Vacation (1983) vs. The Great Outdoors (1988): Part 1

<v Speaker 1>Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Shirley You Can't
<v Speaker 1>Be Serious Podcast. I am d Graves. I am here
<v Speaker 1>with my co host Jason Colvin, and it is no
<v Speaker 1>longer a podcast. It is a quest. It is a
<v Speaker 1>quest for fun. I'm gonna have fun. Jason's gonna have fun.
<v Speaker 1>You all are gonna have so much freaking fun that
<v Speaker 1>you're gonna need plastic surgery to remove the smiles off
<v Speaker 1>your freaking faces. We're gonna be whistling zippity DooDah out
<v Speaker 1>of our assholes. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. We are
<v Speaker 1>here to discuss two iconic movies from the eighties, National
<v Speaker 1>Lampoon's Vacation and The Great.
<v Speaker 2>Outdoors the These are both John movies, but neither one
<v Speaker 2>of them is directed by John Hughes.
<v Speaker 1>We have been doing an eighties podcast for four years.
<v Speaker 1>Once we're done with our episode, this will be the
<v Speaker 1>fourth movie by John Hughes that we have covered, and
<v Speaker 1>we have not yet covered one that he has directed.
<v Speaker 1>That is insane. That is, we haven't done Breakfast Club,
<v Speaker 1>we haven't done Ferris Bueller's Day Off. We haven't done
<v Speaker 1>Sixteen Candles, we haven't done Curly did you just say
<v Speaker 1>curly Sue? Oh my gosh, ladies and gentlemen, let me
<v Speaker 1>tell you a story about a geek in high school
<v Speaker 1>who married the high school cheerleader. And his name is
<v Speaker 1>John Hughes. Oh great, I'm at your feet. Let's let's go.
<v Speaker 1>I will go into his history in just a bit. First,
<v Speaker 1>let me say this, This is just a side story, right.
<v Speaker 1>The Great Outdoors is directed by Howard Deutsch, right, and
<v Speaker 1>he's kind of one of John hughes go to guys
<v Speaker 1>when John Hughes can't direct the movies. Is the go
<v Speaker 1>to guy when John Hughes can't direct it. Exactly the
<v Speaker 1>way he puts it is I am Saliary to the
<v Speaker 1>John Hughes Amadaeus. That's good. And so he's telling this
<v Speaker 1>story about when they're in the midst of shooting some
<v Speaker 1>kind of wonderful and they realize that they need rewrite
<v Speaker 1>on a scene that they've got for the next day,
<v Speaker 1>two page rewrite, and he ends up falling asleep on
<v Speaker 1>John hughes couch. He wakes up and John Hughes hands
<v Speaker 1>him fifty pages of stuff and he's like, this was
<v Speaker 1>a two page rewrite? What is this? And He's like, well, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I didn't do that. I did this instead, hands him
<v Speaker 1>these fifty pages and it's the first fifty pages to
<v Speaker 1>Ferris Bueler's DA. That's incredible. The guy was, as Kevin
<v Speaker 1>Smith puts it, the Shakespeare of the eighties, Like he
<v Speaker 1>could sit down at a typewriter and put fourth Genius
<v Speaker 1>in no time. Like there were no hard, long, laborist
<v Speaker 1>writing sessions with him. He would put himself in a
<v Speaker 1>room for the weekend, and at the end of the
<v Speaker 1>weekend he would come out with a movie. Yeah, just
<v Speaker 1>go in knock it out. Oh, by the way, here's
<v Speaker 1>weird science. I did this in three days or two days. Yeah. Now, guys,
<v Speaker 1>I'm going to digress significantly at this point. I just
<v Speaker 1>got to I got to talk about this for a second. Okay,
<v Speaker 1>So this past week I saw the movie The Flash,
<v Speaker 1>and I was very excited. I even remember watching the
<v Speaker 1>movie and thinking to myself, these guys have got it.
<v Speaker 1>Jason has said when we talked about top Gun Maverick,
<v Speaker 1>we said he figured out the formula. Right, You throw
<v Speaker 1>back to certain spots and then you give us something new.
<v Speaker 1>And I'm watching The Flash and I'm thinking to myself.
<v Speaker 1>They've got the formula right. They threw back to the
<v Speaker 1>right things, and I'm not gonna spoil it unless you
<v Speaker 1>haven't seen the preview. If you haven't seen the preview,
<v Speaker 1>skip the next fifteen seconds. But Batman eighty nine is
<v Speaker 1>a big part of this movie, and I felt like
<v Speaker 1>they absolutely nailed a new movie by throwing back to
<v Speaker 1>an old movie. Jason gives it a C plus. So
<v Speaker 1>I ask you all, just, once you've seen the movie,
<v Speaker 1>send us an email, hit us up on Twitter, hit
<v Speaker 1>us up on Facebook, and tell us which one of
<v Speaker 1>us is right. I'm giving this movie a solid A.
<v Speaker 1>Jason gives it a C plus. I will say this.
<v Speaker 1>You know how much I hate CGI. The CGI is
<v Speaker 1>a distraction, but I just knew that going in and
<v Speaker 1>I put it aside and I said, I'm not gonna
<v Speaker 1>worry about the CGI and the bad CGI that DC
<v Speaker 1>always does. I'm just going to enjoy the story. And
<v Speaker 1>I felt like it was a great story. Yeah you did.
<v Speaker 1>I not so much. Well, I liked it.
<v Speaker 2>I do think there was some missed opportunity there. I
<v Speaker 2>think it could have been better. I do think it
<v Speaker 2>was Barry Allen character was annoying, and then you had
<v Speaker 2>him on screen two times for the entire you know,
<v Speaker 2>and I and I've come to grips with myself. I
<v Speaker 2>think what I really wanted was Batman eighty nine Part three, right, and.
<v Speaker 1>So man, and that's not what a epic exactly exactly.
<v Speaker 2>So I was a bit disappointed, but I did enjoy
<v Speaker 2>it and I thought it finished strong.
<v Speaker 1>So hey, guys, just you know, full disclosure. We have
<v Speaker 1>another podcast that's called the Podcast Full of Kryptonite where
<v Speaker 1>we co host with our friend from the thirty something
<v Speaker 1>movie podcast, John Reid. John read it feels the same
<v Speaker 1>way that Jason does. I am in the minority on
<v Speaker 1>this situation. Please coming back me up and say the
<v Speaker 1>Flash is a good movie. Okay, guys, This episode is
<v Speaker 1>brought to you by our new executive producer, mister Tim Epp.
<v Speaker 1>Tim signed up on our Patreon page. Thank you, Tim,
<v Speaker 1>We truly appreciate you. As with all of our Patreon members,
<v Speaker 1>we usually ask, hey, what do you you know? What
<v Speaker 1>do you want us to talk about? And he suggested Rush.
<v Speaker 1>He thinks that Rush is the band to compare to
<v Speaker 1>somebody else. He suggested maybe some other Canadian bands like
<v Speaker 1>lover Boy or Brian Adams. I'm all good with that.
<v Speaker 1>I mean, Rush is heavy and ready player one and
<v Speaker 1>that's good good enough for me. Hey, listen, he is
<v Speaker 1>our third Canadian patron. Hey, what's going on man? I mean,
<v Speaker 1>what is going on in Canada? Man?
<v Speaker 2>We've established a little bit of popularity up there.
<v Speaker 1>Let's go America and hey guys, we're bringing you today
<v Speaker 1>the Great Outdoors with mister Dan Aykroyd and mister John
<v Speaker 1>Candy too. Two monumental gifts from Canada to the US.
<v Speaker 1>No doubt, no doubt. That's awesome.
<v Speaker 2>All right, So I want to shout out our buddy.
<v Speaker 1>Chris Webber, Chris much further South.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, yes, Chris sent us a record of the Smithereens.
<v Speaker 1>Oh yeah, Chris has sent.
<v Speaker 2>Us some great records that we really need to do
<v Speaker 2>some sort of track by track of what he sent us.
<v Speaker 2>Chris is a great friend of ours and just a
<v Speaker 2>really great support of the show.
<v Speaker 1>Chris, We truly appreciate you, man. Okay, Dan, I've got
<v Speaker 1>a special shout out for you. You ready for this one?
<v Speaker 2>This is a shout out from a guy who follows
<v Speaker 2>us on Twitter. His name is Lee Matthews. Okay, Okay,
<v Speaker 2>now get this. This tweet happened on June twentieth at
<v Speaker 2>nine to eleven.
<v Speaker 3>AM.
<v Speaker 1>Okay, okay, this is what he said.
<v Speaker 2>I'm listening to you guys right now driving over here
<v Speaker 2>in the UK. Love your guys work. Thank you very much.
<v Speaker 2>Oh how about a versus of Eastwood every which way
<v Speaker 2>but loose versus any which way you can?
<v Speaker 1>Just a thought? But that was the day that we
<v Speaker 1>released it, right, So I hit him right back. I'm like,
<v Speaker 1>you mean like this, bam. So he suggested a matchup
<v Speaker 1>that we had literally released dropped it that morning. Oh
<v Speaker 1>my gosh, that's hil How about that. That's fantasmic. I no, well,
<v Speaker 1>there you go. Your wish is our command. We're here
<v Speaker 1>to serve. Thanks Lee, Appreciate you, buddy.
