Annie (1999) dir. Rob Marshall | Showgays: A Movie Musical Podcast

0:05 [Music] in the morning [Music] I think she's just a wonderful character I think people are going to laugh and be horrified at the same time they're going to go like this they're just gonna they're just gonna like they're not gonna believe it I don't think get to work despite a career built on heavy duty rolls oscar-winning actress is realizing a lifelong ambition with this part I've

0:51 always wanted to sing I've always wanted to do Musicals A song in the shower but I haven't uh done it in public so I guess I'm getting to you know fulfill the dream [Music] foreign [Music]

1:47 24 happy hours a day oh boy can I see that pamphlet sir my dad this house is freaking sweet [Music] too bad one me me say where does a young prostitute get started in this town [Music] [Applause] [Music] thank you [Music]

2:41 and I see just to God here this morning three bucks two bags one me Molly do you remember when those videos came the compilations of different different Productions doing the three bucks two bags one me uh vaguely but I feel like that was mostly a Twitter thing and I think Twitter is a hellscape so I will not sign on there yeah it it had such you're not wrong there was one where the the girl had three bucks one bag one me because she was holding just a microphone with her other hand yeah so she can only carry one three books one bag one me I mean

3:27 the flexibility of live performance we love it I love that they couldn't like give her like a little messenger bag to carry so they could still have nope there was no other solution to that problem nope it's changed the lyrics of a Tony winning musical yeah um welcome back to April Annie um happy April how are we feeling we're too too we're more than halfway through yes two Annie's in I you know as I sat down to the second Saturday night in a row of watching the musical Annie it wasn't it wasn't exactly how I imagined my life in my 30s but I also wasn't mad once I was in it and I was watching godra I was like you know there

4:14 were worse ways to spend a Saturday it wasn't how I imagined my 30s but it also wasn't not how I imagined it yeah I it's how I imagined my 60s probably I'm sure that the Molly in my senior pictures that I shared last episode would have been thrilled to learn that that would be her 30s absolutely hey RJ welcome to your 60s this is a preview of when we all Golden Girls and live with each other in Miami when we're 60. yeah yeah are we doing Miami we don't want to do Palm Springs I'm not moving to Florida Miami will be in the ocean by the time that we're in our 60s so that's true Palm Springs will be a luscious uh a luscious green yeah it'll be Lush very

5:02 Lush [Laughter] um well my personal relationship with this Annie well we're not doing it we're not doing a one minute summary because it's the same as last week get on board y'all it's Annie unless we no I don't even think we need to and then um We're not gonna talk about relationships the only thing I would say is I did own this one on VHS and I will say I think this may have been the first conscious time I saw the whole movie I have seen Clips because I kept uh thinking this was the version of Annie that I saw when I was a child but it was in fact the original the 82 yeah yeah because so the 82 is definitely

5:48 like my Annie but Adam for you this one Adam or Annie I would say that this is my Annie in just that I'd seen it I want I definitely watched it a few times as a kid but this was not in like heavy rotation in my home okay there were parts of this movie that I was like oh I remember this moment yeah yeah yeah I think that I watched it because it aired on ABC ABC when it first that was its first wonderful world of Disney Infinity my memory was like we watched it and then I like went to school the next day and everyone like talked about whether that was a good Annie or not I don't know like did it truly have enough cultural relevance that I had like multiple people at school that I could talk to about it I don't know are you asking me about the background of this film Molly is that true yeah

6:34 she said I want to get through this episode quickly wow this is our first 25 minute episode yeah um and it's just 20 minutes of us talking about Audra McDonald's because unfortunately she is not really represented in the movie musical Canon it's like this and then Beauty and the live-action Beauty she just she just wants to she wants to make her Gray's Anatomy spin-off shows and just catch those checks and cash the checks and the need to saying anymore y'all she'll she'll do what what she wants to do at this phase yeah tune in tune in to our next podcast where we just watched the Gilded Age and talk about accent work in the Gilded Age it's great um so

7:20 this movie called a movie is let's say this TV movie made for TV movie yeah yeah um uh is written by Irene mecky as I believe how you say her last name she also helped write the screenplay for The Lion King and Hunchback of Notre Dame oh so she was like in the Disney she's in trouble she's in the house and by written by we mean like she adopted the stage show to yes credited it says written by on Wikipedia okay well you don't have any more details than that no I'm just curious how different it is from the stage show but maybe we can wait it says it says written by Irene Mucky and then under that it says musical Charles Strauss

8:06 Martin Charmin Charney I'm sorry and Thomas Meehan yeah and unfortunately Wikipedia is the only source of information is this so that's all we'll ever know oh we'll never know um it was directed right by Rob Marshall so this is our second martial work in in this uh podcast series um it stars into the woods oh no third Chicago this is our third he didn't do Dream Girls right no that's um I keep going I keep messing those that's the other one yeah showman guy that and he's maybe doing the Guys and Dolls and that one Bill Condon Rock Marshall's not problematic right

8:52 I'm just gonna double check that but like I feel like he's I mean he's problematic in that he's gay so in Florida he would be problematic because you can't say he's not allowed you know what's great is that this episode is coming out in the middle of April and I don't know I don't know Joe will even still be relevant I I hope I hope by then yeah that sure is hack hope it's not relevant anymore yeah I can tell you right now that Rob Marshall was born in Madison Wisconsin and I don't see a tab on Wikipedia for controversy so I'm gonna assume he's fine I feel like he he turns in reliable directorial versions of musicals Time

9:38 After Time good job absolutely I would say they are typically not my favorite movie musicals but they are like they're like BFA well done they're like you go to see a BFA show because you know you're gonna show up you're gonna experience the entertainment it's going to be polished and then you're gonna go home and never think about it again that's what you want yeah sometimes Chicago is the best for me Chicago is the best version but in general yeah yeah but yeah that was I think a a solid one-off on his uh Cannon um so it stars Kathy Bates as Miss Hannigan uh Alan [ __ ] as a rooster Audra McDonald as Grace Farrell Kristin Chenoweth is Lilly Saint Regis Victor

