WEBVTT - Weirdhouse Cinema: Psycho Beach Party 0:00:03.080 --> 0:00:06.120 Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:13.440 --> 0:00:16.200 Hey you welcome to Weird House Cinema. This is Rob 0:00:16.320 --> 0:00:19.040 Lamb and you know, at this very moment Joe is away. 0:00:19.120 --> 0:00:22.960 So I reached out once more to Seth Nicholas Johnson 0:00:23.040 --> 0:00:26.320 of Rusty Needles Record Club to discuss a film here 0:00:26.360 --> 0:00:28.880 on Weird House Cinema. Seth, welcome back to the show. 0:00:29.080 --> 0:00:31.360 Thank you for having me again, Always happy to return. 0:00:31.840 --> 0:00:35.639 Now, this is an interesting pick. This is not a 0:00:35.640 --> 0:00:38.400 film that I was familiar with at all. It is 0:00:38.640 --> 0:00:41.720 I guess you might describe it as an overlooked Jim 0:00:42.320 --> 0:00:47.000 the Year two thousand's Psycho Beach Party, a wonderfully campy 0:00:47.200 --> 0:00:51.159 comedy that takes the nineteen sixties beach Party movie by 0:00:51.200 --> 0:00:55.080 way of a little seventies horror and uses this to 0:00:55.480 --> 0:00:59.080 like a send up of gender norms, pop culture, astro turfing, 0:00:59.160 --> 0:01:03.400 of diverse Russian and more, while also just firmly committing 0:01:03.520 --> 0:01:06.440 to laughs. Seth, I had never even heard of this 0:01:06.520 --> 0:01:09.560 film before you brought it up in email. Could you 0:01:09.640 --> 0:01:11.000 share your history with this film? 0:01:11.000 --> 0:01:11.720 Like? Where did you? 0:01:11.880 --> 0:01:13.679 Where did you learn about this? Because I feel like 0:01:13.720 --> 0:01:15.920 this is one that it doesn't seem like it was 0:01:15.959 --> 0:01:19.080 appreciated as much when it came out, and it seems 0:01:19.080 --> 0:01:21.600 like it was ahead of its time, and it doesn't 0:01:21.800 --> 0:01:24.679 seem like it has the cult following it deserves. 0:01:25.120 --> 0:01:28.000 Agreed, Agreed on all counts. I have to give all 0:01:28.040 --> 0:01:30.920 credit to my wife. Back when her and I were 0:01:30.920 --> 0:01:34.560 first dating, we were living down in Los Angeles, and 0:01:34.640 --> 0:01:36.280 she told me how much she loved this movie. I 0:01:36.319 --> 0:01:39.039 also had never heard of it, and so on a 0:01:39.120 --> 0:01:41.640 date one night, we went on a little DVD hunt. 0:01:41.720 --> 0:01:43.679 We had to scour Los Angeles trying to find a 0:01:43.680 --> 0:01:47.200 copy of this. We eventually found a copy at one 0:01:47.200 --> 0:01:49.880 of the best record stores that ever existed in Meba Hollywood, 0:01:50.480 --> 0:01:54.000 And yeah, we watched it, and it immediately became just 0:01:54.160 --> 0:01:57.160 a perennial household favorite of ours, and we just watched 0:01:57.200 --> 0:01:59.840 it whenever we had the chance. And yeah, I have 0:01:59.920 --> 0:02:02.080 to ask her where she first heard of it, too, 0:02:02.200 --> 0:02:06.440 because this does seem like a chain of like, all right, 0:02:06.480 --> 0:02:09.760 who's the one person who knew someone who was like, 0:02:09.800 --> 0:02:12.680 you know, a grip on the movie, who told their 0:02:12.800 --> 0:02:15.720 friend and it just kind of continued on. But yeah, 0:02:16.000 --> 0:02:18.200 I mean, honestly, there's there's quite a few people of 0:02:18.440 --> 0:02:21.160 note in this film too, So maybe that's kind of 0:02:21.360 --> 0:02:24.880 where she first came across it, but I'll ask her later. 