Tony Maietta:
Well, I think, Brad, before we say one more word, we need to set some ground rules because we are taking on a chunk here, and if we don't have some ground rules, this can turn into a mad, mad, mad, mad podcast.

Brad Shreve:
I agree. You know, normally I have maybe one page up of notes, two at the most. If I do a lot of side notes, I have six pages of notes on this podcast. And the reason is I know we're not going to get to all of that, but I have. With this movie being so huge, I have no idea what gopher hole we're going to go down. So I'm trying. So you'll probably say something. I'm like, hold on.

Brad Shreve:
I've got that conversation somewhere here in my notes. I sure. I had some idea about it. So we'll see how this goes. We might be editing some blank space while Brad scrolls through his page.

Tony Maietta:
It's a lot.

Brad Shreve:
It's big.

Tony Maietta:
It's a lot. But I'm glad we're doing it. It's another one of our summer movies. I think it's probably the hottest summer movie. Definitely. It's definitely almost as hot. I think it's probably hotter than Seven Year Itch because we're in Palm Desert. We're in Rancho Mirage in July.

Tony Maietta:
So we are talking about from UA in 1963. Yes. The ultimate. It's a mad, mad, mad, mad world. I'm very excited to talk about this movie. Even though it is a lot. It's a lot. This movie on purpose.

Brad Shreve:
It is a lot. There's big things about this movie, and, you know, they're. They were kind of with a little bit bigger cast than normal.

Tony Maietta:
Just a bit. I want to say, too, that this movie has a huge and passionate fan base. We recognize that. So what we're going to do here, what we're going to attempt to do here is give an overview of the film and tell you our impressions. This is by no means the be all and end all, because this movie has many, many, many fan sites, websites, articles. I mean, it's. It's. It's.

Tony Maietta:
The passion people have for this movie is actually wonderful. I love it. It makes me happy when I see people get so worked up about this movie, as they should, because it's a wonderful movie and it incites all kinds of passions from people.

Brad Shreve:
It is, It's. Well, I love it. Anytime anybody's passionate about a film on. Well, most films.

Tony Maietta:
Me too. Especially from 1963.

Brad Shreve:
Yes. I mean, this movie was an annual event in my household. Every time it Popped up on television. I remember what network ran it every year. But we were always like right there in front of it. And I have mixed feelings, like I do with every movie today, but it's still I love so much about this film.

Tony Maietta:
That's interesting. I have an interesting relationship with this film. This is one of the few. Usually when I see a film I have an immediate visceral reaction. And I remember seeing this film. A friend of mine was always talking about this film when I was a kid. And so I was very hyped up for it. And then I went and I saw it and I was like, really? That's it? I mean it was very long.

Tony Maietta:
I was like, that's it, really? Come on. But I think because I was so hyped up, because it's one of those rare films that to me, every time I watch it, I fall in love with it more and more and more. Until this last time I saw it, I couldn't stop smiling for the three hours it takes to watch this movie because it's just so much more fun.

Brad Shreve:
Well, before we get rolling, let me just step aside because we're going to get really deep into all this. Let me just step aside and say what this movie is. Yeah, it's. It's a Mad Mad, mad mad world. 1963 film distributed by United Artists. Written by William Rhodes and Tania Rose.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah.

Brad Shreve:
Directed by Stanley Kramer. And a quick, easy synopsis which is actually pretty easy to do with this film.

Tony Maietta:
It is.

Brad Shreve:
A criminal crashes on a desert highway. And in his dying breath he tells a group of motorists about $300,000 buried under a big W in the town fictional town of Santa Rosita, California. And unable to work together, the drivers scatter in a mad dash to find the treasure. And to help find the treasure and solve this age old crime, the police headed by Captain TJ Culpepper trust their instincts and stay back to allow this crazy cast to take them to the money.

Tony Maietta:
That's it exactly.

Brad Shreve:
We're done for now.

Tony Maietta:
For a movie which of varying lengths, from 201 minutes to 196 minutes. There's a different. There's a different length for so many versions of this film. So we'll talk about that. But these 12 people, what's. So it's a pretty simple synopses for this very, very big film. And it is big. And people.

Tony Maietta:
A lot of criticisms of the day of this film were that it was over the top and overwhelming and that you kind of missed the point. That's the Point. It is over the top. It is overwhelming. It's exactly what Stanley Kramer was trying to make. He was going to make the comedy to end all comedies. And he did that by packing this thing chock full of. Of comedians.

Tony Maietta:
Almost every single person, except for Spencer Tracy, except for the lead is a very, very well known comic. And not just the 12 major characters. There's also comic cameos throughout this whole thing which are so funny and so wonderful. And I think that's why people get such a kick out of this movie.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah, it's. That was actually part of the fun is because you don't always remember who were the cameos in here. And some of them are big cameos and some of the. There's a lot of the. Oh, that guy. Cameos.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. And I know him. Oh, who is that? I know that guy. Oh, yeah. Sometimes you're like, what's his name? What's his name? And then you're like, oh, my God, that's Jerry Lewis.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah.

Tony Maietta:
You know what I mean? It's for two seconds you're just sitting.

Brad Shreve:
There watching for him. That's a huge part of the film.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah, it's one of them. One of the very, very funny things. I want to give a little background about Stanley Kramer, if I may. I think it's important to talk about Stanley Kramer because Stanley Kramer is of course, the driving force behind this entire. For people who don't know who Stanley Kramer is, what I can do is I can throw a couple titles out at you and you'll say, oh, that guy. So we have Judgment at Nuremberg, the Defiant Ones, Inherit the Wind, Guess who's Coming to Dinner. Those are just four. Okay.

Tony Maietta:
But when I say those titles to you, what do you think, Brad? When I say those titles to you.

Brad Shreve:
They all sound like dramas to me. But Guest coming to humor is a little bit lighter.

Tony Maietta:
Side Guest is Coming to Dinner.

Brad Shreve:
High Noon's another drama on the beach. Big Time Dark.

Tony Maietta:
Yes, yes, those are those. He's a producer on High Noon. But the rest of those he was producer and director. And the thing about Stanley Kramer, besides the fact that those are mostly all dramas and Guess who's Coming to Dinner? Comedy, drama, they're all message films. Stanley Kramer was very famous for his social message films. And what happened was, was that he had done so many of these social message films that New York Times critic Bosley Crowther said to him, I bet you couldn't make a comedy. Well, Kramer had done some comedies. He had done true.

Tony Maietta:
He tried two comedies before, but they were Unsuccessful. So Kramer went, oh yeah, you wait. So he set out to make the comedy to end all comedies. But this is still a message film. That's what I find really fascinating about Mad Mad Mad Mad World. What is the message of this insane comedy, Brad?

Brad Shreve:
Oh my gosh.

Tony Maietta:
I can give it to you in one word. One word, starts with a G. 

Brad Shreve:
Greed. 

Tony Maietta:
Greed, exactly. The message of this film is the corrosive effects of greed. Because we have a handful of people here who are, who are perfectly law abiding, normal citizens were just driving on a highway in middle of Southern California and they turn into maniacal criminals by the end of the movie because of greed. Because they want that 350k, that 350 big ones under the big W. Even.

Brad Shreve:
Our moral center falls prey.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah, exactly. I was trying to do a really. I was trying to do Jimmy Duranty there and it came up big W. Never mind. We'll put him in the beginning of this episode so you don't have to listen to my.

Tony Maietta:
You'll never match the.

Tony Maietta:
You will not have to listen to my terrible Jimmy Durante impression impersonation. So, yeah, so this film actually Greed was one of the. Unfortunately, there's a very famous silent film called Greed. So they really couldn't call this film Greed. But a few of the other working titles when they were putting this together were so many thieves. Only in America they settled on It's a Mad World and they're like, okay, no, this is. We need more Mads. Let's get some more Mads.

Tony Maietta:
So I think they went to five and then they went to six and they went too many, let's go to four. So it became It's a Mad, Mad, Mad Mad World.

Brad Shreve:
And I think Mad World would make a good song.

Tony Maietta:
What do you think of It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, the title song from the film.

Brad Shreve:
You know, it's. I finally reached the point that when I say the name to people, I can say it without having to think about how many Mads fit. Yeah, it's just right all out. There's a time you have to like sit and write it down or count or. It's a. It's an awkward name, but it works. It's memorable.

Tony Maietta:
It works, it works. But the song, the song was nominated for an Oscar. This, this film was nominated for six Oscars at 1:1 for Best Sound effects editing, which, God, was that deserved because the sound effects in this film are phenomenal. It's. It's such an art for itself. It's incredible. But it was also nominated for cinematography, color film editing, music score, song, sound and sound effects editing.

Brad Shreve:
And, you know, I know one for sound effects. I know Tom Jones won for best film score.

Tony Maietta:
That score.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah. Or best original music. And I don't know if. I don't even remember if I've ever seen Tom Jones, but I have a hard time believing any film can match what this film had. It was bold. It was brash. It was cartoonish. It was looney tunes.

Tony Maietta:
It was.

Brad Shreve:
It was all over the place. It was just as chaotic as the.

Tony Maietta:
Movie, but it worked exactly well. What Ernest Gold, who wrote the score and who wrote many, many of Kramer scores, was doing was. He put. He put a carnival theme behind it. It's like a carnival. It's a circus. Because this movie is a circus. These people are in a carnival.

Tony Maietta:
And he has that wonderful bouncy. I mean, it's in my head. I can't get out of my head after. I mean, you know, it's just. It's permeates the movie, and it's so much fun. It's like the. It's like in Foul Play, the. The chase and foul play and that fun, wonderful music and foul play.

Brad Shreve:
Same thing here. The music adds so much to this film and gives it so much of its energy and its drive, and I just adore it. I adore it.

Tony Maietta:
Well, going back to what's up, Doc? You know, we talked numerous times about. It was a cartoon. This movie is totally a cartoon. And the music makes it very clear.

