Page 7 - Pop History: The Princess Bride

Episode Date: June 16, 2020

We explore the making of one of our favorites, "The Princess Bride".Even more Page 7? Inconceivable! Support us through Patreon - Patreon.com/Page7Podcast Subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts+ to listen to new episodes of Page 7 ad-free.Start a free trial now on Apple Podcasts or by visiting siriusxm.com/podcastsplus. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

name is Enigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepared you today. I love is like a story, book story. Oh my goodness. I was obsessed with that song as a kid. And I mean, we're going to start off this episode just saying that Jeff and I definitely got into an argument because like this is a dumb song. It's like, you never, you will never say that about anything in Princess Bride in front of me.

I'm not a monster. Just the part with the lyrics. Yes, so the lyrics are a little, they are a little, okay. Oh, interesting. Talking bad about the movie immediately. What do you hate about the princess bride? How dare you?

You know what? I will, all right, well, you want to start this off? Yeah, let's start with what we hate about it. As an adult and as a child still, I still don't like the R-O-U-S's. I'm not a fan. It's because you grew up in New York. Is that what it is,

I was actually scared of rats. Probably. They're not that much smaller in New York than that. No, they really aren't. And they are just as aggressive in New York as well. And I, but although I have more appreciation now because they're not CGI and because they are dudes in rats and that makes it a lot more fun. Yes, definitely.

No, I love, I mean, that's great. That's, I, no CGI. I hate it. No CGI. I hate. I hate. Please. I don't.

I don't enjoy that there's no fun female characters in it, but I will say. But Carol Kane. Yes. I mean more so like no fun warrior ladies. I understand. But I will say in this- It is 1987. Yeah, in this most generic, like, heterosis storyline, as a girl, I still really connected

to a lot of the supporting characters. And I think that it's easy to do that in this movie. Also, Robin Wright's red dress makes up for her not doing any action. Gorgeous. And I'm gonna say the thing I don't like about the movie is that it ends. Welcome to our episode

on The Princess Bride. I love how the framing device of this episode mirrors my relationship to the film as a young boy. And I think many of us young boys felt this way. We saw a movie titled

The Princess Bride and felt like, oh, that's not for me. And then you end up watching it and very much like Fred Savage's character in the film, you all as as a young

masculine child I was born with an adult penis I was born with the penis the size of the adult I had like a baby's eyeballs same with my penis man's penis oh what did you name him uh Geronimo

oh that's kind of fun he's always dropping boughs yeah because I'd go that's aggressive that is not diddle but anyways let's not talk about my sex life as a child Let's talk about this film and how I had the same relationship to it, but you start watching it and oh the sword fights and oh the many wonderful characters.

The humor, and also the different fun characters. It's just the fact that there are such, it's such a wide range of characters that now especially as an adult, you look at you like, man, they were having some fucking fun on that set. Oh my god, totally. And I mean, I think you might have also read the book, The As You Wish. As you wish. Which I already had in my audio, audible books.

I will say real quick, though. I don't usually listen to audiobooks. Listen to as you wish, inconceivable tales from the making of the Princess Bride. They all read their own stories in it. It is all, like every person that, most of the people, part of the cast that are still live,

are involved in the audiobook. It's awesome. It's so fun. Also, Carrie Elis, he does like the over, I don't know what would you call like the narration Yes In between stuff

And he does really good voice impressions Yes he does Of everybody I'm in love with Carrie always I'm in love with everyone I gotta say man Watching that

The The chemistry between him And Robin Wright Like they're basically the same person Their faces are the same I was thinking that they would be perfect For the Lannister twins If Game of Thrones was shot

in that time Definitely watch that They're so fucking beautiful And I would watch If they wanted to make a sex tape, like, I would pay for it. Also talk about two good people. They were completely horny for each other throughout the shooting of this.

And you can see it in their eyes. And neither one of them ever acted on it. They never said anything about it because they are two professionals. And they knew that it would be weird and bad. And then they found out in interviews later that both of them felt the same way about each other. And doesn't that hurt your heart?

And watching him and every time he looks at her and says, as you wish, you know that he wanted her. That just makes it sexier. I love. I love. I just think about it. I'm sexualizing their relationship. That's what I'm thinking about. Dog. It is such a great movie. It also, I was saying this to Natalie

right before we started recording, really shows where my sexual awakening came from. If you look at, you know, the fact that I was loving Legolas and Lance Bass. And I really think it also started with Carrie Always. The beautiful lesbian Carrie Always? Oh my God, with his floppy,

with his floppy late 80s hair. Ooh, ooh. And all of his sword fighting, ooh, as you wish. But exactly, and you just, yeah, there you said it. I was going to also mention just that we watched that sword fight scene when we were studying fight choreography.

Oh, absolutely. It is such a classic sword fighting scene, and you don't get enough of those anymore and knowing that they how much time they put into that fight in order to pull it off those actual actors that they not there was like a stunt person for one flip in that fight and everything else was done by the actors themselves and they trained for months yeah and they they kill it's like academic stuff at this point textbook stuff at this point it is just this I like that rob Reiner said that the princess bride is a celebration of storytelling that is it's fun because it's such a generalized statement, but it makes sense for this because, and it was difficult to publicize,

it's difficult to nail down what this movie really is because it bridges so many different genres in one, down to the fact that it's also a time, it's a period piece that's set in real life because the only thing that really sets it in the 80s are the scenes of the narrator throughout. And so everything else is like, that could be at any time period. And it is, it's just, it's something that will, I always put a smile on my face. It is Comfort Food, the movie. Yes.

This is the ultimate sick day movie. And I mean, even you have a sick kid in the, like, it's so perfect for all of that. It just, it is something you can always go back to and enjoy and throw on while you're putting a puzzle together or curiously grabbing at yourself. Sure. I think it's, I think it also, it really comes. through Amy Boe? That so many, almost everyone involved,

was very respectful of the book that it came from, and also this movie in general, that everyone was trying to make the best movie they could. Jackie, and we can kind of start getting into it at this point, and it all starts with the book.

Haven't you, weren't you always trying to get me to read this book? Yes. Right? You love this book. I love this book. Speak,

speak towards that when you read it and why the book's so great? I think that it's such a great back and forth, especially in the book. It's a little bit, the narrator character is a little bit meaner towards the little boy, and I think that I was into that, and he was always kind of just, yes, that he's always like, you know, essentially like calling him a little fat kid. And I think that's why I weirdly identified with the book so much. But I love the idea because as a kid, I really thought that it was an abridged version of some other story that I had never read. And I was like, what is that?

Yeah, we'll talk about the framing device for the book. That was all lies. Yes. And I've never really looked into this before. And the fact that this movie was supposedly, it was almost made like six times before it actually got made. And it's fun to read about how many. how the generations of people that were also obsessed with this book

because I thought I was the only one. I thought it was mine. You know those things from a kid when you're just like, no one else knows about this and no one else cares about this except for me? And obviously that is not the case. Did you read the book before you saw the movie? No. I read the book afterwards.

Because I saw the movie, because this movie came out the year I was born. 1987, what? And I, so as kids, because also I've got to, two older siblings. I don't know if you guys know this. And we, so all three of us, even though there's a 13 years age gap, all three of us were obsessed with this movie as kids. Because again, it has everything in it.

And it does. It's multi-generational. Again, like you said, it's very timeless except for the Fred Savage part. So it's easy for all people to sort of connect to it, I think. Yeah, dog. Absolutely. Let's talk about old Bill, old Bill in 1916. And so our tale begins. Begins. Yes, 19703, this book was written by William Goldman. Goldman grew up in a Chicago suburb and went on to Oberlin College for a Bachelor of Arts.