<v Speaker 2>And then finally, I want to give a quick shout
<v Speaker 2>out to our good friend Jeff Johnson.
<v Speaker 1>He sent me a couple of DVDs. It just really
<v Speaker 1>made my day.
<v Speaker 2>So he sent me the director's copy of The Outsiders,
<v Speaker 2>which we talked about ye. And then he also sent
<v Speaker 2>me a DVD of Wisdom Early Emiliostavez Demi Moore movie
<v Speaker 2>that he and I had been talking about. We may
<v Speaker 2>cover in nineteen eighty six. So Jeff, thank you very much.
<v Speaker 2>We appreciate you, boy.
<v Speaker 1>And now back to John Hughes. Okay, so John Hughes,
<v Speaker 1>he actually moved around a bunch. He wasn't only raised
<v Speaker 1>in Chicago. I think he said in seventh grade he
<v Speaker 1>had gotten his life finally figured out was popular with people.
<v Speaker 1>And then they moved to Chicago, and I think he
<v Speaker 1>was a nerd for pretty much all of his high
<v Speaker 1>school career. But he did, in nineteen seventy end up
<v Speaker 1>marrying one of the cheerleaders and they stayed married until
<v Speaker 1>his death in two thousand and nine. So he gets
<v Speaker 1>married to her in nineteen seventy the cheerlead, yes, and
<v Speaker 1>then he promptly drops out of the University of Arizona. Okay.
<v Speaker 1>He starts writing jokes for Rodney Dangerfield and Joan Rivers,
<v Speaker 1>just sending them, just twenty year old guy, just sending
<v Speaker 1>jokes to these two comedians. And then he gets a
<v Speaker 1>job as a copywriter at an advertising agency, works at
<v Speaker 1>Needham Harper and Steers, went to another advertising company called
<v Speaker 1>Leo Burnett Worldwide and seventy four and he's the guy
<v Speaker 1>I sent you this ad earlier. He's the guy that
<v Speaker 1>comes up with the Edge credit card shaving test. If
<v Speaker 1>you guys can remember it, like, they shave the guy's
<v Speaker 1>face with you know, edge gel on one side and
<v Speaker 1>regular shaving cream on the other side, and they rub
<v Speaker 1>a credit card on his face and it's scratchy on
<v Speaker 1>the shaving cream side and smooth on the edge jail side.
<v Speaker 1>That is mister John Hughes's first worldwide success is a shaving.
<v Speaker 3>Jail commercial with an ordinary credit card. We're going to
<v Speaker 3>prove that Edge let's you shave closer than the leading film.
<v Speaker 3>First listen to an unshaven face. Now we'll shave the
<v Speaker 3>left side with poone. The right with Edge Edge lubricates
<v Speaker 3>is at ladder, so we can press harder to shave
<v Speaker 3>closer than phone. Now listen to the phone side, Then
<v Speaker 3>listen to the edge side. Phone Edge Edge lets you
<v Speaker 3>shave closer than the leading phone.
<v Speaker 1>So he is working for this advertising company and one
<v Speaker 1>of their clients is Virginia Slims. So he ends up
<v Speaker 1>going over to the Philip Morris headquarters, which happens to
<v Speaker 1>be in the same building as a little known magazine
<v Speaker 1>called National Lampoon. Oh, this is good. Okay, so no
<v Speaker 1>idea about this. Yeah, so he realizes, Hey, I don't
<v Speaker 1>have to sell my jokes for a dollar apiece to
<v Speaker 1>these comedians. I can sell funny stories to this magazine.
<v Speaker 1>And PJ O'Rourke, who is kind of the main guy
<v Speaker 1>over at National Lampoon at the time, said he would
<v Speaker 1>write things so fast that we almost couldn't keep up
<v Speaker 1>with him. So some of his submissions were things called
<v Speaker 1>April Fool's Day and and my Penis and my vagina. Okay,
<v Speaker 1>all in these kind of kid perspective storylines, right sure.
<v Speaker 1>And one of them was called Vacation fifty eight from
<v Speaker 1>the point of view of a little kid who goes
<v Speaker 1>on a vacation road trip with his family.
<v Speaker 2>That is what leads us into this movie, the National
<v Speaker 2>Lampoon Vacation Movie. And from that story Vacation fifty eight,
<v Speaker 2>we also get parts of Christmas Vacation yep, that we've
<v Speaker 2>already talked about.
<v Speaker 1>Yes, yeah, there are all kinds of things that spill
<v Speaker 1>over into the other vacation movies I mentioned earlier. We've
<v Speaker 1>covered a few John Hughes, we covered Christmas Vacation, and
<v Speaker 1>we covered Home Alone again, different directors on those but
<v Speaker 1>in Rewatching Vacation, it's so much like you can tell
<v Speaker 1>that Christmas Vacation is like, let's pick up some of
<v Speaker 1>these best parts. You got the Swat team at the end,
<v Speaker 1>You've got the loss of control by Clark when everything
<v Speaker 1>is finally hit its peak and he loses it and
<v Speaker 1>cusses everybody out.
<v Speaker 2>And when he kidnaps his boss the end of Christmas Vacation. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>they actually do a great job. It's funny and it's lighthearted,
<v Speaker 2>and the whole family's there and it's a Christmas thing.
<v Speaker 2>That was the deleted ending for the original Vacation movie, right,
<v Speaker 2>like they took it to theaters. They film that where
<v Speaker 2>he kidnapped his boss, and Harold Ramers said there was
<v Speaker 2>not a laugh for the last twenty minutes of the movie.
<v Speaker 1>Right. So the who they kidnap instead of his boss
<v Speaker 1>is Roy Wally. Yeah, Roy Wally exactly. Yeah. He's in
<v Speaker 1>some mansion and they go in and kidnap him and
<v Speaker 1>force him force them to do dances like him and
<v Speaker 1>the other rich guys to do dances. And then later
<v Speaker 1>he takes over a plane which shows up in European Vacation. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>and yeah, last bit, They're like, Nope, this isn't working.
<v Speaker 1>So they literally come back six months later to shoot
<v Speaker 1>the ending that we all know where they end up
<v Speaker 1>at Wallyworld and they bring in John Candy and that's
<v Speaker 1>how you get one of our major connections between these
<v Speaker 1>two movies.
<v Speaker 2>Well, and also, if you'll notice, Anthony Michael Hall is
<v Speaker 2>about six inches taller at Wallyworld than he is the
<v Speaker 2>high the.
<v Speaker 1>Rest of the movie. Yeah, pretty crazy. Yeah, so this
<v Speaker 1>was not his first script to be made. There was
<v Speaker 1>another one. Okay, it was called National Lampoon Class Reunion
<v Speaker 1>and it was a dismal failure. National Lampoon had come
<v Speaker 1>out with Animal House and then had come out with
<v Speaker 1>National Lampoon Glass Reunion Fail. National Lampoon goes to the
<v Speaker 1>movies fail, So they weren't doing too well at this point. Now,
<v Speaker 1>the editor for National Lampoon I talked about him on
<v Speaker 1>our Christmas Vacation episode, is a guy named Matty Simmons. Now,
<v Speaker 1>if you don't remember, Matty Simmons is one of the
<v Speaker 1>guys who was a creator of the first credit card
<v Speaker 1>in addition to being a huge movie producer and a
<v Speaker 1>what yeah he was talking about, Yeah, Diner's Club Card
<v Speaker 1>first started with Matty Simmons because he did food reviews.
<v Speaker 1>That's what happened. Okay, go check out if you want
<v Speaker 1>if you want the full story, go check out our
<v Speaker 1>Christmas Vacation. I forgot about that. Okay. So he's got
<v Speaker 1>this story, Vacation fifth eight that John Hughes has written,
<v Speaker 1>and he brings it to his buddy Jeffrey Kassenberg, right,
<v Speaker 1>and Jeffrey Katsenberg's like, nah, won't work. It's too episodic. Yeah.
<v Speaker 1>I mean Jeffrey Kassenberg has had a lot of very
<v Speaker 1>good decisions in his life. Yeah, this was not one
<v Speaker 1>of them. That's right, it won't work.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, they're going here, they're going there, They're going here,
<v Speaker 2>they're going there.
<v Speaker 1>There's not a movie there. Yeah. Madison is like, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>because it's a vacation. That's the way that it's like
<v Speaker 1>a road trip. The road trip. Yeah, they're going places.
<v Speaker 1>It is episodic. Turns out that's the way life is.
<v Speaker 1>You go from one chapter to the next. Have you
<v Speaker 1>ever been on a road trip before it? So that
<v Speaker 1>doesn't work, and so he ends up with his agent
<v Speaker 1>going over to Warner Brothers and Warner Brothers all of
<v Speaker 1>them are like, nah, I'm not really interested in that
<v Speaker 1>story either, except for one guy, guy named Mark Canton.
<v Speaker 1>Mark Canton is a relatively new executive at Warner Brothers,
<v Speaker 1>and he's like, I love it, I want to do it.
<v Speaker 1>Let's figure out how to do it, and they make
<v Speaker 1>it happen. Now, Mark Canton, this is his first big movie.
<v Speaker 1>He goes on to do Purple Rain, Batman eighty nine,
<v Speaker 1>The Leath a Weapons series. Not a bad record and
<v Speaker 1>a good start off with this movie.