0:02:25.600 --> 0:02:27.600 Yeah, yeah, yeah. There are a number of folks that 0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:29.720 are very talented folks in here that went on to 0:02:29.800 --> 0:02:33.920 some really great things. And also, I guess depending on 0:02:34.040 --> 0:02:39.840 how connected or into the off Broadway and ultimately Broadway 0:02:40.400 --> 0:02:43.280 a scene of the eighties and nineties you happen to be, 0:02:43.560 --> 0:02:45.760 you also might have a leg up on knowing about 0:02:45.760 --> 0:02:48.760 this movie. I guess the other main thing that might 0:02:48.840 --> 0:02:51.480 draw folks into this particular film is that it is 0:02:51.560 --> 0:02:55.440 a parody of sixties beach movies, and we're gonna have to, 0:02:55.560 --> 0:02:58.800 I think, unpack that for a lot of listeners. So 0:02:58.840 --> 0:03:00.720 we certainly have listeners out there who know the way 0:03:00.720 --> 0:03:03.800 around sixties beach movies. But I think even if you 0:03:03.840 --> 0:03:07.000 haven't watched a lot of them, you probably have some 0:03:07.240 --> 0:03:09.400 idea of what we're talking about here. There are a 0:03:09.480 --> 0:03:15.639 lot of common elements. Bikinis, romance, oftentine romance, there's comedy, 0:03:15.680 --> 0:03:19.720 there's surfers, there's rock and roll. Occasional appearances by other 0:03:19.760 --> 0:03:23.680 subsets of youth culture, you know, so pre hippie generally 0:03:23.720 --> 0:03:27.280 with beat nicks and greasers, maybe some bikers and more 0:03:27.800 --> 0:03:31.520 and Seth, I'm delighted that you have done a much 0:03:31.600 --> 0:03:36.200 deeper dive into the world of beach movies. Give us 0:03:36.240 --> 0:03:39.000 a little primary here on the beach movie so we 0:03:39.000 --> 0:03:43.240 can better appreciate what is being lampooned and subverted in 0:03:43.320 --> 0:03:43.880 this picture. 0:03:44.600 --> 0:03:47.480 Not too long ago, I went on quite the beach 0:03:47.560 --> 0:03:49.800 movie binge. I'm not sure kind of what got it 0:03:49.840 --> 0:03:52.600 in my head, but I decided that, like this entire 0:03:52.720 --> 0:03:56.120 genre was unexplored territory for me, and so I decided 0:03:56.160 --> 0:03:58.520 to watch them all. And first of all, there is 0:03:58.560 --> 0:04:03.320 a very specific, i guess, cinematic universe of beach movies 0:04:03.800 --> 0:04:07.960 that are primarily focused on the actors Frankie Avlon and 0:04:07.960 --> 0:04:11.640 an Nett Funicello. And I literally think if you pull 0:04:11.720 --> 0:04:13.960 up the Wikipedia page on this, it's probably something like 0:04:14.000 --> 0:04:18.279 twelve movies. And they just keep going and going and going, 0:04:18.640 --> 0:04:23.160 and they are so much better and so much stranger 0:04:23.400 --> 0:04:26.200 than I thought they would be. So, for example, here's 0:04:26.240 --> 0:04:29.240 the few of my favorites. There was one called Pajama 0:04:29.279 --> 0:04:33.440 Party from nineteen sixty four Tommy Kirk Old Disney actor 0:04:33.480 --> 0:04:35.919 favorite you know from like you know Old Yeller and 0:04:35.960 --> 0:04:39.680 many other hits. He plays a martian named Go Go 0:04:40.320 --> 0:04:43.880 who he is in an advanced scout for a Mars invasion, 0:04:44.400 --> 0:04:46.440 and of course he has to kind of disguise himself 0:04:46.480 --> 0:04:48.720 as like a local teenager and he kind of learns, 0:04:48.800 --> 0:04:51.960 you know, the fun of like being an earth teenager 0:04:52.000 --> 0:04:55.280 at the beach, and that ultimately, you know, dissuades him 0:04:54.960 --> 0:04:59.000 from destroying the Earth. Another one which I think a 0:04:59.040 --> 0:05:01.680 lot of people have heard of. It's such a ridiculous title. 0:05:02.600 --> 0:05:06.080 It's called Doctor Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine. This is 0:05:06.080 --> 0:05:09.279 from nineteen sixty five, still the same film series. It 0:05:09.360 --> 0:05:12.640 stars Vincent Price as a mad scientist and he builds 0:05:12.640 --> 0:05:16.560 an army of female robots to rob rich, gullible men, 0:05:17.000 --> 0:05:19.560 and of course that ties into Frankie and Annette having 0:05:19.640 --> 0:05:24.159 their own melodrama as well. And well, one more I'll mention, 0:05:24.760 --> 0:05:27.680 let's see one more year later The Ghost in the 0:05:27.720 --> 0:05:32.719 Invisible Bikini from nineteen sixty six, again same film series. 