Then he went off to the army to work as a clerk at the Pentagon due to his good typing skills. And after getting a Master of Arts in Columbia University in the mid-1950s, he lived with his brother, who was a playwright and screenwriter in NYC. and that is where he writes his first novel in less than three weeks called Temple of God and managed to get an agent through a mutual friend for this book and that agent got the book published through Knopf as long as he doubled the length of it.

Temple of God sells well enough in paperbook to launch his career. Goldman said the book like most of my books got crucified in hardcover and was a very, very successful book in paperback and kind of mirrors Princess Bride was not super successful in the theater, super successful on home video.

Most of the books that I've written Had their success in paperback Which is hilarious to me Because again, just like the movie So he and his brother Work on plays together through the 60s As he kept publishing novels as well And his first screenplay writing gig

Was an adaptation of the short story Flowers for Algernon That was the first play I ever acted in Sixth grade I was cast as an extra But in middle school plays You don't even get any touch In middle school plays

All the extras got lines Wait a second, you did flowers for Algernon the play in the sixth grade. In the sixth grade. It was six, seven, eighth graders. That's a choice to make. Sixth, seventh and eighth graders, right? Oh, you get the complexities. Oh, I see it.

No, no, no, sixth grade. That is where you do it. Well, my role was, it was, there was a park scene and they had to give us. Were you the bench? Yeah, right? No, it was man on blanket. All the, all the extras got sympathy lines that they would just make up for us. And my line was, shut up and sit down, stupid. That's so perfect for you.

That is perfect. Which I said, I believe, to Algernon. You got typecast. I wish I could see the VHS of this performance. A little newsy cap. Does it exist at your parents' household? They were very disappointed me, my parents. And that was not the last time, I'm sure.

Jackie, I can't believe I'm mentioning this movie yet again. This is a sign that you and I and Natalie, we all need to sit down and watch this movie, especially if you haven't seen it before. His first original screenplay was Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. You know what? He's good at it. I'll give it to the...

I will give this to him. He's pretty good at it. Butch Cassidy's Kid is so good, and we keep weirdly bringing it up. I forgot why it last came up in one of these... We've been tap dancing around it. I think that I guess that we should do it for an episode. Cool.

All right. So he did research for this for eight years to tell the story of the Wild West Outlaws. And this earned him and Oscar for best original screenplay. Goldman said I had two little daughters. I think they were seven and four at the time. And I said, I'll write you a story.

What do you want it to be about? One of them said a princess and the other one, a bride. I said, that'll be the title. That'll be the title. Okay, I mean, that's a little bit cliche for some girls. Yes, but you know, they're seven and four, you know. Okay, you know what? They need to figure

grow up. Yeah. That's what we say. It sounds like a seven and a four-year-old little girl needs to listen to some bikini kill. That's right. That's right. Learn, start learning.

Now, the full title, of course, is the Princess Bride, S. Morgon Stern's classic tale of true love and high adventure, the good parts version, written by William Goldman, which, again, I was duped as a child, thinking that there was another book,

which is exactly what, he wanted you to think. And he started out actually writing it as a straight-up fantasy novel, but it was writer's block that leads him, which started immediately, it started in the second chapter, which leads him to the idea of writing this abridged novel, he said,

and when that idea hit, everything changed. Tennessee Williams says there are three or four days when you are writing a play that the piece opens itself to you. And the good parts of the play. Yeah, a couple times. And can we for a moment? Natalie!

That was a jokeer smile on her. She's right now. It's disgusting. And as you can hear, Jackie's just sort of becoming a full-on caveman over it. She's ready for the story to unfold inside of me.

And the good parts of the play are all from those days. Well, the Princess Bride opened itself to me. I never had a writing experience like it. I went back and wrote the chapter about Bill Goldman being at the Beverly Hills Hotel

and it all just came out. I never felt as strongly connected emotionally to any writing of mine in my life. It was totally new and satisfying, and it came at such a contrast to the world I had been doing in the films that I wanted to be a novelist again. So again, S. Morgan Stern does not exist.

He lied to us. The book doesn't exist. You sound like you have still some anger about this. Maybe you need to work out in a therapy room. I remember going to the library. I must have been 11, and I was asking and I didn't understand what they meant. I was like, no, the book that this is based on,

I'd like to read the rest of it and I had to be schooled by a librarian which is fine that it's what they're supposed to do and I also enjoy that apparently in the introductions of the anniversary reprints of the Princess Bride, Goldman also goes into the details about these increasingly ludicrous fights with the S. Morgan Stern estate and the family lawyers

about him writing the Princess Bride so he continued to unfold this non-story just in the introductions of the reprints. But it also, it goes to show that especially a dude that has written a bunch of other very amazing things that even he knows that this novel was to him, his most precious work to date. He says, the high point of my writing was I didn't know what I was doing and Wesley was in the machine and the bad guy came in and killed him.

And until that moment, I never knew that was going to happen. and I got hysterical with tears. I've never had this before since. He explained of writing the book, after all these years of messing around with this, it's the only thing I ever did in my life that I thought was a successful day. Jesus.

And I just, because I love that he just wrote it and just came out of him, but he's like, I don't want him to die. Wait, no, I don't want him to die. And to the point, which is why I love that they keep that in the movie of like, wait a second, no, he can't be dead. Yeah, right. Maybe dead.

I think we also love that so much too because I love Fred Savage's little slight New York accent. Because if you look at the videotapes of when Henry and I were kid, we talked like this. And so we definitely talked a lot more like Fred Savage. Oh, they are buried. They are buried. Oh, man, I want to see those real bad. Don't worry, Natalie. One day we get to go and clean out mom's garage in the Florida heat and we will find the tapes.

I'm here for it. Oh, no. Now do we get to talk about my boyfriend? I am. Rob Ryder? Yes. I was, I read so many interviews of Rob Reiner. And I knew that he was the best.

But until getting into these interviews, what a humble man. Oh my God, you're getting like very around. I am, I think I'm in love with Rob Reiner. Yeah, well, paint the scene. Okay, Rob Reiner is spread out on the couch, half naked, maybe wearing a bouffant or something like that. You're cooking him a meal. What are we making for him? And how are we having sex with him?

Oh, it's going to be definitely some sort of roast. Oh, whatever he wants. He wants potatoes. He wants sour cream on his potatoes? Oh, yeah, I love the sour cream. And it all starts, I think, because my family, of course, being from Queens, were obsessed with all in the family growing up. And his character was the young buck, of course, that had the more liberal ideals.

And I think, and with the long hair and the big mustache, weirdly enough, very into it as a child. Interesting. And now is an adult reading through how I didn't read, I have not read one bad thing about Rob Reiner. Everything that I've read about him, everyone's just like, what an upstanding human being. What a good dude. He's just apparently just like the dad of the set, even from when he was young. He's not. He's his best friend.

I mean, how could he be? Of course he's great. I want to do a whole thing on Rob Reiner. I love you. I love you. I think he's very old. Yes. Oh, she'd lick those old balls and two clicks of a rat's tail.

Absolutely. Well, either way, let's stop talking about this imagery. It's upsetting me. Rob Ryder, born in the Bronx, with an actress mother and a world-renowned comedian father, Carl Reiner. Best known for his work on Ced Cesar's, Your Show of Shows, which we've talked about, of course, on the Mel Brooks, I'm sorry, rather the Young Frankenstein episode.

Yes. And the Dick Van Dyke Show as well. He, I believe, helped, he created that or co-created that. Either way, Reiner started out in acting in the 60s on TV shows like Batman and the Andy Griffin show. He got into writing on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. I love the Smothers Brothers. I love. I used to watch that as a kid.

And I couldn't believe that that was controversial. That show was actually heavily controversial. There's a book I have about it. They were doing all this counterculture stuff that I didn't even realize because it's so cheesy as like a, you know. I mean, most comedy is, if you think about it. It has to be controversial, because that's the point of comedy is that it's always, it should be boundaries all the time. And this was in 1968.