Tony Maietta:
It does. It does. But I think what's. What's unusual about this film is how it's shot, because it is shot not just CinemaScope, in. It is shot in Ultra Panavision. All right, so I got to give. If it's okay. I'd like to give a little bit of a context about what Ultra Panavision is and where we were in Hollywood as far as the size of films at this time.

Tony Maietta:
Is that okay?

Brad Shreve:
If it's what makes this movie just so fabulous to look at, I would love to hear it.

Tony Maietta:
Okay, so most films today that you see in the theater are in aspect ratios of 2.35 to 1. Okay. That means the screen is 2.35 times wider than it is high. Ultra Panavision is 2.76:1 aspect ratio. So the screen is 2.76 times wider than it is high. Now, people get confused about this because this film, as you know, this film premiered at the famous Cinerama Dome in Hollywood.

Brad Shreve:
The first film.

Tony Maietta:
Yes. And Cinerama. People think this film is in Cinerama and it is and it isn't. Cinerama originally was three cameras in sync, filming a scene and then projected in three projectors that were in sync. So you had three different panels. This isn't that. This is one mofo wide lens filming this whole thing.

Brad Shreve:
I'm gonna jump in. This movie was number three of the top grossing films. The one before this, how the was one. If anybody wants to see an example of Tony's talking about, watch how the west was won. And most of the viewings, you'll see it's. You'll see three squares on your screen.

Tony Maietta:
Exactly.

Brad Shreve:
Had to squish that movie together.

Tony Maietta:
True. That is true Cinerama. This is not true Cinerama. This is, as entrepreneur Mike Todd said, cinerama through one hole. And that gives you an idea of what kind of guy Mike Todd was. Mike Todd. Mike Todd was actually inspirational for this because his film around The World in 80 Days was an inspiration for these big roadshow films. He was also Mr.

Tony Maietta:
Elizabeth Taylor number three. But anyway, that's what that is. So it's. It's not Cinerama. It is actually ultra Panavision, but it's still huge. So when you're watching this, when. I imagine when you watch this when you were a kid in the 70s, 80s, you watched it like I watched it. Well, I saw it in the theater the first time, but even then it was pan and scan because screens were square.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah.

Tony Maietta:
You know, they weren't. This. You need this wide scope, this wide screen for these vistas to really get the impact and the beauty of this film.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah, I. I don't remember the tv, but it was long ago in a land far, far away from here and would just sit on the floor laughing hysterically at this film. Yeah. And when I watch it now on a much clearer screen, it just. Wow.

Tony Maietta:
I love a really wonderful, beautiful print of this in a. In its proper aspect ratio. There's nothing like it. You get the size of it. And that was very different. This is the first comedy, really successful comedy, that was shot in this kind of incredible aspect ratio. Usually that was reserved for dramas or epics or musicals. Think about the Greatest story Ever Told.

Tony Maietta:
Big scope, Ben Hur. Same thing. Musicals. All those big musicals of the 60s that were shot in that we now watch letterboxd because they're huge wide screens. So it's unusual because a comedy. We talked about this a bit with Auntie Mame and how Rosalind Russell was so startled by how big the sets in Auntie Mame were. Because the usual theory is that comedy is intimate, comedy is small, drama is big. So what Kramer was doing here was really going against the grain of the whole paradigm that comedy is intimate.

Tony Maietta:
But he does it because if you notice, even though the screen is wide, the shots are all very intimate. It's. People are talking. They're talking to each other. If they're in a group, it's a very tight group. So it's not. You know, he works within the. He uses the.

Tony Maietta:
The Panavision screen so brilliantly. In that case, there'll be one person talking on one side of the screen, another person talking on the other side of the screen, and there'll be something in the middle to see, which I think you know what scene I'm talking about. The very end where there's a big letter. I won't say what the letter is in the middle of the screen. And you have two people talking to each other. And we, the audience see it because of the way it's shot, but they don't. It's. Yeah, it's a brilliant use of widescreen.

Tony Maietta:
The second thing I want to say, and this is, I promise I'll keep this quick, is that. And this is another thing that people have about this movie. They don't understand. I don't think we. Anybody today hasn't got. A lot of people don't have a concept today of what a road show was. A roadshow presentation. Had you ever heard of a roadshow presentation, Brad?

Brad Shreve:
I only know now for one reason. I could not for the life of me figure out why in one place it was saying this movie was three and a half hours long.

Tony Maietta:
And.

Brad Shreve:
And another place it was saying two and a half hour long. I looked at the ones that we. That we own, which is kind of somewhere in the middle. And then I couldn't access that, so I pulled it up in Amazon, which was a different length. And.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah.

Brad Shreve:
So I had to look up and say, what the fuck is going on? And now I know.

Tony Maietta:
You tell everybody else what a roadshow is along with screens getting wider in the 50s to basically combat television and the erosive effects television was having on films. Not only did screens, films get wider, they got longer before the 50s, and people don't understand this either. This is a weird concept. There were no set showing times for films. You could walk into a film when it was halfway over and you'd watch the rest of the film go out, get your popcorn, come back. The movie would Start again. And then you'd stay in the movie until the part you walked in on. You're like, okay, I've seen the movie.

Tony Maietta:
Which sounds so crazy to us right now, today.

Brad Shreve:
That sounds nuts.

Tony Maietta:
It's nuts. But that's how movies were shown. It was continuous. They were continually showing what a roadshow was. Was. A roadshow was an event. It was usually always a big movie, like Ben Hur, like It's a Mad, Mad, Mad World, like the musicals, like Sound of Music, hello, Dolly, the big ones. Because you would have.

Tony Maietta:
It was like a Broadway play, basically. You would reserve your tickets. You have reserved seats. You sometimes had to get your reserved tickets weeks in advance. So you were. You were ordering tickets for a film, not a play, for a film, weeks in advance. You had an overture, even if it wasn't a musical. This film was not a musical.

Tony Maietta:
It has an overture. You had an intermission with an entre act of music. And you had Exit Music. You also had souvenir programs. You had. There were huge screenings lasted. Movies could be in movie theaters for over a year on roadshow engagements. And then once they played out their roadshow engagement, their big premiere, which was usually Los Angeles and Chicago and New York, then they would go into general release, which was basically.

Tony Maietta:
They come to your hometown, and they would usually lose. They would. Because very few theaters had the capacity to show these huge, long films and make money. They would lose all this stuff. They would lose their overture, they would lose their intermission, and they would just play continually like they've always played. So when you're watching a print of It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, and you're like, why is there an overture? Why? What is this? What is this inter. What is an intermission? What's going on here? That's why. Because it was a roadshow presentation.

Tony Maietta:
And when you're watching that, the people are trying to be faithful to its original presentation.

Brad Shreve:
I heard it equated to IMAX today, which is really not as a great thing to compare to because it's. That's not as big and bold as what we're talking about. But probably the best example today, it's a special thing to go see.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah.

Tony Maietta:
Imax.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. And, you know, there are still. There's not. I don't think any. I haven't seen a film in ages. But I didn't say that I haven't seen a film in ages with an overture or. I mean, you know, from 2025. I don't.

Tony Maietta:
I mean, west side Story, maybe that was a while ago. But the thing about that is it's a real immersive experience. You have to give yourself over to it. It's obviously an evening's entertainment. And that's also why there are so many different runtimes of this movie. So I'm just going to the ones that I found that I think are correct and from sources I think are verifiable. They're all over the place. They're all different times because this is always changing.

Tony Maietta:
But this is what I have. So the preview version before the film premiered at the Cinerama Dome, inclusive all of all the intermissions and the overtures and the exit music, ran 210 minutes. Okay, that's more than three hours. At the premiere, I have 201 minutes, which is still over three hours. Then a few weeks later, they cut that original roadshow down to 162 minutes. And then when it finally went into general release, it was cut to 154 minutes so it could play continually at your neighborhood theater. Now, in the 90s, it was reconstructed. But just as we talked about with the Star Is Born, way back in our first season, they couldn't find all of the cut footage that was cut because Hollywood didn't care.

Tony Maietta:
When they were cutting the movie, they threw it out, unfortunately. So if you're watching a reconstructed version, just like A Star Is Born, there are scenes they could not find, which they insert stills. And the soundtrack is still there. So the most prevalent version now is 163 minutes, I believe. And there's reconstruct. But the reconstructed version using stills and 35 millimeter footage is 197 minutes. I sound like Sid Caesar when I'm trying to divvy up the shares. Does anybody know what I just said? Anyway, that's gonna.

Tony Maietta:
That's the end of my technical stuff for now. I'm not gonna go any more into this because I'm sure if we still have people, God bless you for sticking around. We appreciate it. Let's get into this movie.

Tony Maietta:
Brad, let me just give the time frame here because just very quickly, because we got so much else to talk about, but this was 1963. The top movies of 1963. To give you an idea, they're kind of all over the place as far as types of movies. We have Cleopatra. How the West Was One. We have. Have this film. Tom Jones, Irma.

Brad Shreve:
Is it Irma La Dolce Irma La Deuce. Thank you. I've never. I don't think I've ever even Heard of.

Tony Maietta:
It has one of your favorite actors. It has Jack Lemmon. Jack Lemmon.

Brad Shreve:
Oh, really?

Tony Maietta:
Joe McLean and Jack Lemmon. It was. It was their follow up to the Apartment.

Brad Shreve:
I'm shocked. I don't know it. Other noble films, Lilies of the Field, which won Sidney Poitiers Oscar. Hud, son of Flubber. Dr. No. Bye bye Birdie. The birds, you can tell they were all over the place.

Brad Shreve:
And this was actually kind of a dark year. Kennedy was shot not long after this movie premiered. It was in August. We had MLK and the March on Washington, his I have a Dream speech. And actually that same month, Moscow and the US opened up their hotline to help prevent an accidental nuclear war. So there was a. It was a heavy period.

