the guys that he's also in one
crazy summer stand up comedian of He's now dead. I
don't know if you know that.
Speaker 2: No, really, he passed away. But he's funny. He's one
of the guys, is like Lane, I know you and
I don't really know each other, but I remember this, right.
Was he on the pee Wee Herman show too? Did
he do pee Wee Herman stuff? Maybe? Okay, maybe, okay.
He's one of the guys who asked Lane if he
can ask out Beth. Right. I know, I don't really
know you. What a great scene. Let me he's just
walking down the road. Just dropped robbing Bill's opening stuff
into the book Trashy Women pick Up Women. How about
the name Chuck Mitchell as Rocko? Is that meaning thing
to you? Chuck Mitchell is Rocko? Is he the big
guy who owns the restaurant that he keeps running into
his truck? Fat pig? Yes? Yeah, no, no, pet pig,
Pat pig, hot pig. Right, gonna go wash my hands.
I got a mold and packed. You wash your hands
on your own time. Boy, Now get to work.
Speaker 3: So he's the one who gets like and throws him out,
And that's you know, reckon, I say him.
Speaker 2: No, he plays Porky Porky's Oh that's right, Oh my gosh,
it's been a dang minute since I've seen Porky's. Right,
now that you say it. I forgot about that.
Speaker 3: Wow, yes, okay, and I got one more name for you, yeah,
E G Daily, Elizabeth Daily. Okay, she is the girl
who is singing at the dance.
Speaker 2: Oh really, I could have sworn that was ps. Okay,
so no, EG Daily, EG Daily. She's the one who's
singing Better Off Dead. She's singing Better Off the theme songs. Yeah, okay, Yeah.
Speaker 3: She does the voice for like Tommy Pickles, and she
Rugrats and Powderpuff Girls.
Speaker 2: That's right. She's also Dotty in Peele's Big Adventure. Oh okay, okay, right,
yeah Dotty. That's great.
Speaker 3: So I think that they missed an opportunity in one
crazy summer. I mean, Demmy Moore is a bigger star,
uh huh, But you can have a real singer.
Speaker 2: She wasn't at that point, though she is now, but
she at that point, she wasn't like the she had
just the year before, I mean a couple of years
before she had done Blame it on Rio, right, but
she was. She was the girl that nobody was looking
at Demi Moore, that's right. And then she did. She
did a small affair with John Cryer in eighty five. Okay,
she did sand Almo's Fire in eighty five. Yeah, but
like they're they're doing One Crazy Summer before sant Elmo's
Fire comes out, right, I mean yeah, And by eighty
six she's she's got about last night, she and st
Elmo's Fire and and but what I'm saying is she
wasn't much of anybody before that. That's right right before
she blows up, right before she blows up right, unlike
Creaky's mom, or just like Creaky. I can't really tell you,
ab Okay, So that does it for the cast of
Better Off Dead. Let us come back next time, start
with the cast for One Crazy Summer, see the crossovers
and the new folks who are awesome, and talk about
some of the trivia behind that movie, this movie and
maybe a sequel. I loved it. Yeah, okay, we will
see you guys next week. Why okay, Now I gotta
be okay.