They had a huge issue with the censors on the television network. It was this crazy battle for them to just get things on the air and they were thrown off the air at some point. Either way, this is 1968 and his first writing partner is Steve Martin, which I think is fantastic. They were the two youngest writers on the show. Jackie, look at her lips over here. Ooh, they're my little roast. Ooh, yeah, so the two of them, you've got the two of them. You're in a ball pit at a shutdown McDonald's playhouse.

It's after hours, you guys snuck in. I just want them to write me the best character part of all time. That's really, I just want to trap them in the ballpit. Yes, in the ball pit. I'll be like, make me, give me what you have. Give me your juice. No, I don't mean that juice. Would you kiss them?

Yeah. Only if they wanted me to. Everybody was in agreement. Yes. Reiner was definitely a slice in the 1970s when he became known for his role as Archie Bunker's liberal son-in-law in the show All in the Family. Now, he had said, just about everything I've learned in making films I learned in the course of all in the family. What audiences laugh at, how you structure a play. Because to me, TV and film is theater.

He got into directing in the 1980s, starting with the mockumentary, rather. this is Spinal Tap and film that deserves an episode all in itself I just again almost every single person a part of this movie

all of the things that we are saying that are in italics in our notes I want to do an episode on each one of these things yeah this is Final Tap such a class

I mean Natalie I'm sure you're also a fan oh yeah if anyone out there hasn't watched this is Spinal Tap but you enjoy shows like the office you should check this movie out because it's kind of the beginning of a lot. Goes up to 11.

It's the blueprint for all of that stuff. And this review, it's just two words. Shit sandwich. I love this, this is Rital Tap. Then the comedy romance film, The Sure Thing, which I need to watch with John Cusack. Amazing. Yes. It's great.

And lastly, the coming of age film, one of my favorites of all time, stand by me. I mean, what a absolute beloved class. I love how challenging that movie is to a child too. And how important that kind of movie is for a kid. And those three movies are Rob Reiner's first three movies. That's crazy. Those three insane and knock him up apart. You think you better than me?

I think you're better than me? I mean, look at how happy he is. He's doing something right. Now, before you get into this next quote, Holdenow, I wanted to talk about the relationship between Carl Reiner, and Rob Reiner. Now obviously this is very important. Carl Reiner is Carl Reiner. Everybody knows him.

He's still alive, correct? He's like in his 90s. Yes. He's in his and he's written, I think he's written like 10 books in the past like 13 years. It's how you keep going. And again, it's Carl Reiner that he's best friends with Mel Brooks, not Rob. It's so hard to

distinguish both of them. Yeah, they're all old as fuck. Gross. Yes. But also Rob Reiner is friends with Mel Brooks as well because he grew up with them. Now, why did, so originally, Rob Reiner got the book, the Princess Bride, from his father. Now, why did Goldman send it to Carl Reiner in the first place? It's because they were friends. So legendary comedy writer and director Carl Reiner, whose play something different was included in Goldman's 1969 book The Season, a candid look at Broadway. The two men became friends.

And when he finished writing the Princess Bride, he sent it to my. dad, Rob Reinder remembers. So I read it and I thought, oh my God. And I know you've all had that experience when you're reading something and it's what you wish you could write. It's like somebody's in your head and voicing your feelings for you. I thought this was the most brilliant thing I'd ever read in my life. But his father, Carl Reiner, didn't really know what to do with it. Rob Reiner says, I don't even know if he ever read it or not, but he gave it to me because he knew I was such a big fan of Goldman's. So he had always tried to get his father's approval. Of course.

And he says, I was always and still am much more serious-minded and much more brooding and quiet and that kind of thing. My father's group of friends, Norman Lear included. So Norman Lear is a creator and executive producer of all in the family, right? He did a bunch of these sitcoms. Norman Lear also is one of the producers and gave the money to make Princess Bride. So Norman Lear is kind of his father figure as well as Mel Brooks and Larry Gelbart and Neil Simon. What company? I mean, what an amazing company.

to have. And he says, bucking a father who loves me dearly, but also can't see what abilities I have, and his being as visible as he was and as talented, as successful as he was, that's a real tough thing to get by.

When somebody who is as respected as much as my father doesn't give me the kind of encouragement that I might have to go ahead, that pretty much for most people, I think would be enough to say, okay, I'm not going to be doing this now as my living, you know,

because whatever it is you're going to do, you want your father or your parents to encourage it. Now, of course, my father's very proud of me. So this all comes from, so he gives him, Karowai in the book, Carra Ranis just, no thank you, gives the book to his son.

And that's when he reads the book when he was in his 20s. And Rob Reiner had this to say about reading the fucking book. Wow. I read the book. That's not what he said. When I was in my 20s

because I was a huge William Goldman fan. Then, after I had made a couple of pictures, Spinal Tap, and the Sure Thing, I started thinking of the Princess Bride. I very naively thought I could make a movie. Then I discovered that Frank Watrafant had tried and Norman Jewison had tried and Robert Redford had been involved. One after the other. No studio wanted to make a movie of the Princess Bride.

Nobody was interested in it. By the way, a lot of this comes from the EW oral history of the Princess Bride. Fantastic stuff. Check it out. Got to give credit where credit is due. The first time that the movie was almost made, it was like to the point that it was right before getting the green light. It was in the early 80s, and it was Richard Lester, who did a hard day's night. He was attached to direct it, and Christopher Reeve, at the height of his post-superman popularity, was going to play Wesley. Now, it shows you what Hollywood bullshit politics are, that it was the person that was the go-ahead of giving them the green light got fired over a weekend.

A bunch of people get fired. And then the whole thing went belly up. That is what happened. Yeah, that is something that happens constantly. You make it, even with TV networks, you make a deal with them, and then the entire board of directors gets fired, and then you just, it's gone. Which is why, so right before this, author William Goldman, had sold the film rights to the Princess Bride to 20th Century Fox for half a million dollars. And he also sold the right to write the screenplay himself. So that's when we will see that after all of these things falling through, Robert Redford, John Borman, who did excalibald, Apparently, I don't even know how to say,

Francois Truffat, the French new wave director, that he was so upset about it that Goldman buys the rights back because he didn't trust anybody to do the film properly, which is almost unheard of.

I'm going to say Christopher Reeve is not a pretty enough woman to play the Dreadpire Roberts. No, I think that he's not light enough, I feel like. Yeah, he's I mean, yeah. He's a big Hulkgo man. Yeah, exactly. Carrey Elvis is lith.

Ooh, he is lies. Yes, life is good with it. I want to have him like a little snake Roberts. All right. So either way, while making Standby Me, a Paramount Pictures executive, talks to Rob Reiner about what his next movie would be, and he requests the Princess Bride,

but was refused since other studios had tried and failed, as we just discussed, such as 20th Century Fox, paying Goldman $500,000, which we just discussed, all of that he's learning about on the set. Reiner said nobody was interested in it. We kept tearing the budget down.

I had to try to sell foreign rights and video rights. I had to cut my salary. I had to cut the cast salaries. It was crazy. I think we had like $16 million, which even at that time wasn't very much. In the script, it said, the Army of Florin, I had seven people in the Army of Florida. And also it goes to show of why Rob Reiner cast his friends. He's best friends with Billy Crystal.

He's best friends with Chris Gass. Then he's just like, can you guys like come and do this movie? for really cheap, yeah, for like almost nothing. And that's how we got so many, like, and in listening to them talk about it, and it is such a family-based set. We will get into that. They all immediately became family

because none of them were making really any money. And they were shooting out in the middle of nowhere for a lot of it. But it's just, it's just, you just have to be lucky enough that all of your close friends are world-class actors who will then come to your movie. And by the way, you're, your writer of the source material, this is so rare, has already won an Oscar, right? I believe we're at least nominated for his screenplay writing.

