Episode 27: The King and I (1999)

We're welcome to Ranking on Bass and offhand joke that became a podcast and now we're stuck with it. I'm your host, Mike White, joining me as a little siam boy Siamese is I don't hey to say tie? I guess we change things a lot procession. Is anything okay to say? At this point?

Are we going to get ourselves canceled? At? This is? This is? This is?

This is the bridge too far? Folks also along for the ride as a man who is wearing yellow face for some reason, mister Richard Hadham, Well, I'm happy to be here, etcetera, etcetera. It's etc. Oh boy. On this podcast we discussed the works of Arthur Rinking Junior and Jules Bass.

Usually we talk about their stop motion work, but man, we are stuck here in animation town. We went from the very earliest stuff all the way to some of the latter days. Here with a Ranking Bass production of The King and I from nineteen ninety nine. It's half straightforward adaptation of the Rogers and Hammerstein play and it's half offensive, subpar Aladdin hijinks garbage that I just couldn't believe what I was seeing. Holy cow seeing is one thing.

Hearing Daryl Hammond doing an Asian accent for an hour and a half. It's just the kiss of shit on top of a poo poo Sunday. Because you know, Richard, this might be the one time where I go, Richard is right. We should have taken this thing out into the woodshed and shot it in the head a long time ago. He's saying, no way, I can't believe I'm the one pumping the brakes and going hanging on.

Guys, you're gonna say you liked this movie. Is that what you're gonna say? I can't wait to get Here's what I am going to say to explain Chris's remark. When we were preparing the episode, we were all watching the movie. I was looking for the name Jules Bass in the credits.

So not when you watch the movie, it comes up a Rankin slash Bass production, So the name appears, the name of Bass appears there, but if you look at the credits, he's not really credited as a producer. He's not credited as a writer or whatever. So so for a second there I was like, well, wait, is this just something that Rankin did like? Because it's so late also it's nineteen ninety nine, so I thought, well, wait a second, maybe this doesn't, you know, technically fall under our purview. I didn't run and get the book, so I don't know what it has to say.

I was just sort of going by, you know, Internet information. So I jokingly sent a text saying, hey, should we even be covering this? And right away Chris said yes, absolutely, So I was like, oh, okay, I guess he's really excited about it. And then I watched it in the mindset of this is something that Chris loves and approves of. I'm glad that that's where you were.

I mean, that is the only way to watch a film where again Daryl Hammond is in audio yellow face the entire movie. That is true. Now you said it's it's like rat droppings on a poop poo Sunday, whereas I would say there are certain like bits of rat dropping on I think a yummy omelet of Rogers and Hammerstein, because when they're just doing Rogers and Hammerstein. If you've ever seen the stage production of the King and I or I don't know, there's got to be a movie, but I've seen it on stage. I'm familiar with it.

There's gotta be a movie, really, and it's not this. Well, it's not this bro. You do know there's a movie, right, right? Yeah, okay, but not there has to be one, right, This is a thing that was adapted. Yes, it had to be adapt Um.

It's um, it's wonderful, it's charming, it's it's there's a lot of really great stuff. And and the story is different. I mean, I mean things happen differently, it ends up sort of the same. We'll talk about those differences, which I think are fascinating. It is, as you said, shocking that in nineteen ninety nine we've got a white actor.

Forget that they had a white actor doing it. Asking an Asian actor to do this would be, in a weird way, twice as appalling to do a character that is so it is like textbook racist illustration. Looks like it was some sort of World War two anti Japanese propaganda. You could not have a character more bucktooth, slant eyed. I mean, it's shocking, and so we'd start falling out throughout the entire movie.

Yeah, I don't even care about the racism thing. It's the teeth thing that in the whole like the bumbling and all this stuff, and it's just like, yeah, when they're when they're doing the King and I stuff, that's great. Oh this is so nice. We've got this whole story of this school teacher and her son. And as the credits are playing, the opening had it, I'm just like, how are they gonna screw this up?

Are they gonna add like an animated monkey or something to this thing? First shot? Well, and not only is it an animated monkey, then we get at dragons and all kinds of fun fantasy elements that the original totally didn't have. Yeah, oh my god, it was. It was funny.