Tony Maietta:
You know what else I think people needed?

Brad Shreve:
What else?

Tony Maietta:
You know what else heavy happened in 1963-64 that we've talked about?

Tony Maietta:
What was that Judy Garland show premiere.

Tony Maietta:
And featured so many actors who were in this movie, by the way, P.

Brad Shreve:
S. I knew that because I heard that that's why she wasn't in this movie. And I'll have you talk about that later.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah, allegedly, she was gonna play Mickey Rooney's wife. And I'm like, he doesn't have a wife in this. What he was gonna be. It would be a cameo. It would be a cameo.

Brad Shreve:
He was gonna actually play the Milton Berle role. And she was supposed to play his wife in that. I don't know how true that is. I've seen that.

Tony Maietta:
I have a whole list of maybes. One of you.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah, yeah. There's always those.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Tony Maietta:
The list is huge. With this many people, you can only imagine how many people they went through.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. 63 was a dark year. I agree with you on that. It really. It really was. Yeah, it was.

Brad Shreve:
Should I go to the supporting cast, because you talked about or you haven't even talked about the main cast.

Tony Maietta:
We haven't really talked about the main cast. Well, I think we should do. Is talk about just how it came about briefly. I'm not going to, because I guess a whole spiel about roadshows and, you know, Ultra Panavision and stuff like that. So I just want to say. So it was written by William Rose, as Brad said. Now, William Rose was a British writer. He had worked primarily for the Ealing Studios in the uk which, by the way, I want to do a film from Ealing, particularly the Lady Killers.

Tony Maietta:
He wrote the Lady Killers, which is a wonderful, wonderful film with Alec Guinness. And there's actually a Character. The main character in the lady killers is named Mrs. Wilberforce. And we have a Wilberforce in It's a Mad Mad, Mad Mad World because Rose liked to reuse names, fun names, like Wilberforce. That's a great name. So he envisioned this comedy about greed and it was his idea to use as many famous comics as he could fit in one movie. I've heard this movie being called a murderer's row of comics and boy, is it ever.

Tony Maietta:
I think we should probably talk about some of those comics who are in that murderer's row of comics. Do you. Do you want to take a stab at starting it? Who the main guy?

Brad Shreve:
Main people are the main cast? Certainly. I'm going to bunch them up together in relationship to who they mostly traveled with.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, that's a good idea.

Brad Shreve:
First we have Milton Berle as Russell Finch. He is a seaweed salesman trying to develop a seaweed industry at a time when I don't think it was all that popular. And he also has a very nervous condition. His wife, Dorothy Provine, who is plays Emmeline Finch. She's probably the most disillusioned of the bunch. When all this is over, she.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah, she's not very interesting. She's very. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Brad Shreve:
And then we have his wonderful mother in law person who's singing I'm not all that fond of, but my God, I love her as a comedian.

Tony Maietta:
And that is Ethel Merman, her greatest screen performance ever.

Brad Shreve:
Absolutely. And when I saw that was literally her being bounced up and down, upside down, I was like, oh, my God, bless that woman.

Tony Maietta:
I have a question for you before you go any further. How many times does Ethel Merman go ass over tea kettle in this movie? Do you know?

Brad Shreve:
No, I don't know.

Tony Maietta:
I count three. Okay. I count three. Including the fabulous last ass over tea kettle scene on the banana peel.

Brad Shreve:
Oh, I can guess the three.

Tony Maietta:
Okay, see if you can guess. I'm good.

Brad Shreve:
One where they were trying to shake the keys out of her.

Tony Maietta:
Well, that's for then. I didn't count that one. That's four. Oh, okay.

Brad Shreve:
The other two others I can think of are the. The one you mentioned when she slips and falls on the banana peel. And then there's also when the car crashes and she flips upside down into the front seat.

Tony Maietta:
Correct. There's one more.

Brad Shreve:
Well, I don't remember the other one.

Tony Maietta:
The other one is at the end of Spencer Tracy Runs. Well, Spencer Tracy's double runs into Ethel Merman's double and she flips up on her ass and lands in a. In a big box, in. In a cart. She's like, get me out of here. Anyway, we'll talk. We will talk about the merm. Believe me, I got a lot to say about the merm in this.

Brad Shreve:
Okay, Further down the list, we have now kind of sort of part of this group, we have Terry Thomas, who is J. Algeron Hawthorne, who. You may not know his name. You would know him by face. He's a great actor. Dick Sean, who plays Sylvester Marcus, Mrs. Marcus's son.

Tony Maietta:
Sylvester. Sylvester.

Brad Shreve:
I don't think we ever hear her name. It's always Mrs. Marcus.

Tony Maietta:
Yes.

Brad Shreve:
The next group, two of them, only it's stood. Caesar and Ed Adams as Melville and Monica Crump. And that's actually the two that I heard were supposed to be Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland. Then the next group, we have these two guys. Buddy Hackett as Benji Benjamin and Mickey Rooney as Ding Bell. I don't really know.

Tony Maietta:
I love that name.

Brad Shreve:
They were just. Well, Mickey Rooney was like this suave. Like, I could see him hanging out the lounge.

Tony Maietta:
I think they were supposed to be screenwriters. I think. I think I might be wrong about that. I have read there's different characters to be hanging out together, but I can't imagine Buddy Hackett being a screenwriter. Can you imagine?

Brad Shreve:
It just seemed like an odd paring. But they were fun.

Tony Maietta:
The names Ben. Ben, Benji Benjamin, and what's. What's Mickey Ruder's name? Ding Bell.

Brad Shreve:
Ding Bell. Then we have Jonathan Winters as Lenny Pike. He is the most physical comedy in this film. And actually, he says it helped us. It launched his career to a small degree. Not that he didn't have one beforehand. This is when the world knew about John.

Tony Maietta:
Definitely winners.

Brad Shreve:
He probably had the best thing in this film as far as standing out. And then last but not least, of the big stars, one that I'm usually not fond of, but he was perfect for this role, and that's Phil Silvers as Otto Meyer. Now, Phil usually plays a slimeball character and is no different in this film.

Tony Maietta:
Not at all.

Brad Shreve:
And for some reason, I liked him in this film. It was always the same character, which kind of like Jack Benny did the same thing and it worked.

Tony Maietta:
If there's a villain in this movie, it's Phil Silver's.

Brad Shreve:
Oh, God. Yeah.

Tony Maietta:
As Otto Meyer, who originally was going to be called. Can you guess what his name was really going to be? Oscar Meyer.

Brad Shreve:
Oscar Meyer?

Tony Maietta:
But they're like, we can't call him Oscar Meyer. We'll Call him Otto Meyer. But Silvers said that he actually was surprised. He thought that the character of Otto was going to be a little more benevolent than he was. He wasn't going to be quite as Machiavellian in his manner as he ended up being. So, yeah, if there is indeed a villain in this piece, it is. It's definitely Phil Silvers. And the comeuppance he gets from Jonathan Winters is beautiful.

Tony Maietta:
It's just beautiful. Well, you forgot the. But I. You listed the comics, but you forgot the. The linchpin. You forgot the biggest.

Brad Shreve:
Oh, my God. The guy.

Tony Maietta:
The biggest one of all.

Brad Shreve:
The guy at the very top of the list, I can't believe. Because he wasn't with the group out running about until the very end. And that is Captain TJ Culpepper, played by the wonderful Spencer Tracy.

Tony Maietta:
Spencer Tracy, his pent ultimate film. We'll talk about Spencer Tracy in this. But I. Yeah, he's the linchpin. He's what keeps it all together. He's what keeps this madness. He's the. The eye of the storm.

Tony Maietta:
You know what I mean? We need an eye. We need a calming eye. Otherwise, this movie will just go way off the rails, even more than it does. What I think is interesting is, is that, you know, it was a point of pride to so many comics to be asked to appear in this film. There were a couple comics that Kramer neglected to ask, and they never let him forget it. One of which, according to Kramer, was Don Rickles. And every time Kramer went to see Don Rickles perform, Don Rickles would call him out from the stage and say, why, Stan Lee? Why? Why? But it was truly a point of pride for so many of these comics to be asked to be in this. You know, and there were a lot of comics who were not in this.

Tony Maietta:
These comic. I think what's important to point out is other than Spencer Tracy, these are not movie stars. These are. These are. These comics were TV stars, nightclub stars. We don't have Bob Hope in this movie. We don't have a. And I was going to point this out.

Tony Maietta:
We don't have Lucille Ball in this movie. We don't have big comic names who were still making movies. So some of the people who were approached to. To play in this movie who actually said no were Lucille Ball. Lucille Ball couldn't do it. She was going to play one of the wives, Joan Davis, Imogene Coca. And here you go. Brad, you dodged a bullet here.

Tony Maietta:
Can you guess who I'm going to say?

Brad Shreve:
Martha Ray.

Tony Maietta:
Martha Ray.

Brad Shreve:
And I didn't even know that.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah, Martha Ray did not do it. So Brad is happy about that. And for the part of Mrs. Marcus, the Ethel Merman part, they asked Mae west and Sophie Tucker.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, Shad Cam. It's one of those things where. Oh, that would have been terrible. But you can't say that. It just is hard to imagine anybody but.

Tony Maietta:
And you kind of wonder how much of this is tall tale and how much of this is fact. Yeah, I believe this. I believe this. This roster list, I believe. But yeah, sometimes you got to wonder. And Sergeant Culpepper was originally. The original idea was that the Spencer Tracy part, Sergeant Culpepper would be played by Jack Benny. And Jack Benny has a cameo in this, which we'll get to.

Tony Maietta:
But Spencer Tracy had a relationship with Stanley Kramer. Spencer Tracy, at this point in his career, it was very tricky. He was very. He was a very sick man. And it only get worse. And in the last years of his life, when he could do a film, he would usually work for Kramer because Kramer had his back. Because Spencer, they wouldn't insure. Spencer and Kramer always, you know, would always be there for him.