So, of course, Reiner and Goldman work very closely together on this screenplay, and it shows it is a great screenplay. Really, really fun. I love their relationship, and apparently when William Goldman passed, Rob Reiner had put out a tweet that said, Losing Bill Goldman made me cry. My favorite book of all time is the Princess Bride. I was honored he allowed me to make it into a movie.

I visited with him last Saturday. He was very weak, but his mind still had the Goldman Edge. I told him I loved him. He smiled and said, fuck you. And I did like, that's such a good little tag of what their relationship was. Love it. Love it. All right, this is where I get into casting.

And much like Young Frankenstein and Clueless, some of these other movies, it is such like a laundry list of names. And I'll try to be as brief as possible because there's so much to get through when it comes to these people. But some of the stories are great that I pulled from as. as you wish, about them getting this insane cast together. It is just incredible. Let's start with Carrie Owes, which is the, very early on, they, Reiner wanted Carrie to do the-

How soft do you think his hair is? How soft? Hmm. How soft? You could lay on it. Just to messle in and go to sleep. Yeah, I want to shave them, put it inside of my pillows. Ooh, yeah.

Okay, that's it. Tie up a little knots and tie little dolls. tie little doll heads to it. Yeah, of course. You know what, Wallace Sean, do you want to kiss me? So Mr. Elwiz gets the role of Wesley very early on based on his performance in a film called Lady Jane. Ladies, it sounds like you guys might need to check out Lady Jane.

Have you not already? I have, actually. And I love that Rob Reiner said about the movie. He said, that picture wasn't a comedy. I thought he certainly looks right. He resembles a young Douglas Fairbegg Studio. And he's so handsome and a terrific. actor, but I didn't know if he was funny.

And this is a very specialized kind of acting, where you have to be very real and earnest, but at the same time, there's a slight tongue and cheek thing happening, which, as we know, he definitely understands. And then reprises it and does it 10 times more in Robin Hood men and tights.

Yes. Yes. Which is probably my favorite Malbrokes movie. Yes. Hell yeah. So, yes, Carrie Elways came from an artistic family with members already in the film business. He went to the London Academy of Music and Dramatic arts before moving to the U.S.

to study acting at Sarah Lawrence College, as well as the actor's studio and the Lee Strasbourg Theater, so all the same places everybody studied who was in Young Frankenstein and Film Institute. And in the early 80s, studied under Al Pacino's mentor, Charlie Lawton.

But he made his acting debut in the British historical drama film Another Country before getting the role of Gilford, Guilford Dudley, and Lady Jane acting across from a very young Helen Abonham Carter, by the way, and that is, of course, what catches Reiner's eye. It was much more difficult, however, for them to find their buttercup. Now, what I do love, too, is that they, what, essentially what Rob Reiner did

was to convince people to be in this movie. So when Kerry always gets the ask that they're like, the director wants to come out and meet you, because he was in Berlin shooting something at the time. And Gary Elways loved the book, The Prince, Princess Bride. So when he sits down with Rob Reiner and his buddy, they're sitting down in Berlin. And, you know, like I said, Rob Reiner was nervous. He wouldn't be funny. So they ended up joking around about SNL for like an hour and a half. And then Rob Reiner gives him one of

Wesley's monologues. But Kerry always knew the tone and knew exactly what he wanted. He did half of the monologue. And Rob Ryder's like, stop, you're good. You got it. And then Carrie always like, do you want to go, like, get a drink or something? And they're like, no, no, we're getting on a plane to Paris. We got to go meet Andre the Giant. And so in my brain, it was just them going from place to place. Like, it made me think of, like, the Muppets. I was just, like, picking them up as they go along.

I'm like, of course I want to be a part of your merry band of gentlemen. I don't think it's that far off from the truth. I don't think so. I want that life. Please. Buttercup, much more difficult for them to find. Goldman said we had a terrible trouble finding a buttercup because she had to be so beautiful. We had all kinds of pretty girls come in, but they weren't this staggering thing.

Robin Wright was raised in San Diego and got into modeling at the young age of 14. She got into acting at 18 on the daytime soap opera Santa Barbara. This was her first feature film, but they do speak about how being in a soap opera, you really learn a lot about acting very fast because of the consistency of the work. Oh, yeah. It's like a nine to five acting job. Yeah. No, yeah, it says that in the credits at the end, and I actually didn't realize that at the time.

But it says, yeah, and introducing Robin Wright, who is a literal goddess. Yes. And especially with this quote, so they also did have casting director, Jane Jenkins, who says that this was still her favorite movie to cast. And so when Robin Wright came in, in the initial read, she was fine.

And when the callback, they asked her to do a British accent, And because her stepfather is British, she nails it. So when she went to go meet Rob Reiner and Goldman for the first time, that's when it felt like fate. Because Jane Jenkins explained that the teammate arrangements to meet at the director's house that weekend. She says, I will never forget this for as long as I live. The doorbell rang. Rob went to the door and literally, as he opened the door,

Wright was standing there in this little white summer dress with her long blonde hair, and she had a halo from the sun. She was backlit by God. And Bill Golden looked across the room at her and he said, well, that's what I wrote. It was the most perfect thing. That's amazing. Chris Sanderson, who played Prince Humberdink, said, Robin always had a very strong sense of herself. Sarandon, Chris Sarandon.

Oh, what did I say? Sanderson. Sanderson. Susan Sarandon's ex-husbandin, actually. Oh, interesting. I was wondering if there was any relation great. Chris Sarandon. He's such a great bitch face.

I know. What's I was saying to Henry last time we were watching it. I was like, it must kind of, it's like a double-edged sword of having a punchable face because then you have to play that part. But then at least you get past all the time. Yes. All the time. Just people need that.

Yeah. Sarandon, Chris Sarandon, who played Prince Humberdink, said, Robin always had a very strong sense for herself. And yet there was always a sense of mystery about her as well. I'm sure everybody fell a little bit in love with Robin on the shoot, whether we were attached or not. Yeah. Especially Carrie Elway.

Oh my God, they loved each other. Sarandon had done a bunch of Broadway TV and film before the Princess Bride, including as Dr. Tom Halverson in The Guiding Light. And Al Pacino's transgender wife and dog the afternoon, he keeps coming up in the show for no reason. What, Al Pacino? Yeah, Al Pacino, weirdly, keeps coming up. Oh, you all, my, oh, cocaine.

I know, guys, it's me. It's not Al Pacino, it's me. Oh, my God, thank you. Thank you for. dispelling the rumors that I was doing a podcast with Al Pacino. Let's talk about Mandy Patinkin for the loved Lord. I talk about another one. Talk about another one that if he said, Jackie, I want you to be with me for the

rest of my life. However, we got to go live in Antarctica. I say, well, I get to putting furs on me because I'm wearing a seal. And that's what I'm going to say. And I love seals. And I would wear a seal for him. And if he asked me to. Or even if he didn't ask you to.

If he didn't ask me to, if he just, if he just, you know, just a suit. If he said, come Jackie, he said, I'll put a seal on it. I'll put a seal on it. Yes. Mandy Pintin said, the moment I read the script, I loved the part of Enigo Montoya. That character just spoke to me profoundly. I had lost my own father. He died at 53 years old from a pancreatic cancer in 1972. I didn't think about it consciously.

But I think that there was a part of me that thought, if I get that man in black, my father will come back. I talked to my dad all the time during filming, and it was very healing for me. What a beautiful quote. I, and just like in reading through to where part of where he put his fierceness of studying the sword fighting before, and just thinking that in his brain, he really did. Ed even says, like, I know this kind of sounds silly, but his father died of cancer. And he's like, when I was fighting the six-fingered man, I was fighting his cancer. In my head, when I said, I want my father back, you son of a bitch.