I've seen only bits and pieces of the original for to prepare myself for this. But I was talking with a friend of mine and she's really into musical theater and she doesn't like Rogers and Hammer's sign. And one of the reasons is all of their songs sound the same, which they kind of do. Richard's making a face for those of us that are in the audio medium. But also I asked her because there's a scene where the King is like singing in front of the statue and it's like him like pleading and like it's a really emotional moment, and there's like fantasy bullshit in the background, and I was and I went and like looked at the way the scene is shot and done in the actual source material, and it's like this movie is constantly at odds with itself because it wants to tell the story of The King and I, a story that has endured for a long time because of that Yule Brenner movie.

But then it's like, but none of that's going to be entertaining for five year olds, So let's have some bullshit in the background for the kids while the adults are watching Diminishing Returns a shortened version of The King and I, because this is what an hour and a half barely, and the real musical is three hours with at least twice the amount of songs. I mean, I get that this is like a paired, down streamlined version, but there's so much just just egregiously idiotic shit in this movie that almost completely comes from making this for kids. Like that's all the almost the entire problem with this is it's for kids, and it should have no reason or right to me. Yeah, I don't think this is a musical.

Well, frankly there's not a lot of well, okay, where do I start. Rogers and Hammerstein have written some of the best American musicals in existence. Their songs do all sound the same? Amazing? Your friend is out of their mind.

I'm sure they really like soundheim. Who Jesus Christ, What if this friend didn't exist? What if Chris is actually doing one of those my friends? Says, Yeah, that friend of mine was. Mitch comes asking for a friend.

I'm asking for a friend. Do you really think that Rogers and Hammerstein sounds all the same? Um? So, you know, I mean, I can, I can argue that, but you you realize I will start at a baseline of this is a great musical and go from there. Sure, but um but it does it immediately, you know, off of what Chris says.

It begs the question, well, why was this made? And it was. It was made because in the nineties Disney had great success doing animated musicals that appeal to the four quadrants. You know, it was going to get you know, men and women and young people and middle aged people and old people. So it's like there was no It's not like, well this is being aimed here.

It's like it's being aimed at everyone and it's hitting with everyone. Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, Little Mermaid, Aladdin, all of those were huge successes. That meant other studios like Warner Brothers had to go, Are we leaving money on the table not trying to, you know, make animated movies and do what they're doing? How hard could it be? They're using classic stories, why don't and updating them?

You know, Lion King is basically using the structure of Hamlet. So isn't there some way for us to kind of do the same thing. It doesn't have to be totally original. We don't have to come up with you know, Superdog. We can just take something that exists already has songs that people know.

This is how a movie like this happens. But because it's King and I let's put in, uh, there is a sorcerer. There is a bad guy, just like um, you know ser Khan, or or like Umar and Aladdin Jafar and Aladdin? Who's the uncle? Who's who's Jeremy irons in Um Sarah, thank you Scar?

Yeah, we need the bad guy. I mean, I mean in a way that you know that's equally egregious. Actually it's not nothing's more egregious than than uh than what's the guy, little master or whatever his name master Little Yeah. I mean, I mean it's like, okay, and now let's go. I mean, it really is shocking.

It's like if you went and said, well, there'll be an African American character, so let's let's make them a pickaninny out of the you know, turn of the century, and just and just apply every possible physical stereotype you can think of. The only thing missing from this character was a bony tail. He doesn't turn his rs into els as much as I thought he would. No, thank god, because that was the real that was the bridge they wouldn't cross. I have an alternate theory, which is that this was an attempt to cash in on the live action version of Anna and the King, which is the non musical version of The King and I.

That was Anna Leolin's I guess is how you pronounce her name? It was her book that The King and I was based on, and in nineteen ninety nine Andy Tennant gave us the live action version, the one with Jodie Foster and Chellya and Fat and I'm wondering if this is just kind of one of those like we got a hurry up and come out with this thing, because the next year there would be an animated version of Anna and the King that was sixty minutes long. I don't know if they added songs to it or if that just automatically turns it into into The King and I like, no songs, it's Anna and the King. Add a song, it becomes the King and I No matter what the song it is. I'm not sure what the rules are, but maybe that's just my conspiracy theory that you both that you had two movies in the same year based on the same source material, one being and the King and the other one being this bizarro King and I adaptation.

