Deep Thoughts About Stupid Sh*t: A Pop-Culture Podcast

Deep Thoughts about Clue

• Tracie Guy-Decker & Emily Guy Birken • Episode 8

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It’s Wadsworth in the lounge with the red herring! The 1985 film Clue was a flop when it came out. There were three endings, no clear murderer, and everyone thought making a film based on a board game was just crass.

In this episode, Emily explains how a box-office bomb became a beloved cult favorite, and how this deeply silly little movie subverts cultural expectations about what constitutes a story. She and Tracie enjoy chatting about how Clue is a kids’ movie about adult things, with side conversations about how there is no wrong way to create art, the optimistic lessons to be learned from art that flops but eventually finds its audience, and why Yvette’s French accent was such a formative part of Emily’s childhood.

Join us as we talk about murder, blackmail, monkey’s brains, and flame-flames-flames on the side of my face.

Mentioned in the podcast:

The Crazy Story Of How "Clue" Went From Forgotten Flop To Cult Triumph
Between by L.L. Starling
Roger Ebert’s 1985 review of Clue
The Monkees
Bittersweet Symphony by The Verve
How Do You Live? By Genzaburo Yoshino

Our theme music is "Professor Umlaut" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Learn more about Tracie and Emily (including our other projects), join the Guy Girls' family, secure exclusive access to bonus episodes, video versions, and early access to Deep Thoughts by visiting us on Patreon. 

Speaker 1:

Hi there, I'm Emily Guy-Burken, and you're listening to Deep Thoughts about Stupid Shit, because pop culture is still culture, and shouldn't you know what's in your head? Today, I will be sharing my deep thoughts about Clue with my sister, tracy Guy Decker, and with you. Let's dive in.

Speaker 2:

Have you ever had something you love dismissed because it's just pop culture, what others might deem stupid shit? You know matters. You know what's worth talking and thinking about, and so do we. So come over, think with us as we delve into our deep thoughts about stupid shit. This show is a labor of love, but that doesn't make it free to produce. If you enjoy it even half as much as we do, please consider helping to keep us overthinking. You can support us at our Patreon there's a link in the show notes or leave a positive review so others can find us and, of course, share the show with your people.

Speaker 1:

So, tracy, tell me what you know about the movie Clue.

Speaker 2:

Wow, that's taken me back. I have seen the movie, but it's been a long, long time, and I know it maps to the board game, but I actually don't know which came first. And the first thing that comes to mind is is it Madeline Kahn? She's in it right, like she's talking about like a headache or something and like something radiating out of her head, and I remember it being very funny to me and that's about what I remember about Clue the movie. So why are we talking about this?

Speaker 1:

So I think you'll recall, when I was talking about Beauty and the Beast, that that is about 40 percent responsible for my interest in being a French major.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, I do remember that.

Speaker 1:

But if that from Clue is about another 30 to 40 percent of my interest. Her accent was so endearing and, honestly, even though I ended up taking 10 years of French total I majored in French literature I got as fluent as I think my brain is capable of becoming in French I still can't tell if her accent is over the top, like an American doing a French accent, or if it's good. Oh man, that's funny and it's partially because, like she doesn't actually speak French, she is speaking English with a French accent and Colleen Camp, who plays a vet, is American. So if she were speaking in French I'd be able to tell if she had a good French accent or not, but I can't tell if someone who's pretending to be French speaking English is realistic or not. So I loved her character.

Speaker 1:

I can remember when the movie came out and there are three separate endings and I remember there was the gimmick that you go to a movie theater and each one had a different ending and you'd have to see the movie three times to get all three of the endings. I remember that gimmick. I remember being at our neighbor Kathy's house.

Speaker 1:

Lived across the hall when dad lived in that apartment in Carriage Hill talking about the movie with you and Kathy. But I did not end up seeing it until it was on TV a few years later and when all three endings were put together, and that's the only way I've ever seen it is with all three endings put together. I have always loved murder mysteries. The first grown-up book that I read was Body in the Library by Arthur Christie, so I think I've always been drawn to the idea of a mystery like what's going on and also the kind of danger of a locked room mystery, of is there someone else in the house with us? And then, even though a lot of the humor just sailed right over my head, so much of the humor is so broad and so slapstick that it was hilarious to me growing up, and so it was one of those movies that, anytime it came on TV, I loved Tim Curry's Wadsworth. I thought he was adorable, I loved his accents and the interplay between all the characters who are strangers when they meet and then like kind of are forming not exactly alliances, but all of that is just really really well done.

Speaker 1:

So in doing a little research for this, I knew that the movie flopped when it came out.