10:24 Garber as Daddy Warbucks Andrea McArdle who was the original Annie she is the star to be in when they go to see the Broadway musical so she gets she's a little solo the original Annie from Broadway she's not the 1989 because that could also be correct 1982 version yeah yeah Broadway Broadway uh Alicia Morton plays Annie and then we have Lelane uh Lizzie McGuire's best friend Miranda she plays Kate Danielle Wilson plays Duffy um Sarah Hyland plays Molly uh Sarah Hyland famously is uh the daughter in my family I think is your name Haley yeah yeah um Aaron Adams plays Tessie nania Miata

11:11 plays July which is a character name yeah sure and Marissa Rago plays Pepper I just want to say yeah this is a much grumpier pepper I feel like than the original one's more spunky to me yeah sure um but also definitely it took me until yeah it's only a haircut that's the only option it took me until Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile to recognize both Elaine and Sarah Hyland oh yeah we we were looking for Lil Wayne because we saw her name in that opening credit sequence and so we were like lalaine because famously the lane is I believe half Filipino right yeah so RJ of course has a rolling Rolodex in his head yes absolutely not just Stars just any

11:58 any person yeah um yeah I I was so surprised when I realized that and then I did a little Wikipedia Deep dive did you know that Lizzie McGuire only ran for two seasons yeah isn't that nuts yes but Disney Channel nickel those like kids shows like that don't have normal Seasons they're like 40 episodes per season okay so maybe that's part of it but also the amount of cultural capital that that property holds in my brain is like tracked your your like preview business it was a my brother his first crush was on

12:44 Hillary Duff like it was such a it was when we became adolescents was what does it require entered our household I remember the lead up to the Lizzie McGuire Movie I was like this is going to be an event family but I think it goes back to that conversation we had was it last week I don't remember all of the episodes are blending together about how Theater For Young audiences is like so segmented down to be like it is for like and so once they're out of that age range you're like well gotta go like I think Hannah Montana ran for only three seasons which is like crazy and Hannah Montana was that that was like shocking that they extended it one more season it was like a big deal yeah I guess so yeah I did not watch Hannah Montana because that was when I felt like I was just joking about the Disney Channel but so I

13:31 guess it's that Lizzie McGuire hit I think I looked up the years too but I can't remember now but it must have been that it hit me just perfectly at the time with like that was what I needed to see in those two years that I was over that and it was the next thing because I wanted to say yeah because after Lizzy it would have been like the Raven years and that was already like dipping into yeah fresh like almost freshman year high school I think yeah and I feel like that's where everyone was a show that I like caught some episodes of but I didn't like watch it so it was like just yeah I was just leaving the Disney Channel phase so Lizzy ran from a one to four yeah and there were 65 episodes total so yeah I would have been like nine Middle School nine to twelve-ish

14:16 era yeah but that was also like Disney Channel back then was doing more Middle School yes kind of Ages and I think now it's more and the like cartoons were like you know recess weekenders like very Elementary amazing cartoons I I just feel like I have no reason to claim that I know what's currently on Disney Channel they may still make things for middle schoolers I have no idea I feel like it's well I don't know I guess they kind of do I always feel like it's more high school now but I don't actually know no it's definitely still like pre that when you are a child the thing that you always want is the next phase of

15:02 your life so when I was in Middle School I watched things about high schoolers because that's what I wanted to fantasize about my life being because once I was a high schooler I truly have it all figured out and now they're in our 30s we're watching Annie yes we're trying to reclaim that our lost childhood because we're trying to become his hand again yes that's true that's true yeah [Music] um so to remind everybody the songs are by Charles Strauss and Martin charnon music and lyrics respectively but the score the additional score in this piece is by Danny troub uh the producers were John Whitman Craig zidane Neil Marin and Chris Montan the cinematography is by Ralph Bode the editing was done by Scott Vickery its

15:48 running time is 90 minutes amazing perfect and if and we and if I said the only thing I liked about it was that it was in that in 90 minute Annie I would still give it five stars for that reason um uh the production companies were Walt Disney television Columbia TriStar Television because it was a Columbia property originally so they worked together on this one storyline entertainment Chris Montan Productions and its distributor was brain office to television on ABC for the wonderful world of Disney which ran from I think 95 to 95. oh something I don't remember what but the original release date of this Annie was November 7th 1999. didn't you too in Florida

16:35 oh yeah very important context um when you lived in Florida didn't you live in Buena Vista or like on Buena Vista Drive or something lake Lake Buena Vista is the name of the like uh area the yeah like the neighborhood like if you like if you looked at the the actual address of Disney World it is under League Florida because Lake Buena Vista the municipality that Disney created under Reedy Creek improvement district yes okay because I'm asking it to ask is it that there was a place that Disney is by and then they took that name or they the other way around that the name the place got named after something that did the place got named after after Disney because they're all what

17:20 Buena Vista was I think the street the the original Studio was on I think it was on Buena Vista Street originally and so they've just used that name for a bunch of stuff ever since yeah interesting cool okay they do that a lot um so anyway so this movie um we're coming off Cinderella Cinderella was 1997. uh see our Cinderella episode from 2020 yeah season one baby the end of season one Cinema Cinderella was the most watched uh uh uh movie ABC movie musical or movie ever done and this is has the record for the second most watched why don't we get back to making these they do the live

18:07 ones now but like do this instead I don't know and I've said that since they started doing the live ones and I was like why are we trying to do something that like SNL only perfected after like 10 years of like mess on TV like and like and you would think for Disney plus like they have so many channels Avenues they have so many like production companies that they could tap into now and I'm sure that some of those made for TV musicals like crashed and burned but some of them became endearing Classics like the Cinderella one and I don't think any of the lives have become something that like people keep going back to and watching right well I don't think you even can because they're like not available to like buy or like they they have no other they're not in syndication like they don't replay them