He's like, I was in that moment to the point that apparently Christopher Guest was terrified of him. Because Grasman, like, I know that you are into it. I'm not cancer. I love you. We are friends because he just, he got that into it. Mandy Patinkin went to Juilliard and started out in musical theater playing Che in Evita, I believe in the first Broadway run for.

which he won a Tony Award in 1980. He then jumped to film with Yintel and Ragtime before doing the role of Venigo Montoya. I love to, if you watch any videos of him currently, there's this one interview, and he was being interviewed on a morning show, and all of a sudden, the dude that was interviewing him, one of them got up, and he's like,

I'm so sorry, I have to go. And he's like, is everything okay? Is everything all right? And he's like, my wife, she's about to give birth. I have to get to the hospital. And he just goes, Mausel, Mausel, oh my God, what are we doing here? Go, get out of here. And then the guy goes and he's like, I don't want to talk about the movie.

He's like, what a beautiful day. What a beautiful day for a baby to come into this world. Ah, Mazel, all I'm thinking about is how his life is going to change, that his life is going to change for the better. For the rest of his life, he's going to look at that kid and he's like just going on and on. And I just, I love Mandy Bidinkin so much. Isn't he also being super active with the Black Lives Matter? Yeah, yeah. Lexi pointed me into his Twitter.

Every day he's doing massive donations to a Black Lives Matter campaign. It's pretty amazing. So check out him on Twitter. It's very heartwarming over there. Can we talk about Wallace Sean? I'll do a quote in his own voice. I was not the first person they wanted for the part. Unfortunately, my agent at that time believed that it would be helpful for me to know

who they actually wanted, so he told me, it was Danny DeVito. Looking back on it, it didn't help. Danny is inimitable. Each scene we did, I pictured how he would have done it, and I knew. More list. I could never possibly have done it the way he could have done it. It made it challenging. I mentioned it to Danny since.

I said, you know, of everything that I have ever done since birth, the thing that is most well known is a part I had because you were unavailable. This is also throughout the book, he talks about how nobody wanted him, but everybody did. They had to convince him to play the part. It's ridiculous and he's so insecure about it. But he was so nervous about it. But it's so, what I love about that part is he was really, he didn't really necessarily understand the comedic part that they were asking him to do. So he was just very uncomfortable being like, I can't do a Sicilian accent.

And Rob Reiner was like, no, I just want you to talk. like yourself. Just do it. Yeah, which makes it so funny because why is this guy from like Brooklyn in this story, but it's so perfect. Well, it especially the fact that he is playing Vizidi the Sicilian, the man of dizzying intellect, which also makes sense. It actually makes even more since Danny DeVito, which I wish he could have just like realized he has a history degree from Harvard and studied philosophy and economics at Oxford. Yeah, I love that he initially planned to be a diplomat, but ended up just falling in. into playwriting in NYC, which led him to co-writing and starring in My Dinner with Andre,

which is like now a revered film, a classic film, alongside his collaborator, Andre Gregory. His film debut, however, was, and as Diane Keaton's ex-boyfriend in Woody Allen's Manhattan, in one of my favorite bits, definitely in a Woody Allen movie, but even maybe kind of of all time, the whole movie, she keeps mentioning how she has this ex-boyfriend that was just this sexual maniac, this dynamo, that just is like, like so mind-blowingly amazing in bed. It's just unbelievable. And then when Woody Allen finally meets him a person,

it's Wallace Sean. And he's like, and he's like, what? This guy? And it's so funny. Wallace Sean is always having to play like the character or the, like, he has the same part in sex in the city. Pretty much, yeah. In the end of the series where he's introduced to Candice Bergen

and she's just like, what is this disgusting troll? but then she falls in love with him. Yeah. And one of the things from shooting that I did want to bring up because I know that we're going to talk about Andre the Giant and I, uh, uh, Andre, I love him. You think he said, oh, this is my dinner with Andre the Giant?

Yeah, maybe he did. Maybe he did. Maybe he did. Apparently, Wallace Sean truly absolutely terrified of heights. And so during the cliff climbing sequence, he was having a lot of problems. So Mandy Patinkin said he was terrified of shooting the scene of climbing the 35-foot cliffs with Robin Wright and now deceased co-star Andre the Giant.

The actor's portion of the stunt was done very safely, of course. The cliffs were made of rubber. Andre was raised by a forklift, and the trio he was quote-unquote carrying were sitting on a custom-made three-pronged bicycle seat. He says, Wally was very nervous that day, that he was going to ruin the day's shooting because of his fear of heights. And there he was on this, in this medieval snugly on Andre's stomach. And he was really, quite frightened and Andre in his inevitable beauty just patted him on his head and on his back and he said don't worry I'll take care of you. How adorable is that? Also Wallace Sean chill out man you're not ruining anything. He's very, he's, that's why he was so good as Vizzini though. Oh yeah.

Exxiety ridden. So great. Goldman had always wanted Andre the Giant to play Fezic. Riner said I met him at a bar in Paris. Literally there's a landmass sitting on a bar stool. I brought him up to the hotel room to audition him. He read this three page scene and I couldn't understand one word. He said, I go, oh my God, what am I going to do? He's perfect physically for the part, but I can't understand him. So I recorded his entire part on tape exactly how I wanted him to do it. And he studied the tape.

He got pretty good. Yeah, because he is, he's from France. He's French. So he was nervous about his ability to say the English is. say to English is that's what they say. I implore you to watch Andre the Giant the documentary and it's on HBO.

It opened my eyes to so much about him. I do love this line that Jane Juggins, the casting director did say, if you didn't have to duck in the doorway of my office, there was no need for you to be there in talking about the auditioning for Andre the Giant because they originally wanted him.

He was supposed to do this wrestling event that they had paid him $5 million to do. And so when they called his age about it and like are you going to pay him five million dollars no then he's busy so they brought in arnold schwartzeneager because they really want arswordsenegger to do it then since they couldn't get andre the giant even though that's all rob bryaner wanted and then arnold swastonegger denied the part and then apparently since he had to get his back surgery he couldn't do the fight which is why andre the giant's like i guess i'll do you movie yeah i'll do it boss that's what he called everybody

Everybody boss. I think they were saying in the book as a means to disarm people so that they weren't intimidated by him to show that he was a gentle giant. And that's what he said. When asked about his favorite part of shooting, Andre said, nobody looks at me. Being just another actor on a set full of quirky talent where no one made issue of his height made the giant feel like he fit right in for once. Watch the documentary.

You will cry. Oh, multiple times. Ellis, Elway said he had this that thing you come across with people who were terminally ill where they have a secret most of us don't get they understand that life is precious and you have to cherish every moment he really imparted that to me he was so filled with life and fun and so sweet such a truly gentle soul i mean for a guy who could crush you like swatting a mosquito he was so incredibly gentle i made him tell me his whole his whole life story which is crazy by the way he grew up in a

Little Village in France, he couldn't fit into the school bus even when he was 12. And the only person in the village who had a convertible who could drive him to school was Samuel Beckett, which I think is another movie, waiting for Andre. I love their friendship. He and Kerry always continued their friendship after shooting this movie was over, and they would go out getting hammered in New York. And imagine how much. I think there is some, does there a story about how many beers he had to drink?