0:05:33.240 --> 0:05:36.279 In this one, Boris Karloff is a ghost that needs 0:05:36.320 --> 0:05:39.880 to perform one good deed before he can finally get 0:05:39.880 --> 0:05:45.279 into heaven. These just they're the strangest franchise of films. 0:05:45.320 --> 0:05:49.360 I mean, I think Buster Keaton appears in nearly every 0:05:49.400 --> 0:05:53.039 single one of them for one reason or another. And 0:05:53.080 --> 0:05:56.720 there's also this reoccurring character I love he is. His 0:05:56.800 --> 0:05:59.679 name is Eric von Zipper, and he's the dim witted 0:05:59.720 --> 0:06:03.640 leader of a biker gang, and he is often referred 0:06:03.680 --> 0:06:07.320 to both outside and inside the movies as a middle 0:06:07.360 --> 0:06:11.680 aged teenage delinquent. And I think what what they were 0:06:11.680 --> 0:06:15.760 doing is in the sixties, the idea of the rebel 0:06:15.760 --> 0:06:19.279 without a cause, greaser motorcycle gang was now long in 0:06:19.279 --> 0:06:22.960 the tooth. So the concept was that, hey, what happens 0:06:23.000 --> 0:06:26.960 to all these what happens to the previous generations youth? 0:06:27.160 --> 0:06:30.400 Where does it go? Do they just stay? You know, 0:06:30.520 --> 0:06:34.159 these leather clad biker gangs that are gonna be middle 0:06:34.200 --> 0:06:38.359 aged teenage delinquents. And it's just I suppose, perhaps a 0:06:38.400 --> 0:06:44.240 subtle dig at their parents, perhaps, But it's a far 0:06:44.480 --> 0:06:47.440 better film series than I ever would have realized. And 0:06:47.480 --> 0:06:49.520 I'll throw in one more because I think it ties 0:06:49.520 --> 0:06:51.960 in directly to what we're talking about today. There's also 0:06:52.040 --> 0:06:55.800 a series all about Gidget. The first film was called 0:06:55.960 --> 0:06:58.560 Just Gidget, and then there were many many others which 0:06:58.600 --> 0:07:02.359 you can go into if you like. And this film 0:07:02.400 --> 0:07:06.400 is almost a direct Gidget parody, like all of the 0:07:06.440 --> 0:07:09.720 setup of her like befriending a gang of surfers who 0:07:09.720 --> 0:07:12.680 then give her like a cute scene nickname, and you know, 0:07:13.040 --> 0:07:15.280 falling in love with one of them, all that stuff, 0:07:15.440 --> 0:07:20.800 that's all pure the first Gidget film. So yeah, I 0:07:20.840 --> 0:07:23.560 would say in many ways, I when I first saw 0:07:23.640 --> 0:07:26.120 this movie, I had not seen Gidget. I had not 0:07:26.200 --> 0:07:29.040 seen any of the beach Party Frankie in Anette films, 0:07:29.320 --> 0:07:31.320 and so I just took this almost like as its 0:07:31.360 --> 0:07:34.480 own creation. I knew obviously the beach parties had existed, 0:07:35.200 --> 0:07:37.800 but after seeing those, I'm like, oh, this is nearly 0:07:37.880 --> 0:07:40.280 direct parody. Yeah. 0:07:40.920 --> 0:07:44.200 I think the original sort of brainstorm title for this 0:07:44.440 --> 0:07:47.840 of what would become Psycho Beach Party was Gidget Ghost Psychotic. 0:07:49.440 --> 0:07:51.920 And are you talking about I hope not getting too 0:07:51.960 --> 0:07:54.920 far ahead of us here, but talking about the original play, 0:07:54.960 --> 0:07:56.160 Is that correct? Yeah? 0:07:56.280 --> 0:08:00.000 Yeah, from what I read before it even really solidified 0:08:00.120 --> 0:08:03.000 as a play. Apparently Charles Bush, who will get into 0:08:03.720 --> 0:08:05.280 a lot of these shows they would do, they would 0:08:05.280 --> 0:08:07.480 put it on like a different show with you know, 0:08:07.840 --> 0:08:10.280 a lot of like diverse like drag elements, and other 0:08:10.400 --> 0:08:13.119 like comedic elements, and then they would sort of tease 0:08:13.200 --> 0:08:15.400 what the next one might be, but in kind of 0:08:15.440 --> 0:08:18.440 like almost kind of an arrested development, you know, closing 0:08:18.480 --> 0:08:22.360 credit style. It's not necessarily something they planned to produce. 