Before our feature presentation, ACME would like to start the evening with another Porky Pig Looney Tunes cartoon, the 1938 Porky's Five & Ten, directed by Bob Clampett.
This cartoon uses the song Hooray for Hollywood, with one part of the lyrics changed from "Go out and try your luck, you might be Donald Duck" to "Go on and try your luck, you might be Daffy Duck", likely changed to avoid the mention of the Disney character. Coincidentally, the same thing happens in the short released prior to this one, A Star Is Hatched.
The staff of The ACME Eagle Hand Soap Radio Hour and I caught an episode of Frasier the other night. We (or at least I) had forgotten how funny the show was. Here's a clip video, showing the brilliant comic timing of Kelsey Grammer and David Hyde Pierce:
They truly were a great comedy duo
We’ve selected another entry from the excellent reference book 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, edited by Steven Jay Schneider. Today’s film is the 1982 comedy Diner, directed by Barry Levinson (in his directorial debut) and starring Steve Guttenberg, Daniel Stern, Mickey Rourke, Paul Reiser, Kevin Bacon, Timothy Daly, and Ellen Barkin. MGM was initially disappointed that the film wasn’t more like Porky’s. Executives didn’t rave about it, didn’t want to release it, and even considered shelving it altogether. The studio didn’t prioritize the picture or know how to market it - until they learned that critic Pauline Kael had written a glowing review in The New Yorker. Suddenly, MGM rushed it into release.
Competition among the actors was most intense during the improvisation sessions, where each displayed different levels of skill. By his own admission, Kevin Bacon was the least adept. Tim Daly later said it was hardest to top Paul Reiser’s improvisational dexterity, calling him “the sharpest, fastest guy alive.” Bacon, meanwhile, said he was never very good at improvising, so he would just sit, listen, and grin - which turned out to be perfect for his character, whom he described as “a reactive sort of guy, someone on the outskirts.” So please, find a comfy chair and join us here at The ACME Eagle Hand Soap Radio Hour as we watch this wonderful debut film - Diner.
Barry Levinson had the main actors arrive in Baltimore a week before filming began to get to know one another and build rapport. Predictably, the young male cast members went out to clubs and tried to meet women—sometimes spinning elaborate tales about what they were doing in town. Tim Daly claims he came up with the most popular one: that they were engineers working on a rotating rooftop restaurant.
Demand Euphoria!
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