18:53 or anything it's so strange yeah I don't really get it I mean not to be like Live Events when we're all theater people but like I just feel like but live TV events at all yeah that's not it um we've fought so hard to not have to do live TV although Jesus Christ Superstar was the best one they've done it was an absolute sleigh I've watched none of them so I won't um great so uh anyway so this is the second most watched uh of the movie musicals I think they also did I know they did the music man I know they did bye-bye birdie and I know that they did Once Upon a mattress I think those are the other three this and Cinderella of the I think the only ones that I've actually seen

19:38 I saw I watched Once Upon a mattress I really liked that and it was good timing for me yeah well Carol Burnett and and um Tracy Ullman I think is the woman who plays Fred the princess yeah um and it was like just as I was getting into like doing more theater and I was I loved the song shy and that was like a very good it had a lot of good roles for girls that are not just like dainty little princessy rolls so I really liked that at the time and I I assume it holds up I don't know though um I think it's a shot weird I watched a bit of it because I was in Once Upon a mattress in high school and um I like watched parts of it and um just the kind of production budget I

20:25 think was we I don't know what's going on it just seemed it seems weird but anyway it doesn't matter that's what we're talking about today so um they were so Rob Marshall in case you forgot the conversation from Cinderella Rob Marshall choreographed the Cinderella that was on ABC and then the producers enjoyed him so much they thought he did so much great work and like he really helped the direction along as well that they wanted him to be the director and originally he was like no I'm truly just a choreographer that's it's truly not for me and they were like no no we really want you so he then agreed but then the Disney execs were like oh we don't trust him he's never done anything before like we can't give him all this money to do this big thing we don't know and then the producers were like well then we just won't we

21:12 won't do it and they were like well let's get a list of directors and we'll go through and we'll find something they're like we're not going to do Annie if you do not let us have Rob Marshall which is crazy so they like yeah won the fight the ball used to say that to Disney execs and again like I said earlier I think this is competently directed yes yes very solid he also having like a dance background I think he understands like how the camera needs to move to show off dance yeah there are a lot of great dancing sequences in this the only thing is like it has the like made for TV movie problem where like nothing is like wider than this like a wide shot is just like a full body the tightest shot of

21:57 warbucks's Manor like just showing the gate the gate yeah it's also weird I was thinking about this as I was watching it that I feel like things for TV are always just brighter there's just like more lights on the set when it's made for TV and that's how you can tell yeah I also think I mean this was also an Aaron TV and there was not Prestige television yet HBO I think had just debuted The Sopranos this year so like we are we are not near Prestige television yet and it is now you can watch it now on Disney plus that's where I'm assuming we all watched it watch it on Disney plus and it is like I think in like not HD it's not been like digitized it seemed like it was like shot on film and then they like

22:43 projected the film on a wall and then shot the wall and then put that on Disney plus because I was like this is grainy girl what are we watching but there is something kind of like I don't know it reminds me of my childhood because we our childhood because we all you know what you know it's it's the soft transition into the commercial breaks that really got me well yeah that really tells you TV but I just mean apart from that but it fully transported me to like wow I am watching a TV a TV movie yeah I almost wanted them to like include because something something did that some I don't remember what streaming service I think it was Disney plus but I'm not totally sure some one of the streaming services put something that was like originally a TV event onto

23:31 their streaming service and they like included some original like time specific ads yeah and everyone was like this is amazing like it totally gets you into the mood and like I think a couple of those could have been fun of like an Herbal Essence is commercial spur a bit of context um there was a reshoot that happened apparently the not the produ maybe the execs I wasn't sure who but there was some some kind of concern about how America would see a white man and a black woman getting engaged oh my God after Cinderella

24:18 in which Victor Garber was married to the queen who was Whoopi Goldberg I guess though that they don't have any like romantic I mean they are married to each other but we don't like see them kiss or like do right I don't remember anything like that we don't even like Kiss here they get they hug you know I love a proposal hug yeah but that's I mean that's what you and I did when we got burned that's true we didn't want it we just went yeah bud good job um uh so they were supposed to be the reshoot the reshoot happened and allegedly Victor Garber like threw the scene so that they wouldn't use the take Ally

25:04 yeah okay that's what allyship looks like okay I don't I don't want to praise a white person too much for doing something just I'm not saying anything I'm glad that they included the version where they got engaged that's ridiculous that it was ever a question I okay I agree that I it's crazy it's fine don't don't you say do I think the grace Sparrow and Daddy Warbucks should be together at the end of this year absolutely not okay we'll get into we'll we'll get what it is yeah yeah so let's pin it I'm truly wondering if this happens in the 2014 one too because it's Rose Burn and and

25:50 um Jamie Foxx yeah anyway so um this was nominated for a bunch of stuff like a bunch of awards like on the Wikipedia page it's like this I'm I'm demonstrating with my hands which is perfect but actually it's it's more like this long so maybe if we said said this and but more like this but like kind of this long yeah what you're doing right now perfect just exactly what you're demonstrating as what I'm seeing correct foreign so let's just talk about the Emmys this

26:36 was nominated for outstanding made for television movie outstanding supporting actress in a mini-series or movie for Kathy Bates outstanding directing outstanding art Direction outstanding casting outstanding cinematography outstanding costumes outstanding hair styling outstanding single camera picture editing for a mini series and outstanding sound mixing oh they really fit all the shmemis in here too and it was creative art it won outstanding music Direction and it won outstanding choreography so that's Christmas on the Square One zero it was also nominated for the Kathy Bates was nominated for the Emmy for this as well or I'm sorry the Golden Globe the Golden Globe wow for this

27:24 um pretty much everything a lot of the like one-off nominations on the list were like Kathy Bates [Music] it's a choice is very interesting and then the final piece of background information I have is that on everyone's favorite Fresh Air with Terry Gross support your local NPR station it is March just like Molly's family who owns every NPR tote bag get your toe join the wine club um Anna Kendrick revealed that she auditioned for this Annie but we don't know if it was just like General orphans and he's she put in her name in the call casting call so anyway Anna Kendrick

28:11 could have been in this among the likes of Lalane all right that's all I have let's get into it [Music] foreign [Music] so we'll just start from the same place kind of we started last week with um