<v Speaker 2>Wow, you're telling me that the same guy who did
<v Speaker 2>Leith a Weapon and Vacation did Purple Rain.
<v Speaker 1>Yep, he was the producer. He was He was the
<v Speaker 1>guy behind the money and the big studio that said,
<v Speaker 1>let's make these things happen. That's fantastic. Yeah.
<v Speaker 2>So here's the interesting thing at this point, So Mattie
<v Speaker 2>Simmons says that he bought this at an embarrassingly low price,
<v Speaker 2>like insultingly low to John Hughes.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, and he.
<v Speaker 2>Said, now he's gone on to do better things. And
<v Speaker 2>of course, so he's okay, you know, so it doesn't
<v Speaker 2>really feel that bad anymore, right.
<v Speaker 1>Well, and credit to Matty Simmons, he made it a
<v Speaker 1>part of the contract that John Hughes would be the
<v Speaker 1>guy who would write the screenplay. So John Hughes writes
<v Speaker 1>the screenplay for National Lampoon Vacation. Again, he does it
<v Speaker 1>from the perspective of Rusty, yes, not of Clark, right.
<v Speaker 1>But Harold Ramis gets involved in Chevy Chase get involved,
<v Speaker 1>and they say, let's make it from the dad's point
<v Speaker 1>of view instead of the kids point of out. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>that absolutely happened. But here's the deal.
<v Speaker 2>You hire Harold Ramis, who just came off the success of.
<v Speaker 1>Caddyshack Ye right, yeap and Caddyshack.
<v Speaker 2>It had been about three years prior to and it
<v Speaker 2>didn't do great at the box office, but it had
<v Speaker 2>really built a strong cult following. Absolutely And of course,
<v Speaker 2>Chevy Chase is like the coolest guy in the world
<v Speaker 2>at this point. He'd been in Foul Play, He'd been
<v Speaker 2>in Caddyshack, Under the Rainbow, Saturday Night Live, he was
<v Speaker 2>mister carry grant Us stud.
<v Speaker 1>I will say this, he had a couple of movies
<v Speaker 1>right before this that were not like O Heavenly Dog
<v Speaker 1>Dog and Modern Problems. It was just a couple of
<v Speaker 1>movies that were not that great, and so under the
<v Speaker 1>rainbow that might have been. Yeah, you know, Kerry Fisher
<v Speaker 1>and Abra Hello. Yeah, all right, But anyway, you have
<v Speaker 1>a few entities that are on a downward trajectory instead
<v Speaker 1>of an upward trajectory, right, Chevy Chase being one, National
<v Speaker 1>Lampoon being the other. Obviously with National Lampoon vacation, and
<v Speaker 1>you get a home run. Then that's followed up by
<v Speaker 1>John Hughes doing Mister Mom, which we plan to cover
<v Speaker 1>very soon, yes, And those two get him a three
<v Speaker 1>film deal with Universal, and that's when we get sixteen.
<v Speaker 2>Candles, Candles, Breakfast Club, Paris Bueeler, Weird Science, weird science.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, okay.
<v Speaker 2>I do think it's interesting though, that the shift from
<v Speaker 2>Rusty's perspective. So we know, we all know John Hughes
<v Speaker 2>is a teen guy. I mean, gosh, he was the
<v Speaker 2>voice of teenagers in the nineteen eighties.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, teen speak, teen speak. There you go. But when
<v Speaker 1>you hired Chevy Chase, you can't just ignore that star power, right,
<v Speaker 1>And so Harold Ramis, who had directed Chevy Chase and
<v Speaker 1>Caddy Shack, they get together, they rewrite the script and
<v Speaker 1>it becomes from the dad's perspective. Yeah, here's what's interesting.
<v Speaker 1>I looked at Harold Ramis because I saw, you know,
<v Speaker 1>this is his sophomore directorial thing, and I was like, okay, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>Caddy Shack was number one, right, great great movie. By
<v Speaker 1>the way, guys, go check out our Caddy Shack versus
<v Speaker 1>Happy Gillmore episode if you haven't seen that. Fun. It
<v Speaker 1>was fun. Had a great guest on that one as well.
<v Speaker 1>Number two is Vacation, Yes. Number three Club Paradise. Gosh,
<v Speaker 1>I think I've seen that once. I have not seen it.
<v Speaker 1>I couldn't have told you who was in it had
<v Speaker 1>I not just looked it up. But it's like Robin
<v Speaker 1>Williams and a bunch of you know, like Twiggy and
<v Speaker 1>some other random big ensemble piece. And it did really,
<v Speaker 1>really poorly. And that was nineteen eighty six. Harold Ramis
<v Speaker 1>did not direct another movie until nineteen ninety three, when
<v Speaker 1>he did Groundhog Day. Then put your little hand in.
<v Speaker 2>Go back and check out our Groundhog episode versus Multiplicity.
<v Speaker 1>I had to think hard. I was like, what did
<v Speaker 1>we compare to Groundhog Day? Too? It was so lopsided
<v Speaker 1>that particular matchup. Yeah, but but yeah, check out Multiplicity. Okay.
<v Speaker 2>So that's interesting because right after he directs Vacation, Harold
<v Speaker 2>Ramis stars in Ghostbusters. Yeah, which second biggest movie.
<v Speaker 1>Of nineteen eighty four. Yeah, yeah, I think so, I
<v Speaker 1>means huge. Right. Here's something for you that I just
<v Speaker 1>ran a bit of trivia that happened because I happened
<v Speaker 1>to watch The Shawshank Redemption in the last week. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>the warden from Shashank Redemption. Yes, he's the guy who
<v Speaker 1>plays Harold Ramis's ghost in Ghostbusters Afterlife. I was like,
<v Speaker 1>those two guys don't look anything alike, but they just
<v Speaker 1>they put the right prosthetics on his face and I
<v Speaker 1>guess whatever features he has, they matched up very well
<v Speaker 1>with what Harold Ramis looked like. I thought they just
<v Speaker 1>took like, you know, they just created a cgi of
<v Speaker 1>Harold Ramis's face, But no, it was actually the warden
<v Speaker 1>from Shashank Redemption plays the ghost of Harold rams You
<v Speaker 1>are blowing my mind. There you go, just a random
<v Speaker 1>thing that happened in life, not even for this episode.
<v Speaker 1>You are blowing my mind. Or Miss Fussy Britches being
<v Speaker 1>too obtuse.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, hey, here's something interesting. Chevy Chase, when he was
<v Speaker 2>signed on to do Vacation. He went to Harold Ramis.
<v Speaker 2>He's like, listen, I'm not a father. How do we
<v Speaker 2>play this guy? And I just I could not believe
<v Speaker 2>because he seems like the every dad. Yeah, I mean,
<v Speaker 2>I really think he nails this part Chevy Chase. His
<v Speaker 2>two best roles, in my opinion, are Clark Griswold and Fletch.
<v Speaker 2>Those are the movies that he does the absolute best in.
<v Speaker 1>Sure, I just couldn't believe he wasn't a dad at
<v Speaker 1>that point. All Right, dee, So I've got a question
<v Speaker 1>for you.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, okay, name me a movie written by John Hughes
<v Speaker 2>with a great all American dad, a mom who has
<v Speaker 2>to handle that dad a little bit right right. They
<v Speaker 2>take a reluctant family vacation, you have annoying relatives.
<v Speaker 1>That show up. Yeah, and you encounter a dead person
<v Speaker 1>like every vacation movie.
<v Speaker 2>Well, it's actually National Lampoon's Vacation and The Great Outdoors.
<v Speaker 1>It is is what.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, it is exactly the same. It's like a reboot
<v Speaker 2>of Vacation.
<v Speaker 1>So you're telling me that basically John Candy's character in
<v Speaker 1>the Great Outdoors is Clark w Yes. Yes, And here's
<v Speaker 1>the thing, okay, stay with me on this. Okay.
<v Speaker 2>So we talked about how Chevy Chase and Harold Raimis
<v Speaker 2>changed the perspective of vacation from a teen point of
<v Speaker 2>view to the dad point of view. He wasn't all
<v Speaker 2>that happy with that, right, John Hughes is pretty particular guy. Now,
<v Speaker 2>do I think that he just took that story and
<v Speaker 2>remade it in the great outdoors?
<v Speaker 1>Yes? I do, Yes, I do.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, and I've got evidence to back it up because
<v Speaker 2>he's done it before.
<v Speaker 1>Okay, all right, stay with me on this. Now.
<v Speaker 2>I know that you haven't seen these two movies, but
<v Speaker 2>we're gonna cover this at some point.
<v Speaker 1>The movie Pretty in Pink Mally Ringwold.
<v Speaker 2>Andrew McCarthy, James Bader, John Prior, right, and you have
<v Speaker 2>this sort of love triangle.
<v Speaker 1>Is that before or after super that's before? Yeah, that's good. Okay,
<v Speaker 1>he was so dismal. All right, sorry, digressional. Okay.
<v Speaker 2>They finish out Pretty in Pink Andy, the Mully Ringold character.
<v Speaker 2>She ends up with John Cryer's character.
<v Speaker 1>Right.