It's crazy. A hundred beers in a single sitting. He said his daily concerns. Consumption consisted of an entire case of beer, three bottles of wine and two bottles of brandy And apparently afterwards, Carrie always said they were getting hammered in New York and he's like, do you notice this dude that keeps following us? And he goes, yeah, that's an undercover cop. And he's like, why? Why are we being followed? He's like, ah, last time I was in New York, I got so drunk, I fell over and I hurt somebody. So now they do it for insurance purposes. But he was in really bad health during this movie. And like he couldn't do the wrestling match because of his back. But he was. also, I mean,

Dionism is a really, you have a lot of health problems. And he liked to drink. Because your organs don't stop growing. Yeah. And so like a lot of the scenes where he was doing catching or having people on his back and stuff, he really couldn't do it.

Even that final scene when they're riding on horseback, like one unfortunate thing is knowing what I know now, it's like kind of, it's almost painful to watch him. And a lot, even that final riding away on horseback scene, I'm just like, oh, I know that really hurts. Well, a lot of it is, there's a lot of doubles for him, including, and if you see the wide shots, you can definitely tell it's a double. He's a normal size, you're not normal, he's a, he's a regular size person.

Whenever he's doing the, like him and Carrie Alas are doing their fight scene. And also that scene where he catches Princess Buttercup was a huge problem for him. Like, it really hurt him. Yes. Yeah, so they had to lower her down on wires. Yeah. As we said, he grew up in France, but he got into professional wrestling at the age of 18 in Paris and starting getting a name for himself in Eastern Europe as well as Australia, New Zealand, and Africa, and then Japan, where he was billed

as Monster Rousamoff. Rousamov was his last name. Wrestling in Canada got the attention of Vince McMahon Sr. And his worldwide wrestling federation and had him change his name to Andre the Giant. And quickly, he became a fan favorite in the 1970s and 80s. Boo, Vince McMahon, boo! Booh! Watch the doc.

Booh! I love that boo woman in the movie, by the way. Carol Kane. Henry said we want to start an app where you can send that woman to people's houses who you want to shame. It was Christopher Gast who played Count Tyrone Rougan. He studied acting at Tisch School of the Arts,

then performed in theater and NYC, as well as on the National Lampoon Radio Hour, which we talked about during our Gilda Radner episode, which led to getting cast as Nigel Tufnell in This Is Spinaltap, a role he would become quite famous for, probably the first role he became famous for. and he's great in this film as Super Evil Dude. Also, you have Billy Crystal who says,

Rob said, you could have fun with this. Do you want to do it? I said, you bet. It was such a perfect little cameo to play. I met with my makeup artist, Peter Montagna, who had done all these characters with me on Saturday Night Live. And I said, I want him to look like a cross between my grandmother and baseball legend Casey Stingle. Also, look up a picture of Casey Stengel.

He looks just. like him. It's insane. He said that for three days straight and 10 hours a day, this is what Carrie always said in his book, Billy, oh, this is talking about the actual scene that they did together. That they did together. Billy improvised 13th century period jokes, never saying the same thing or the same line twice. And apparently there's so many jokes that were not fit for a family-friendly film that were all blue jokes and that is how which I think that most people have heard this story that's how Mandy Pintin actually hurt himself on set was because he couldn't stop laughing

that he bruised a rib that he was being so disgusting with his I love that it too it's 13th century humor that almost everything that they say the New York accent yes is improvised and so their bromance goes back to All in the Family because Billy Crystal was brought on to do a bit part because Norman Lear had seen him at the comedy store and they just

immediately hit it off I think I'd want to do a whole episode just on their love for each other because apparently Billy Crystal and Rob Reiner are just bosom buddies and that makes me smile. Crystal and Christopher guest were actually classmates

at NYU. Crystal also studied at the HB Studio, which we mentioned in our Young and Frankenstein episode, and was in a comedy trio in NYC, and later struck out on his own in stand-up. Crystal became known for his characters and impressions

performing on SNL and the Tonight Show as well as playing Jody Dallas on Soap, one of the first unambiguous gay characters on an American television series. His first film role, another crossover for this episode, was in Joan Rivers' rabbit test, which we talked about on the Joan Rivers episode,

and he made a brief appearance in This Is Spinal Tap as well. Of course he has a supporting role for his cameo, one of the not complete without mentioning Carol Kane, the wonderful Carol Kane. God, I love her so much. She played Valerie, the wife of Miracle Max, who is Billy Crystal's character. Kane became known for her roles in films such as Dog Day Afternoon,

which is the second time I'm mentioning that, Annie Hall and her role as the wife of Andy Kaufman's Latka in the TV series Taxi. And obviously Adam's family values. Yes. Her most famous role. Kane said, Billy came over to my apartment in Los Angeles

and we took the book and underlined things and made up a little more backstory for ourselves. We added our own twists and turns and stuff that would amuse us because there's supposed to be a long history. Who knows how many hundreds of years Max and Valerie have been together, which is that's just so fun to think about. Like, how fun would that be to be in a fly in the wall while Carol Kane and Billy Crystal? Especially that Rob Reiner had essentially said to both of them

You're in the rubber So do what you want talking about Because they had to wait for so long to get all the makeup put on It is such a little encapsulated sequence I bet you they just had free rain Like they kind of just got to do whatever they wanted in that little room Oh yeah You just said have fun storming the castle

That was improvised As was don't go swimming for an hour A good hour a lot of stuff They just let them go bananas A little mutton, letton, sent a tornado. Didn't they have to replace Elways on the bed with a body double because he was laughing so hard?

Yes, and they also, Rob Reiner kept having to also leave the set because he kept ruining takes because they were laughing so hard. But also what I love is that watching it now, that's the same thing like you had just said, Holden, watching it now, I'm like, man, what I would give to hear

the blue shit he was actually saying, that apparently he did this long rant about how his nephew got caught with a sheep, like, while he's trying to, like, wait, but, like, he needs more time. So he's just riffing about what his nephew did with the sheep and how he felt about it, and then what he did with the sheep. And then, like, this whole, like, 10-minute monologue about sheep-fucking. And that didn't make it, huh?

No. Surprisingly. And I was going to say, I mean, I feel like that's the cast that I covered. There's others, of course. This is a big cast film. Those are the, I mean, but I, yeah, that's, that's my coverage of our cast. I wanted to talk about that sword fighting y'all's. Oh, quickly, can I give honorable mention to the albinoc guy?

Yeah, yeah. Like, again, didn't mention him because I was just like there was so much to cover. We're just doing the big ones. He's fantastic. He's so good. Yeah, I believe that is his name. He's fucking hilarious. I briefly mentioned the boo witch lady in the dream who's one of my favorites ever.

and I want somebody to follow me around and do that. Oh no, Peter Cook was the, um, knowledge. Again, him, Mary. Yeah, he's amazing. Also the, um, the, we were both laughing a lot,

last night at the red-haired, um, like, minion guy of Prince Humberdink. He's great in it with one who's holding the key. There's, everybody in the movie is just so fucking good. All those little parts, it really make the whole thing so fantastic.

Mel Smith is the person that plays the albino. The history's fair. Yeah. So let's talk about the sword fighting. It is such a big part of this film. Again, like studied in classes and whatnot. The fight between Wesley and Enigo is described in the script simply as the greatest sword fight in modern times. That's what band to recreate.