28:58 Hannigan now I'm gonna say something here that I think we all I believe we all agree okay I also want to say before you say this Kathy Bates at this point in her career has won an Academy Award for best actress for misery you may continue she was not good she she it's a different take it's a more sanitized take of what it's hard to compare to it is unfair to compare Kathy Bates to Carol Burnett removing from that I thought Kathy Bates

29:43 did an excellent Community Theater production of Annie Miss Hannigan I think it's a quick yeah yeah I think that she turned in a dramatic portrayal of Miss Hannigan it's too grounded she's yeah it's like and I actually think her singing is pretty good I didn't know what to expect since I've never seen Kathy Bates in a singing role before um she just was like earnestly playing a woman who runs an orphanage yeah and who cares about the kids but like not that much and could be persuaded to get a fifty thousand dollar check instead of

30:29 taking care of the orphans but like she's also not that mean about it and she's she's just like a very middling character yeah wishy-washy Hannigan because there is there is like a an endearing quality to like how she treats the kids obviously like they make a point that like she's never hit them or anything but then like later when they reveal the scam and rooster was like oh yeah we'll we'll take care of Annie she's like great you know so it just felt like uh a Hannigan that didn't really have any decisions made like there weren't any just real firm decisions made of how this Hannigan actually fits

31:15 and how she actually feels canonically a comedic character right it's not just that I've seen Carol Burnett yeah I think that's why rooster is there because rooster is the menacing yeah yeah and it's yeah I did feel like it wasn't that she was like more menacing in this I just felt like it was like not she couldn't in shirtless guideposts for acting they talk about he talks about finding the humor and I don't think she or Rob or together that they found the humor in moments for this character

32:03 she does in her song um little girls she does the same bit like four times in a row where she throws something like over her shoulder it's like two socks she throws a thing out the door she throws a thing at the end and I was just like that's not a bit and it's not funny so you don't need to keep repeating it like I just there was no like punch line at any point in this performance I felt like do you think though that she was trying to be funny and didn't do it or do you think that she was like I to distinguish myself from Carol Burnett will play a not funny version of Miss Hannigan I think that

32:48 there are a lot of changes script Wise from for her and I think because it is the Disney version she was neutered because she is like not sexual at all and I don't think you need it needed to be like Carol Burnett level like dry humping Mr Bubbles in the car or whatever I don't remember what his name bundles Mr bundles but I also was like when he came by and was just like oh I'm just your laundry guy and she was like well thanks Mr bundles I was like they flipped there's nothing happening it was he was he was the one that's like you know let me take you out sometime and she was like ah no I'm saving myself for Daddy Daddy Oliver Warbucks and I was

33:36 like yeah huh and she also obviously doesn't drink but I I refuse to believe that you can't that like there are no comedic Avenues if you can't be drunk or sexual like that obviously you could make this character funny I do think it's a perfect storm of I think she genuinely interpreted Hannigan in a more grounded way and also Rob Marshall probably created an environment that is so neutered and I mean not just him but also like the powers that be at Disney that like this there's a bigger kind of picture for the whole movie to to fit a certain type I also just felt like her the dialogue that she delivers in this movie just has

34:22 less jokes in general like I just felt like there was the weird thing where she was like the first interaction she has with Annie where she talks about how she was like I've never hit like there was like this like serious like I would never hit you moment and then like she was like no but the threat is scarier and I was like I just I was like is there gonna be a joke in this movie at any point but thank God Kristen chenowitz in this yeah the dialogue doesn't help but I also refuse to believe that another person couldn't find humor in this character yeah no I just think yeah yeah I just think it was I think it was probably a Confluence of many things that were just yeah well do

35:08 that I was surprised because I thought I I was like why would Kathy Bates agree to be in a in a TV movie of Annie and then I was like maybe she was like look how often do I get to play a fun character like this like Kathy Bates often gets cast as like the villain or like a very sad or very serious character right and so I was like maybe she was like yeah like I'll do this made for TV movie thing because I get to be the comedic character and that's really fun but then she just like didn't and then I was like again now Kathy Bates I'm confused about why why in real time Judy Dench thing all over again remember she did that other time didn't she do that she did the late night TV movie at the same around this

35:54 no this that was like early 90s I think that was pre-misery because I was just directly after where she probably shot it right before misery because I was just wondering like was this just like uh a general like this is the new frontier you know TV like in the 1990s TV I do think though here's what I will say about Kathy Bates I think she's a really weird career for someone who is literally won an Oscar I don't know if it's that she just like has an interesting taste and she just does things that she wants to do I don't know if it's that she just doesn't get offered a bunch of stuff because she is a very specific type um but like the fact that she's been in multiple American Horror Story Seasons yeah and the fact that she is currently

36:40 in commercials in ads on Facebook as the grandma in the merge mansion Game blows my socks off I didn't know that last part it's wild crazy I was like is that Kathy Bates I think let's be honest Kathy Bates is not conventionally attractive and I think that Hollywood often doesn't know what to do with her because of that so I don't doubt that there's at least a part of that is 100 her not getting the parts that she should get based off of her Talent level but it's it's weird also because Hannigan is like not it's not a part that I would think cat if you were like name 50 actresses that could play Miss Hannigan I don't know that Kathy Bates would have been on that list for me it's also like she literally two years before her and Victor Garber are in the

37:26 oscar-winning film Titanic together so that's also like she's this is post Titanic like it's weird it's a weird point in her career no we're still in I guess then I guess we haven't left so we're still there um anyway remember when she was in that um stupid Clint Eastwood movie Robert Jewels yeah where she was the mom of the and she got nominated for it yeah anyway um let's listen to a little bit of her version of little girls which I thought was good or I heard like singing was good little girls little girls everywhere I turn I can see them [Music]

38:12 little girls little girls night and day I eat sleep and breathe then I'm an ordinary woman I like a man to nibble on my ear but I'll admit no man is bent so how come I'm the mother of the year now let's listen to a little bit of Adam's version of little girls little girls everywhere I look I can see them um but I do want to talk about more important not more importantly but also just as importantly Alan [ __ ] and