<v Speaker 2>Well, the studio says, no freaking way, cut that, there's
<v Speaker 2>no way we can do that, and then they change
<v Speaker 2>it and you have the epic Reunion of Andrew McCarthy
<v Speaker 2>and Molly Ringwold, which test audiences hated the original ending,
<v Speaker 2>which was the John Hughes ending. The studio said, no,
<v Speaker 2>we're going to change it. John Hughes is like, heck.
<v Speaker 1>No, we're not changing it.
<v Speaker 2>No, we're changing it, right, So they remade it where
<v Speaker 2>she ends up with the boyfriend.
<v Speaker 1>That sounds ju jus right.
<v Speaker 2>You have the swell of the music from OMD and
<v Speaker 2>everybody loves Pretty in Pink when John Hughes was not
<v Speaker 2>happy and you're very, very mad about that.
<v Speaker 1>He wants the cheerleader to end up with the geek,
<v Speaker 1>right right.
<v Speaker 2>So basically he turns right around and does some kind
<v Speaker 2>of wonderful which is a reboot of Pretty and Pink
<v Speaker 2>where he does what he wants and it's the exact
<v Speaker 2>same thing.
<v Speaker 1>So if I understand your theory, Yes, he was unhappy
<v Speaker 1>that they changed National Lampoon vacation storyline, and so what
<v Speaker 1>five years later he does it again and gives it
<v Speaker 1>his own storyline. Yes, and that's why we're comparing these
<v Speaker 1>two movies today.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, all right, I love the same movie, just revamped
<v Speaker 2>a little bit.
<v Speaker 1>I love it. I love it all right. Instead of
<v Speaker 1>cousin Eddie, you get cousin Roman. Yes. Wow, yes, you're
<v Speaker 1>blowing my mind. I love it. I love it.
<v Speaker 2>So this goes into our summer of nineteen eighty eight.
<v Speaker 2>The Great Outdoors came out June seventeenth, nineteen eighty eight.
<v Speaker 1>Just to touch on this, guys, we're talking about nineteen
<v Speaker 1>eighty three and nineteen eighty eight. We're talking about these
<v Speaker 1>movies are celebrating their fortieth and thirty fifth anniversary this year.
<v Speaker 2>I can't believe these movies are this old man, No, right,
<v Speaker 2>we're getting old.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah.
<v Speaker 2>This movie, The Great Outdoors was originally titled Big Country.
<v Speaker 1>Right. This was the twenty fifth biggest movie of nineteen
<v Speaker 1>eighty eight. Oh okay, that's something. Nineteen eighty eight was
<v Speaker 1>a pretty good year for movies. I mean, honestly, to
<v Speaker 1>be twenty fifth is still pretty darn good. Yeah. Did
<v Speaker 1>you see this in the theaters? Yes? Okay, yeah, did
<v Speaker 1>you enjoy it? Yes? This is a two thumbs up
<v Speaker 1>for you. Okay, good good, okay. So once again, written
<v Speaker 1>by John Hughes, directed by Howard Deutsch. Let's talk about
<v Speaker 1>him for just a second, right, Yes, Howie is I
<v Speaker 1>think what he goes by. But as we said, you
<v Speaker 1>call him Howie again, I'm gonna Howie Deutsch. That's what
<v Speaker 1>his wife calls him.
<v Speaker 2>Oh okay, No, it's okay, good call him Holly.
<v Speaker 1>It's fine. If if you're hearing this and you're upset,
<v Speaker 1>just give me a call, be happy to apologize in person.
<v Speaker 2>Howard Deutsch directed the beautiful Leah Thompson in Some kind
<v Speaker 2>of Wonderful.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah right.
<v Speaker 2>We talked about how he steps in and he directs
<v Speaker 2>the movies that John Hughes doesn't basically, so he directs
<v Speaker 2>some kind of wonderful. He starts dating his leading lady
<v Speaker 2>and ends up marrying her, and they've got kids and
<v Speaker 2>they're still married.
<v Speaker 1>Awesome. Yestast is great. By the way, Just on Leah Thompson.
<v Speaker 1>I'm going to be bringing up Back to the Future shortly,
<v Speaker 1>and for those of you that don't know, Back to
<v Speaker 1>the Future is my favorite movie from the nineteen eighties,
<v Speaker 1>so I will be bringing it up later in the podcast.
<v Speaker 1>I won't tell you when. It'll just be a surprise.
<v Speaker 1>That's fine, that's fine.
<v Speaker 2>We actually talked about Back in the Future last week
<v Speaker 2>when we talked about Clint Eastwood the biggest yellow belly
<v Speaker 2>in the West.
<v Speaker 1>Right, I think it should be in every episode.
<v Speaker 2>So anyway, Howard Deutsch comes in to direct The Great Outdoors,
<v Speaker 2>which is why it's a little bit campier than maybe
<v Speaker 2>the others more serious John Hughes stuff.
<v Speaker 1>You mean like Vacation And yeah, you think it's more
<v Speaker 1>campy than Vacation. Well that was directed by Harold Ramis right.
<v Speaker 1>It's not Breakfast Club, right, you know what I mean.
<v Speaker 1>I mean you have talking raccoons, okay, subtitled. Now I
<v Speaker 1>am not a fan of the talking raccoons and chipmunk speak.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, yeah, okay, So yes, I do believe The Great
<v Speaker 2>Outdoors is just a revamp of Vacation.
<v Speaker 1>Fantastic. Okay, I can live with that. I can live
<v Speaker 1>with that. Cool.
<v Speaker 2>Just one more thing on Vacation. Yes, it was released
<v Speaker 2>July twenty ninth, nineteen eighty three. We're coming up on
<v Speaker 2>the fortieth anniversary. That weekend it opened against Private School
<v Speaker 2>and Kroll.
<v Speaker 1>Oh, Kroll, there's a throwback. Yeah. When are we going
<v Speaker 1>to do our Croll versus Beast Master episode? Maybe maybe
<v Speaker 1>next year.
<v Speaker 2>Before we get into the movie, I want to talk
<v Speaker 2>about one thing I want to bring out real quick.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, the movie poster. Let's talk about both movie posters.
<v Speaker 1>Let's talk about both both moviess. Okay, let's talk about
<v Speaker 1>both the movies posters. How about we do that echo?
<v Speaker 1>What echo? All right, we'll talk about both movies, talk
<v Speaker 1>about both movie posters. All right.
<v Speaker 2>So the first one, National Lampoon's Vacation, one of my
<v Speaker 2>all time favorite movie posters.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, it's fantastic. It's like dazzling, right right.
<v Speaker 2>You have Chevy Chase who's muscled up and he's ripped up,
<v Speaker 2>and he's got the tennis racket. He looks like a
<v Speaker 2>gladiator champion.
<v Speaker 1>Dad, he looks like Conan the Barbarian he does, which
<v Speaker 1>was also a big movie in that time period. That's right,
<v Speaker 1>But I looked there isn't a cone in the Barbarian
<v Speaker 1>poster that is identical to this one. But as it
<v Speaker 1>turns out, the guy who did the poster did a
<v Speaker 1>whole lot of cone in the Barbarian artwork.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, that guy's name is Boris Viejo. He also did
<v Speaker 2>posters for Barberrella. Okay, The Empire Strikes Back, oh wow,
<v Speaker 2>and cue the Winged Serpent.
<v Speaker 1>Oh you remember that movie. We have talked about this before.
<v Speaker 1>Why in the world have we talked about that? I
<v Speaker 1>don't remember. I feel like maybe it was a special
<v Speaker 1>effects Ah, maybe it's.
<v Speaker 2>One of those cheesy gargoyle like movies that I still loved. Okay,
<v Speaker 2>and then let's flip back to Great Outdoors.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, so Great Outdoors. If you are from the US,
<v Speaker 1>the image that you probably have in your head is
<v Speaker 1>dan Aykroyd holding John Candy up by a fishing line
<v Speaker 1>on the poster. Yeah. Well, okay, so do you have
<v Speaker 1>something to say? Yeah? Okay, So here's the deal with that.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, that's based on a magazine, a Canadian magazine I believe,
<v Speaker 2>of course, called The Great Outdoors. And so it's the
<v Speaker 2>poster is made to look like the front cover of
<v Speaker 2>that magazine.
<v Speaker 1>Right, So, do you know why they changed the title
<v Speaker 1>from Big Country to The Great Outdoors? I do? Well,
<v Speaker 1>then share it please, you know I do? Okay, well,
<v Speaker 1>we all know, but we're gonna blow your mind for you.
<v Speaker 2>Because they didn't want to get anybody confused with the
<v Speaker 2>movie Big.
<v Speaker 1>With Tom Hanks. Yeah. So, by the way, go check out.
<v Speaker 1>That's that's an episode from this season Big Versus Twins.
<v Speaker 1>Big Twins, Remember that is because big is so much
<v Speaker 1>better than twins, That's true. And by the way, on
<v Speaker 1>that track, yakud yak, don't talk back. In both they
<v Speaker 1>Got Some Papers and the Trash, it's in. It is
<v Speaker 1>in the Great Outdoors and it is in it is
<v Speaker 1>two movies from nineteen eighty eight that throw back to
<v Speaker 1>the same song from the fifties. Yeah, could act don't
<v Speaker 1>talk back? Okay. I'm a quick question. Do you ever
<v Speaker 1>sing with your children in the car? Yes? Will they
<v Speaker 1>sing oldies with you like that?
<v Speaker 2>Are they putting on the headphones to listen to blitz Creakbop.
