Here’s a FQ that became an entire post… WITH a visual aid.
Coram_Loci asks:
Was there any talk (do you wish there was any talk) of an animated episode of Cheers or Frasier?
For Mickey Mouse’s Birthday (I forget how old he was at the time, mice age well), Disney did a big special. And there’s a scene where he goes to CHEERS. So our characters interacted with a cartoon mouse.
Someone from Disney wrote the scene and it wasn’t very good. So Michael Eisner called Jim Burrows and asked as a favor whether we CHEERS writers would take a fast look at it.
We did a rewrite one afternoon, sent it in, and everyone at the Mouse House was thrilled.
So they filmed the scene and the animation was added later.
But a week after we turned in the script a big truck from Disney pulled up and each of us received these giant gift bags filled with Disney merchandise. There were stuffed animals and jackets and tapes and phones and books and assorted toys. Looking back, each bag probably cost $500 retail so maybe $20 out of their pocket, but we all had small children at the time so this was the coolest gift EVER.
And now, here’s the scene. Watching it for the first time since it aired, I think they were overly generous with their gift. Either that or the original script was REALLY terrible. Anyway, enjoy.
42 comments :
Lucy, MTM & Kirstie Allie: Among the precious few comic actresses that can make even crying funny.
I understand the context for the Mickey crossover, but now find myself wondering what might have been if the Pink Elephants on Parade had suddenly invaded Cheers, maybe led by the bat from THE LOST WEEKEND.
What else could happen? They come in the bar, stop and shout "NORM!"
John Ritter!
Who on earth thinks these types of cartoon/live mish-mashes are a good idea? They are always painfully unfunny. It just looks awkward. (Well maybe except for Who Framed Roger Rabbit where you have millions of dollars to work with). Swap out Mickey mouse for Alf or Miss Piggy and it might work.
How do I not remember this episode? Thanks, Ken.
In other news, NPR has an article previewing the fall lineup. Murphy Brown is on it, so I guess that's really happening and not just a summer daydream. Most of the shows have me scratching my head (variations on Manifest have been tried before, and the problem seems to be nobody knows what to do with episode 2). The First with Sean Penn sounded promising until I got to the "addict daughter, and uber-repressed boss and a trenendous tragedy" part. Sounds depressing. Real life has enough angst.
Maybe I'm showing my own age here, but the two I'm excited about are Murphy Brown and The Kominsky Method. Rel might be good, too, depending on how they handle it.
Wow. Once upon a time a root beer float cost a $1.50!
Part of our work as writers in Disney Parks and Resorts Creative was to come up with outlines for this sort of thing. We didn't do Cheers, but we did write outlines for shows like Home Improvement and Modern Family.
Lots of TV specials were either actually shot or planned for the parks, and often the strangest assignments were given to us, like coming up with concepts for MacCauley Culkin or Michael Jordan. Of course, there was always Regis Philbin, who did the ABC parade every year and was game for almost everything, including a crush on Cinderella. The biggest name I got to do a script for was America's King of Comedy, Buzz Aldrin. It was a thrill to meet him but I didn't get a chance to ask if he ran into Alice Kramden on the moon.
If only "Cheers" had done something w/ one of the Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies cartoon characters.
It's interesting that Ken decided to post this article now as this weekend we watched what was billed as the "lost episode" of DOCTOR WHO. It was written in the 1979-1980 season by the late Douglas Adams.
The episode--with commercials--clocks in at 3 hours and the odd thing as you watch is it seems to randomly switch to animation and back to live action, with no rhyme or reason.
Well there is no rhyme or reason until you learn the reason this episode was "lost" in the first place is it was produced amidst a production strike and not finished... until..
Until some current day producers reunited the original cast--now decades older. That aging means they couldn't do believable live action today to finish the work but they worked as voice actors with animation and voila, the decades are bridged and this episode is now complete.
The shift back and forth to animation is admittedly a bit jarring--and the underlying story wasn't all that strong to begin with--but you have to tip your hat to the inguinity to see this to completion.
Rob D: Who Framed Roger Rabbit had the advantage of being not only a live/animated mish-mash, but also (simultaneously) a mish-mash of Disney characters, Warner Brothers characters, and originals invented just for that movie.
As for the Cheers clip, nothing can be done about the fact that M. Mouse is a fundamentally uninteresting character.