39:00 Kristen [ __ ] generous Kristen the Chenoweth I felt like Easy Street was pretty boring really wow I fully disagree when they go outside oh okay well I will say I will say I only watch Kristin when I watch this that's true yeah she does make it very anime she's also wearing the brightest a garment and she is acting at every knowing that she's not the focal point of the shot she is like constantly doing something yeah I just thought like we've covered that I find Kathy Bates performance very just like middle of the road feels like she didn't make any character choices honestly and then like I love Alan [ __ ] he's our Scottish

39:47 bisexual king but like I just much better accent work I just like was it again like I didn't feel anything in particular I didn't really connect that much to his character I I don't know I mean there's probably a bigger uphill battle for me because I'm so attached to the 82 version and Tim Curry is so good in that um but like I just didn't like care that much about this rooster but Lily I was like 100 down for it it does feel crazy to like compare Kristen Chenoweth and Bernadette Peters and come out on the side of Crystal show if it really feels like crazy uh we are the trash Millennial Music Theater people yeah but I don't think it's anything against Bernadette I

40:32 just think that Bernadette was in a scene with two other amazing performers so she was like holding her own equally in like a threesome whereas Kristen feels like she's like dominating the scene to me yes with like no lines like it's just all like looks which is she if she really took the note of acting as listening and reacting to its like most extreme they do the bit about the the the the line where it's like we know you're listening down there and then they look down yeah and she's on the other side of a desk and then she like slides across the desk to look over the edge of the desk to see where they were looking and it's already it's such a funny bit in the song and I didn't know that there was a way to make it funnier but she managed to find a way to do it it's so good for all of her talk

41:20 about choices all of her choices just feel like very like I mean ditzy blonde is like a a was a very popular Trope in 1999 I remember all the jokes but it really does feel like she just like leaned into it and I I think it works really well and I like her accent I just think she's very funny in this um can we talk a little bit about well let me let me play Easy Street for just a second just you can hear this version you don't get there by playing from the rule book you stack the aces yellow the dice Mother dear oh we know you're down there listening

42:05 how can we follow your sweet advice too easy easy [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] she'd repeat easiest [Music] soon can we can we talk a little bit about the change at the end yes to have

42:54 Mrs Mudge be Miss Hannigan and not Lilly Saint Regis truly such an insane insane man and no woman who Annie and the people at this house have never met that could be part of this Con but let's send the woman who's been caring for Annie her entire life and to Grace has met twice yeah and let's put her in very light makeup let's be honest in order to pass her off as Mrs Mudge and I'm sure no one will recognize her why would you do this it does feel like a weird decision of like we have Kathy Bates we have Kathy we have Kathy Bates and be like maybe the audience won't it's gonna

43:41 be funnier if it's you know it's not even the thing is it's not played for Laughs like there are some laughs like there are some jokes in it like the the very obvious ones where they're trying to forget Annie like those but nothing about like her dressed up is like the joke no so I was like well then what was the what's the payoff I was wondering if and this is RJ where I'm going to ask you in a second about how it compares to the stage show it because then what they do is they have Lily come in and be like oh I think you're cutting me out of the deal and that's how they get found out and I was wondering if they were like this is the only way we can figure out how to like wrap it up quickly is that like we have to get Lily to come in and do this so she has to not be in on it at

44:29 the beginning but like I don't know so like how does it wrap up at the end RJ because I assume it's not a helicopter chase as it is the perfect 1982. well it is it is absolutely right yeah it's a it's a very um what's what was that show the like stupid not stupid but the show you based your thing on sleep no more it's very sleep no more where you the whole audience boards the helicopter and you all fly after Annie [Music] not currently still running not immersive sensory not an amazing conversion of a space into a landscape

45:16 that is constantly changing around you it's just kind of stupid it's just one bit that keeps going the entire night uh-huh um anyway oh yeah what was the question no in the original show Annie asks if all of the orphans and um yeah if all the orphans can come for Christmas so in the last scene it's it it's pretty much close to what happened here we're close to this one uh Christmas Eve they are about to sign the papers judge Brandeis comes there's a big judge Brandeis and he goes inside the papers and then and then Drake is like there's a Mr and Mrs Munch out here and then you

46:03 know that all of that tracks it's just hand again comes in with the orphans during Christmas day to celebrate uh Christmas with with Annie and then that's where it's it's um as they're leaving it's the it's the same FDR comes in and says we we're back we found the proof it's Deus Ex Roosevelt so FDR op just them two they still have that scene where she originally sings tomorrow to FDR not with Eleanor but with the cabinet and then that's the infamous Roosevelt cabinet we can all name here we go here we go and also and that guy

46:51 I have a picture right here this one yeah that one you all can see it oh my god oh that one oh yeah and then him Secretary of the Interior yeah absolutely yeah um and uh that's the impetus to like have him uh like help with the FBI and and that's like so that he does come um at the end of the movie with the paper so he's not just at the very end like he is in this version he is set up in another scene yeah yeah okay hmm but it's still Lily and rooster yeah and Miss Hannigan has brought all of the orphans so she's that's how she's also that's how she's on stage yeah um does

47:38 FDR also in the stage show come in and is like hey I'll get you eight kids adopted rather than I don't know being the president and being like maybe I can improve the entire foster care system considering the fact that I'm the president rather than just like I'll get these eight kids to families I think it's I think first of all it's six so calm down foreign it's better if it's only six yeah I think it's the same I think it's the same he says like we'll make sure you you you girls are all get adopted yeah okay yeah don't over complicate Annie yeah no you're right there's nothing about systemic uh proper leftist ideologies

48:26 how dare I talk about Lefty things when I'm discussing FDR oh you got some sort of a new deal with this President why can't America be go back to the olden days with FDR I will say not a single Democrat Republic joke in this one no oh not a not a political anything inside yeah enough nothing no Wars no no war nothing I don't know if you knew no war happened uh during this around this time you know well that's true for America yeah yeah we've got a few years when Annie escapes from the orphanage and then she like meets Sandy for the first time ever finished I this time around like