Speaker 1:

The gimmick of each theater having a different ending made people stay away instead of going to see it.

Speaker 1:

They were thinking people see it three times and people were like, well, I don't know which is the good ending, I don't know, I'm not going to go at all Whereas they would have been better to put it out with all three endings. But I also know that it is beloved and has become a cult classic in many, many circles, and so part of the reason why I want to talk about it is I want to talk about art that endures despite flopping when it comes out. So that's part of the reason why I want to talk about it. I also want to talk about story construction and the meaning of a movie, because the other reason why it flopped was because the critics who saw it didn't know what to do with this film, whereas the kids who are watching it at home didn't need it to do anything. They didn't need anything specific from it the critics needed. So those are the reasons why I want to talk about it, and then I also just want to talk about how dang fun it is.

Speaker 2:

Okay, all right, I'll bite, so, but let's start with like what is this film? Because, really, like, I have like these little snippets of memory that could just as easily be I could have gotten from trailers. So, what's the setup? What's a concede? Who are we watching? What's the deal?

Speaker 1:

So the movie was based on the board game. The board game came first. The board game had been around for I think about 20, 25 years when the movie came out. So the board game, which is called Cluedo in England and Europe and Clue in America, came out in I think the early 60s and at the time the idea of making a film based on a board game seemed like a crass money grab. So that was one of the things that made people go like you're doing what now? So in the board game, your board game is set up like a man or house with all these different rooms. The point of the game is to figure out who committed the murder, what weapon they used and in what room in the manor house.

Speaker 2:

Right, right. That's like Colonel Mustard with the lead pipe in the library, correct? And all the characters have like color names. Color names, and this is white and Colonel Mustard and yeah.

Speaker 1:

And the reason for that is because the game originally came with just instead of creating like individual game pieces.

Speaker 2:

They weren't meatballs, they were just little colored, like they were just pieces.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, partisi pieces. So like Mrs Peacock was the blue one, colonel Mustard was the yellow one. So that was actually a very savvy way for the board game designers to create characters without actually having to spend the money on creating custom game pieces.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, custom board game pieces.

Speaker 1:

So there are six suspects. There's Mrs White, mrs Scarlett, mrs Peacock, colonel Mustard, professor Plum and Mr Green. They are recreated in the film and they arrive, one at a time, to a manor house in 1954 in New England. The film had to create new characters because that's not enough. So one of the most important new character, or the most important new character, and in some ways the main character of the film, is Wadsworth the Butler, who was played by Tim Curry, phenomenally. Phenomenally by Tim Curry. There is also Yvette, who is the French maid. There is the cook, who we only really see for one scene. Then there's Mr Body, who is that's the dead guy, who will be the dead guy. He's not dead. Go first meet him, okay, but he is the host of this little dinner party. And then, throughout the evening, three other people end up showing up at the house there's a stranded motorist, there's a police officer and there's a singing telegram girl. So what happens is all of the guests arrive, wadsworth greets them by their color name you know, mrs White, professor Plum and it says to them I know that's not your real name, but you are probably going to want to use the pseudonym that we've provided you with so, which is again a very savvy way of giving the characters a reason to use these fake names from the board game. So they have very awkward dinner.

Speaker 1:

Mr Body arrives and they end up learning that all six of these color characters have been blackmailed by Mr Body for years. They didn't know that it was Mr Body, they didn't know who was blackmailing them, and each for a different reason. Ms Scarlett is the madam of a high-end brothel in Washington DC. Professor Plum lost his medical license because he slept with a patient. Colonel Mustard was a war prophet here during World War II. Mrs White allegedly killed her husband, although it's never confirmed or denied for sure. Mr Green admits that he is gay, which in 1954 would have made him lose his job at the State Department. And who have I forgotten? Mrs Peacock is the wife of a senator and accepts bribes on her husband's behalf. Because of that, they've been blackmailed. Turns out that Mr Body is their blackmailer and he gives them each a gift which is a gift-wrapped box with a murder weapon in it, and it's the six murder weapons from the board game. Mr Body suggests that they turn out the light. Somebody kill Wadsworth, because once he is dead, no one will know what is going on. There's no other evidence and they'll continue.

Speaker 1:

The blackmailing. Lights go out, shot goes off Mr Body. When the lights come back on, mr Body is lying face down, presumably dead. That sparks this crazy running around the mansion. They hear a vet screaming in another room. Then they come back. Mr Body's body is missing. Turns out he wasn't dead but he was killed the second time. Then they're like is there anyone else in the house? They realize the cook is in the house. They find her dead body.