0:08:22.680 --> 0:08:25.800 They would just be like, next next week's show is 0:08:25.840 --> 0:08:30.160 going to be a gidget goho psychotic And apparently they 0:08:30.240 --> 0:08:32.719 just once the idea was unleashed, they were like, oh, 0:08:32.760 --> 0:08:34.880 what if we did it, what would it consist of? 0:08:35.000 --> 0:08:36.320 And it grew from there. 0:08:36.800 --> 0:08:40.199 The only reason I knew this was a play originally 0:08:40.640 --> 0:08:42.040 was that at some point when I was looking it 0:08:42.080 --> 0:08:45.480 up online, I saw a poster for it that was 0:08:45.640 --> 0:08:49.160 not the film poster, but we had the same title 0:08:49.600 --> 0:08:52.600 Psycho Beach Party, but I believe the date said nineteen 0:08:52.640 --> 0:08:55.600 eighty seven, and I was so confused. I'm like, oh, 0:08:55.640 --> 0:08:58.400 was this based on something else? Did they perhaps originally 0:08:58.440 --> 0:09:00.920 make it in eighty seven, et cetera. And then as 0:09:00.920 --> 0:09:03.160 soon as I do a little bit of research and like, oh, 0:09:03.280 --> 0:09:06.600 it's all the same. It just at least this poster 0:09:06.720 --> 0:09:08.480 is from eighty seven because they were doing it that 0:09:08.679 --> 0:09:11.440 long ago. That's how long this play took to become 0:09:11.440 --> 0:09:13.160 a film. I'm sure you'll talk about that soon. 0:09:13.640 --> 0:09:15.839 Yeah, yeah, I think that would have been the original run, 0:09:15.920 --> 0:09:18.800 the original off Broadway run, And if memory serves when 0:09:18.800 --> 0:09:21.480 I was looking around, I believe there have been more 0:09:21.520 --> 0:09:24.960 recent productions of it. I think one was either done 0:09:24.960 --> 0:09:27.600 in or came through Atlanta at some point, but again, 0:09:27.640 --> 0:09:30.080 it was totally off my radar at the time, so 0:09:30.480 --> 0:09:31.319 I didn't know about it. 0:09:31.760 --> 0:09:34.640 I'd be very curious to see a stage version of this. 0:09:34.920 --> 0:09:37.120 I honestly don't really know how they would do it. 0:09:39.600 --> 0:09:40.920 I think one of the great things to keep in 0:09:40.960 --> 0:09:43.439 mind about this movie's humor and perhaps sort of the 0:09:43.520 --> 0:09:46.800 origins of the play. I think it summed up well 0:09:46.840 --> 0:09:50.200 in actually a letterbox review that I ran across by 0:09:50.240 --> 0:09:55.160 the late Eli Hayes, who was a real prolific letterbox reviewer, 0:09:55.200 --> 0:09:57.319 and if you spend any amount of time on that website, 0:09:57.360 --> 0:10:00.439 you'll probably run across reviews that he did. So it's 0:10:00.440 --> 0:10:03.880 just a very brief write up, but he summarizes this 0:10:03.920 --> 0:10:07.840 film as being quote a relatively neglected, should be contemporary 0:10:07.880 --> 0:10:13.160 cult classic of burlesque, lampoonery and maximal camp. So yeah, 0:10:13.200 --> 0:10:16.720 I mean, obviously it's a very campy film. It gets 0:10:16.720 --> 0:10:21.640 into some subversive elements and some social commentary, but the 0:10:21.720 --> 0:10:25.520 laughs always come first, and I think the burlesque observation 0:10:25.640 --> 0:10:27.560 is key here as well. It's that kind of like 0:10:28.280 --> 0:10:31.520 at times body humor, but the pasties are on too, 0:10:31.640 --> 0:10:35.000 so it's not going too far, and it's again laughs first. 0:10:35.280 --> 0:10:36.760 That's very true. Yeah, I like that. 0:10:37.200 --> 0:10:39.280 Now, coming back just real quick to Gidget. 0:10:39.640 --> 0:10:39.880 Yeah. 0:10:40.040 --> 0:10:41.839 I don't have a lot of experience with the beach 0:10:41.960 --> 0:10:45.680 movie a beach party movie genre myself, but when you 0:10:45.679 --> 0:10:48.160 start reading about it, everyone points to the gidget movies. 