Tony Maietta:
Had his back, said, you're still going to be in our film. So they had a great relationship and that's why Spencer Tracy's in this. But I also think I want to say that, you know, along with the special billing for these comics, there was a special tier system for payment. Oh, so you had this. These top 12. Got a certain amount of money. Well, first of all, Spencer Tracy got the most because he was Spencer Tracy. And then you have the.

Tony Maietta:
The comics under him that Brad just mentioned. They got a certain amount of money. And then underneath you have the featured players, the people like Andy Devine, like Jimmy Durante, like Joey Brown, like Jim Backus, Norman Fell. These people were at a different tier of payment, obviously. And then you had the cameos, which I think a lot of them were done for free. Don Knotts, Jerry Lewis, I mean, some Buster Keaton for a second. Buster Keaton's in this?

Brad Shreve:
Yeah. I heard he wasn't happy.

Tony Maietta:
Well, he was.

Brad Shreve:
He had scenes cut.

Tony Maietta:
Here we go. In another legend. He was originally supposed to play Jamie Durante's part. He was originally supposed to play the Smiler because. How funny. Because Buster Keaton's whole Persona was the great stone face. He was totally blank. So it's funny that he would have a character named Smiler.

Tony Maietta:
But what happened was, was that they didn't think that Keaton could really give it the Oomph that Durante gives it in the very beginning when he's talking about the big W. It's under a big W. I tried it again. It didn't work. So they switch roles. And because the character that Buster Keaton plays, his name is Jimmy. So it's kind of interesting. And these two had a relationship.

Tony Maietta:
They worked together in the 30s. Not very well. So anyway, that's going off topic. All to say that this was a. This was a very, very prestigious thing for these comics to be in this film. And for most of them, it is their biggest film role ever.

Brad Shreve:
And, you know, I don't know if this counts as a cameo because she wasn't that huge star like these others were. But as I'm listening to Culpepper on the phone, I'm like, that sounds like Selma Diamond. Is that Selma diamond playing his wife? Yeah, used to be. Sure enough, it was. Great voice, Great choice.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. We know who else is in this. Who is Bobo Lewis. Bobo Lewis, who we talked about last year during our Bewitched episodes. And I thought for a minute, I knew it was Selma diamond, but I thought, oh, that could also be Bobo Lewis. Bobo Lewis plays the pilot's wife who does a sign of the cross when Sid Caesar and Edie Adams are taking off in the plane. Anyway.

Brad Shreve:
And Tony has not scratched the surface on the number of people that stand. And they aren't all comedians, but there are so many people that. That come into this film that you would never think would be in this film. And tell us who Zazu Pitts is. Tony. Have we discussed her before? We have, haven't we?

Tony Maietta:
No, no, we've never discussed Sassoop, because.

Brad Shreve:
I know this is her final film and I certainly know her.

Tony Maietta:
Zazu Pitts goes all the way back to silent film. In fact, she was a comic actress. But she was also in the film Greed, the Erich von Stroheim film Greed, which was a drama, not a comedy. It was very unusual. But Zazu Pitts was a character actress in silent film and then a comic character actress in the 30. Once you see her face, you can't forget it. She's wonderful. And yes, this is.

Tony Maietta:
This indeed was her last film. She plays the receptionist at the police station. So I guess what I want to say about this, this cast is. And this is what. This is what William Rose thought, and this is what Kramer said, and this is very true, is that typecasting saves you exposition. What do we say all the time? What do I say ad nauseam? That actors bring certain Qualities of their own personality to their roles. So you don't have to say to somebody, oh, Phil Silvers is a real son of a bitch, because you know he is. Because it's Phil Silvers.

Tony Maietta:
So when he was casting these role, that's where he was going. He was thinking, okay, what, what, what baggage does. Do certain people bring with them? You have an actor like Jonathan Winters who was kind of unknown, but Jonathan Winters has an innate sweetness.

Brad Shreve:
Yes.

Tony Maietta:
Which just lends itself to the part of Lenny. You love Lenny because he's such a sweetheart. The merm. Come on, we talked about it before. Big, brassy loud. Who is Mrs. Marcus? Big, brassy loud. That's.

Tony Maietta:
That's what's so wonderful about the way he cast this film. He kind of went against type with some characters. Milton Berle didn't usually play a weak character. He was usually a pretty strong character. But in this film, you know, Russell is a very weak character.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah.

Tony Maietta:
But something funny about Milton Berle is, as you can imagine, you have all these comics and they're always trying to one up each other and outdo each other. That's what this movie is about. And Milton Berle had an annoying habit of always being the last one out of a shot. So even if he was in a group of people exiting a shot, he would find a reason to turn around and run back for some reason. He'd find some motivation so he would be the last one out of the shot. Because that's what these. This is what these comics did. They were always trying to one up each other.

Brad Shreve:
And that was smart casting in that sense. I will say, for those that are trying to find some depth in this film, it could be considered one of its negatives because these characters are mostly, and mainly because time doesn't allow it, mostly undeveloped. They're really cartoon characters, cartoon characters, but caricatures, archetypes, you know. Thank you. The. The brash mother in law, the weak son in law, you know, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So are you gonna get to know these characters on a personal. No No way.

Tony Maietta:
No.

Brad Shreve:
But it's not that kind of film. But if that's what you're looking for, you're gonna. You're. You're kind of like that. That is an argument I've heard. And it's legit to a degree, if that's where you wanted to go.

Tony Maietta:
No, this isn't Igmar Bergman and death playing chess.

Brad Shreve:
Well, there is a middle ground, you know.

Tony Maietta:
It'S a mad, mad, mad, mad world These are all archetypes, like Airport. Think of it as a funny version of Airport. Because their motivations, their inner motivations, their inner character struggles are not the point. They all have one motivation. It's to get the 350 GS. And just for context, Brad, how much are 350 GS in 2025?

Brad Shreve:
And that's actually. I want. Before I answer the full question, I want the listener to think about this. If you had a situation with a group of people and if you were honest and not. Or not. If you wanted to be fair and not greedy, do you. Would you come in an agreement of $300,000 that you could take home? With each of split among 12 people, you'd get 300, $305,000. I think you probably would.

Brad Shreve:
Because in Today's value, that 100 and $350,000 now is worth $3.7 million. Which divided amongst the first 12 people would be $305,000 a piece.

Tony Maietta:
Okay, that's interesting.

Brad Shreve:
As a kid I was watching this, I'm like, that's only $350,000. Why? They're destroying everything for $350,000. That's crazy. Yeah, it makes sense. But do that and it makes sense.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah, that's so funny. And that the whole splitting of the Cher scene with the brilliant, brilliant Sid Caesar. So, you know, that was the first scene that was shot with the whole group.

Brad Shreve:
Oh, really?

Tony Maietta:
The whole group of them together. It was shot, I think, on a Saturday. A very, very hot Saturday, I guess we should say. This is on Highway 79 between Palm Desert. Where does Highway 79 go? You know, that's. That's your neck of the woods. I'm sorry, Highway 74. Highway 70.

Tony Maietta:
Highway 79 is where I'm from in Pennsylvania. Highway 74, the Palms to Pines highway in Palm Desert. And this was the first scene shot, so. And it was July. We're, you know, we're in the summertime now. Brad, what are the average temperatures in the. On the Highway 74 in July?

Brad Shreve:
Well, they're usually a little bit hotter than we are. Typically this time of year, we run 104 during the day. And we are high desert, which is what they call us because we are a higher plane. Palm Springs area is lower level. And they are hot as hell.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. So these actors in this makeup, in these heavy costumes. There's nobody in a bikini. Well, Barry Chase is in the bikini, but we'll get to that. There's nobody in that group. They're all very Dressed. So can you imagine? They filmed that scene all day because they were all ad libbing and they finished at the end of the day. And Kramer said, we're gonna do it again tomorrow.

Tony Maietta:
And they're all like, excuse my French. Oh, I say it all the time. Oh, fuck. We better just stick to the script. And they did, and they got it the next day. But what's so funny about that first scene where they're. Where they're divvying up Sid Caesar has this whole long monologue, very complicated, about how much each chair would be and who gets what chair for what car and who's going down to see know. It's insane.

Tony Maietta:
And the funny thing about Sid Caesar is, is one of the most notorious things about Sid Caesar was when he was doing his live TV show, your show of shows, Caesar's Hour, he could never remember his lines, so he would ad lib. That's what was so brilliant about your show of shows. And what's so brilliant about Caesar's Hour was he was an incredible improvisational comic. He remembered those lines and he's brilliant at it. I guess we should say that Sid Caesar and Milton Berle were two huge giants of early television. So for people who don't know who that. Who they are today, maybe people know them now. You know, Sid Caesar played the gym teacher in Greece, you know, and Milton Berle is just that annoying man who was always in drag.

Tony Maietta:
But they were giants. They were giants. They weren't by this time, by this time, you know, their heyday was in the 50s. But I think that's amazing. I think it's amazing. And I read that the part of Melville Crump played by Ted Caesar was originally, they. They talked about perhaps it was going to be played by Ernie Kovacs. Ernie Kovacs was a comic in the 50s and 60s.

Tony Maietta:
Very famous comic who was married to Edie Adams and who tragically died in a car crash right before filming started. And Sid Caesar kind of came in as a replacement, but Edie Adams obviously stayed in because Ernie Kovacs left her in a lot of debt and she had to pay it off. So they did say that. But Edie Adams is beautiful. Beautiful. She plays Monica. Beautiful, beautiful actress. She was in Little Abner on Broadway.

Tony Maietta:
Gordon, don't you think she's a gorgeous woman?

Brad Shreve:
She is a gorgeous woman. But you know who I thought would be good for that role? And this is a person that actually was in the film very briefly.

Tony Maietta:
Who's that?