Batinkin said, I knew that my job was to become the world's greatest sword fighter. I trained for about two months in New York. And then we went to London and Carrie and I trained every day that we weren't shooting for four months. there were no stuntmen involved in any of the sword fights except for one flip in the air, which is incredible. Well, yeah, there's a couple of scenes that are obviously gymnasts, but the rest of it. Elway said, Mandy and I got so good at both left and right-handed fencing that by the time we showed the sequence to Rob, we'd gotten too fast, and the fight was over very quickly

in a couple of minutes. Rob went, that's it? You guys have to go back at that some more. I love it. So to help the actors appear ambidextrous, because both of them start off fighting with their left hand and then they go, hey, not offended. Apparently, two identical but mirrored sets were constructed to make it appear that the pair were just as good with their other hand. So the entire time, so they did only study with their right hand because both of them are right-handed actors. So, but that's to the point that not only they had studied for like six months, as well as built-to. two separate sets to make it the greatest sword fight of all time. Again, Rob Reiner was so ready. He wanted to make this movie as perfect as possible according to the book. I love it too that in talking about the Christopher Guest, the fight with the six-fingered man as well, I said this earlier that Christopher Gess was actually scared of Mandy Patinkin. But what I do love this,

and it makes me think of all the times on set and in thinking about transferring over to when you're doing comedy on stage versus comedy on a camera. Apparently, Christopher Guest said, I was so into it. I was making the sound of the sword hitting the other sword. I was doing the chink, chink, chink, chink, because that's what you do when you're a kid. And Rob said, cut, you don't need to do that. We'll add it later.

We're going to put you in the sound of the swords later. So funny. By the way, shout-outs to their instructors, Bob Anderson and Peter Diamond, who both worked with actors for the original Star Wars trilogy, which I think was one of the cooler facts that I learned from this. Also, Christopher Guest, I guess, was stabbed in the thigh during rehearsal. He got the crap beaten out of him in this movie. And he loved it.

Oh, I'm sorry, actually, it was Christopher Guest who would later beat the crap out of Elways with the butt of his sword. Yes, and he actually knocks him out. Actually knocks him out when he hits him with the butt of his sword, and now I can't see that scene in the same way anymore. But let's talk about the filming, sword-fighting aside. The whole thing was shot around Great Britain and Ireland, including the Brunham beaches and other fantastic places. I love the scenery of this film. I'd love to go.

I'd love to do a Princess Bride, like, location trip. I mean, just even listening to his reminiscing about when they were shooting in London. So Rob Render sat down for this interview talking to a dude that was British. And he goes, hi, you know, I spent some time in London when I was making the Princess Bride. and he said, says Reiner, before he even sat down looking as content as a bear, we're calling an especially satisfying Honeypot. He says, that was a great experience. We were shooting in Haddon Hall, which was built in 1086.

And I'm sitting there with Chris Guest and Mandy Patinkin. And we start singing that old rock and roll song, What's Your Name? You know, was your name? Little girl, what's your name? And he says, we were singing, What's Your Name, in three-part harmony, in this echoy old hall. I'm thinking, a thousand years ago, did anybody ever think we would be here doing this?

It was such a surreal moment. Guests said every day was really movie camp. There are a lot of times when you're on a movie on location, you're kind of a loner and you stay in your room. This was an uncommonly friendly gang of people. And Reiner even rented a house in England near the sites of shooting to have folks over for meals and get-togethers, which created this family-style atmosphere.

Everybody just hanging out. Yes, Robin Wright said, you know, we would go over to Rob's house. They would cook, they would cook dinner, and somebody would pull out a guitar and start singing songs. Rob would sing. It was a real family, and we laughed so much. Well, in the book, according to Garay-Elwis, they did that because the food was really bad where they were. Because they were out in the middle of, like, you know, the countryside. So Rob Reiner got a habachi and he would make hot dogs and hamburgers and make food for everybody.

And I have got some quotes just in general, as well, Rob Reiner as a director on set and Billy Crystal said, the only problem with Rob is that he's too good of an audience so he laughs and no ruin takes. You have to tell him, go home. You'll see it tomorrow. He is the greatest ear for comedy of any director I've ever worked with.

Mandy Patinkin said he's a real actor's director. He's an actor and he loves actors. He takes care of you. Also, the confidence that he gives you where you feel like you can try anything. There's nothing you wouldn't try that he suggested. It's an incredible trust.

And he says, I'll never forget. Rob said to me, what I really want the actors to do in this movie is, as though they're holding their card, their poker cards in their hand, but they're just hiding one card. And the one card was the twinkle in their eye. The one card was the fun they knew was underneath everything they were saying. And I never forgot that image, that there was always a little secret. And that secret was the fun.

Yeah, whatever. That's kind of weird. I like it. I like that there was a... Because even in such a secret. Because it does weirdly, though, make sense. You look at it and they're all acting it so seriously, but in such a way that you know that it's funny,

except for that scene, especially, between Mandy Patinkin and Christopher Guest. Because it makes me think, like, it did remind me, I remember when, I mean, not to bring this up right now, but we're talking about the actual book and not the person. Like the not my daughter, you bitch in Harry Potter with Mrs. Weasley. Yes. That's the only curse in the entire movie.

And that moment is so upsetting and it's so satisfying. Oh, yeah. Definitely. It's cathartic. That you needed that wink of fun, but you also needed that seriousness as well. You needed a real actor. Yeah. Two real actors to be able to do that.

No, but I really feel like that's one of the overla themes that really makes this movie good for audiences to watch is the resilience and the characters. Like that character was stabbed in the gut And he just getting the more he wants to To avenge his father The more he wakes himself back up His name is a Nigel Maudea Prepare to die It's very inspiring and passionate

Also I wanted to mention quickly about that scene I thought maybe that that was a set Because the room is so cool and interesting But that's actually a real place in Kent That they shot that is a castle With that fireplace on the ground That huge firework That's real

That I want one of those now It's awesome. All right I want to go. One day while on break from shooting, Elways took an ATV ride around the countryside and ended up breaking his big toe, which he hid from production. And actually, you know who he was on the ATV ride with? Andre the Giant. I just guessed that. I guessed it. Yes. So in the scene in which he's disguised as the Dred Pirate Roberts and he tells Buttercup that life is pain and as he stands up, you can actually see him leaning on his right leg because of that injury with the hit from everyone. Anybody that says otherwise is trying to sell you.

something. Anything else you have on the filming before we talk about music and the film's release? I just, I really love that everyone was so into it to the point that they didn't use a whole lot of stunt people for it. That when he, when Elie's jumps into the quicksand and the fire swamp, he did that stunt. That's wild, man. It really's crazy. Yes, there's a trapdoor underneath a layer of sand.

And then there was foam padding underneath. So originally the direction called for Wesley to jump in feet first after Buttercup. But Elway's argued that this wasn't particularly heroic. So switching up the direction was a risky move. If the trap door wasn't opened at exactly the right instant, Elie's wrist hitting his head into the floor or breaking his neck. And so first they did, of course, have the stunt double do it first to show him how to do it properly. And then he did it on the first take.

So what you see in the movie is him trying that for the first time. is honestly often the role of the stunt double to do the scene up a few times before the actor if the actor wants to do it which can turn both ways sometimes the actor's ego makes them want to do a scene that they cannot do but i think al-wez was fully capable of doing that so worked i know and also that andre the giant apparently it was always cold and robin wright was always cold so when buttercup is kidnapped on the derby shire moors and right couldn't stop shivering always recalls how Andre, sweetheart of a man that he was, would use one of his hands as a hat on top of Robin's head.

Oh, yeah, because he was very hot all the time. Yes, so she said it was like having a giant water bottle on top of her head that would warm her up. That's amazing. And you just look at his man, his hands. Well, Ryder said he always looked forward to seeing him on set every day because he would get a handshake with him and he would just watch his hand disappear at Andre's hand.

thought it was so cool. And Carrie Elwis says to Google the image under the giant beer can to see how insane his hands are. Nuts. Last thing I will say is all I can think about in that quicksand scene is whoever's holding the trap door and the cold sweat they must have been breaking out into. Terrified. Because at that point, at that point of the movie, he couldn't get hurt.

They didn't have the money for him to get hurt, which is also why he hid breaking his toe because he knew that they didn't have the money and he was worried that he was going to lose the job. Right. So the music, of course, done by Mark Knopfler of Dyer Straits. It's not a bad song. It's maybe not for everybody. Dyer Straits, money for nothing.