Speaker 1:

They come back and they are piling all the bodies up in the study. They end up deciding to search the house to see if there's anyone else there. The stranded motorist arrives. They put him in the lounge, I think, to make a phone call for help. He's murdered in what appears to be a locked room. But it turns out there's some secret passageways, as there are in the board game. After the motorist ties, a police officer comes by who found the motorist's stranded car. He comes to check to see if everything's okay, asks to make a phone call. They have to mock things up because everyone's acting weird, because there's at this point three dead bodies yeah, three. So they have to mock things up to make it look like there's nothing wrong going on. So they make it look like it's just a party.

Speaker 2:

So is it like weekend at Bernie's stuff, yes, stuff with the dead bodies, okay, yes, Mrs White pretends to be kissing Mr Body, the motorists.

Speaker 1:

They pour alcohol all over him so it looks like he's just dead drunk, passed out drunk. Yeah, and they have the cook propped up against the window with someone behind him, behind her, rather to make it look like she's dancing with Colonel Mustard. The cop goes back into the lounge to make his phone call and they split up again. Lights go out, the cop is murdered, evette is murdered, and then someone rings on the doorbell. It's the woman from the singing telegrams who is then shot, and so at this point, instead of being shocked anymore, it's just like there's another one.

Speaker 1:

And at that point Wadsworth says I know how it was done, and he kind of acts out the entire evening in a madcap frenzy, culminating in explaining who committed the murders. And there are three different endings. In the first ending, miss Scarlet committed the murders because she's the mad. She's a mad. If that had been one of her escorts, the cop had been on the take from her, the motorist. I don't remember, but there were reasons for it.

Speaker 1:

In the second ending, mrs Peacock killed everyone and it was because she's trying to prevent the knowledge of her bribery and she's the senator's wife, she's the senator's wife. And then in the third one, everybody killed someone. Professor Plum killed Mr Body. Mrs Peacock killed the cook because she had been her cook in DC. Miss Scarlet killed Yvette. Colonel Mustard killed the motorist because he had been his driver. Who am I forgetting? Oh, mrs White killed Yvette because she had had an affair with her husband. And that's where that flames, flames up the side of my head Burning, burning, that you remember, which is one of the reasons why it's such a shame that there were three different endings, because that means two thirds of audiences missed that performance, lori, and I think I'm forgetting someone. Did I get everybody? I?

Speaker 2:

think I got everybody the singing telegram oh.

Speaker 1:

Two killed the singing telegram. I can't recall. Everybody killed someone, except for Mr Green. He was the gay guy. Yes, and it turns out Mr Green was actually an undercover FBI agent and Wadsworth was actually Mr Body. So Professor Plumb's like well then, who did I kill? He's like my potler. And Professor Plumb goes ah shocks. So Mr Green ends up shooting Wadsworth to prevent him from escaping and that is the end of it. Oh, it is such a glorious piece of silliness With a really high body count.

Speaker 2:

Oh, it's, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1:

Six dead, seven if you count Wadsworth in the final ending.

Speaker 2:

All right, yeah, wow, I did not remember all of that, so talk to me. Why is it so beloved? Why do you think that it has become a cult classic?

Speaker 1:

So there's a couple things I think. Going on, I notice I feel like there is an age demarcation so people who are our age and younger love it, meaning people who encountered it the first time as a child love it, whereas it feels like anyone who encounters it for the first time is an adult, and the critics and the adults at the time that it came out were like this is a ridiculous, pointless thing, and I think I understand where that comes from.

Speaker 1:

Now there's one thing I read a long piece from 2015 from Buzzfeed that interviewed many of the people involved with making it Jonathan Lin, who wrote it and directed it, many of the still living actors so Christopher Lloyd, who played Professor Plum, tim Curry, who played Wadsworth, leslie Ann Warren, who played Ms Scarlett, martin Mull, who played Colonel Mustard, and Michael McKean, who played Mr Green, and it's an interesting phenomenon. I saw this also with the Princess Bride, when I've done a little bit of digging into that. So these actors, these, you know, this writer, these directors they made a movie that flopped and then they moved on with their career and so they didn't really think about it and then, all of a sudden, years later, people come to them and, you know, are so excited because of this movie that they've kind of forgotten about. You know, it was a minor blip in their career. It flopped, and the expectation when it comes to putting out art is that it's either going to be big right away or it's not going to be big at all.

Speaker 2:

Right, right, yeah, you. When we talked about Mrs Bride, you talked about that with the guy who played Wesley. I can't think of his name, carrie.

Speaker 1:

Ellis yeah.

Speaker 2:

Carrie Ellis like had a server say as you wish and he was like oh, that sounds familiar, it's the same. It's the same sort of phenomenon.