49:13 um when I saw the dogs in cages and stuff when Sandy was gonna get carted away I was like this really is like a story about institutionalization in a way this is where I'm gonna bring in the big brain stuffed this episode so like Annie is escaping from the institution where she's being raised and then like Sandy has this threat of like going to the dog pound is like institutions for dogs right and I was like it's interesting that the movie is taking sort of a de-institutional stance in that like these children should be at homes in the community and like Sandy should be with a family right then Hannigan gets strapped down to get carted away like literally strapped to like a I don't know what you would call that like a dolly I guess it's just to cart her away and I get that they're

49:59 like re-referencing the line that I found funny as a child about getting sent to the nut house but I was like this is really a very dark image to end on yeah yeah no uh no handing and writing an elephant in this one what was it an elephant yeah yeah and I feel like I mean I guess that Hannigan kind of earns her Redemption more in that one because like she's been bad and then we see her we see her across the line right yeah so you like and like this one has been just like okay morally the whole time so there's no like reversal we could have but um it's like funny that this is like you've been talking about out to the ABC Disney version and like everything's

50:45 been very neutralized and everything but like but like haha send her to a mental institution that's fine nothing wrong with that that's what we did that's what we did to all the women who were hysterical yeah oh hysteria Disney friendly um I mean yeah but also like I think in 99 I just think maybe mental the mental conversation has come a bit of a ways since then yeah in mainstream American culture we that black and white people kiss on screen so I guess it's really you know we've made a lot of great houses did it but yeah um yeah I just think that that's uh interesting that in 1999 that felt like

51:32 a fun ending yeah and I I do I feel like comparing the two handing obviously like performance wise we we I think we prefer carols but also that that trajectory for Hannigan I do appreciate more than this one because I do like redeeming her in a way um especially comparing her to Rooster and Rooster's the one that wants to like go all the way in the scam um it in the original story like she it's kind of like the same thing that happens she does get taken away not not obviously like strapped down but she's just like she's gonna be fired she's gonna be fired because she does have that out like out uh break of like

52:19 you're like the worst I literally can't stand you out of all the orphans like that was pretty much uh close to the script huh I I would say if I like Hannigan not being redeemed because I I just think it's fine that she's the villain just like let her be the villain I don't yeah I don't love when uh I don't like I don't see a place better I don't love living in a post-wicked era where everybody feels like they need to justify a villain's existence with like a sob story um famous Wicked hater Adam unless I stand Wicked but I'm saying that it led to a

53:06 current glut of every place being like let's take a traditional anti-hero and make them you know let's understand their reasoning um but I also don't love how this one ends more I the bigger thing that I was annoyed by is that she sings little girls three times the full song and then two reprises and every time there's like something that closes in front of her and I was yeah I didn't think it was like a strong enough choice for it to keep being referenced so I was more annoyed at like the just like the like obviousness of the like Choice that's definitely something in this adaptation there are a lot of reprises lots of reprises Rob reprise Marshall

53:51 robber priest Marshall he just slept on one just to be like and we'll do a nice little button here so we could cut to commercial right um it always got to a commercial is great yeah um and I think hers was although I liked hearing it like it was nice to be like oh a little girl's reprise I like that but yeah I did feel a little jarring out of all of the more sentimental ones that we've had to experience I also would say her being more actively involved in the plot like makes her less morally gray than in in the uh in the 82 version her like swapping out with Lily makes her like more of a villain yeah I mean she's very involved in the plot though in the 82. she's like literally she like gets in

54:38 the car immediately after they leave warbucks's estate it's not like she like didn't know what was happening yeah but there's something about her like literally being in the room that makes it feel like oh she's like in in it in it you know what I mean I don't know she's doing a physical con I think that you're letting your emotions dictate Justice here Adam you know you're a woman you're filled with him classic harder off to the nut house um all right we're moving on to Annie yeah Annie Annie I have a question is is playing Annie on film a career killing role because neither this girl nor the 82 version had a career afterwards and

55:24 Covenant was like she was in a Beyonce video and she's like written some books but she hasn't had any major acting roles since playing Annie I mean after before before Annie she was nominated for a beast of a southern wild so maybe she was just like I I'm I'm taking time I just think it's interesting that it's like Annie the huge child role yeah and then like but nobody who's actually played Annie on film has like parlayed that into a greater film career yeah yeah wow yeah wow wow look at her wow Acclaim accolades is a full page good for her good for her

56:10 um yeah I don't know I mean maybe I guess like I think psychologically there is something of like if you are if you were in that age and you you know work so hard to audition because you know the Annie auditions are gonna be grueling even from like from a community theater to a film like because that's just a lot of you know young egos that you have to manage and I do think there is something I don't know After experiencing playing Annie I feel like you play Danny yeah as someone who has experience playing Annie before it was really a career died right it was really hard to get back into it and find new projects because it was just so exhausting it's important to talk about and

56:55 um I really left it out there you know I love the work you did on straight tones in maybe no vibrato I wasn't allowed to sing with vibrato I'm now imagining a version with RJ as an eight-year-old playing and the line the war book says is where's the little red-headed girl all orphans are red-headed girls instead of the boy line and it's that joke that it's a little Filipino boy named yes because famously we also that happened on our into the woods uh at Loyola where they had to change uh Jack's mom's line to like have you seen a little boy with a with Raven hair okay so it's supposed to be like red or something yeah yeah oh my gosh okay I saw um so UW opera did Sweeney Todd and I went to see it this weekend and it was good it was

57:43 like a little stand insane because it was an opera doing it but like I liked it and the woman who played love it was amazing um and there's a line I think that must be in the original Sondheim when he's doing pirelli's miracle Elixir where he says that he came down with an oriental disease but they changed it to infectious so in the in the they had subtitles because I think they just do that now for the Opera whenever and so they had it as infectious in the subtitles but he's a singer saying Oriental and it's like whoa well now it's way way way worse when he says a worse sometime yeah