Brad Shreve:
Carl Reiner. I pictured Carl Reiner in that role.

Tony Maietta:
Carl Reiner would have been great. Carl Reiner would have been great. I'd say something about Sid Caesar, though. Sid Caesar brings such a gravitas to everything because he's a big guy, especially back then, he was a big, big guy. And he brings such a gravitas and such. He brings leading man energy. If there's a leading man in this film, it's Sid Caesar. And you know, as we know in the film, if you watch the film, he.

Tony Maietta:
He spends most of this film with Edie Adams, trapped in a hardware store, which is one of the most brilliant. It's a movie in itself. Everything they do to get out of.

Brad Shreve:
That hardware store, that is before my time. I know Sid Caesar from your show of shows and mainly I know him from being on talk shows talking about those early days of television. It was nice to see him in a film role. And that. That whole scene in the. You know why. You know why? It was such a good scene. It was total chaos and madness.

Brad Shreve:
But you related to this couple. At least I did to this couple more than any others because they really were kind of, in a way, the most grounded.

Tony Maietta:
They were. They were the family couple. He was a dentist. Yeah, yeah, they are. Yeah, exactly.

Brad Shreve:
They were the most grounded.

Tony Maietta:
They're the most identifiable.

Brad Shreve:
Even though they were just as greedy.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. You know what's interesting too, is that Kramer, also. Kramer also designed this. So the cars represented the actors. And you think about it, yeah. Milton Berle and Dorothy Provine and Ethel Merman are. Were a little affluent. So they had the Chrysler Imperial.

Tony Maietta:
Sid Caesar and Edie Adams were, as we just said, the doctor, the family. They had the station wagon. Mickey Rooney and Buddy Hacker are the flashy ones in the little VW Bug. And of course, there's a big old. Lenny. Lenny. Jonathan Winters in that big truck. And as you said about Jonathan Winters, this was his.

Tony Maietta:
This was. This really put him on the map. And he was. He was the one everyone came to watch. Spencer Tracy. Now, Spencer Tracy was ill during this. He was not in the best health. We just said, you know, he had difficulty getting insurance.

Tony Maietta:
He was diabetic. He had heart problems. It was terrible. But he would come to the. He had emphysema. He would come to the set on his days off to watch Jonathan Winters. He was so enamored with. Especially Tracy loved comics.

Tony Maietta:
He loved comics. He was so enamored with Jonathan Winters, he would come to the set and watch. But I want to give you. Ask you a question. Can you venture a guess as to who was not enamored with Jonathan Winters during the making of this film. One of his cast members.

Brad Shreve:
Oh, one of his cast members, yeah. Well, he mainly interacted with Phil Silvers.

Tony Maietta:
He interacted with somebody else near the end.

Brad Shreve:
Oh, Mickey Rooney.

Tony Maietta:
This guy was really into. Into fitness.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, into fitness. Oh, Dick Sean.

Tony Maietta:
Dick Sean Sylvester. Dick Sean. The wonderful Dick Sean. He was a nightclub performer. This was his first big movie as well. And they had a rivalry, or at least Dick Sean did with. Because he was also an offbeat improvisational performer. And you can see it in this movie.

Tony Maietta:
That's who he is. That's his. Clearly his Persona. He was also into fitness, which is why he's in those short shorts through most of the film. You know, it's very funny because he. This rivalry was. Was pretty one sided because I think Jonathan Winters. I mean, come on.

Tony Maietta:
You mean we know who Jonathan Winters is. He's, you know, he's Robin Williams, before Robin Williams. And they were together. They were even funnier. So that was kind of interesting that there was a rivalry between them. Had you ever heard of Terry Thomas before this movie?

Brad Shreve:
I know Terry Thomas just from many things that he's been in. In fact, he was in some I Love Lucy episodes, wasn't he?

Tony Maietta:
He was on the Judy G Show. He's another one who was on the Judy Garland show, as was Dick Sean.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah, I knew Dick Sean was. I know Terry Thomas because of things he's been in. I would never have known his name had it not been for this.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah, he plays J. Algernon Hawthorne. He's. He was an English music hall comic. He was just then making his introduction to American audiences. And he's wonderful. He plays the botanist. He's so funny.

Tony Maietta:
His interactions with Ethel Merman, when Ethel Merman's just looking at him like, what the hell? Who the hell are you? You know, she's a real American. She's a real American broad, I'll tell ya. Do you want to talk a little bit about Mrs. Marcus and Ethel Merm? Because you love the Merm. You love her when she's a comic.

Brad Shreve:
I do love her when she's a comic. I first want to go back to Terry Thomas and Jonathan Winters because.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, please.

Brad Shreve:
I kind of looked back. I did a little search to see what the different actors had to say about this film. And all of them, when it came later years, they looked on it very fondly. Not all of them remembered it necessarily that fondly at the time. If for no other reason. It was hard to work in I mean, like you said, it's physical work. It was hot, sweaty. So I'm not saying anybody really hated it, though.

Brad Shreve:
There may have been one or two that I recall, but they had mixed feelings. Terry Thomas and Jonathan Winters were the two that had nothing but love from this film from beginning to end. They, Jonathan Winters loved his role. He was very grateful that it made him stand out as a star. Terry Thomas was honored that he got to work with these people and just had a great time. And that kind of fits both of their personalities, I think.

Tony Maietta:
Can you imagine what it was like for some of these actors to say I'm. And they've never done films before. They were just starting out in films or they were TV comics to be told that they're going to be in a film with Spencer Tracy.

Brad Shreve:
No, no.

Tony Maietta:
Can you imagine?

Tony Maietta:
No. Just Buddy. Yeah. I mean, just many of these people. It's just hard to imagine.

Tony Maietta:
So you're. You're Buddy Hackett and you're told that you're going to be in a film with Spencer Tracy.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. And you're seeing.

Tony Maietta:
With your scene with Spencer Tracy is basically Spencer Tracy looking at you and you looking back at Spencer Tracy. And that's your scene. But I take it in a New York minute, let me tell you.

Brad Shreve:
And before we get to Ethel, it is really interesting if you watch this film, these. There are only a few scenes where these. This whole cast is together. Yeah, most of them were some apart from each other. They probably really didn't see that each other very often. But Ethel Merman is. This is Ethel Merman. As I picture Ethel Merman, she is obnoxious and brash.

Brad Shreve:
And I'll tell you, the cast said that she was. They. Not everybody really liked working with her. But as Stanley Kramer said, you can say one thing about her. She was 100% on par and nailed it.

Tony Maietta:
Well, think about it.

Brad Shreve:
Kramer admitted that she was difficult to work with. I mean, who she would be. I mean, good God, just hearing. To talk.

Tony Maietta:
Think about it, though. She was the lone standout with all these comics. I mean, you. What up? What a brass diva. I mean, that's her nickname, the brass Diva. Because think of it, she had to be. She had some real balls of brass. Ethel Merman.

Tony Maietta:
I don't think that's a surprise to anybody. You know, Ethel Merman's Persona is pretty much who Ethel Merman was. She laid on the line. She was. She was straight. You know, everything in your face, that's who she was. That's showbiz kids and the Fact that she could not only hold her own with this murderer's row of scene stealing comics, but the fact that she comes out as one of the funniest.

Brad Shreve:
Oh, yeah.

Tony Maietta:
Is tremendous credit to Ethel Merman. It really was. Ethel Merman had been in film since the 30s. You know, she did films way back in the 30s and she just could never catch fire and film, she didn't need to. She was the first lady of Broadway, you know. So this was about the time when she started coming back to Hollywood because she was tired of Broadway. She did Gypsy. She was like, I'm done with Broadway.

Tony Maietta:
That's when she was on the Lucy show, and that's when Lucy was trying to get that sitcom for her. And I think I called it Maggie Flynn, which was wrong. It was Maggie Brown. That never happened. This is the same time she did the Judy Garland show appearances. So it's all that era, you know, it's great to see her in color, too, to see that. That hair. So, I mean, the unfortunate thing is, is that Ethel really never took a hold on either.

Tony Maietta:
So this is funny. So when this was over, not long after this, she got married again. I think this was her third husband. And we talked about her third husband. She was married to him for 32 days. I don't know if I should even ask you to venture a guess who it was.

Brad Shreve:
I've seen who she'd been married to. It won't be a surprise, but I can't remember.

Tony Maietta:
Ernest Borgnine.

Brad Shreve:
Yes.

Tony Maietta:
Can you imagine Ethel Merman married to Ernest Borgnine and neither could anybody else. The marriage lasted 32 days. And in Ethel Merman's autobiography, the Chapter, she has a chapter about her marriage to Ernest Borg 9. It says my marriage to Ernest Borg 9 at the top, and it's a blank page. So there you go. That's, that's, that's effort for you. She was one of a kind, and thank God she's preserved in this film.

Brad Shreve:
You know, there were three actors. When they showed up on the screen, I was most excited. One was special Spencer Tracy, Just because I needed a breather now and again. And I liked his humbleness in this film through most of it. The other one was Jonathan Winters, just because he was such a presence. And the third, the most standout, I was most excited when that's, hands down, it's just great.

Tony Maietta:
When you see these people, you're like, oh, this is going to be fun because they're so outrageous. They're so outrageous. You know, this film took 166 days to shoot, which, you know, it seems like a long time, but when you think about all the people in this film and in the traffic direction and the special effects. The special effects in this film are unbelievable. Yes. There's a lot of process shots. Excuse us. We need to have process shots.

Tony Maietta:
You know, you can't. This was, this was before cgi. This was how they did it. You couldn't have put the actors in this danger. Although Milton Berle said, and this was verified, that one of the worst things about making this film was they all had to have plaster Paris masks made of their faces so their stunt people would wear the masks when they were doing. When they were stunting for them. It doesn't work. You still know?

Brad Shreve:
I think it does.