Speaker 1:

Yes, in any case, I believe it was Christopher Lloyd. Might have been Michael McKean. I'm kind of mixing up the quotes, but one of them said this is a movie about grown up things, so it's about blackmail, murder, sex. There's a lot of discussion of communism and socialism, but you do not have to have experience with any of them to get the movie, and so that's one reason why I think kids really liked it, and I know that it felt like I was in on something, even if I didn't really quite get it. It was like I'm at the cool kids table.

Speaker 2:

Like.

Speaker 1:

I don't get it. I don't get why Wadsworth is tearing up when he talks about his wife's friends being socialists. But it doesn't matter, I'm in on it. So that, I think, was exciting. The other thing is that kids didn't come to this with the expectation that you watch a movie and each scene builds on its other to an inevitable conclusion, which is, I think, what most grown ups bring to a movie. They come to this thinking like I need, at the end of this film, to be a little bit different than I was when I started it. But this is a film based on a board game. The point is the journey, not the destination every time, and so because of that, I think kids come without any expectation, like I could see an adult feeling cheated that they don't know who did it at the end Because you don't Like. I've actually I've seen it so many times that there have been times where Wadsworth will say this person wasn't with us and I've gone back to be like were they? Can you tell? I don't know.

Speaker 1:

And it doesn't matter, Like that's the thing. It doesn't matter. That's not what the point of the film is. The point of the film is to have zany antique fun with these weird characters for two hours. It's not to reach an established end point. And so if you are coming into a movie with an expectation that a story is going to be told that has a cohesive beginning, middle and end, that provides a satisfying conclusion, that is satisfying for more than just like that was fun, you're going to be disappointed by this movie. But if you don't come with any expectations and you just are watching adults be silly and use some really really incredibly funny one liners on each other doesn't matter, you know you're delighted at the end of it and you kind of want to start it over and watch from the beginning again. So I think that's a big part of why there's this generational divide in who liked it and who didn't?

Speaker 2:

You know I'm thinking about Princess Bride in conversation, since we brought it in about the path after release. When we talked about Princess Bride actually, we did talk about, though, sort of an insight like a moral, in a almost ace ups kind of way, because I recall that you and I kind of did a little push and pull about what that might be. Are you suggesting there isn't one at all for Clue?

Speaker 1:

No, I don't think there is, because there isn't for a board game. You know there's no moral for playing Clue. There's no. Like you know we get justice or we, you know, stop a killer from killing again. It just is, it's just a fun thing to do. The one line that is repeated in all three of the endings is communism was just a red staring, because there is throughout an undercurrent of the possibility of the House on American Committee, the McCarthy hearings yeah, yeah yeah, so it takes place in 1954.

Speaker 1:

Jonathan Lin who wrote the screenplay. He was asked by John Landis to write the screenplay and he was like this is weird, but okay, I'll give it a try. And he had friends who had lived through the McCarthy era and so he knew that timeframe intimately and so he decided to set it during that time and that would help explain some of the sense of blackmail and paranoia, and that was why Wadsworth teared up about the fact that his wife had been a socialist. So then when you get to the end and you say communism is just a great herring, I think that's the closest you're going to get to any kind of moral, which is that focusing on that kind of ideological difference between people is kind of ridiculous.

Speaker 2:

But even that and not the real danger, I mean that's what I'm hearing, not the real danger. Yes, I mean, all of these people were dangerous, but not because of communism, correct?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah. One thing I appreciate very much now as an adult that I didn't really get when you say all of these people are dangerous. The one person that is not true of is Mr Green, who was homosexual, and he is the only character in the three endings provided who never committed a murder.

Speaker 2:

Oh, so in all three endings Mr. Green is innocent of any Mr.

Speaker 1:

Green is innocent of any. Now, because being gay is not actually a dangerous condition. Yes, now I will say it's undercut, because the very last line is Mr Green shoots Wadsworth, who is actually Mr Body, in the final third ending. Turns out he's an FBI agent undercover and he says now I'm going to go home and sleep with my wife, right, right, right. And so it does undercut that message a little bit, but I do think if you're going to overthink it, recognizing that he is the only non-dangerous, like non-lethal, member of the party in all of the endings, and that's because he is not actually doing anything wrong, I would claim Ms Scarlett, you know she has a brothel. It is illegal. But you know sex work is work she does. In her version, in the one where she is the murderer of all the characters who die, she says she's not really about the brothel, she trades in information and so she's a blackmailer, which does make her dangerous. So, in any case, it comes down to what are you expecting from a story?