0:10:48.280 --> 0:10:52.120 They kind of point to nineteen fifty nine's Gidget starring 0:10:52.160 --> 0:10:53.679 Sandra d who would go on to be in The 0:10:53.760 --> 0:10:57.080 Dunwich Horror, among other things. This was general This is 0:10:57.080 --> 0:11:00.000 generally regarded as the beginning of the beach movie crazy, 0:11:00.640 --> 0:11:03.800 and it spawned the sequels Gidget goes Hawaiian, Gidget goes 0:11:03.840 --> 0:11:08.640 to Rome, so that's where we get the natural continuation 0:11:08.720 --> 0:11:12.079 of that Gidget go Psychotic. There are also a couple 0:11:12.080 --> 0:11:14.920 of TV movies, but it goes on from there, like 0:11:14.920 --> 0:11:17.920 there are Elvis movies that are clearly beach party movies, 0:11:18.559 --> 0:11:22.679 and there are a There are also some other genre examples, 0:11:22.720 --> 0:11:25.000 two that come to mind for me, and these are 0:11:25.000 --> 0:11:26.640 the two that I had really seen before because they 0:11:26.640 --> 0:11:29.920 were on Mystery Science Theater. Three thousand would be nineteen 0:11:29.960 --> 0:11:33.120 sixty four as the Horror at Party Beach, which is 0:11:33.320 --> 0:11:35.960 both a beach party movie and a monster movie with 0:11:36.160 --> 0:11:40.160 ridiculous monster and a musical performance by the dell Airs. 0:11:40.760 --> 0:11:43.600 Another example that I really like is the nineteen sixty 0:11:43.640 --> 0:11:46.920 seven film Catalina Kaper, also featured on Mystery Science Theater. 0:11:47.240 --> 0:11:49.840 That one had Tommy Kirk in it and a musical 0:11:49.920 --> 0:11:53.440 number on the Beach by Little Richard. Pretty amazing, so 0:11:53.480 --> 0:11:56.080 that one's worth checking out, if for nothing else, for 0:11:56.160 --> 0:11:59.000 Tommy Kirk, for Little Richard, and I believe there's a 0:11:59.040 --> 0:12:02.600 scene where like surf dudes battle beat Nick, not beat Nicks, 0:12:02.840 --> 0:12:04.199 they battle greasers on the beach. 0:12:04.320 --> 0:12:08.680 So again that must have been a reoccurring theme of Hey, 0:12:08.720 --> 0:12:11.840 that that's your generation, mom and dad, we're on the 0:12:11.840 --> 0:12:12.439 beach now. 0:12:13.640 --> 0:12:15.960 And it does seem to I wonder if the subtext 0:12:16.040 --> 0:12:19.160 too there is kind of like, oh, the previous generations 0:12:19.360 --> 0:12:22.760 counterculture group, they never integrated, They're always going to be 0:12:22.760 --> 0:12:25.240 outsiders and maybe they're a little bit losers, you know. 0:12:25.400 --> 0:12:26.840 It kind of ties in with kind of like the 0:12:26.880 --> 0:12:31.320 straight laced veneer that you get in the mainstream sixties 0:12:31.440 --> 0:12:34.640 pictures of this this era before you know, the more 0:12:34.760 --> 0:12:39.280 counterculture hippie movement really becomes more standard. 0:12:39.559 --> 0:12:40.520 That's a good observation. 0:12:40.679 --> 0:12:42.600 Yeah, all right, well, let's go ahead and listen to 0:12:42.679 --> 0:12:51.040 the audio from the trailer for Psycho Beach Party. I 0:12:51.040 --> 0:12:53.120 guess we are the only ones watching the movie. 0:12:53.720 --> 0:12:56.000 These guys have only on their minds. 0:12:57.600 --> 0:13:07.720 Want a winner. Check with the splat person. 0:13:07.760 --> 0:13:13.079 He should I unpack my gongles. I intend to unpack my. 0:13:17.920 --> 0:13:19.520 Alright, guys, come on, that's an. 0:13:23.440 --> 0:13:25.000 I like to say this, but I think our little 0:13:25.040 --> 0:13:27.080 chicken maybe the butcher melody. 0:13:26.840 --> 0:13:30.040 Beach hardy till you drop dead. 0:13:32.760 --> 0:13:34.720 I hope you put some baccino that scratch. 0:13:37.160 --> 0:13:38.360 Psycho Beach Party. 0:13:38.920 --> 0:13:41.840 That's the most exciting story idea I've. 0:13:41.720 --> 0:13:42.679 Heard in years. 0:13:51.000 --> 0:13:52.360 Now. I'm not sure if we used all that, we 0:13:52.440 --> 0:13:54.040 might have had to cut a little of that out. 0:13:55.400 --> 0:13:57.200 Some of it might not have worked out of context. 