Tony Maietta:
Did you really?

Brad Shreve:
Because I kept watching for the stunt.

Tony Maietta:
Spencer Tracy. Oh, God.

Brad Shreve:
Well, I'm not saying that they were great, but I kept looking for bad stuff. You know, watch old Star Trek episodes. That's supposed to be Shatner. Oh, come on. No.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah.

Brad Shreve:
I kept looking for the bad stuntmen, as always, or the stunt women. I was really impressed with how frequently look like them because most of the time it was a far shot. Like they're in their cars. I mean, this movie, you talk about practical effects. This was crash up cars.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, yeah.

Brad Shreve:
Blues Brothers was like an afterthought after this film.

Tony Maietta:
I mean, well, this was just like.

Brad Shreve:
I don't know how many vehicles they went through. It was a lot.

Tony Maietta:
You know, this was the first. This was the granddaddy of car chase films, car crash films. This. No one had ever. No one had ever filmed cars like this in this manner. Now we think about the French Connection, we think about, what's up, doc? We think about foul play, we think about bullets. This was the first one. And one of them, they saw the footage of the film.

Tony Maietta:
Some of the actors, when they saw the film, before they even started shooting, I think it was Milton Berle. He said that, you know, why are you using actors? These cars are funny enough. We don't. You don't need us. Milton Berle also said that they got two scripts and they were like phone books. They got one script for the dialogue and the second script for the special effects and the action. It's that complicated. And some of these special effects, which were real effects.

Tony Maietta:
The plane flying through the Coke billboard, I mean, that is an incredibly dangerous stunt. And actually it damaged the plane. Incredibly dangerous. The plane in the hangar, going right through the hangar. And that's insane. I don't know how many feet clearance of about four feet. That's what it was on each side. For that plane to go through that hangar.

Tony Maietta:
Unbelievable. Unbelievable.

Brad Shreve:
And that is one thing I remembered most as a kid. We were always an ow, wow.

Tony Maietta:
It's incredible. Right?

Brad Shreve:
That's what we were always in awe. See, I was in such awe, I couldn't even say the word.

Tony Maietta:
Who was in that plane with Buddy Hackett and Mickey Rooney that was supposed to be flying at Brad.

Brad Shreve:
Your. Your favorite rich drunk Jim back is. Do you know man who made a career out of playing rich drunk?

Tony Maietta:
His name is Tyler Fitzgerald in this film. Tyler Fitzgerald. But you know, there's some speculation that Sherwood's Swartz saw this movie and went. Thurston held the third right there. Because if you ever watch Gilligan's island, it's the same character. He talked. What can go wrong with an Old Fashioned? I mean, he's so many quotable lines. One of the most famous ones is when they're in the airplane, he says it's the only way to fly.

Tony Maietta:
And that's a reference to a famous commercial for Western Airlines. And the bird said in a Jim Backus like voice, it's the only way to fly. People thought it was Jim Backus for years, but it wasn't. It was another actor. But that's a great shout out. I mean, I love that. He is Thurston Howell. He is Thurston Howell iii before Thurston Howell III came up.

Tony Maietta:
Yes, I love that. I love that. Okay, well, my other two of my other favorite characters and we have to talk about them. And the real set piece of the first half of this film is none other than our friend Henry. Marvin Kaplan. Yes. And Arnold Stang as the gas station attendants who have a brand new gas station that Jonathan Winters completely, totally, utterly demolishes.

Brad Shreve:
I'd say this movie gave those two kind of a cult following.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, absolutely.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah.

Tony Maietta:
You know. Yeah. When they were doing screenings of Mad Mad, Mad Mad World, you know, up until 2000, the early 2000s, he was there in a wheelchair. Marvin Kaplan was there because everybody knows him from. As Henry on Alice and they know him from this film. But there's so many interesting things about this. So that that set, that was a real set that was built. I don't know if you know this, if you know this, jump in.

Tony Maietta:
It was built on a corner in Palm Springs. We're talking about Palm springs in the 1960s, early 1960s. Very little there. There ain't nothing there, you know what I mean? Even less than is there right now. And it was on this intersection. I don't know what the intersection was. Frank Sinatra Drive. And, you know, I mean, just out in the middle of nowhere, nothing but tumbleweed.

Tony Maietta:
And suddenly there's this beautiful big gas station there one day. And the residents were like, oh, we have a gas station. There's a gas station here. How great. And then a couple days later, it's gone because Jonathan Winters demolishes it. Why does he demolish it, Brad?

Brad Shreve:
Because Phil Silvers has convinced the gas station attendant. Phil Silvers is trying to get away from this guy because he screwed him over. As he does. Everybody screwed him over. He convinces the two guys left him.

Tony Maietta:
On a little girl's bike in the middle of the desert.

Brad Shreve:
So he convinces these two guys in the gas station that he is a killer who. I think he's out of the psych ward. And so they. They tie him up. And Jonathan Winters decides to take revenge on them as he's trying to get away and they're trying to stop him. It's. It's hysteria. It's just a total slapstick.

Brad Shreve:
If you don't like slapstick, I think you'll still love it. It's just. It's. It. You think it's gonna. He thinks, oh, this has got to be the end. This has got to be the end. This gotta be.

Brad Shreve:
And no, it's. Till there's not a toothpick left of that garage.

Tony Maietta:
It's. It's a genius. Genius effects. This. This thing is demolished, this whole thing. And the special effects person on this is a very famous man named Linwood Dunn. He's really the genius behind so many of these special effects in this film. To make that gas station fall apart the way it did, you know, he had to slow down certain portions of the film so it.

Tony Maietta:
So it made sense. Because, I mean, things don't always go the way you plan them in a film especially. And they had, like, one chance at this. You know, they're not going to rebuild that gas station and then do it again. You know what I mean? They had one shot at this. So it's incredible, this scene. I think what's interesting about this scene is, you know, so it's Marvin Kaplan and Arnold Stang play the play. The two gas station tennis and Arnold Stang, if you notice when you watch this film, is holding his left hand, oddly, because he had just broken it.

Tony Maietta:
He had tripped near his pool at home. And he came to the set with a broken arm. And he was afraid that he was gonna be replaced. And Kramer said, no, Just put, put a glove on it and we'll work around it. But he's left handed. So he broke his left. He broke his left arm and he's left handed. So Arnold Stang looks kind of odd in this scene, the way he's holding his hand and he has to hit Jonathan Winters with a wrench and he's trying to.

Tony Maietta:
The pain. I can't imagine the pain. But hey, comedy's painful.

Brad Shreve:
So it's an awkward character anyway. So it works.

Tony Maietta:
It works for the character. That's what I was gonna say. There are no accidents. It works for the character. These two nebbish characters who have this big beautiful gas station which is destroyed by this big lug, Jonathan Winters to get back at Phil Silver's. It's a brilliant, brilliant bit. Brilliant piece.

Brad Shreve:
And because you talked about where this gas station was located, where they built it, I'm gonna segue this into talking about the geography of Southern California here because. And how it's. How it's played on here. Now, I am happy to say that I live very close to the park where the big W was. But I was even more excited when I was looking online for all the different locations and it said incorrectly that the garage was built in Lucerne Valley. Now you probably never heard of Lucerne Valley because it's a crossroads village about a 20 minute drive. For me. It's actually where I have my post office box.

Brad Shreve:
And the reason that's there is because I was. I was going to rent a house to use as an office and the whole deal fell through. But anyway, so I put my post office box. There it is. And I was so excited they were listing that scene and all these other scenes that were filmed in Lucerne Valley. And I thought I could see why we have nothing but big, wide open desert here. But the geography doesn't look exactly. Because our geography doesn't look like Palm Springs area.

Brad Shreve:
So that was all wrong. But it took me on this deep dive of the show. And I will say if you use. You can use this movie as a California travelogue.

Tony Maietta:
Oh yeah.

Brad Shreve:
If you're interested in driving about 400 miles in a circle. Because some towns don't exist. The ones that do are oddly too close together, are too far apart. They name a town that's not too far from my area that is just a few miles down the road from one that's in San Diego, which is almost a three hour drive from me. They spread towns apart. San Diego and Tijuana on the map are substantially pushed away from each other to make room for the town of Santa Rosita, which is the fictional town that this film ends in.

Tony Maietta:
Right.

Brad Shreve:
The geography is just another casualty of the madness in this film.

Tony Maietta:
That's.

Brad Shreve:
And if. If you're not from California, you may not catch that, but, boy, if you're from California, you're like this. I was sitting there trying. All my life, I've tried to figure out where all this is, and I finally realized there's no way in hell to know. And it's probably on purpose.

Tony Maietta:
No, it makes no sense directionally. It makes no sense the way they're going. Nothing.

Brad Shreve:
And the reason I went on the deep dive with this one is because when Culpepper Spencer Tracy points at the map, he points right at the town where I live. When they start talking about where these people were.

Tony Maietta:
Oh.

Brad Shreve:
But when they talk about them, they are nowhere near me. So that was why I'm like, okay, did they film it here? No, no, they. They filmed it. It was all over the place.

Tony Maietta:
So, yeah, it's.

Brad Shreve:
No, it's kind of fun.

Tony Maietta:
It is fun. It's fun because you just, like everything else, you just got to go with it. You just got to go with this movie. So many things in this movie do not make sense. Buddy Hackett and Mickey Rooney flying that Beechcraft through the Koch billboard and then managing to land that plane. I mean, come on, let's really suspend our disbelief. How about Sid Caesar and Edie Adams decimating that hardware store? The things that happen to Sid Caesar. He almost gets electrocuted.

Tony Maietta:
There are fires. He falls off. Scaffolding. Paint falls on him. Shelves fall him. Yet he's still able to get up and grab a shovel and run, run to that big W. And from day one, Jimmy Durante, I wanted my. They're too very funny in that very, very first scene.