Speaker 1:

And I've had this thought recently, because I recently read two really good fantasy novels, both of which are completely polarized on reviews. People either love them or hate them. The first one is called Between by LL Starling, and it was something that Starling, I think, self-published. It is a monster of a book. It's like 950 pages. Whoa. If she had gone the traditional route, I have no doubt they would have cut it down.

Speaker 2:

Oh yeah, no, that's beyond the word count for fantasy genre. We have rules and fantasy genre has the longest work out. We have rules.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and even within fantasy the word count is way higher than contemporary fiction or anything else, and part of the reason why it's so long is that there are all of these delightful side quests Not even that, just descriptions, moments and so I described it when I was reviewing it. I read it on Goodreads and I said, like, if you're looking for a book that where each scene builds upon the last, this is not going to satisfy you. If you're happy to just meander along and discover delightful, wonderful new things that you never occurred to you, come join the water spine.

Speaker 1:

And so that's me, I think speaks to kind of societal expectations about stories.

Speaker 2:

Cultural. I think cultural in particular. What I'm thinking about right now is that I haven't done a lot of reading on this and I'd like to do more, but I have done a little bit of thinking about what makes a story in the West versus sort of Eastern Japanese storytelling. This came up for me in the past couple of years when they finally translated into English the book how Do you Live, which is almost required reading for schoolchildren in Japan. Apparently it's like the book that the guy the studio. You know what I'm talking about.

Speaker 1:

Ghibli Studio Ghibli yes.

Speaker 2:

Studio Ghibli, that guy, it's his favorite book and so they're making a movie of it and the powers that be decided that Americans needed the book before the movie came out. And I read the book and I loved it. It was published in the 50s, I want to say, and it was set in the 20s in Japan. Never, ever would have been published if written in English originally. Because they're the like. Americans expect a beginning, middle and end. They expect a rising crescendo of drama, danger, stakes and then a resolution.

Speaker 2:

You know, and it maps onto Joseph Campbell yes, I was going to say Cornell, but that's a different dude. It maps onto Joseph Campbell's like hero's journey, like there's a very specific structure that we expect and when we don't get it we're like what the heck is this? That's not, that's a cultural thing. I mean we're taught that it is natural and normal and right and like immovable but it's actually cultural.

Speaker 1:

Cultural, yeah, the idea that you can't have a story without conflict.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1:

Very cultural.

Speaker 2:

That is exactly how I got into this question, actually, because Japanese storytelling often has no conflict. There will be something to sort of subvert your expectations often, but it doesn't need to be conflict, and that's. I find that really really fascinating. And sort of what you're suggesting is that clue breaks some cultural norms in terms of storytelling, which means that adults who had been acculturated into what to expect are like what the heck is this? Whereas kids who are young enough to have not yet been fully acculturated are like oh, this is fun, I like this, let's do more. And I think that's really really fascinating, because adults, we have such a hard time seeing what is in fact culture, we assume that it is somehow written in-.

Speaker 2:

And down from one high.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2:

Written in our DNA. Even more than that, it's actually like truth with a capital T that cannot be changed, and that's the way the publishing industry in the West also treats it. You can't have a novel that's that many words. There are rules, as if those rules weren't made up by people who can change or break them. Yeah, I think that's really really fascinating that you're getting there with clue.

Speaker 1:

Well, and I think what's really interesting is because it was based on a board game that has no story, you know, and that's where the thing that does have a story but it doesn't have an insight and it doesn't have that neat like-.

Speaker 2:

Yes, the game is a game of deduction right, where you're collecting information so that you can move out and rule in potential suspects, weapons and places.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah. And what I find really fascinating about Jonathan Lynn's screenplay and how he wrote this is how faithfully he kept to the board game itself. You know, he managed to find ways to make the pseudonyms make sense, managed to find a way for everyone to have a weapon, managed to find a way for the manor house to make sense. That all, I think, is just fascinating, and it speaks to me of how sometimes the most creativity comes from the tightest boundaries, because he wrote something that is phenomenally funny and enjoyable and kind of recreates the feeling of playing the game, in that when you play clue, you don't remember the specifics. You remember having fun with your family.

Speaker 1:

When you watch this movie, you don't remember the specifics because they don't matter. And so the fact that he was able to recreate that and it was I think if they had released all three endings at once, probably not have flopped quite as bad as it did. It didn't make back its budget and it was like a $15 million budget made 14.6, but still it lost money and I think that it might have at least broke even if they had all three endings at once. But having three different endings also is like a phenomenally smart way of being like. This is based on a game.

Speaker 2:

Yeah yeah, because there is no one ending with close around.