0:13:57.920 --> 0:13:59.800 But hey, if you want to go watch Psycho Beach 0:14:00.000 --> 0:14:03.920 already before continuing with this episode. Fortunately, it is widely 0:14:04.000 --> 0:14:08.240 available for digital rental or purchase. It's currently streaming on 0:14:08.400 --> 0:14:10.599 TB I believe. If you don't, I think you have to, 0:14:10.760 --> 0:14:13.520 you know, deal with some ads. There. Also Strand Home 0:14:13.600 --> 0:14:16.880 Video put out a multi format disc in twenty fifteen, 0:14:16.880 --> 0:14:19.280 which of course includes the Blu Ray. I know there 0:14:19.600 --> 0:14:22.320 was a DVD director's commentary at some point because I've 0:14:22.320 --> 0:14:24.760 seen it reference, so I'm assuming it might be on 0:14:24.880 --> 0:14:25.320 that disc. 0:14:25.720 --> 0:14:28.040 I'm holding it right here in my hand, and yes, 0:14:28.280 --> 0:14:30.760 it is on this disc, and I've listened to it before, 0:14:30.800 --> 0:14:33.200 and you you got some nice insights on there. Oh cool? 0:14:33.280 --> 0:14:34.960 Is it? Is it just Charles Bush or is there 0:14:35.040 --> 0:14:36.080 someone else in there as well? 0:14:36.320 --> 0:14:39.320 I remember it being just Charles Bush. And this is 0:14:39.400 --> 0:14:43.040 the era of DVD also where they would be like, oh, 0:14:43.440 --> 0:14:46.440 we're including a fun music video and like original trail, 0:14:46.520 --> 0:14:51.960 you know, like the classic DVDs of the early early 0:14:52.080 --> 0:14:54.160 two thousands, where they weren't quite sure what to do 0:14:54.400 --> 0:14:56.080 with all that extra space on the disc. They just 0:14:56.440 --> 0:14:58.840 kind of filled it with stuff, you know, whatever was 0:14:58.840 --> 0:15:00.640 sitting around. I kind of like that. 0:15:01.560 --> 0:15:03.520 But yeah, I bet that's a great commentary track because 0:15:03.760 --> 0:15:05.800 I didn't get to listen to that, but I did 0:15:06.320 --> 0:15:08.840 check out like an old nineteen ninety three fresh air 0:15:09.000 --> 0:15:11.360 Terry Gross interview with Bush. 0:15:11.400 --> 0:15:12.160 That was really cool. 0:15:12.280 --> 0:15:14.400 It was very short, but it was insightful. And I've 0:15:14.560 --> 0:15:16.960 got a few other things on YouTube where he's talking 0:15:17.000 --> 0:15:19.840 about his past and his projects and so forth. 0:15:20.240 --> 0:15:22.520 He's definitely had a pretty amazing career, that's for sure. 0:15:22.920 --> 0:15:34.360 Yeah. All right, well, let's talk about the people involved here, 0:15:34.840 --> 0:15:37.800 starting at the top with the director. The director is 0:15:37.920 --> 0:15:41.120 Robert Lee King. I don't have a birth date on him, 0:15:41.640 --> 0:15:45.120 American writer and director whose father, Robert L. King, worked 0:15:45.160 --> 0:15:47.480 on the screenplay for the nineteen seventy two Disney film 0:15:47.560 --> 0:15:49.720 Now You See Him, Now You Don't, starring Kurt Russell 0:15:49.800 --> 0:15:53.520 and Caesar Romero. Robert Lee King. However, the sun here 0:15:54.160 --> 0:15:57.080 only has a handful of movie credits. Nineteen ninety one 0:15:57.200 --> 0:16:00.240 short titled The Disco Years, which he also wrote, two 0:16:00.280 --> 0:16:03.440 thousand and two She Gets What She Wants with Michael McKean, 0:16:04.000 --> 0:16:06.600 and he also co wrote that one. And then there's 0:16:06.760 --> 0:16:10.760 twenty Eleven's Bad Actress, which he directed. That one features 0:16:11.640 --> 0:16:14.720 Beth Broderick. More on her in a minute, and Ryan Hanson, 0:16:15.000 --> 0:16:17.240 who a lot of you know is Kyle from Party Down. 0:16:17.720 --> 0:16:21.400 All right, but then we come to the writing credit 0:16:21.480 --> 0:16:25.320 here for the screenplay, also the original play of which 0:16:25.360 --> 0:16:28.440 he adapted. This is Charles Busch, who've already been talking about. 