58:29 um I mean he had the f words on he had the the F slur in the original company so [ __ ] no no the the cigarette fruit yeah fruit yeah he said fruit fruity too said fruit in in and I mean everyone was shocked in the 70s especially my God oh my God nobody was saying it um so I thought I don't know to actually talk about her performance I thought she was fine I liked I think I like 82 Annie a little better because she's a little they're just like yeah it's yeah it's this crappy dude yeah girl is a little more child actory to me whereas the 82 Annie

59:16 I like fully believed that she was just like some Plucky kid that they found they found out I mean I'm sure she was also I think I read that like her mom was in theater or something like obviously you have to get involved somehow as a child actor but like this this girl yeah she felt more like okay like she's been doing theater since she was three was like yeah that I got from her yeah I just I also just wanted curly hair yeah I didn't I do I look because I like the reveal of her in the red dress with the curly hair I like that moment a lot so I really appreciate that it's like a makeover she's getting it she's getting a Christmas dress um I wanna I'm gonna play

1:00:03 um should I play maybe or should I play tomorrow play maybe because there's a better tomorrow uh in the movie [Music] don't really care as long [Music] foreign [Music]

1:00:52 [Applause] [Music] let's talk about the kids the orphans in this movie specifically in the song uh fully dressed you're never fully dressed without a smile that whole number sold me on this movie I am not kidding that movie that number was so good they were so cute when they do the little bit where they're on the like they're on their knees and they're like sliding across I was like this is amazing this is what I want for musical theater this is what I want from young children in a chorus situation it was so

1:01:38 cute a plus Rob Marshall wrangling little brats I love it I I was telling Adam just during that number I was like you can picture Rob Marshall behind the camera like miming the choreography like a show Mom just like and do that yeah very very Amy polar in uh Mean Girls yeah yeah so proud so proud of the girls I mean I really liked it I didn't have any sort of like huge reaction to it but I appreciated it I did like that there were like fully eight orphans and Hannigan made them do a roll call at the beginning and I was like you do not need people you can see you can see how many kids there are in do a head count there's no there's no need for this I will say I did miss the probably like

1:02:25 lesser child laws that happened in the 80s where they could have a hundred children so many children in the orphanage girl it's eight like you can you can keep them you can keep track of them yeah yeah um I yeah I just thought these I thought they were cute I liked the song I liked I did I thought there were smart things that they cut like I didn't think there was anything that they cut that felt like oh you're missing a part of the plot like I didn't need to see the radio show I liked that they were just like listening to the radio and then they went into the song and I was like great and it was just I got all of it yeah yeah I like the radio show I of course missed Punjab I don't know why they caught him

1:03:10 that's the shame that's the real shame here real sham where's the magic realism where's the magic um where's the tensiveness in other words what's the tension the inside joke that only the three of us understand and we'll never explain keep telling on our podcast um yeah I I mean I missed I think what I missed was like the scale of the 82 version you know what I mean for sure the helicopter chase [Music] [Applause] um but I agree that this I mean this

1:03:55 does feel like a maid it just feels so small and there's also something too about watching a movie now that I'm so used to a widescreen format like watching something that's four three uh like ratio where it's like that square instead of like having the black bars on top and bottom that I was like oh it's I I felt claustrophobic in the shot sometimes huh I feel like my TV epic so I don't but Having Eight orphans to me is very like this is all that we're doing like yeah it is weird that you missed the helicopter chase when we had a riveting exciting and a 10 minute heart palpitating Chase sequence between the

1:04:42 the officer and the officer and Annie that sequence went on first so long and I was like I looked at RJ like more than halfway through it and I was like how are we still changing chasing Annie that segment was supposed to be 15 minutes before the next commercial break yeah Ash break was just one big chase sequence yep so that was that was what it had to be you know yeah that that one was that one could have been cut it this could have been 85 minutes instead of 90 minutes um is there anything else I want to talk about uh do [ __ ] should we talk about

1:05:27 I I think everything else involves uh Grayson Grayson Warbucks yeah should we bring them in let's bring them in uh Richard Garber uh we're letting you in the zoom right now so I'm just gonna thank you in the waiting room for us yeah for an hour stunt standby I had this vlogging at 7 30 just to be safe so perfect yeah awesome two hours and 15 minutes they've been waiting um so I think that I I don't know if I like okay I love Victor Garber I love him in anything I see him in so I can't tell if

1:06:14 I like this Daddy Warbucks more because I just like this interpretation you know Daddy Warbucks he's reliable he's like the Rob Marshall of effect it's just reliable you know or if I just like Victor Garber so I was like endeared to him faster than I was in the 82 version I I think that Victor Garber has a bad head for being bald and it really distracted me it looked I mean it was a bald cap definitely but it looked like they but then added like I don't know like some shading so it does look like his you could kind of see it where was it I didn't even notice it was a bald cap it wasn't about that it's like the proportions of his head are wrong like it's like too short of a head

1:07:01 I also am kind of afraid of bald people I feel like it's probably important to mention that as a contest so it's coming out now there was like some show that I watched with my parents as a child where there was like a villainous character who was bald who like really really scared me and was like Austin Powers it was not awesome powers no it was a I believe it was a Lord Peter Whimsy um eight part series um and Adam's eyes just rolled to the back of his head just a Masterpiece Theater it's a very Masterpiece Theater uh get your tote bags everybody so don't forget to also donate to your local PBS station yeah so like I like I can obviously interact with bald people like in my regular life and I like have friends who

1:07:46 are involved but like when somebody's and I think with the first daddy Gore box I was like I've seen this so many times it like didn't register sure but this time because I'm not used to this version I was like kind of uncomfortable with the fact that he was bald because it's definitely more Mr Clean than it is the 82 version um but I also think I just like I understand that in the original Little Orphan Annie Comics the Daddy Warbucks was bald and so that's why they insist on making him bald like a kingpin You Know sure how many people at this point know that Daddy Warbucks in the original Comics was bald like do we need to is this the thing that we need to like standardize but I know that because he was bald in the 82 so like it's that