Speaker 1:

Yes, and this was the first movie that Lynn wrote and directed. He had done theater and, I think, television before, so it was like a big swing for him and it felt for a long time like a swing and a miss. He then went on to. He wrote and directed my Cousin Vinnie. So he was afraid this was going to be the end of his career as a director and it was not. But I feel like now this is the first ever movie that was based on a board game. Since then there's been battleship and Ouija.

Speaker 2:

Ouija's not really.

Speaker 1:

But Jumanji wasn't a real board game. First.

Speaker 2:

Right, it was a book first and then they did yeah.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so and I feel like this is the only one that has had any kind of cultural success. I mean, like battleship has been forgotten, whatever it did at the box office, like 2012-ish, I think.

Speaker 2:

And I had never even heard of Ouija.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I only remember it because I like horror movies and I remember when the trailer came out. Ouija is not exactly a board game.

Speaker 1:

Exactly so, but the reason I feel like this one works, whereas those two don't. Now, to be fair, I have not watched either of them, but I know that they were panned. So it was clear though. Yes, but there's no. It's been long enough. We'd know if there were cult file one. No one says battleship is my favorite movie, but I think the difference is that Clue sticks to the rules of its source material while building out places where it makes sense and it doesn't take itself seriously.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, I'm thinking about other films that don't take themselves seriously and wondering how it's like a fish called Wanda, like how does Clue sit? How does Clue? What conversation does Clue have with a fish called Wanda? I haven't seen that one either in a long time, but that's like that sort of absurdist silliness with I don't remember exactly how you said it, but like adult acting, you know silly. Yeah, you said it just a few minutes ago, but I don't remember exactly how you said it. What a fish called Wanda is coming to mind as another one with that sort of absurdist humor.

Speaker 1:

Well, and the other thing was that just 10 years before I don't know exactly when there was a Neil Simon Agatha Christie mystery parody called Murder by Death that came out. I have not seen it but that, I think, takes its source material of Agatha Christie more seriously is what I've gotten based on the reading I've done. I'd be interested to see it because I think it would be a hoot. But this not only had like the sense of a locked room murder mystery, but it also screwed all comedy from like the forties Right, and Jonathan Lin actually had all of his All the actors watch. I'm not going to remember which movie it was, but a movie from the forties where they had that really quick cadence where they were talking very quickly with that mid-Atlantic accent Interesting Because he wanted them to have that kind of cadence. He wanted it to be that kind of screwball comedy that is from a very specific time period. And so I'm wondering if part of the reaction was also like what is this mashup? In the same way that fusion cooking can sometimes really turn people off, whereas other people are like this is the most delicious thing ever, if you're just not expecting a mashup of murder mystery or game and 1940 screwball comedy. You're like I don't know what to do with this. It doesn't fit anywhere in my brain. Yeah, interesting.

Speaker 1:

So the one last thing I want to talk about is Clue's place in our culture as a cult favorite.

Speaker 1:

So that has to do with my ideas about art in our community. In our culture, as I mentioned, there's this expectation when you make a piece of art, that it'll either be big right away or it will fall to obscurity, even though there are things that make a huge splash and then you never hear or think about them again. And there are plenty of things that go unknown for years or decades or centuries and then are found again and beloved. And I feel like there's an insight in there somewhere, because Jonathan Lynn talked about how disheartened he was by how badly this movie did, because it was his first and completely comprehensible he's worried that this is going to end his burgeoning directing career. He, a couple of years after the film came out, he walked into a video store. For those of you listening who are under the age of 30, you used to have to go to a brick and mortar store to rent a video. Yeah, by video I mean a movie, not streaming, right? Anyway.

Speaker 2:

Oh man, and if you didn't rewind it, they would find you when it was still VHS tapes Still.

Speaker 1:

VHS tapes, fine Rewind. Everything started with that FBI warning. Oh yeah, he walked into one and there was a shelf that said do you dare rent these? And Clue was on it with like four or five other movies that were known to be stinkers, that flopped, and so, like that really hurt his feelings, which is understandable, I completely get it.

Speaker 1:

But and this is more for people who create art than it is for the general populace but I think it's really important to remember that your audience is out there. If you've made something that resonates and it will find your art you might not be around to see it, it might happen in a way that you are really not expecting, but the hard part is getting the art out into the world. Once it's out there, you, a don't have control over how it's received there's no control over that and B you never know when it's going to take off. And so some examples of that I'm thinking of, like that song Running Up that Hill is that Kate Bush which went to the top of the charts because it was in Stranger Things? I mean, it did well the first time around too. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm not saying it didn't do well the first time around but children, like kids who had never heard it before, were like, oh my God, this is beautiful, I love this song. And so it took off again, and like no expectation, no reason to believe that would happen, but because someone who loved it the first time thought it was an appropriate and it was soundtrack for a moment in Stranger Things, which is set during the time that it came out. So fair enough.