0:16:29.120 --> 0:16:34.120 Born nineteen fifty four, writer, director, actor, and drag performer 0:16:34.200 --> 0:16:37.000 who initially made him a name for himself in off 0:16:37.080 --> 0:16:42.080 Broadway theater, often in drag performances, where he apparently initially 0:16:42.160 --> 0:16:43.000 found his voice. 0:16:44.040 --> 0:16:44.280 Again. 0:16:44.400 --> 0:16:48.240 I listened to this nineteen ninety three Terry Gross interview 0:16:48.280 --> 0:16:51.960 with Bush, and in that and again, this is the 0:16:52.080 --> 0:16:54.840 way before the movie Psycho Beach Party comes out. But 0:16:54.920 --> 0:16:58.760 Psycho Beach Party does exist at that point. Unfortunately, at 0:16:58.880 --> 0:17:00.880 least in the clip I heard, Terry didn't get a 0:17:00.960 --> 0:17:03.600 chance to ask him about that production. But at any rate, 0:17:04.400 --> 0:17:07.159 in that interview he says that, Okay, he's doing like 0:17:07.320 --> 0:17:10.480 various characters on stage, and I think in like a 0:17:10.560 --> 0:17:13.159 one man show he was doing. But most of the 0:17:13.240 --> 0:17:16.320 male characters, he said, felt very locked down, very static, 0:17:16.920 --> 0:17:18.840 And it was in the female characters that he was 0:17:18.880 --> 0:17:21.560 able to really bring everything to life. And so that 0:17:21.880 --> 0:17:24.920 becomes like part of major part of his work moving forward. 0:17:25.440 --> 0:17:28.760 His first big off Broadway hit was nineteen eighty four's 0:17:28.840 --> 0:17:34.600 Vampire Lesbians of Sodom, a very provocative title that He 0:17:34.640 --> 0:17:37.760 says that the New York Times in their their advertisements 0:17:37.800 --> 0:17:41.080 for local theater, they were very hesitant or even refused 0:17:41.119 --> 0:17:43.000 to use the full title. He says, you could have 0:17:43.080 --> 0:17:45.760 called it vampires, lesbians or sodom and they would have 0:17:45.800 --> 0:17:47.000 been cool with it. But he put all of them 0:17:47.040 --> 0:17:50.680 together and it's gonna make people want to push the 0:17:50.760 --> 0:17:51.280 elite button. 0:17:52.080 --> 0:17:52.560 That's great. 0:17:54.280 --> 0:17:56.320 I've not seen this, and it hasn't been adapted, to 0:17:56.400 --> 0:17:59.920 my knowledge, into any kind of like film or TV property, 0:18:00.400 --> 0:18:04.639 but it's apparently a series of comedy skits throughout time 0:18:04.920 --> 0:18:09.000 about a pair of immortal vampires who keep encountering each other. 0:18:09.119 --> 0:18:12.080 So it's like, you know, biblical sodom all the way 0:18:12.160 --> 0:18:14.280 up through like mid eighties Las Vegas. 0:18:14.920 --> 0:18:17.680 I'd only heard of this because in an interview that 0:18:17.800 --> 0:18:20.960 I saw with Charles Bush, he was describing that this 0:18:21.280 --> 0:18:23.040 was the play that he was in the middle of 0:18:23.160 --> 0:18:26.600 actually performing and was already a success and already a hit. 0:18:27.200 --> 0:18:30.920 And then after they would finish their off Broadway performances 0:18:31.640 --> 0:18:35.200 of Vampire Lesbians of Sodom, they would be invited to 0:18:35.280 --> 0:18:38.119 go perform like these little one act plays, like on 0:18:38.280 --> 0:18:41.000 tiny little stages, like just you know, a little hole 0:18:41.080 --> 0:18:43.879 in the wall type places, and because he loved stage 0:18:43.920 --> 0:18:46.200 time and loved to perform, he always said yes, he 0:18:46.320 --> 0:18:49.160 always took them up on it. And those little ideas 0:18:49.240 --> 0:18:53.800 there are eventually what turned into Psycho Beach Party. Nice Nice. 0:18:54.680 --> 0:18:59.240 So among the performances to follow coming out of Off 0:18:59.280 --> 0:19:02.720 Broadway Easte Performances and the like was this concept for 0:19:02.840 --> 0:19:05.440 gidget go psychotic. You know, I saw this interview where 0:19:05.440 --> 0:19:08.119 Bush says it, you know, initially wasn't fully developed or 0:19:08.160 --> 0:19:11.000 a full fledged idea, but just kind of a humorous teaser. 