I didn't get it. Why didn't anyone recognize Mickey? I thought it will be like they will all fawn over Mickey when he enters the bar.
Anyway, happy for the gifts Ken.
Nice to see writers being appreciated.
As for me, after seeing 'Family Guy', Mickey will always be associated with their nasty cutaways :P
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4ORtYcVaPQ
Greg Ehrbar,
When you had met Buzz Aldrin, you should have asked how it was, working with Stanley Kubrick.
Watching that made me really miss CHEERS.
Hi Ken, long time reader, first time Friday Questioner. Martin, Roz, and Daphne all contrasted sharply with Frasier, but he and Niles were similar in most respects. Did that make it hard to write scenes with just Niles and Frasier?
I love the dynamic they had, and it makes me wonder why it worked so well. Is there a technique to scenes with the opposite of odd couple comedy? "Even couple" comedy, I guess you'd call it.
Greg, did you assist or help coordinate the "Sabrina" episode where the teenage witch and her high school pals are on a trip to Disney's Animal Kingdom in Orlando?
I believe this is the first time anyone ever was asked to pay for a drink at Cheers.
Well, that was . . . interesting. Clearly, that wasn't shot in front of a live audience (it'd be rather difficult), and Bobby Douglass's sweetening seems almost lackluster - you'd think we'd be hearing all kinds of (canned) cheering and applause for Mickey's appearance - especially given that it was his birthday.
I think you're being overly critical. "Give me ... four," is a great line.
FYI, the 15th anniversary of John Ritter's death is 9/11/2018 (and he would have been 70 on 9/17
Watching it for the first time since it aired, I think they were overly generous with their gift.
Ok, so it has some corn and cliches, what do you expect for four hours work?
(it's an indication of Disney's cultural impact that Mickey/Disney references seem hackneyed)
Probably not interesting to you, Ken, but why not try a rewrite? Better yet, assign it to your next writing class, see what the students do with it.
The best examples of what animated versions of CHEERS and FRASIER might look like comes from the SIMPSONS. In the episode, "Fear of Flying" Homer walks into CHEERS. Most of the cast except, ironically, for Kelsey Grammar voice their characters. And in "Brother From Another Series" Sideshow Bob's brother Cecil comes to Springfield. Technically not FRASIER, but a pretty good emulation of the show. When Ken has been asked about the possibility of rebooting one of his series, I've often thought, why not an animated version? (I mean that sincerely. I'm not being facetious or sarcastic.) That would add a lot of opportunities for expanding their world. And a good way to recast deceased actors.
M.B.
I think it was a pretty good scene, with quite a bit of thought put into it. Nice appearance by John Ritter. I always enjoyed his stuff.
Yyeeeeaaaahhhhhh ...this was not the best crossover I've ever seen. But then I guess that the humor is meant to be mild like it's subject, Mr Mouse.
I find it hard to believe that nobody at Cheers could recognize Mickey Mouse.
That just reminded me how much of a crush I had on Kirstie.
Reminds me of the video that the post office use to play around Christmas with Cliff Clavin. I always thought that was funny. My postman did not. Of course, I use to call him Cliff Clavin out of spite. He didn't think that was funny either. It's hard to make an asshole laugh.
Anonymous Rashad Khan said...
If only "Cheers" had done something w/ one of the Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies cartoon characters.
Elsewhere on NBC, "Night Court" being produced by Warner Brothers gave them access to their stable of cartoon characters, and they actually did get a good gag out of it (which worked in part because they had the sense not to linger on the set-up or the punchline)
That was terrible. No offense. But a perfect example of the power Disney had & has. To make a quality sitcom like "Cheers" do a scene with Mickey (who, for some reason, nobody in the bar recognizes. And if that was part of the joke, then...) is sad. I hope the cast all got bonuses for putting up with that.
Am I the only one who thinks it's odd that Disney thought nothing of a Mickey Mouse Birthday special that included a scene in which Mickey is used by Sam Malone to try and get into Rebecca's pants ? Or has Me Too made me too sensitive ? Because I love Cheers when Mickey is not there to spoil the fun.
@Joseph Scarbrough: I wonder if that was even the work of Mr. Douglass at all. The timing is all off, with several laughs beginning before the punchline is even finished, like an old episode of SCTV. Maybe Disney decided to do the laugh track on the cheap instead of getting the best.