Speaker 1:

But that sort of thing, like you never know who's listening, who's watching, and so Clue, which flopped, has influenced so many people. I mean, for one thing, you go on any social media, you're going to find Mrs White going flames, flames in a gif somewhere. It is really for me. I find it heartening, it's like inspiring to realize that you don't have control over your legacy. You don't have control over how your art is received. That's scary in a lot of ways because it could flop and it could be forgotten forever. But you just need the right audience at some point and you never know when or if that'll happen. And you never know if 500 years from now, your name is a household name because of art you made that nobody liked at the time Right Right, like Vincent Menko or something.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yes, and even the Velvet Underground. They talk about how they only sold a thousand copies of their album, but every single person who bought a copy started a band.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Like do you want to be the Velvet Underground or do you want to be the Love and Spoonful? Nothing wrong with the Love and Spoonful, but if I had to choose, I would rather inspire than be a commercial success. I'd rather do both if that was on the menu, but recognizing that you don't know who you're inspiring and you can just take heart in the fact that someone out there is inspired. So that's my super polyana view of why part of why Clue is important. It's important for us artists out there who are toiling and afraid that no one's ever going to pay attention. Maybe they won't, but maybe just one person will and they'll be the right person for it.

Speaker 2:

I didn't expect us to land there.

Speaker 1:

I do. I spend a lot of time thinking about. I have these limiting beliefs. I'm thinking about the right way to make art and the right way for art to be produced, and I actually had a recent thought. I don't know how it happened I went down a rabbit hole about the monkey's band. Something mentioned Mickey Dolan's and I was just like God, I haven't thought about him forever. I'm like, are any of the monkeys still alive? And I just went down this rabbit hole.

Speaker 2:

And so, as a reminder to our listeners, the monkeys were a made up band for a TV show. But they did have some commercial success. But they were like cast, so it wasn't like an organic musical group. Each of the performers was cast for this TV show. Hey, where the monkeys. People say we're monkey around, okay, all right. So Mickey.

Speaker 1:

Dolan's. I had this realization as I was reading about it. I was reading about the casting process. I was reading about how they ended up playing which instruments they played. Like Davey Jones actually was the best drummer, but they didn't have him play drums because he was only five foot three and they were afraid he wouldn't be able to see him over the drum kit.

Speaker 2:

Also, he was like he was the handsome one. He was like, yes, the dream boat.

Speaker 1:

Yeah Well, and that's why they wanted to be able to see him. So that's my feeling, is like, because I have these limiting beliefs, is like there's a right way to create art. I'm like, okay, this is. I mean, this isn't a real band. They're not making real music.

Speaker 2:

That's actually what I said, not a real band. That's what I first liked, so it's our listeners who they are.

Speaker 1:

Yes, and but the thing is they had some best selling albums. Yeah, they sold very well. And I went back because of this, this deep dive, and listened to their greatest hits and I was like I like all these songs, yeah, like I sing along to the last train to Clarksville yeah, I was just thinking the last train to Clarksville, yeah, you know I'm a believer and and you know they really like their music. And so I was like the art that comes about from a non-standard way of creating art is still art. Similarly, it's not the greatest song in the world, but I love it the song Bittersweet Symphony by the Verve came out in about 1999, 2000.

Speaker 1:

So the riff the Dun dun dun dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun dun was taken from a Rolling Stones song, was sampled. They didn't get permission before they released the song. Rolling Stones were not happy about it, I guess. Ended up, yeah, so Rolling Stones ended up getting a songwriting credit and I think they get all the royalties I don't know If it's all or most and the Verve didn't survive because of that.

Speaker 1:

I remember telling the kids about this because my eldest liked the song and my husband was like, yeah, that was a really dumb move on their part. I'm like I'm not saying it wasn't, they lost out on music. But I can't regret it because the song exists now and it makes me happy every time I hear it. And if they'd asked for permission it might not exist. And, yes, it's really unfortunate for them and their financial situation.

Speaker 1:

But artistically I can't say they did the wrong thing, even though they very much needed to credit the people who wrote that part. Yes, I'm all about giving credit, but by doing it the wrong way, they created this piece of art that would not exist. And so I think about things like that and that's kind of what I'm thinking about with Clue. They started with a board game which people thought was silly and crass and going to make something awful, and they created this non-standard story process. It's very all over the place. It's a mash-up of weird, different genres and it flopped and critics hated it. Yet it's this beloved cultural artifact from the 80s that I tell you, if it is on TV, I stop what I'm doing and watch it, even though I have seen it so many times, I can quote most of it, and so that's. Another aspect of this is like there is no right way to create art. There is no wrong way to create art.