Rodgers and Hammerstein were known for adapting material. South Pacific is based on the stories of James Missioner. Oklahoma comes from a book called How I think it's called How Green Was My Valley, which was also a movie. Yeah, things that you know, Oklahoma source material not as well known as the Missioner stuff, and in the King somewhat well known but not you know, they're not doing the Wizard of Oz. To call back to our last episode, they're trying to find source material that they that they can then sort of present to an audience, a Broadway audience, you know, for the first time, and and use it as a way to platform you know, another dozen or twenty songs written by Richard Rogers and lyric by Oscar Hammerstein.

So so, I don't know, I've never seen a non musical version of this, have you, guys? And is it doesn't hold up dramatically. I haven't seen that. And In the King, and I know that that's also been I think you'll. Brenner even did a version of Man and the King for TV and seventy two.

I want to say, thank you, right, yeah, I would, I would actually I agree completely, well, I agree with both of y'all. But I think obviously with things like Little Mermaid and Aladdin and Lion King, they're going to things that are not owned by anybody because at this point they're literally in the public domain, right. Shakespeare has been in the public domain since we were all alive, essentially since we've all been born, just like cons Christian Anderson's stuff. And instead they go, well, this has more quote curbside appeal than those do, because this is more well known to people that are around right now. Like you mentioned, Richard.

I mean, Rogers and Hammerstein is known by people in the nineties, maybe less now by a lot of people, but then the adult could get down with it and the kids would be like, oh, this is fun, and you know, this doesn't exist at a vacuum. I mean, I don't know if you guys looked around with the other movies that were coming out from Warner Brothers Home Entertainment at the time, but the movie we should be watching, Rover Dangerfield is one of the movies that came out, which is Rodney Dangerfield as a fucking dog. Hey, I don't get no treats. Even when I'm on a leash. I get pulled out.

I mean, like that's I mean, what the fuck movie is that? But at least it's something original, right. This is from Jules Bass and Arthur rankin Junior, going we want to do a Rogers and Hammerstein thing, and it was the two of them convincing them to allow them to make this. But you know, it feels like you're just ripping off Disney and you don't have the writers. It does, and not only that, but it feels like you don't have the writers to land something that already exists.

I mean, this is a story that already exists that people like, and they ruin that story. I mean, Quest for Camelot came out the year before this movie. I don't know if you all have seen that movie. That movie is actually very good. It's a lot of fun.

It has Eric Idol in it has Don Rickles in it, it has Pierce Brosnan and Kerrie Elwis. It's a lot of fun. This movie is it based on Camelot. It's not based on It's based on like the stories of Camelot, but it's it's not the musical, and it's about, you know, the Excalibur gets stolen and they have to go get it, and Eric Idol and Don Rickles play a two headed dragon and Gary Oldman is the bad guy. Like it already sounds more interesting than this movie.

And that movie is really good. It go nominated for Oscars for the music and everything, and then this movie comes out and it feels like that's exactly what they were trying to do, was capitalize on something that was adjacent to a musical, and now they're just like, let's just make a musical that exists already in film form. And it could have worked. It really didn't though, like it could have worked. There's nothing to say it good.

Yeah, I think, I mean obviously the attempt to age it down because there's not it's not a traditional love story, so it's not it's not a musical in the sense if you think about Hollywood musicals, I go, a Hollywood musical is about two young people falling in love, and that's not really what this is, right. You kind of have that slid in on the side with the whole prince and servant girl thing, right and in the and in the musical, it's not even um uh trulo long come if that's his name, kind of I don't have it in front of me. Um. But but there's actually two characters. There's the there's the king's son, the crown Prince who will become the king, and then there's another character who falls in love with tub tim So.

And I actually think I was one of the best ideas in this thing was to combine those two. Actually, I'm like, that's actually really smart. Um. You know, Rogers and Hammerstein would always do this. There would be the A love story and then a B love story.

But anyway, but that wasn't really enough to sort of say, this is going to get little kids excited. You've got to have animals the monkey you talked about, you know, elephants and stuff like that. So it really was unfortunate. And they had to go to the Rogers and Hammerstein estate, who controls every production right they had ass and Rank and Junior did together like that. That's where Jules Bass comes into this equation.

Is it was him and Rank and Junior that went yeah, and and they said, well, okay, it's a little weird, but a there may be money in it. If it you know, if fucking lion King can do it, we can do it, I'm sure was part of that, right and be right. And then also it's like, well, if it gets if if you basically tell the same story, but there's enough in there to get kids excited, there's a monkey or whatever. Okay, okay, go for it. But boy, that was not a good idea.