<v Speaker 1>I don't think I have any kids that listen to
<v Speaker 1>the ramones, but.
<v Speaker 2>Hey, I will tell you something. I do really love
<v Speaker 2>the scene. Of course, we talked about Ellen Grosvelt be
<v Speaker 2>Everly D'Angelo, who was in every which way but loose.
<v Speaker 1>We covered a couple of weeks ago. She was a
<v Speaker 1>singer my.
<v Speaker 4>Bird head, my buddy, he you, I have you, Ey's
<v Speaker 4>gown a fie. Mar jon't saying don't fit easy, he's
<v Speaker 4>brown a fire, I'm a ring any of the dwnh.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, And so she's like nailing it.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, she's getting the harmonies I literally had that thought
<v Speaker 1>as I was watching again, I'm like, I can tell
<v Speaker 1>that she's a singer now. And I also had the thought,
<v Speaker 1>I wonder if the Fairly Brothers deliberately did the throwback
<v Speaker 1>to It's Gotta be Mockingbird. I think so, right, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>but it never occurred to me until I would rewatch
<v Speaker 1>the movie. I'm like, Oh, they're singing mocking Bird, the
<v Speaker 1>exact same thing that they do in Dumb and Dumber.
<v Speaker 1>Mock Yeah, yeah, bird, Yeah, yeah.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, mocking Bird.
<v Speaker 1>Don't everybody have you heard you? She's going on back.
<v Speaker 3>Bird.
<v Speaker 1>And if that mucking bird, don't.
<v Speaker 4>Say, she's going about me.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, it's fun. Yeah. Okay, So are we ready to
<v Speaker 1>talk casting? Let's start casting. All right, let's go, let's
<v Speaker 1>flop back to vacation. Okay.
<v Speaker 2>So we talked about how out of the gate they
<v Speaker 2>hired Chevy Chase.
<v Speaker 1>I gotta be crazy. I'm gonna pilgrimage and see him moves.
<v Speaker 2>Praise Marty Moose, which was the coolest, funniest guy in
<v Speaker 2>America at that moment. Now he had taken a couple
<v Speaker 2>of steps back, but he was still going strong from
<v Speaker 2>Saturday Night Live and Foul Play and once you got
<v Speaker 2>him on board, now you've got a movie. But here's
<v Speaker 2>the guys that they were looking at. Now let's step
<v Speaker 2>into the alternate universe where you can imagine somebody else
<v Speaker 2>playing Clark w Griswold.
<v Speaker 1>Okay, yes, Bill Murray. Well, of course Bill Murray and
<v Speaker 1>Chevy Chase were pretty interchangeable in the nineteen eighties. Well, yes,
<v Speaker 1>they were the rivals. Okay, Now, then here you go
<v Speaker 1>Robert Klein as Clark Griswold, Robert Klin not Kevin Kleinert.
<v Speaker 2>Robert Klein now Kevin Clin I could see, actually, yeah,
<v Speaker 2>Robert Klin now Richard Belzer.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, both of those guys were like comedians that I
<v Speaker 1>never thought were funny.
<v Speaker 2>No, no chance, and they're they're not suburban dads, so
<v Speaker 2>looky for them. They got Chevy Chase right out of
<v Speaker 2>the gate. Okay, Now, then they had to find the
<v Speaker 2>right woman that matches up with Chevy Chase, right, somebody
<v Speaker 2>has to take care of this madman. So here's who
<v Speaker 2>they wanted. Kim Control.
<v Speaker 1>Okay, this is pre Mannequin but post Porky's right, So
<v Speaker 1>she'd been hot. I mean, oh, she's beautiful, right, we've
<v Speaker 1>been a great shower scene or jumping in the pool scene.
<v Speaker 1>No doubt.
<v Speaker 2>She's pretty enough to drive the Ferrari I mean Kim
<v Speaker 2>Drawl in nineteen eighty three for smoking, but for whatever reason,
<v Speaker 2>she didn't quite work out. They also considered Maureen McCormick.
<v Speaker 2>Does that ring a bell? It does ring a bell,
<v Speaker 2>but I don't remember Maureen McCormick. Yeah, here's the story
<v Speaker 2>of a lovely lady.
<v Speaker 1>She's the Brady Bunch.
<v Speaker 2>She's Marcia Marsha, Marcia Marsha. She is Marcia really hot.
<v Speaker 1>I forgot about that. Could you see here as Ellen Grizold? Maybe? Yeah?
<v Speaker 1>To me, that was mind blowing. Marsha Brady as the mom. Yeah, okay,
<v Speaker 1>you know I like it. Okay.
<v Speaker 2>They wanted somebody sweet but sexy, right. I had to
<v Speaker 2>be matronly, sort of motherly, but also had to be
<v Speaker 2>you know, hot, right. They wanted somebody hot and kind
<v Speaker 2>of spicy. Yeah, So they bring in Beverly D'Angelo. She
<v Speaker 2>was thirty at the time, okay, and she didn't want
<v Speaker 2>anything to do with it. She's like, I don't want
<v Speaker 2>to play the mom.
<v Speaker 1>I don't want to play it. I want to play
<v Speaker 1>the hot woman.
<v Speaker 2>You know, but when she shows up, she said, she
<v Speaker 2>and Chevy just kind of fell into this relationship.
<v Speaker 1>Uh huh, okay, let's go. Come on, where's that She's
<v Speaker 1>in the car?
<v Speaker 3>Good? Come on, kids, get your butts in the car.
<v Speaker 3>Don't you want to look at the grand can here?
<v Speaker 4>Now.
<v Speaker 2>I don't think anything bubbled up out of that, but
<v Speaker 2>they they just kind of fell into it as husband
<v Speaker 2>and wife.
<v Speaker 1>And so because of that chemistry, that's why she was
<v Speaker 1>hired on Awesome. I thought that was cool. Now, then Anthony.
<v Speaker 2>Michael Hall plays Rusty. This is where we find Anthony
<v Speaker 2>Michael Hall.
<v Speaker 1>This is his break in. This is his first one.
<v Speaker 1>This is Anthony Michael Hall, icon of the eighties. His
<v Speaker 1>first movie, DA this is not the car you ordered?
<v Speaker 1>Take it easy, russy ed, this is not the car
<v Speaker 1>I ordered.
<v Speaker 2>Do you remember what movie he auditioned for right before this? No,
<v Speaker 2>The Outsiders? Oh okay, the auditioned for Johnny I believe.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. And this is where he gets introduced to Don Hughes.
<v Speaker 2>He goes on to sixteen Candles, Breakfast Club, Weird Science.
<v Speaker 1>He was supposed to be Ferris Bueler. He turned down
<v Speaker 1>Ferris Bueller and he turned down another movie that Hughes
<v Speaker 1>was doing, and that kind of you know, it was
<v Speaker 1>upsetting and they kind of lost touch after that, which
<v Speaker 1>is tragic. They talk about Molly Ringwaldby and John Hughes muse.
<v Speaker 1>I think that Anthony Michael Hall was also.
<v Speaker 2>No doubt if you want to hear the story on
<v Speaker 2>that at a film buy. I did a podcast with
<v Speaker 2>Jeff Johnson on Out of Bounds. Oh yeah, which was
<v Speaker 2>like an action movie starring Anthony Michael Hall in nineteen
<v Speaker 2>eighty six. Right, that was the movie he chose to
<v Speaker 2>do instead.
<v Speaker 1>Of Ferris Bueler's Day Off. Gosh, there are bad choices, choice,
<v Speaker 1>and then there are bad choices. Yea. So here's the deal.
<v Speaker 2>You know, they went all over the country looking for
<v Speaker 2>Rusty and they just couldn't find anybody that they liked.
<v Speaker 2>Harold Reimas said, they were like depressed. They're like, we
<v Speaker 2>can't Rusty and everybody was so over the top, like
<v Speaker 2>too much. Every kid was like on. And they went
<v Speaker 2>in and Anthony Michael Hall played it kind of minimalist, shy,
<v Speaker 2>and he had braces.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, don't take off your braces.
<v Speaker 2>When they hired him, they're like, great, you got the job. Kid,
<v Speaker 2>don't don't take off your braces, which is great.
<v Speaker 1>Can you imagine though, as a kid, if you had
<v Speaker 1>braces as a kid, as soon as you got them on,
<v Speaker 1>you were waiting for the day to take them off.
<v Speaker 1>And now you get cast in your first major movie
<v Speaker 1>and they say, don't take your braces.
<v Speaker 2>So next was Audrey the daughter. They brought in Dana Baron.
<v Speaker 2>They just want to see the chemistry with Anthony Michael Hall.
<v Speaker 2>She said she had older siblings, so she understood the
<v Speaker 2>stopped touching me and making peanut butter and faces.
<v Speaker 1>Look his hand and touching exactly.
<v Speaker 2>She and Anthony Michael Hall just fell in right away
<v Speaker 2>like siblings.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, she was hired right away. Yeah, and you told
<v Speaker 1>me that Anthony Michael Hall kind of had a crush
<v Speaker 1>on her.
<v Speaker 2>Anthony Michael Hall did have a crush on Dana Baron.