Speaker 2:

Well, I think subverting the sort of cultural right way is actually essential to subverting the racist, sexist, heteronormative hierarchies and values that are reified by that sense that there are rules Because those rules exclude people who aren't old white dudes. So I think that's really like I would never. When we sat down to talk about this, I would never have thought that we would land with clues subverting the canon, but that's ultimately what you're saying.

Speaker 1:

Is that by using a board game as inspiration instead, of a book, and that's the right way to write a movie, yes, yes, and taking the process seriously while not taking the product seriously. Because that's what Jonathan Linn did. He did his work, writing the story, which I don't feel like people who are writing battleship did. They're just like insert every man here, insert story, trope there. He actually. He spent time thinking about what would make sense. How would this work? Why would these people be here? Why would they be using pseudonyms? What time period would this make sense for them to be in this house?

Speaker 2:

Why are they also paranoid? Why are there multiple motives across these strangers?

Speaker 1:

Yes, so like he took the process seriously but not the product, and that is like, if there's a right way to do art, which I don't think there is, I think you can. You can not take the process seriously and still create great art, but you still have to respect for the process, if you know what I mean. So have respect for the fact that you need to put work in if you want to get art out Right. So, and that that is, I think, what's really interesting about this film and part of why so many people claim it as their favorite.

Speaker 2:

All right, we've been talking for a minute. I want to try and synthesize back to you what I've heard today. Okay, we we have this movie, clue, which flopped in the box office initially. It is a mashup of the locked room murder mystery and a specific genre of screwball comedy from the 1940s, based on a board game that was about 20 years old at the time, with, actually an all star cast, or at least not necessarily at the time. Oh, okay, so people, they were on to become stars.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, they were up and coming for the most part, gosh. I don't think any of them were were established at that point. Yeah, carrie Fisher was supposed to play Miss Scarlett, so she was going to be like the, the name that drew people in. Unfortunately, she needed to go into rehab because she was having a pretty serious problem with her addiction at the time, and so they got Leslie and Warren as a replacement last minute. So you did a fantastic job.

Speaker 2:

And the thing part of the reason that this movie flopped at the box office initially was it subverts expectations about story, at least in Western culture, in American culture, and that's one of the things that you and I have brought to this conversation is the fact that those expectations are cultural and there's nothing in the DNA of human beings or the universe that requires story to be a certain way. And you have a beautiful sort of Pollyanna insight about art, because of the initial flop and the now beloved nature of this movie that the audience is out there. You just need to find the right one. And finally, where we landed was about the multiple ways there is to make art and in particular, about at least the way Jonathan Lynn did it, sort of taking the process seriously without taking himself nor the product too seriously, which I think is really lovely and the idea that by subverting those things that are not in fact in our DNA, we can start to make room for artists who are not old white dudes, old white, straight dudes.

Speaker 2:

So, that's my synthesis.

Speaker 1:

What did I miss? Putting boundaries around yourself and creating a piece of art can inspire incredible creativity. Because that was a tough project he was handed.

Speaker 1:

When John Landis asked Jonathan Lynn to do this, he was kind of like here I'm thinking like Miss Scarlett's going to be running after Mrs Peacock, and he was talking about this and jumping up and down on furniture. And Jonathan Lynn is British and so the interview I was reading he was saying like, yeah, he was enthusiastic, but you know I'm British so maybe that's normal and he thought it was a little bit nuts. There's not a story that I can build off of that. But by putting those constraints in place in his mind, he created this really fun vehicle for this journey. That's not about the destination, it's not about the who done it, it's not about the satisfaction of that. It's about the fun of getting there. I have so much respect for people who are able to create something from these, like scraps, like that.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, it's fun, okay, so next time it'll be my turn to present to you and I'm actually I'm thinking about Disney's Robin Hood, the animated one with the boxes. Yes, it came up at a party recently, believe it or not, and so it's in my head and I really want to rewatch it and dig into it, because that movie is. It's in my head.

Speaker 1:

Oh, the Lolli.

Speaker 2:

Exactly. Like we both quoted different things, but yes, yeah, I'm seeing.

Speaker 1:

I sing sometimes the ups, how to number the downs, all the time, but not in Nottingham yeah. And I had a weird crush on Robin Hood as a fox. I feel like I'm not alone and that some of the furry community might have you know, had an awakening when they first saw that movie, you know, and I really liked it because our mom's name is Marion.

Speaker 2:

So I really liked that too Like made. Marion, anyway, so, but we'll get into that next time.