Tony Maietta:
We're never going to get through this podcast if I go back to the beginning. But anyway, I'll just say really quickly two things that made me laugh out loud. Of course, when Jimmy Durante first finally dies, he's in this incredible plane, a car crash. He goes over the side of the highway and the car flips down amongst these rocks, and he's still laying there somewhat intact. And of course, the piece de resistance of the whole thing is they think he's dead, but he's not dead. He gives his dying words about the big W and the 350 G's under the big W and go get it. Go get it. Go back to your old neighborhood.

Tony Maietta:
And really, I'M doing a terrible Jimmy Duranting and really show him. Show off. And they think he's dead. And they're like, oh, he's dead. And then he comes back. Aunt Belle, Aunt Belle, forgive me, Aunt Belle. And then he finally really dies. And what does he do, Brad, when he finally really dies?

Brad Shreve:
I love it because nobody says it like they would have in today's films. He literally kicks the bucket.

Tony Maietta:
It is the first big belly laugh in this.

Brad Shreve:
It is. It's a good one.

Tony Maietta:
He kicks the bucket. Literally. It's so great. It's so great.

Brad Shreve:
Since you've talked about the big belly laughter, can I go to my challenges with this film? Because I want to end on a high note.

Tony Maietta:
Sure, of course.

Brad Shreve:
And I don't want to make it sound like I dislike this film because this film, I've loved it for years, but there are aspects of it that always bothered me, and they bother me more each year. And I think maybe it's because I'm getting older. One. It does drag. It does drag. It is long. Yeah, it is long. For example, the scene in the hardware store in the basement with Sid Caesar in.

Brad Shreve:
And it's. It's a funny scene, but we really are seeing the same thing happen.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah.

Brad Shreve:
Over and over and over. There is a lot of replay in this film.

Tony Maietta:
Agree.

Brad Shreve:
Like, how many times can we see people swerving past each other? It's. It just.It's a lot of yelling, a lot of crashing, a lot of falling. And sometimes it seems like the movie is just screaming to make you laugh rather than trying to be funny.

Tony Maietta:
I agree with you on that. I agree with you in that.

Brad Shreve:
It's like a Saturday Night Live skit that starts out funny but drags on too long. And after the while, the chaos isn't funny anymore. It's just exhausting.

Tony Maietta:
I get that. No, I agree with you in part on that. I do. Yes. One of the reasons for all the cuts all the time was because they were taking out repetitive things. They're like, we don't need to say that. We just said that in two scenes ago. So that's true.

Brad Shreve:
The scene in the hardware store. I love the scene in the hardware store. But yes, it is too long. It's much longer.

Brad Shreve:
It's always been my favorite scene. I'm criticizing it, but it's always been my favorite scene.

Tony Maietta:
Right, but you got to give Sid Caesar and Edie Adams something to do while the rest of them are getting to Santa Rosita. So they. They make this scene so incredibly long. What I love about this movie is the way it's structured because as we get to the intermission, Kramer starts doing a lot of fast intercutting. It's like that. It's. It was first done by DW Griffith back in Intolerance.

Brad Shreve:
And I was literally clapping because I thought it was so well done.

Tony Maietta:
And what they were originally going to do, Mr. Airport, was do split screens, which could have been really interesting, but they decided not to do split screens and show them each on their various. Where they were at this point in the story. They do really fast intercuttings, and I like that better than split screens because the intercutting gives it an energy. It's getting faster and faster and faster and faster until finally we get to the intermission and they were like, whew, we can take a break, but we really can't take a break because in the original. Did you know this? In the original roadshow presentations, during the intermission, when people went out and went to the bathroom and got their popcorn, they played police radio calls of where the characters were at this specific point in the story. So the story kept going, even during the intermission. And I love that.

Tony Maietta:
And I love that. When we pick up again with act two, it starts out very quietly, very softly, just that little pin spot that turns out to be the fuse of the dynamite that Sid Caesar is going to use to blow himself out of the hardware store. I love that. I love the structure of this. Yes. It's this unwielding, massive piece of work, and it's one of those movies where you got to give yourself over to it. And that's why there's an intermission, so you can go pee and take a break and maybe come back a few minutes later when you've had a little rest to digest it. I get that.

Tony Maietta:
I have the same criticism. Still love it.

Brad Shreve:
The other criticism I have, and this is something I noticed as a kid, and as I get older, I notice it more. And again, it doesn't change the film, but the older I get, the. The worse it gets. And that is this. This movie makes me sad.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, really?

Brad Shreve:
It's a. It's a morality play with no redemption.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, well, yeah, yeah.

Brad Shreve:
Nobody walks away better. They're all beaten up. They're all arrested, humiliated. As I said earlier, Spencer Tracy is supposed to be our moral compass, the authority figure. In the end, he gives up and runs off with the cash.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah.

Brad Shreve:
And with all of this chaos and. And these people all lose their minds. Normal, everyday people who have gone into madness because of their. Their money. And they all lose everything. They all lose everything. And in the end, were supposed to laugh because Ethel Merman slips on a banana peel and it's like, what the fuck? I mean, that's not a punchline.

Tony Maietta:
But isn't that genius? What is the most elemental laugh in film history? From the beginning of films? Slipping on banana peels. Isn't it beautiful? Genius that. That is the final thing. That Ethel Merman slips on a banana peel. We've just been through three hours of cacophony. We've just been through more than three hours of cacophony. And madness and things coming at us and things exploding and collapsing. And what is the final salvo? Ethel Merman slipping on a banana peel.

Tony Maietta:
And the first time I saw that, I screamed hysterically. It is so funny. Even though it's clearly her double. It's so funny. See here, you idiots. This is all your fault. If you hadn't excuse my Alpha merman. Sorry if that got loud, people.

Tony Maietta:
It is.

Brad Shreve:
Even Spencer Tracy got the laugh.

Tony Maietta:
They start to laugh and it's like. But what you're saying is, is exactly what we said at the beginning is this is a message picture for all of Stanley Kramer's. You know, Stanley Kramer does message pictures. The corrosive power of greed. These people are everyday people who turn into maniacs because of the opportunity for some fast cash. So it's interesting.

Brad Shreve:
And the fact that nobody gets the cash at the end, it opens up and the money goes flying everywhere. So if you took out the humor, this has been a giant, exhausting mess of chaos for nothing. For nothing, for nothing. And even Kramer said, let me find this quote here. He said, I don't know if this is a direct quote, but Kramer said, beneath all the wacky stunts, it's really all about what greed does to people.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah, absolutely.

Brad Shreve:
And when I. When I saw that, I didn't know if it was a direct quote or they were quoting of him, but it's.

Brad Shreve:
So that I actually do end that movie feeling sad. Even though the rest of the movie is fun. I love it every time I watch it. And like I say all the time, if nothing else, for nostalgia sake. And it is always funny. I'm always like, oh, God, is it worth lung? Is it said? No, it's funny.

Tony Maietta:
Well, you. You hit the nail on the head, though, when you said as a cartoon. Because think about it, all the things these people go through, they would have been dead. I mean, Come on. Yeah, they're very injured in the end because they've been thrown all over the place. But some of the things these people go through would have killed a normal person. So you got. That's removed.

Tony Maietta:
You had to remove yourself and realize this is a little cartoony. This is a cartoon. So you've got to remove that one level of awareness, you know, suspend your disbelief in that respect to know that this is very much a cartoon. But what I have. What my. My pro. I don't mind my problem with this movie, but what happens at the end. It's like he's trying to get bigger and bigger and bigger.

Tony Maietta:
And my issue with the film is the ending, because the there. There were three. That final scene wherein they're on the fire engine thing and they're being thrown back and forth, it reminded me of the Towering Inferno when everybody is jumping on that lift to get out and Richard Chamberlain jumps on the lift and then they all end up falling. You know, the chair that's going to carry them out of the tower. So they all jump on that ladder from the fire department, from that. From that high rise. And it's three different methods of filming he used. It was a real backlot of Universal.

Tony Maietta:
They use a matte painting and they use miniatures, and they all blend together perfectly. It's incredible. The filmmaking skill in that is incredible. Here's where I have the problem. It's not that. It's not that visual. It's the dummies, you know.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah, they were bad.

Tony Maietta:
They didn't quite have. Now, I am not throwing any shade on Linwood Dunn and any of these geniuses who put this film together. Don't get me wrong about that. We're so used to CGI now and people being able to do anything that we get kind of jaded. So they didn't quite have the technology to make that really, really believable. And some of the things that happened, like Buddy Hack and Mickey Rooney bouncing up and down on the telephone wires, which is hysterical. But it's like, oh, my God, that would have killed you 3 million times over. What are you talking about? Dick, Sean going flying, hitting that picnic table and going slide.

Tony Maietta:
Incredibly dangerous stunt. If that stuntman had missed by a few inches, he would have been dead. Slides down that picnic table and all the way down Spencer Tracy going, oh, yeah. Being on that palm fronds.

Brad Shreve:
He flew into a window, smashed against the wall and crashed down to the floor below.

Tony Maietta:
The floor below. And he's getting licked by the dog. Back and forth and Back and forth.

Brad Shreve:
Because the dog's love that saved him.

Tony Maietta:
Yes. Well, the dog, if you notice, to the dog, it's a reverse shot. It goes back and forth and back and forth because the dog would only lick once. So Kramer had to make it.

Brad Shreve:
And it kind of add to the humor. But, you know, here's. Here's what I gotta say about the miniatures. This is something they didn't have. That is a luxury filmmakers have today because of cgi. If there's a moment where it's easier just to do something funny rather than get. I'm trying this airplane as an example that did this. The Naked Gun did this.

Brad Shreve:
They fumble around a person that is actually really a dummy. You can tell it's not supposed to be a person. And that's part of the humor.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah.

Brad Shreve:
It wouldn't have worked back then.

Tony Maietta:
No, no.