<v Speaker 2>He said she was a little hottie.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, and I heard that they were We talked about,
<v Speaker 1>you know, Beverly d Angelobi and the little sexy mom
<v Speaker 1>and they're all getting ready to film the shower scene,
<v Speaker 1>right and she comes in and you know, she's got
<v Speaker 1>a robe on, and they're all getting ready and all
<v Speaker 1>of a sudden. Marty Simmons, who was there, is like, hey,
<v Speaker 1>what are you doing here? Anthony Bichael Hall had snuck
<v Speaker 1>in to try to sneak peek of Beverly de d'An
<v Speaker 1>angelo do in the shower scene. Can you blame the kid?
<v Speaker 1>I cannot. Are you gonna bring up the story? So
<v Speaker 1>you're finally here. Yeah, it was nineteen eighty three. I
<v Speaker 1>was seven years old. I've told this story a million times,
<v Speaker 1>but I'll tell it again. I was nineteen eighty three.
<v Speaker 1>I was seven years old, and my cousins and my
<v Speaker 1>brother and I bought tickets to see the movie Snow White,
<v Speaker 1>and we walked into the theater and theater hopped from
<v Speaker 1>national lampoon vacation to risky business to trading places, and
<v Speaker 1>so in one day, I saw Jamie Lee Curtis's boobs boobs,
<v Speaker 1>And the first one, the one that changed my life,
<v Speaker 1>the one that I went, oh my gosh, I didn't
<v Speaker 1>know they could do this in movies, was really DiAngelo.
<v Speaker 1>That's wonderful. And in rewatching it, I was like that
<v Speaker 1>scene was over in a blink, but it is etched
<v Speaker 1>into my memory as though it lasted four hours.
<v Speaker 2>So here's the funny thing about that. It was a
<v Speaker 2>close set. Of course, that's why they were trying to
<v Speaker 2>keep all the non essential.
<v Speaker 1>People out under fourteen year old exactly right.
<v Speaker 2>They're like, okay, Beverly, whenever you're ready, And Mattie Simmons
<v Speaker 2>says that she took off her robe and like walked
<v Speaker 2>across the room and was doing stuff, and he's like, Beverly,
<v Speaker 2>you don't have to take your robe off until you're
<v Speaker 2>like ready to get in the water. I mean, you know,
<v Speaker 2>She's like, please, I did four hundred shows of hair
<v Speaker 2>or I was naked every night.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, She's like, this is nothing to me. Nice Bravo, bravo. Yeah, okay, lastly,
<v Speaker 1>just a couple more people I want to bring up
<v Speaker 1>real quick, huh imaging Coca plays aunt Edna. Glad you
<v Speaker 1>brought her up.
<v Speaker 3>You enjoy throwing up every five minutes, Claude Clark, I thought, so, well,
<v Speaker 3>am I gonna eat?
<v Speaker 2>Or am I gonna.
<v Speaker 4>Starve to death?
<v Speaker 1>This movie is not this movie without ann Eda in it.
<v Speaker 1>She is a gem. She's awesome. Yeah. She was a
<v Speaker 1>comedian from the sixties. Yeah, she was on the Sid
<v Speaker 1>Caesar Show and stuff like that. She was in a Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>Sid Caesar Show won many awards for her work in
<v Speaker 1>comedy TV shows. This was kind of a she hadn't
<v Speaker 1>done something for a while and they brought her in
<v Speaker 1>on this. But before this, in the seventies, she was
<v Speaker 1>involved in a car wreck. She was afraid to travel. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>she was afraid to travel. And of course, well, in
<v Speaker 1>the real car wreck that she had in the seventies,
<v Speaker 1>she's in the passenger seat her husband's drive and they
<v Speaker 1>run into this nineteen year old girl. Her husband and
<v Speaker 1>the girl aren't seriously injured, but the rear view mirror
<v Speaker 1>comes out and goes into her eye and they have
<v Speaker 1>to do reconstructive surgery. She has a glass eye. She
<v Speaker 1>was blind out of that eye for the rest of
<v Speaker 1>her life. And of course, in this movie they have
<v Speaker 1>the gigantic car I mean, they have several car incidents,
<v Speaker 1>but they have the gigantic car wreck where she's in
<v Speaker 1>it and you'll remember her hat is pulled down over
<v Speaker 1>her face at the end of it. She was terrified
<v Speaker 1>to do this scene because of that accident she had
<v Speaker 1>had less than ten years old. That's unbelievable.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, you know, the funny part is they were like
<v Speaker 2>they're not actually going to go on the road, because
<v Speaker 2>they'll just do it on the studio.
<v Speaker 1>That's how they do road movies. Nope, they went on
<v Speaker 1>the road. Yeah, she was awesome. Jes, that must have
<v Speaker 1>been like sixty yards.
<v Speaker 2>Sixty I bet when when she when her husband crashed
<v Speaker 2>that car. I wonder if she said he he shouldn't
<v Speaker 2>even have a license.
<v Speaker 1>Here's something that I thought was interesting that I hoped
<v Speaker 1>to blow your mind with. Okay, she was in an
<v Speaker 1>episode of Moonlighting. Really yes, Now I'm gonna say this,
<v Speaker 1>and you're gonna be like, of course, right. She played
<v Speaker 1>Agnes's mother. Oh yeah right, I mean yeah, they could
<v Speaker 1>be mother And I had to look at them like
<v Speaker 1>are they really mother and daughter because they look so
<v Speaker 1>much alike. But you will remember the episode, Agnes's mother
<v Speaker 1>is coming across the border and like some drug dealer's
<v Speaker 1>plant drugs so that they come across the border with
<v Speaker 1>her and she gets in trouble and it's one of
<v Speaker 1>those ones that Ruce Willis and Sybil Shepherd were both gone,
<v Speaker 1>and so it's Agnes and the guy booger whatever his
<v Speaker 1>name is, Curtis Armstrong. Yes, they have to they have
<v Speaker 1>to solve the mystery in this particular episode. She got
<v Speaker 1>nominated for an Emmy for that. Wow.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, okay, I know we're veering off the track here
<v Speaker 2>just a little bit. But did you know that Harold
<v Speaker 2>Ramis thought she had a stroke while filming this movie?
<v Speaker 3>No?
<v Speaker 1>Did you know? You haven't heard this story? No? No, okay,
<v Speaker 1>so listen to this.
<v Speaker 2>So they're filming one morning and she's in the backseat
<v Speaker 2>and it's some scene with with image and Coka. Right,
<v Speaker 2>So they've been working on this scene all morning, right,
<v Speaker 2>They go to break for lunch, and when they come back,
<v Speaker 2>Harold Ramis is like, all right, imaging whenever you're ready,
<v Speaker 2>and she's like, okay, what are we what are we doing?
<v Speaker 2>He's like, well, we're gonna We're gonna keep doing that
<v Speaker 2>scene we were.
<v Speaker 1>Working on right before lunch. She's like, what was that again?
<v Speaker 2>He's like, well, the scene, the one that you know
<v Speaker 2>we've were working on all morning. And she's like, well,
<v Speaker 2>which one? And he kind of describes it to her.
<v Speaker 2>She had no memory of it, like gone, like whoosh gone,
<v Speaker 2>She didn't know her liiance, she didn't recall that morning nothing.
<v Speaker 1>Uh huh.
<v Speaker 2>So they called the paramatics. They're like this woman had
<v Speaker 2>a stroke. They thought we're gonna have shut down production.
<v Speaker 2>They were very, very worried about her, and so she
<v Speaker 2>gets checked out. Paramac says, well, she's okay. She and
<v Speaker 2>her husband spent all that next night relearning her lines. Wow, yeah,
<v Speaker 2>that's really weird. Yeah, she was really frailed during the
<v Speaker 2>filming of this.
<v Speaker 1>Well, it's interesting that you say that because I read something.
<v Speaker 1>I cannot remember at this point what the movie was,
<v Speaker 1>but basically she it was a movie or a TV episode,
<v Speaker 1>but they had to be out in like the fifteen
<v Speaker 1>degree weather. She sat on a sidewalk, like as she
<v Speaker 1>was playing a homeless person seventy five years old, sat
<v Speaker 1>on the sidewalk in the snow for hours and hours,
<v Speaker 1>and like all of the twenty somethings were like cuddled
<v Speaker 1>by the heater and graplaining about the colt and she
<v Speaker 1>never complained once. They said she was the consummate professional,
<v Speaker 1>you know, just tough and could bear through anything. Well,
<v Speaker 1>that's interesting.
<v Speaker 2>So the woman who played cousin Catherine, Yeah, her name
<v Speaker 2>is Miriam Lynn Flint. She was in the house the
<v Speaker 2>you know, cousin Eddie's house and Ima Jean's Like I
<v Speaker 2>just don't know if I can do this. I'm just
<v Speaker 2>not very strong and I'm not feeling it. And she
<v Speaker 2>was kind of whining, and Mary was like, man, I
<v Speaker 2>don't know if she could do this. And then they're like, okay, Emagen,
<v Speaker 2>whenever you're ready, and she's cracked that door open and
<v Speaker 2>was like popping out with her little walker.
<v Speaker 1>Am I gonna eat? Or am I gonna starve to death?
<v Speaker 1>And she said she just nailed it.
<v Speaker 2>So she was just kind of a little bit frail,
<v Speaker 2>but she nailed it anyway.
<v Speaker 1>Do you think it's funny that both of us just
<v Speaker 1>got fascinated with i'ma gene Coco?