We are the sultans of Swin. We're just like the Dyer Straits. Absolutely. He did it on the one condition that the baseball cap Reiner's character wore and this is Spinal Tap be seen in Fred Savage's character's bedroom. which he later said he was just joking about. But Reiner did manage to get a replica of it made since he no longer had it.

It's because Mark Knopfler was obsessed with This is Spital Tad. Also on Fred Savage's wall, we noticed last night is a very weird demonic Santa Claus. Yeah. Oh yeah. Check out.

Yeah, yeah. I really love the set deck of his room. I think they had a lot of fun with it. And also, which I didn't realize. And it does make me sad because I feel like it should have been up for more that the storybook love. which was written and performed by Willie DeVille and Mark Knopfler.

It was nominated for an Academy Award. It was nominated for an Academy Award. It was the only nomination that they got. It was for Best Original Song and it lost to, which does make sense, I've had the time of my life from Jeremy Dancing. Of course. Well, yeah.

Yeah, I mean, because it's not the best song I understand. It's almost like they had the theme and then they just put some words on top of it quickly. But if you think of, but the rest of the music is all offshoots of the song. just done with like synthesizers in different ways throughout the rest of the movie. And it was in it that way though? Isn't it the reverse that they put, they made the themes?

And then he just like put words on it. Yes, pretty much. I think it's really what happened. And I understand why not to call him out again, why Jeff was like, I never realized, I heard this song. But it's because I would watch it on VHS and I would watch it all the way through and I liked the song so I would always leave it on. And he had never really listened to it before, which is why he was making,

fun of it. Wow. Divorio. Divorce. Yeah. Their love is like a story book story. I love this quote

from Mandy Patinkin. It makes me cry. I don't know if it made me cry, but we'll see. It makes me lie. Oh, no. I've got another one that made me cry about

also by Mandy Patinkin I think it's a different one. He's so great. I just love him. But he said this. I'll never forget the first screening. Everyone came to L.A. on their own dime to see a rough

cut. Gilda Radner was there with Gene Wilder, Mel Brooks was there, all these people Rob grew up with. I sat with my wife watching the film and at the end I was crying. My wife said, what's the matter? I said, I never dreamed I would get to be in anything like this. I love Mandy Patinkin. Apparently he said he watched the, this was a recent interview, he watched the movie again.

And his last words, I've been in the revenge business so long. Now that it's over, I don't know what to do with the rest of my life. And he hurt them quite differently. He says, as a young man, I think I was in a bit of the revenge business for too many years of my life. And, you know, somewhere in the past 10 years, I stopped being so angry and started being a little more grateful, literally for the sunrise and the sunsets and my kids and my family and the gifts I've been given. And then I saw that movie, the end of the movie. I didn't see the whole thing.

I just caught the end of it. And I heard that line. And as a young man, I remember saying it. I went back and looked at my script to see what notes I'd put in and really didn't have any notes. for that line. I just said it. And I didn't realize what I was saying. And then I heard it as a grown-up or whatever you want to call me. And it means everything to me today.

And I love that. I love that he, like, in going back. And the fact that he kept the script, which that's so cool. Yeah. So the weird thing is, and I did not realize this, is always one of those weird hindsight things. They're like, how? This movie did not do all that well in the box office.

And Rob Reiner had this to say about it. The studio never knew how to market it. We literally never had a trailer. They tried to sell it as a zany comedy. I remember having this conversation with Barry Diller, who was the head of Fox at the time. I was screaming at him. I said, Barry, I don't want to have a Wizard of Oz.

Because when the Wizard of Oz came out, it was a disaster. Nobody liked it. And it didn't do well. But I'll never forget what he said to me. He said, Rob, don't let anybody ever hear you say that. You'd be so happy to have a Wizard of Oz. He was right, of course. It takes time sometimes for these kinds of oddball movies to find an audience.

But an audience, it would find. Definitely is... Especially with John Gotti. Apparently many years ago, the Princess Bride director, Rob Reiner, was out at a restaurant in Little Italy. When in walked Gotti and a crew of six henchmen, Reiner finished his meal and walked outside, coming across one of the wise guys standing in front of a limo. Hey, the mobster yelled at Reiner. You killed my father.

Prepare to die. Then he chuckled and said, the Princess Bride. I love that movie. And it was John Gotti. That is the only time to hear from that guy and then you don't immediately start running. Yes, exactly. But I think you speak towards something so important about the enduring quality of this film and that is that it is so damn quotable to the point where I have a quote from so many of the people involved in this film about how much people quote the lines film. It is really fantastic. But Tinkin says, not a day goes by where somebody doesn't come up and ask, can you say the line?

And I say it with the greatest joy in the world. I'll often whisper it into a little kid's ear, so he's not looking at my face. So he just hears my voice, because I don't want to mess up the magic. I love Mandy Petit. Maybe don't get too close to the kids. Yeah, but he's such a jolly man.

He loves his kids. I know. I love this from Carol Kane to have a different perspective on it. Every time someone says to me, aren't you the one from the Princess Bride? I have to think several times about how I feel about being recognized.

Because I think I was like 36 or something. at the time we made it. And I think, what does this mean? Am I growing into that face? Is Valerie creeping into my everyday face now? I'm always honored, but I'm also like, hmm, how should I feel about this? I think is so good. And then while the Sean, my heart goes out to him.

It's safe to say that three days don't go by without somebody shouting and conceivable to me in the street. Many of them not particularly imagining that anyone else on earth had ever thought of doing it before. It's like when people find out that my initials are JZ. And they're like, like JZ, like JZ. and I'm just like, yep. What else do you say about that? Yes.

Yes, indeed. Billy Crystal is the last one I have for this. I think every time I'm out, someone will either say to me, you look marvelous or have fun storming the castle. And when I get, have fun storming the castle. And they ask for an autograph. I know they're special people. So I'll use my best pinmanship.

I do love that the gasses openly against a sequel. William Goldman started writing it and also against a reboot as well. Yeah, I can just leave it alone. Leave it alone. This is not the one. I don't know how I feel, but William Goldman was working on a version of the Princess Pride, the musical, since 2006. Last year, apparently, they are getting it up on a.

its feat and it was supposed to come out this year, but of course this year is over. So I don't know if it is going to end up happening. And I also don't know how I feel about it. I only support it if the only song in it is your love is love and they just do it every 10 minutes of me. I would be fine with that. I think it made to the point that people are begging, begging for it to be over. So I do enjoy the fact that I think a lot of people, when they talk about reboots and stuff

like that, the people that were in the original, like, you know, I guess we'll have to say, all of them are like, no. No, no, no, no. Please don't do that. Begging that, like, that if William Goldman was still alive, that if he could write it, I guess it would be fine. But even actor Carrie always says there's a shortage of perfect movies in this world. It would be a pity to damage this one.

Oh, like her boobies. Yeah. Like her boobies. I love it. All right. I think that's our episode on the Princess Bride. Check us out on Patreon. Patreon.com forward slash page 7 podcast.

You can find me on Twitch with Jackie on Friday nights, Twitch.tv, forward slash, holdonators ho. Fantastic stuff going on over there. And by fantastic, I mean drunk. Natalie. Yes. We're at page 7 LPN and I'm at the Natty Jean. And check out all the episodes of Trulville up on YouTube.

Nice. And I'm Jackie Zabrowski. And please check out if you wish, as you wish, inconceivable tales from the making of the Princess Bride and telling you, the audiobook is amazing. And watch that Andre the Giant documentary. It will make you cry. I love you guys.

You can follow me on Instagram but Jack That Worm and we will talk to you next week. Bye everybody. This show is made possible by listeners like you. Thanks to our ad sponsors. You can support our shows by supporting them. For more shows like the one you just listened to, go to

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