Well, and on top of everything else, this is, without a doubt, one of the ugliest animated things I've ever seen. It's so poorly animated, it's just not pleasant to look at. It's not look quest for Camelot. I watched part of it yesterday, just so I could remind myself that's a year before this, and it's it's there's just like, even from the opening shot where a kid is hanging on the side of the boat, the water is just it it all looks so muddied and it's not very it's not very clearly defined in a way that something like this should. And what's what's kind of strange is the opening of this movie and then there's kind of a dance scene later in the movie, are so well animated and interesting to look at and vibrant with their colors that it's like, what is what is the disconnect here?

Again, there's a there's a very huge disconnect between the things you expect from a King and I and then all the other stuff. Well, well, it's funny because if you compare it to other things at the time, mostly Disney animation, Yeah, it's not as good if you compare it to other ranking and bass stuff I've seen uglier. Well, oh right, that's fair case in point. The last thing we watched, right, yeah, this I wanted to like the animation style a lot more than I did. And yeah, I mean you're talking about how smart it was to combine different stories and when they're not doing all the stuff with the Wizard and Master Little and all that kind of stuff.

The elephants, I mean, even the elephant was okay, but as long as they're not dealing with that whole evil wizard who's trying to come the King, I guess. But it just feels I mean, it's all it is what it is. It feels like it's just shoved on there. It's all stuck out. It's all just this top layer.

And if you just peel that off, you'd be left with something somewhat decent. I would say, well, they had they had a the original material, they had a problem, and then with this we got to get kids involved. They had a potential solution. So I'm sure there was something attractive of because in the King and I there's that whole you know, Oh, we've got the emissary coming from Britain. It's her old boyfriend.

Okay, that's perfect. In the play rather in the musical part of the the sort of reception is there's going to be a sort of a little play put on based on Uncle Tom's cabin, right. I was wondering if that was ever going to come into right this movie that we're watching. Yeah, it's like it's like wait what, okay, we're in We're in you know, Siam, and now they're going to take Uncle Tom's cabin and do a play. So but it works because it's echoing a theme of of you know, political systems where slavery exists, where people are you know, indentured servants.

So it's like, oh, we're sort of using the play to show how the king is brave enough to question a system and do a play about it, and somehow it'll reflect well on the king. And it's and there's there's certain comic elements because a story that is endemic to one culture is being translated into another culture, and there's some things just aren't translating one to one. But it's you know, the point is made, and of course it leads into the most horrifying thing. It's like Rogers and Hammerstein musicals are really dark. They can get really dark.

Um, this one gets to the point of like, oh, the king is going to whip someone to death. It's like, well, his his Burmese slave, who will either be I'm gonna either gonna whip or to death or I'm gonna sent her back home or she'll be murdered. Right what But it's in the But it's in the musical, and um, and it's addressed, and it's addressed in exactly the same way it's addressed in in this movie where where she says, fine, if you're gonna do it, you're gonna do it in front of me. And by then they have enough of a relationship where he's seeing his own behavior through Anna's eyes and can't do it. Which, again, that's great.

That's the theme of the play. You know, that's the theme of the musical is is lurching and you know the fits and starts of lurching forward in a character's evolution, a country's evolution. Great. Um, But they couldn't do that. It's we're not going to do Uncle Tom's cabin in this animated movie.

So what are we gonna do? Well, cut all that part out, but we'll sort of add in a hot air balloon and there you go. So kids love That's what I've heard kids these days love hot air balloons. Yeah, that third act we really get, we really get far astray of what the rest of the film was. I mean, they set up that hot air balloon early on.

You know, it's very you know when we saw that Genghis Khan movie, you know, it's very uh Desi rons Junior on the Big Kite, you know, and you're just like, Okay, the Big Kite's got to come in someplace. I don't think it does, and that Genghis Khan film, but it doesn't this one with the balloon. So it's like, oh, all right, it comes into play a couple of times and the fireworks. Yeah, you know, you know, clearly they knew, well, okay, and at a certain point we have to have a big exciting conclusion where people are being rescued and the King becomes a hero and all that stuff. So they did the best they could.