<v Speaker 3>Yeah?
<v Speaker 1>I think it's great. Other folks that you got from
<v Speaker 1>vacation that you want to talk about. Yeah. So Randy
<v Speaker 1>Quaid plays cousin Edti his defining role. I don't know
<v Speaker 1>why they call this stuff Hamburger Helper. It just fine
<v Speaker 1>by itself, huh. I like it better in tune to
<v Speaker 1>help her myself, don't you, Clark? You're the door man
<v Speaker 1>around here.
<v Speaker 2>Ed He nails it right right. They could not have
<v Speaker 2>done better with either of these if you.
<v Speaker 1>Said Randy Quaid and somebody was like, I don't know,
<v Speaker 1>and you're like, cousin EDDI like, oh right, right, that's
<v Speaker 1>it's the finding role.
<v Speaker 2>They wanted Robin Williams to play cousin Eddie. That would
<v Speaker 2>have been too much, too.
<v Speaker 1>Much, Yeah, Randy Quaid is just enough. Yeah, Robin Williams
<v Speaker 1>too much. Yeah. And they have the kids there at
<v Speaker 1>the shock that they live in. Yes, you know, and
<v Speaker 1>you've got the boy cousin Dale doesn't have the video games,
<v Speaker 1>don't have asteroids, doesn't have a Space Invader. My dad
<v Speaker 1>had asteroids some days. Caves in the toilets, so you
<v Speaker 1>got pack.
<v Speaker 3>No you got space Vaders.
<v Speaker 2>Nope, you got asteroids.
<v Speaker 4>No, my dad does.
<v Speaker 2>Came was so toilet some days.
<v Speaker 1>And then there's the sister cousin, Vicky. Cousin Vicky is
<v Speaker 1>Jane Krakowski exactly. I'm going steady and I French kiss.
<v Speaker 3>So everybody does that, yeah, but Daddy says I'm the
<v Speaker 3>best at it.
<v Speaker 1>So in the nineties when I started watching Ali McBeal,
<v Speaker 1>I'm like, ah, that's the cousin from Vacation and now
<v Speaker 1>she I mean, she was a huge Broadway star. She's
<v Speaker 1>been in a ton of stuff, thirty Rock, Yeah, she's
<v Speaker 1>all over the place. This is where she got her start.
<v Speaker 2>Of course, you have John Candy as Russ Laski, the
<v Speaker 2>security guard at wally World. They brought him in the
<v Speaker 2>last second, and I would make an argument that he
<v Speaker 2>may be John Hughes's most valuable player ever ever, Right,
<v Speaker 2>I mean he's up there with with Molly Ringwold and
<v Speaker 2>Anstrains and automobiles, Uncle Buck, home alone, great Outdoors, he
<v Speaker 2>plays Gus and home alone.
<v Speaker 1>That's right.
<v Speaker 2>Whenever you need something to perk up the funny, you bring.
<v Speaker 1>In John Candy. Yeah, okay, one more person, two more people.
<v Speaker 1>I want to talk about.
<v Speaker 2>Christy Brinkley may have been the most beautiful woman on
<v Speaker 2>the planet.
<v Speaker 1>In nineteen eighty two when they felt this. She was
<v Speaker 1>not an actor. I'm not a dancer.
<v Speaker 2>We know she's done a dancer. Flashy back to our
<v Speaker 2>Billy Joel episode.
<v Speaker 1>So when did they get married and Billy Joel and
<v Speaker 1>Christophrinkley get money?
<v Speaker 2>Gosh, well that dropped in eighty three, so ride around
<v Speaker 2>this time. Yeah, okay, if you want to hear the
<v Speaker 2>story about how Billy Joel almost had Elman Pearson and
<v Speaker 2>Christy Brinkley in bed in the same day, and go
<v Speaker 2>listen to our Billy Joel Innocent Man episode Not So Innocent.
<v Speaker 2>That's right, Okay, we can talk about how great Dinky the.
<v Speaker 1>Dog was Dinkham's okay on that subject. Yes, the cop
<v Speaker 1>James Keach, Yeah, James Keach, brother of Stacy Keach. Yes.
<v Speaker 1>Do you know what the penalty is for animal cruelty
<v Speaker 1>in this town? I'm sure it's pretty stuff. It's probably
<v Speaker 1>pretty steff he I had no idea. Not only is
<v Speaker 1>the brother of Stacy Keach, he married and is still
<v Speaker 1>married to Jane Seymour. What doctor Quinn medicine one? What
<v Speaker 1>are you solitaire?
<v Speaker 2>What are you talking about that?
<v Speaker 3>Yeah?
<v Speaker 1>Ravo, guy, ravo.
<v Speaker 2>I watched the behind the scenes on this movie. Chevy
<v Speaker 2>Chase said he delivered the line better than any line
<v Speaker 2>he's ever heard in any of his movies. James Keach,
<v Speaker 2>do you know what the line is?
<v Speaker 3>No?
<v Speaker 1>Explain this, you son of a bit. That's great if
<v Speaker 1>you watch that scene.
<v Speaker 2>So we're talking about the scene where he gets pulled
<v Speaker 2>over in Colorado and the cop is super mad at him.
<v Speaker 2>Get out of the car, sir, and he's like what
<v Speaker 2>what weaving or something? He's like, no, explain this, right,
<v Speaker 2>and he picks up the dog leash and you realize,
<v Speaker 2>oh my gosh, he just killed Dicky right right that scene.
<v Speaker 2>If you go back and watch it, James Keach and
<v Speaker 2>Chevy Chase were laughing so hard that there were actually crying.
<v Speaker 2>Those are tears of joy, and they had to keep
<v Speaker 2>redoing it and redoing it, redoing it because the other
<v Speaker 2>one crack up.
<v Speaker 1>You will watch chevy Chase. You think he's just trying
<v Speaker 1>to like, you think he's happy because the horrible, horrible
<v Speaker 1>dog has been murdered. As it turns out, he's just
<v Speaker 1>cracking up at the delivery of these lines. That's fantastic, he.
<v Speaker 2>Said, For like ten minutes all they did that one
<v Speaker 2>would go they went good.
<v Speaker 1>That's fantastic. That's fantastic.
<v Speaker 2>And then one more character I have to bring up.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, that's truly a character in this movie. I know
<v Speaker 1>where you're going. I think I know where you're going.
<v Speaker 1>Go ahead and go. It's the Family Truckster. I'm glad
<v Speaker 1>you went there. Okay, are you ready for this? Yeah?
<v Speaker 1>Do you do? You have more on the Family Truckster? Well,
<v Speaker 1>other than it being metallic p instead of antarctic blue.
<v Speaker 1>Let me talk to you about tell me Okay, I've
<v Speaker 1>got a story on the family truckster. Yeah, that I
<v Speaker 1>will save until our next episode. But I'm telling you fans,
<v Speaker 1>you want to come back for this one. All right,
<v Speaker 1>come back for the family trut story. But you think
<v Speaker 1>you hate it, now wait until you drive it. But
<v Speaker 1>before we end today's episode, we need to talk about
<v Speaker 1>casting for The Great Outdoors. Yes, as I mentioned, we
<v Speaker 1>have two of Canada's best gifts to us. No, not
<v Speaker 1>Michael J. Fox, but Dan Ackroid and John Candy. Then
<v Speaker 1>we have the wives, which I think are critical to
<v Speaker 1>this movie. Oh yeah right, oh yeah. So the first
<v Speaker 1>one that you have is one that everybody knows. It's
<v Speaker 1>a net Binning. What you may not know is this
<v Speaker 1>is her very first movie. Yes, I'm a net Binning
<v Speaker 1>married to Warren Baty, a net Binning, the major. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>all of that. My mind was blown. I was like,
<v Speaker 1>this movie was her first movie, and she does a
<v Speaker 1>fantastic job. Okay, are you really what?
<v Speaker 4>No?
<v Speaker 2>No, no, she does a fantastic job. Okay, she's not very
<v Speaker 2>likable in this movie.
<v Speaker 1>Because you're not supposed to be like exactly Okay, all right, yeah, okay,
<v Speaker 1>there you go.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, so let's talk about it. So Roman Craig is
<v Speaker 2>played by dan Ackroyd. He is the supposed investment broker,
<v Speaker 2>the rich jerk uninvited brother in law John Candy. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>this is the third movie that dan Ackroyd has done
<v Speaker 2>with John Candy.
<v Speaker 1>Can you name the other two? You've got Blues Brothers, Yes,
<v Speaker 1>which is great because they have a song, an Elkwood
<v Speaker 1>blues song that comes up in this movie. Yes, and
<v Speaker 1>then after is it after Blues Brothers? Before Before Blues Brothers.
<v Speaker 2>Directed by Robert Zamechas nineteen forty one, nineteen forty one.
<v Speaker 1>Nineteen forty one. Wowka.
<v Speaker 2>Not a big part by either of them, but they
<v Speaker 2>share the screen. And if you'll remember, John Candy was
<v Speaker 2>supposed to be in Ghostbusters. He's supposed to play the
<v Speaker 2>part of Lewis.
<v Speaker 1>Oh right, but he didn't really he didn't understand it.
<v Speaker 1>He said, call my buddy Rick.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, that took over by Rick moranis. So it could
<v Speaker 2>have been a fourth movie.