I remember this was a piece of a big, strange TV special. When Mickey expresses some existential angst, an animated wizard zaps him with a spell that causes people not to recognize him. Thereafter Mickey has random adventures like the Cheers interlude; John Ritter and Jill Eikenberry are a TV news team who keep delivering updates. Early on Ritter announces he won't leave his chair until Mickey is found; late in the show Eikenberry is spraying him with air freshener.
Sort of a G-rated version of those specials where Bob Hope would do scenes with a long list of guest comics connected by a vague plot. The one other bit I remember was Cheech Marin as a disgruntled Disneyland maintenance worker. When Mickey tries to cheer him up, Marin irritably swats him out of frame. Of course Mickey eventually DOES cheer him up (a production number of happy Disneyland night janitors), but I was amazed they let anybody take a swing a Mickey.
Did Mickey step in for a nightcap after dinner and a movie? I'd almost bet money there's fan fiction out there.
One more CHEERS-Disney link. The old Disney MGM Studio had a show called "Superstar Television", where guests would interact with old and current TV shows. People in the theater would see the volunteers doing their bits onstage while the monitors showed them tweaked into vintage clips. Think the CHEERS segment was from an actual episode. Dave Letterman had a Disney contract for a while, but this may be the extent of his Disney work. This old video shows the monitor view.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MwNEzDA24XM
I'm guessing the storyline of the special was that Mickey Mouse is missing. That was a weak and poor premise to have to work the "Cheers" segment into.
OK, not riotous, but Sam trying to use Mickey Mouse to get into Rebecca's pants is pretty subversive. Would have riled Walt, so that's cool. And Rebecca's crying jag made me laugh.
OK, not riotous, but Sam trying to use Mickey Mouse to get into Rebecca's pants is pretty subversive. Would have riled Walt, so that's cool. And Rebecca's crying jag made me laugh.
https://youtu.be/X6Xr8vkuFZA.
Cheers on The Simpsons
https://youtu.be/X6Xr8vkuFZA
@VP81955: I did not work on the Sabrina shows that took place at Animal Kingdom, thought I get a kick out of how Aunt Zelda is seen at the "Dino Dig" attraction acting as if she's doing a serious archealogical project when it's really a very elaborate kid's digging area with "dino bones" embedded in it.
@Donald Benson: I miss Superstar Television! It was in need of updating and was changed for to a live version of the Doug cartoon then The American Idol Experience. Superstar TV used live chroma key to insert guests into "I Love Lucy" (the candy scene) and others. They mostly used edited clips from the shows, replacing actors (The Golden Girls episode was "To Catch a Neighbor") and the Johnny Carson guest was, I believe, Lee Marvin.
David Letterman, who did appear in the lamented "Cabin Boy" for the studio, did some new material for Disney-MGM Studios park, including some greetings for the Monster Sound Show, a film starring Chevy Chase and Martin Short. The park was very much a product of the Eisner/Katzenberg era, with stars from their heydeys at Paramount and ABC like Penny Marshall and Goldie Hawn appearing in videos around the park.
Since Mickey Mouse was created in 1928, and Sam was still interested in Rebecca, who'd joined the show in 1987, and she was still somewhat cold, but beginning to go kooky, I think this is from Mickey's 60th Birthday in 1988. I don't remember seeing this, but I did see parts of Mickey's 50th in 1978.
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All I could seem to notice was how poorly the live characters "interacted" with Mickey. Line of sight is (almost) always the dead giveaway.....VERY rare when the humans actually end up looking directly into the eyes of the animated character. Most of the time they always seem to be looking off to the side, behind, or in front of the character.
Hmmm.....for some strange reason I now want to go back and watch "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" to see if their "logistics" (properly integrating animated characters with human actors) to see how badly they muffed this (obviously VERY difficult) interplay (if at all)....
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"Or has Me Too made me too sensitive ? Because I love Cheers when Mickey is not there to spoil the fun."
YES, it HAS made you too sensitive! Of COURSE Sam Malone wanted NOTHING to do with "get(ting) into Rebecca's pants"......I'm sure he just wanted to romance her like any other respectable man would, with absolutely NO thought whatsoever of her as simply just another sexual conquest, at all!! (and YES, that's me being COMPLETELY cynical!!)! ;-)
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