Look, the one really unforgivable thing is Daryll Hammond. It is it's hard to tell it, Tim. I mean, at least there's that yeah, and I say him and you know, I mean, I guess he's a guy just taken a role. And I don't know. I was alive and I was a full grown adult in nineteen ninety nine, and in my memory, it was not okay.

It would not have been an awesome idea to go oh, and then he'll just be the goofy Asian character with the teeth. Just maybe I'm misremembering nineteen ninety nine. We're already having crowns with Aladdin at that point, like I remember, and that was what ninety two like, haven't they edited that? So there's like lyrics from one of the songs that is missing because they talk about how bloodthirsty the Arabs are. Well, as an Arab, I can attest to that.

Well, I know, Richard, you guys swear to God from one Arab to another. Let me just speak freely. We're a murderous savage breeds, which is okay, But to celebrate that and song sometimes it's like, yeah, it was where they cut off your ear if they don't like your face, right, yeah, yeah, yeah. Have they stopped doing that? Well, I don't know if in Siam they've stopped beating you with a whip to death, you know, I would assume they Well, I don't know.

I do understand that it's still a theocracy and it's still a little uh sorry, it's not a theocracy. It's still a monarchy, and I think it's still a little tough. Can go as far as like you cannot make fun of the king or the royal family whatsoever. So if you don't stand up in the movie theater when they do the proclamation for the king at the beginning of the movie, you get in trouble, right, m Yeah, that's real. That's Thailand, baby, that's Siam.

I guess. Look, I think the other thing that you kind of mentioned, Richard, You know, the other thing that's kind of unforgivable is you have actual stage actors doing the singing. I mean, Christian Noel, Martin Vidnevik is a Broadway actor. They do the seven songs in the in the piece. That's the thing I'm kind of shocked by.

The original musical has about twenty songs. This one has seven, right, I guess almost all of the songs are recognizable to me. Getting to know you right, to know you, you guess exactly. I'm surprised they left out the one that I always remember, the one We Are Siame different musical. Yeah, there was a Siamese cat in the at one point.

Yeah, Sime, maybe wonder are they all Siamese cat if they're in Thailand? Every cat is a Siamese cat. Yeah, just just talk about Daryl Hammond as a as a comedian and as a voice. He does some pretty good impressions, right, Yeah, I remember, I liked it. He would do Clinton all the time, correct and Connery on Celebrity Jeopardy on SNL.

He's the one who would always be Connery versus Wolf Ferrell's tribec I didn't realize that that was him. Yeah, yeah, yeah, he was the He was the Bill Hitter of his day. Yeah. I didn't watch a lot of SNL when he was on there, but I do remember obviously the Celebrity Jeopardy skits quite a bad. Yeah.

I don't have a deep knowledge of Daryl Hammond, do you, Chris? Do you? Was that your more your generation? I mean again, like I've seen him in things, but I just he for me is the guy who was on SNL for a while and then left, and he's on SNL still, Like is he? Yeah?

Oh wow? No, Darren Haymand is not still on Saturday Night Live. Somebody got to look this up right now, going Wikipedia, go and watch he shows up on SNL from time to time, dude, Like, well, from time to time. Okay, maybe he shows up eight guests or something, but he's not part of you know, maybe not as the opening, but he does show up. I mean, who else is showing up that frequently that wasn't on the show before?

You know what I mean? Martin says he was all the way up to twenty twenty one. He was still a regular cast member, so he was in it from season twenty one. Didn't make every season, but then up to forty six, sold you looking crazy? Told you what, Wait a second, he's just doing impersonations, like he's doing impersonations for them?

Is he the longest regular cast member? He has three hundred and eight is it three hundred and eight episodes? Yeah, three hundred and eight episodes to his credit? Jesus, Yeah, I stand corrected, and I stand horror. Fid I know?

Right again? Like, I don't know. I honestly don't even know what Daryl Hammond's thing is other than being the dude who did impersonations on SNL. Like that's when I think of Daryl Hammond, That's who I think of, is the guy who was on SNL doing impersonations. And when I think of Daryl Hammond, I think of an interview with him.