<v Speaker 1>Wow, okay, and they would go on to do your
<v Speaker 1>favorite movie, Nothing but Trouble.
<v Speaker 2>Oh my gosh, I totally forgot about that.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. Yeah, it is the old codger.
<v Speaker 2>Judge it may be the worst movie of the nineties.
<v Speaker 1>We have to have to go back and check that out.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, okay, So do you know who they were wanted
<v Speaker 2>to play Roman?
<v Speaker 1>Tell me Chevy Chase? Well, sure, you know, yeah, Chevy
<v Speaker 1>Chase and Bill Murray. Oh, both for Roman.
<v Speaker 2>Oh okay, I see they wanted John Candy as the
<v Speaker 2>family guy.
<v Speaker 1>They were set on Candy already, but the Roman was
<v Speaker 1>a question mark. Yes, okay, all right, yeah, no, I yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I think dan Aykroyd is the right fit. I just
<v Speaker 1>I do.
<v Speaker 2>Dan Ackroyd has a style and a character that he
<v Speaker 2>really does.
<v Speaker 1>Well, yeah, that's it. Yeah right, Bill Murray, he's too likable.
<v Speaker 2>Even when he tries to play a turd like in Scrooged,
<v Speaker 2>he comes off as sympathetic, likable. So okay, John Candy,
<v Speaker 2>as we talked about, he is John Hughes's MVP when
<v Speaker 2>you know, when we need funny, right, he's his.
<v Speaker 1>Go to guy. By the way, we didn't talk about this,
<v Speaker 1>but let's touch on this real quick. John Hughes didn't
<v Speaker 1>direct The Great Outdoors even though he was like, I'm
<v Speaker 1>I'm going to redo vacation and do it the way
<v Speaker 1>that I wanted to he didn't direct The Great Outdoors.
<v Speaker 1>Do you know why? No, because the there was another
<v Speaker 1>movie with John Candy going on at the same time
<v Speaker 1>called Planes, Trains and Automobiles that he said, Oh, I
<v Speaker 1>really want to work with Steve Martin, and so he
<v Speaker 1>directed John Candy in Planes, Trains and Automobiles while The
<v Speaker 1>Great Outdoors was being filmed by Howard Deutsch. Right now,
<v Speaker 1>there's another movie that John Hughes was doing at that
<v Speaker 1>same time as well, called She's Having a Baby. You'll
<v Speaker 1>remember at the beginning of Planes, Trains and Automobiles, there's
<v Speaker 1>this school cameo by Kevin Bacon because both of these
<v Speaker 1>movies are happening at the same time. Well, She's having
<v Speaker 1>a baby. The end of the movie, the kind of
<v Speaker 1>what happens is they're trying to think of a name
<v Speaker 1>for the baby. And then the rolling credits they have
<v Speaker 1>all of these cameo appearances by these various stars. One
<v Speaker 1>of them is Bill Murray, who is obviously shooting Scrooged
<v Speaker 1>at this time, yes, and then you also have dan
<v Speaker 1>Aykroyd and John Candy, who are obviously filming The Great Outdoors.
<v Speaker 1>You can see the wood paneling behind Ah that's awesome.
<v Speaker 2>By the way, you know why Chevy Chase did not
<v Speaker 2>take The Great Outdoors. Tell me he was shooting Funny Farm,
<v Speaker 2>which is about a city guy who goes to the
<v Speaker 2>Great outdoors and comes into all these misadventures.
<v Speaker 1>Man, that was a bad movie. I do not like
<v Speaker 1>Funny Farm, are you? I'm easy? I am not crazy.
<v Speaker 1>But again, I didn't see it until I was an adult.
<v Speaker 1>We talked about this with twins. If you don't see
<v Speaker 1>the eighties movies, either when you were a kid or
<v Speaker 1>when you were a kid in the eighties, sure it
<v Speaker 1>makes a difference, no doubt about, huge difference. By the way,
<v Speaker 1>Funny Farm better than Great Outdoors. Shut your mouth, I'm serious.
<v Speaker 1>Oh my gosh. Okay, you tip in your hand a
<v Speaker 1>little bit. Let's talk about Lucy Deacons for just a second. Okay,
<v Speaker 1>Lucy Deacons. I married a girl who looks like Lucy Deacons. Okay, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I agree, Yeah, I guess. So, yeah, she got it
<v Speaker 1>a lot. Espe about that kid, but yeah, she got
<v Speaker 1>it a lot. Curly or brown Hammy and Casey yeah okay, yeah.
<v Speaker 1>And she was also in The Boy who Could Fly. Okay,
<v Speaker 1>that was kind of those These were her two big
<v Speaker 1>movies of the day, but she did not stay in
<v Speaker 1>act right. She decided to go ahead and go to
<v Speaker 1>law school. She graduated a few years after I did
<v Speaker 1>and is now a partner at a firm that has
<v Speaker 1>her name in it. Something that beacons in something. Yes,
<v Speaker 1>you can literally look it up and see her as
<v Speaker 1>one of the of council attorneys for this law firm.
<v Speaker 4>It's nuts.
<v Speaker 1>It's in Denver, it's in Colorado. Yeah, same place where
<v Speaker 1>Dinky was killed on the road. She went back to
<v Speaker 1>help pick up the carcass. Yeah, okay. And then for
<v Speaker 1>the brother you have, mister Christopher Young. Yeah, now Christopher Young.
<v Speaker 1>His first role is also in the early eighties, in
<v Speaker 1>a TV series we all know called Max Headroum. Okay,
<v Speaker 1>do you know what his character's name is?
<v Speaker 2>Chris No, Max Bryce Lynch, stop it.
<v Speaker 1>That is why. In the book Ready Player one and
<v Speaker 1>he decides to sneak into the IOI Credit Bureau and
<v Speaker 1>pretend he's somebody else. His pseudonym is Rice Lynch.
<v Speaker 2>My mind is not only blown but destroyed. That was
<v Speaker 2>amazing for being a big greater player one fan, man,
<v Speaker 2>that's a big bomb.
<v Speaker 1>You're welcome. Good job thank you.
<v Speaker 4>So.
<v Speaker 1>Also, since then he has done some directing and producing.
<v Speaker 1>He has produced no less than twelve Kelly Clarkson videos. Okay,
<v Speaker 1>I Hey, everybody's gotta have something that you're good at.
<v Speaker 1>Might as well be Kelly Clarkson.
<v Speaker 2>It's fantastic because right next to his name in my
<v Speaker 2>notes I say he has done nothing.
<v Speaker 1>Okay. So we talked about Anette Binning. By the way,
<v Speaker 1>I said, this was her film debut. She was acting.
<v Speaker 1>She had gotten to Tony in nineteen eighty seven. Right
<v Speaker 1>before this, she had been on Broadway. She played Lady
<v Speaker 1>Macbeth with a lot of acclaim at the American Conservatory Theater.
<v Speaker 1>But we haven't talked about the other very important wife.
<v Speaker 2>Her name is Stephanie Pharisee.
<v Speaker 1>Stephanie Pharisee. Her debut was on a show called Laverne
<v Speaker 1>and Shirley.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, which we talked about in our Best TV Themes
<v Speaker 2>of the seventies.
<v Speaker 1>And connection to Anette Beinning. She was also in Heaven
<v Speaker 1>Can Wait? Is that right? Yeah? How about that? Starred
<v Speaker 1>with Warren Batty, starred with a Net Benning. Maybe she
<v Speaker 1>introduced him, who knows that's true? She I love her
<v Speaker 1>in this movie.
<v Speaker 2>She may be the best, most likable character in this
<v Speaker 2>entire movie.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. I mean, she keeps it all together. She is
<v Speaker 1>the Ellen of the Great Outdoors.
<v Speaker 2>And literally she's the one with the least amount of
<v Speaker 2>star power.
<v Speaker 1>She's my favorite character. Yeah. She was in Fraser. Oh, okay,
<v Speaker 1>she is one of the girls that was always hitting
<v Speaker 1>on Niles. She's also in Blind Date, another one of
<v Speaker 1>your favorites. Really, oh man, awesome?
<v Speaker 2>You know who else was in Fraser? Mister Robert Prosky,
<v Speaker 2>the guy who plays Wally, the owner of the resort, right, the.
<v Speaker 1>Guy who plugs the shotgun in the guy who tells
<v Speaker 1>him that they're kissing a dead person.
<v Speaker 2>So he was in Frasier. He was in Missus Doubtfire.
<v Speaker 2>He played Rebecca's dad on Cheers.
<v Speaker 1>He's been in He's been in some stuff. Yeah.
<v Speaker 2>And then, of course Hillary Gordon and Rebecca Gordon are
<v Speaker 2>the twins romanicdes twin daughters. They're totally weird this entire movie.
<v Speaker 2>They played Harrison Ford's twins in the movie The Mosquito Coast.
<v Speaker 2>That's all I got on casting for The Great Outdoors.
<v Speaker 1>Okay, guys, that does it for episode one. Come back
<v Speaker 1>for episode two. Well, where I will share my story
<v Speaker 1>about the wagon Queen Family truckster, and we will talk
<v Speaker 1>about music, we will talk about reception, and we will
<v Speaker 1>talk about our final judgment on which of these two
<v Speaker 1>movies as the best. Yes,