1:08:33 every time you do it it becomes more iconic so I don't feel like it's like the okay throw around the word iconic now but it's iconic in the sense of like an icon in that like it is the image is more important than the source of the material I'm not using it as not like a value I'm just here's what I'm saying if we can in our next episode if we can have an Annie that does not have red hair I think we can have a Daddy Warbucks that's not Bob obviously everybody that protested the 2014 version it was only about the hair and there was nothing underneath that uh resentment that people had there was nothing else about there's nothing else that was very specific about that interpretation of Annie no totally

1:09:19 randomly people didn't like it um I mean I I don't have anything against having like an iconic look to a character except for as we're now like referencing if then you use it as an excuse to not have diversity but like I think that I think that it's like good that there's like a way of distinguishing that character because it also like helps you kind of cut down on time to like establish who it is that kind of thing I just wish that he wasn't bald because it freaks me out but if it weren't that if it were something else I would be okay with it it looked very skeletal as opposed to I feel like the 82 version which was more proportional of like this is a rounder shape he had a better head for it what is the what is the song that

1:10:07 he and Annie sing together what is that song called together at last yeah I don't need anything oh yeah yeah I don't need anything but you um let me play a little bit of it [Music] yesterday was just awful you can say

1:10:53 that again but that's not now that's that then um this was the first time I've watched that number and enjoyed that song shockingly they are very cute together they're very cute and I really I think it's the choreography and like the moments he has them like Rob Marshall has them do yeah in different parts of the like house and then they get on the table and do the dance and I was like yeah this number is very like this is how it's typically staged you know when I play Nanny this was how it was staged um I forgot who was your Daddy Warbucks uh Harry Connick Jr I was in the live TV yes

1:11:40 um yeah it like it's just it's this is why in the original like stage version this is this is why Annie and Warbucks I feel like like work together it's just so cute and leans in on how cute it is it's fun to see him like indulge into it because that's like his journey you know they we're gonna a family and stop but I also think I also buy into the chemistry in the 82 version so the entire time after NYC happened I was like I think it's funny that we told Molly that it's unbelievable for him to have a change of heart that he wants to adopt Annie in like the 82 version when

1:12:28 it literally happens in NYC start to finish and that's yeah 25 minutes into the musical when he decides he's going to adopt her after defend my point last week though I was saying that he was such an [ __ ] at the beginning that I was like that's a real long way to go fix your Garber in the beginning of when the first scene he comes on he's just like I'm busy and so like that that journey is not the football length field that that other man had to go that's true I got up times the 82 there's like bigger character changes because like Hannigan gets redeemed Daddy Warbucks like goes really it's a cartoon version is the cartoon yes uh which is perfect

1:13:13 um I had a question about did they explain in this version why he wants an orphan for Christmas or do we just like backfill that information when he's later like I was an orphan that like he was shopping around to adopt somebody I mean she does have the line where she says Grace says that yeah it was for his image yeah his image has been bad but we don't see like a photographer because is it in the 82 we like they talk about it so it's like they're gonna have photographer there and stuff and we don't see it like getting publicized do we no it's all backs you know um off stage off stage stage yeah yeah Grace comes in and goes well the photographer just took the greatest

1:14:00 shots yeah everything happened off stage and we're just now going to talk about it yeah um let's listen to NYC finally in this in this stupid series of Annie's this is the only time we'll be able to listen to it it took us the second end to listen to NYC got here I got here this morning three bucks two bags who won me [Music] NYC I give you fair warning lights I'll be go ask the girl

1:14:46 the place they love the best though California pays big for their art their fan mail comes out to rest [Music] this is where this is my theory oh the Annie Cinematic Universe theory that you have the Rob Marshall Cinematic

1:15:34 Universe oh yeah this is my this is my theory that this is where Rob Marshall got the idea to do Chicago the way he did it where everything is like uh a scene like a like a scene within a scene or there's like there's diegetic sound happening because in NYC as it is staged in the musical on stage the star to be is a girl who just arrives in New York City the song they're singing about and she sings about how she's going to be a star because she's now arrived she's got three bucks she's got two bags and she's got one me and that's kind of like her thing you know what I mean

1:16:20 but in this version they make it where it's she is this person is in it's this song is in the show that they are seeing on stage so it is transitioned from being non-diegetic sound which is sound that is happening outside of the world in which the characters actually live to being I have to explain this for our mothers to being diegetic sound which is now sound that the characters are experiencing in real time and we are experiencing along with them so I think this is like where he started like getting the idea of like separating those two for Chicago which was like why Chicago was such a big deal because it was the first time in a long

1:17:06 time that movie a movie musical had like used that conceit in a different way nothing I mean I love that intro to theater lecture that was great uh that's three credits yeah I mean I thought it was kind of silly at first until I saw the fact that this was the original Broadway Annie and then I was like oh that's fun then that she was like on stage and whatever because I'm pretty sure right in the stage show this is not part of them seeing a Broadway show they're just like walking around New York and that yeah they see yeah yes at the end of NYC they see a movie and then during the movie that's when Annie falls asleep and then

1:17:52 he sings the little tag at the end of like yeah yeah but the two two bags and three bits or whatever girl is two parts three bits uh shave um [Laughter] I just want to say though that I well this song is a better song than the movies that let's go to the movie songs um no [Laughter]

1:18:38 I'm taking the heat off of you Adam because we're gonna do your syllables I'm next um okay so oh I do kind of hate the song NYC though only because I hate all media that's about how unique New York City is for having all the features that every major metropolitan area in the world has and it's like people thinking New York is like distinctive for any of these reasons it's like the one version of American exceptionalism that we all pretend is sophisticated for some reason and not just like actual jingoism like I don't know why we all act like this is acceptable firstly Chicago has everything that they say in this line so it's like not even true within the US

1:19:24 and secondly like there are other cities you know there's like an entire world where there are other cities and there are things like cab drivers and like Windows you can look in and see the things in the stores none of these things are unique to New York City and everyone acting like they are and us all nodding along is like a very insane social contract I'm not doing it anymore okay I'm not uh Molly is taking down uh Coastal Elites yeah we're starting with starting with New York and working our way those of us in the flyover states really suffer it's about time we speak you know what

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