0:19:11.119 --> 0:19:13.960 But it then grows into Psycho Beach Party, which initially 0:19:14.040 --> 0:19:17.359 ran eighty seven through eighty nine, with Bush himself playing 0:19:17.359 --> 0:19:21.120 the role of Florence Chicklet Forrest, the gidget character here, 0:19:21.640 --> 0:19:23.760 and it was a hit with audiences. You know, it's campy, 0:19:23.960 --> 0:19:26.679 over the top, a send up of beach party movies, 0:19:27.040 --> 0:19:30.280 you know, has some social commentary in there and more. 0:19:31.000 --> 0:19:31.160 Now. 0:19:31.200 --> 0:19:33.719 Bush also had some early TV and screen credits as 0:19:33.720 --> 0:19:38.400 an actor. Notably there's nineteen ninety three's Adams Family Values, 0:19:38.880 --> 0:19:42.600 in which we see him as in Drag as Countess 0:19:42.760 --> 0:19:47.480 cousin of Phasia DuBarry. I haven't seen this Adams Family 0:19:47.560 --> 0:19:49.440 movie in a long time. But you know, I looked 0:19:49.520 --> 0:19:51.200 up some stills and there she is, like standing in 0:19:51.280 --> 0:19:54.240 the background at a funeral perhaps, or it could be 0:19:54.320 --> 0:19:57.960 any other function since it's the Adams Family, right. He 0:19:58.160 --> 0:20:00.560 also was on Let's See nineteen ninety Wars, it Could 0:20:00.560 --> 0:20:03.639 Happen to You, nineteen ninety seven's Trouble on the Corner, 0:20:03.800 --> 0:20:07.399 and eight episodes of HBO's ODZ between nineteen ninety nine 0:20:07.440 --> 0:20:11.119 and two thousand. During this time, there were efforts to 0:20:11.200 --> 0:20:13.479 bring Psycho Beach Party to the screen, but it apparently 0:20:13.520 --> 0:20:16.120 took a long time, and it wasn't until two thousand 0:20:16.560 --> 0:20:19.080 that it finally comes out. You know, so late nineties 0:20:19.119 --> 0:20:22.000 before this thing finally begins to roll in earnest and 0:20:22.040 --> 0:20:24.040 then they end up shooting it in twenty one days, 0:20:24.119 --> 0:20:26.879 which pretty pretty tight schedule even for a film you 0:20:26.960 --> 0:20:29.680 know like this that you know, it doesn't have space 0:20:29.720 --> 0:20:32.200 stations or anything like that in it. They cranked it 0:20:32.240 --> 0:20:33.760 out in it and it looks good for. 0:20:33.840 --> 0:20:36.840 Sure, you know, even like we'll talk about this when 0:20:36.880 --> 0:20:39.600 we talked about the movie, even like little kind of 0:20:39.840 --> 0:20:42.760 just esthetic choices that are made throughout this film. Sure, 0:20:42.760 --> 0:20:45.919 it's not a high budget affair, but like the visual 0:20:45.960 --> 0:20:49.720 effects that are thrown in there, the sets, everything was 0:20:49.760 --> 0:20:52.320 done with care and with attention, even if it isn't 0:20:52.320 --> 0:20:53.200 a high budget film. 0:20:53.480 --> 0:20:56.359 Yeah, there's clearly a lot of love for the cinema 0:20:56.440 --> 0:20:59.320 of the time period that they're referencing, and even with 0:20:59.400 --> 0:21:01.239 a limited by you know, it's not one of these 0:21:01.280 --> 0:21:03.000 things where you watch it and you're like, this could 0:21:03.080 --> 0:21:05.520 just be mistaken for a product of the nineteen sixties, 0:21:05.600 --> 0:21:08.440 Like it's not, you know, it's not that level of recreation, 0:21:08.880 --> 0:21:11.520 but the homage is still very strong, and you totally 0:21:11.560 --> 0:21:13.760 get it. It's a it's a it's a great callback 0:21:13.840 --> 0:21:16.560 to those films now as we reference already. The film 0:21:16.680 --> 0:21:18.640 was seemingly not a hit. I don't think it made 0:21:18.640 --> 0:21:21.840 its money back. Critical reviews were also kind of mixed. 0:21:21.920 --> 0:21:24.679 It looks like and I'm not sure again that it's 0:21:24.760 --> 0:21:28.040 truly established the cult following that it's that it's that 0:21:28.119 --> 0:21:30.640 it deserves at least not to not to the degree 0:21:30.680 --> 0:21:33.000 that you know, it feels like it should have because 0:21:33.160 --> 0:21:34.960