Brad Shreve:
So they're kind of making fun of that time period when you kind of had a rag doll if it was something too dangerous for his person to do. And you just kind of made the best of it. And they don't have that luxury back then.

Tony Maietta:
No, they didn't. And you have to put yourself kind of like we just said about the Seven Year Itch. You have to put yourself in the mindset of 19 5th, of 1955, of 1963, and realize what life was like in 1963. And the fact that this movie was so outrageous and so big for the time and so out of the ordinary. We're looking at it with our 20, 25 glasses on. We got to take them off and say, wow, this is spectacular. Even though we can sit here and go, that's clearly a dummy. That's clearly a stuntman.

Tony Maietta:
I am the first person to do that, and I'm the first person to say, stop it. You know, put yourself in that mind. And when you can do that, if you can do that, it's an incredible ending. It's a phenomenal, phenomenal ending.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah. And you know when I first realized how looking back can be difficult? When we did Alice.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah.

Brad Shreve:
And we were watching episodes that had outdoor shots that were so bad. Or you know, when they showed a. Like when they were driving in the truck and you could see it was a truck sitting on a soundstage so clear as day, had nothing but a black background. And during that time period, you knew it was cheesy, but you're like, yeah, whatever. And you didn't think twice about. But now we're like, God, that was so bad. How did they stand it? You know?

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. Well, that's.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah, we've gotten. We've gotten spoiled.

Tony Maietta:
We have gotten very spoiled. Very spoiled. And personally, I prefer the 1963 version because I think it's. It's so much fun. You know, that final scene where they're all together under the big W. The big W, which is basically, you know, four palm trees. I'm sure people. I hope people have seen this movie.

Tony Maietta:
I mean, why would you listen to us if you haven't seen this movie, which is actually a big W? And the way it's presented is so funny. It's funny that Dorothy Provine is the first one to. To notice it and she's the one who's not interested at all in it. And she's the one who first discovers it.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah.

Tony Maietta:
And when they finally get the money and then Spencer Tracy, because of personal problems and his life has kind of turned and is going to take the money and run and they feel. And they realize that he is stealing the money too. So they have the big chase scene and they all end up. It's, you know, in that big, tall, abandoned building. And what we just talked about, you know, how else are you going to end it? You. You have to have the big. You've just seen so much stuff. You've seen planes flying through billboards and under hangars and explosions.

Tony Maietta:
You gotta end it big. So I think maybe Stanley Kramer was a little bit of a victim of his own ambition in this ending because it would be so difficult for anybody to pull that off. And he does about as good as any other person I can think of that did that. That's my opinion. So what more do we want to say about It's a mad, mad, mad, mad world?

Brad Shreve:
Well, I have to give it credit for one thing, and you tell me I'm wrong about this, but I think I'm pretty right. You mentioned Tower Inferno.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah.

Brad Shreve:
You know, this cast was pretty incredible to get these comedians together. I mean, we had, again, it's like a time capsule. We had Sid Caesar, Milton Berle, Ethel Merman, Jonathan Winters. Phil Service is a time capsule of mid 20th century comedy. But even more, it's the grandfather of the ensemble cast that eventually was made mostly into disaster films.

Tony Maietta:
It's an interesting take. Yeah.

Brad Shreve:
Were there any before this that had such a huge.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah, there's, you know, the first. All the first. Well, okay, you're talking all star cast or ensemble cast?

Brad Shreve:
All star cast. Like this bring back a lot of stars that some were sunsetting. Not hugely so, but their big, big days were over.

Tony Maietta:
Well, yes, as I said at the beginning, around The World in 80 Days, which was kind of the inspiration for this because it was kind of like one of these travelog all star cast people making cameos, you know, and it was produced by Mike Todd, the, you know, Cinerama out of One Hole guy. And that's where that idea came from, that big, beautiful, you know, that's. So it was around the world in 80 days, but this is the first comedy really to attempt it. There was one called Pepe which wasn't a big hit before this, but this one was the hit. This one was a huge hit. So despite, you know, as I said before, this film has such a passionate and loyal fan base 60 plus years later that the legacy of this film, it's only grown in stature. I think the love people have for It's a Mad Mad, Mad Mad World has only grown in stature. I feel like it's a Chinatown of big star comedies because it's what so many filmmakers aspire to.

Tony Maietta:
After this. You had Blake Edwards tried it in the Great Race. There was a movie called those Magnificent Men and Their flying machines from 1965 also, both from 65. Spielberg did it in 1941. You know, all those Cannonball Run movies, remember Those in the 80s, you can draw the line all the way up to 2001. Rat race, you can draw the line from that all the way back to It's a Mad, Mad, Mad Mad World. And I'm sorry, but It's A Mad Mad, Mad Mad World does it much, much, much, much better.

Brad Shreve:
But considering this movie was made for less than 10 million and grossed worldwide $60 million, you can see why people are trying to copy it.

Tony Maietta:
Of course. Of course. Is that your way of giving the stats on the movie? Do you want to give the stats on the movie?

Brad Shreve:
No, you actually made me think about it. No, it's. I don't have a whole lot of stats other than we talked about the when it was made and that sort of thing, but Rotten Tomatoes critics score is 69%. And I think most of those from were from back in that era. A lot of people were kind of uptight about the film critics. In fact, Clyde Gilmour from Canada, a top film critic in Canada, said three and a half hours of tiresome proof that Stanley Kramer should stick to dramas and leave comedies to his competitors.

Brad Shreve:
Oh, wow, he's been proven wrong.

Tony Maietta:
Yes, the audience seemed to like it much more than the critics. They liked it 83%.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. And it's all. It's only grown since then, it's only grown in. In regard in legend. Do you know there was even a Bollywood remake of this film in 2007?

Brad Shreve:
I think I did hear that.

Tony Maietta:
It's called I hope I get this right. Please don't hate Me. Bollywood De Mall. Is that. Is that right? De Mall?

Brad Shreve:
Do you know what that means?

Tony Maietta:
I have no idea. What's it mean?

Brad Shreve:
Oh, I have no idea. I was hoping you could tell me.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, I thought you maybe knew what it meant. If anybody knows what it means, let us know. Text us, email us, write us, think about it.

Brad Shreve:
Did I like this film? The first time Maurice and I watched it together, we said, nah, let's buy it because we'll watch it over and over and over again.

Tony Maietta:
So the mall or it's a madman. Madman World.

Brad Shreve:
Oh, no, I've never seen them all. I don't. I've never watched a Bollywood film.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, okay. I'm like, what are you talking about? What are you talking about? Yes. I think the proof of it's a mad, Mad, Mad, Mad world is this. You know, it has survived the test of time. You listed a whole bunch of movies from 1963, many of which you never even heard of. Emer, La Deuce, Tom Jones. You know the ones that you listed. Who knows those movies now? Or if they do, you do know those movies.

Tony Maietta:
They're horribly, horribly dated. They seem archaic. This movie, even with the 60s cars, even with the 60s attitudes.

Tony Maietta:
Yep.

Tony Maietta:
It's kind of timeless. And I feel funny saying that because a couple episodes ago I said that it wasn't timeless, but it is timeless. I was wrong. I was just trying to plug one of our upcoming movies. It is timeless. Good comedy is timeless. That's why we can watch a silent comic. We can watch Buster Keaton in his silent era.

Tony Maietta:
We can watch Chaplin and laugh, Harold Lloyd and we watch Ethel Merman, Sid Caesar, Milton Berle, Terry Thomas. We can watch him because it's timeless. And that's what's wonderful about this movie, and that's the true legacy of this film, is its timelessness.

Brad Shreve:
And something I gave it as a kind of a. A ding, very lightly, that actually did help to make it timeless, is that it doesn't go deep.

Tony Maietta:
Right?

Brad Shreve:
We know these cartoon characters. Bugs Bunny will last forever because he's funny.

Tony Maietta:
Right.

Brad Shreve:
We don't know his motivations and we don't care. He's just funny and that's. We know these folks motivations. It's all money. But beyond that, we don't know anything.

Tony Maietta:
We don't know anything about him. Other than Milton Berle sells seaweed and he invested Alpha Merman's money and she ain't happy about it, let me tell you.

Brad Shreve::
$15,000.

Tony Maietta:
She's not happy about that one bit. Well, Brad, wow, that is a lot. We actually talked about it's a mad mad, mad mad world in under 90 minutes. It's pretty amazing.

Brad Shreve:
That is amazing.

Tony Maietta:
I was afraid we were going to have it as long as the film itself. Is there anything we want to say about the podcast or anything at all?

Brad Shreve:
Well, we, we have been neglecting to tell people first to please contact us. We would love to hear from you. You can reach us@goinghollywoodpodcast@gmail.com or you can in the show notes you can click and it'll text us. We can't respond, but we'll respond on the air. We'd love to hear from you. We'd love to hear suggestions, ideas and Tony is always putting together our playlist and we haven't mentioned it in ages, but on Spotify there's a link in the show notes for this. There is a Spotify playlist from movies that we've talked about, different scores and that sort of thing.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah, I was going to say, unfortunately there's not one for this movie. This movie is not on Spotify, unfortunately. However, it is on YouTube. The beautiful, fun, hysterically funny Ernest Gold score is on YouTube. So I'll put the link there. It's up to you whether you play or not. I listen to it because I think it's wonderful score.

Brad Shreve:
It would be a great score to listen to while you're cleaning house.

Tony Maietta:
Absolutely. Give you energy.

Brad Shreve:
Yes, exactly. And aside from that made it this far. Please rate and review the show, Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to this podcast.

Tony Maietta:
Well, Brad, I think that's. It's a mad, mad, mad, mad world. And there's only one thing left to say. But I don't want to say it. So let's not say goodbye, you big stupid muscle headed moron. Let's say au revoir.

Brad Shreve:
I can't even say come back. No, let's say goodbye, Sylvester.

Tony Maietta:
Bye, everybody.