I don't even know where it was on you know, NPR or something where he was talking about how he because like he's he really he's he's like a scientist when it comes to these impressions. And and apparently he can tell when someone has had surgery, like like he can sort of hear. He's like, I can look at someone's face and listen to their voice, and if something's not matching up, it's usually because they've had rhinoplasty or some kind of you know surgery, their their you know, tonsils or something something's been done, maybe their teeth where where it's literally affecting the physical structure of their laryns and their naso pharynx, and sounds are coming out in ways that are unexpected, and then I have to account for that as I do an impression of them.

And I was like, okay, that's I've rich Little never said that. Huh. Daryl Hammond is the narrator for SNL now, folks, that's what it is. And he shows up in episodes doing Get twenty fourteen, Richard, what would have happened in twenty fourteen? Uh?

Danald Trump? That's what he did before Baldwin took over, was he was doing the whole Trump impersonation that when you say he narrates, he's doing the n O. He's announcing the Saturday Night Live. Yeah, but he also SHO. But he also he does show up from time to time from that, but he's doing who else is?

But who else? But Don Pardo didn't show up in front of the camera. I can't speak for Dono. Okay, let's let the man rest him. I think more to I think more to our points.

I don't when I think of Daryl Hammond, I don't think of him in front of the camera, even like in front of the camera in movies. It's TV on sketch comedy doing impersonations. So it makes sense that they would have him doing this. I don't think it's okay, but it makes sense why he's doing this. But yeah, it's it's the worst part of this movie by It's so bad and offensive that it almost made it would it makes the movie unwatchable anytime it's on screen.

Yeah, And and it didn't. They did not have to do that. They could have had a dumb lackey goofy you know, you know, the sort of talking animal. Well, it's the henchman who doesn't scare us it's the lovable dom henchman who works who gets slapped around by the evil henchman. I get that that exists in a lot of Disney things like Modoc.

What like Modoc from whose New ant Man film where he starts off as a bad guy and they say, hey, don't be a dick, and then suddenly he becomes a good guy. I was waiting for somebody to say that to Master Little and then him just be like a super nice guy and then they get him dentures at the end. He has no teeth by the end of the movie. That's what happens when you're a bad guy. Okay, exactly, But you can have that goofy character without making them It's like, okay, and let's just go full stereotype.

You just do the character, but not by employing every ethnic stereotype that exists in American history in regard to Asian people. I mean, for fuck's sake. And again that's why I mentioned at Talking Animal because in respute and that rescute. But in Anastasia another not Disney animated movie, because that was a Fox animated movie that came out in ninety seven, it's Hank Azaria playing a albino bat. So we don't know hank Azaria has never done an accent that's upset any racial group within American culture.

Not right. I mean, hey, you know what, I'm not speaking for anybody about Hank Azaria, but Apu was a fully formed, fucking character at this point. Guys, like, it's not Master Little the most offensive animated character I've seen in a movie close enough that I could say people are still alive and can watch it. This isn't Song of the South, for fuck's sake like this, Like you said, Richard, this is so so contemporary. The contemporary nature of it, I think is what's the most shocking.

Frankly, well, there was there was a big like I was racking my brain for controversies of this sort, like I never heard. I mean, as far as I know, there was no controversy. Not enough people saw it to provide controversy. That's the big that's the big shovel of dirt right on top. Nobody's saw it anyways.

But what I do recall is Jonathan Price starring in Miss Saigon on So yeah, right around the same time, I think it was late nineties, and he was playing an Asian character, and there was then you you heard about the controversy where people are like, why why is this rule not being played by an Asian stage musical actor, of which there are many. Yeah, and it was like yeah, but are they the argument back, well, yeah, but are they as famous as Jonathan Price? And it's like, well, that's beside the point. You can never get as famous as as Jonathan Bryce if you don't get a break, and actually, yeah, exactly, it's like, then go do that, you know, get get get that person and allow them to become as famous as Jonathan Price by doing that role.

So so I so there was like and it was also right around that time that David Henry Huang did his update on Flower Drum Song, which was a musical that had sort of fallen out of favor, and he said, I want to restage it. I want permission to rewrite it and sort of recontextualize it and and as as an you know, Asian American sort of given a new spin. And so there was a new production and it played in New York in LA and I don't I don't think it was a massive hit, but it it was. It sort of was the other story or you heard alongside to Miss Saigon story in terms of, hey, what are opportunities being given to Asian people? And and are we are we so focused on the way we've treated, you know, the horrible way American institutions have treated African Americans that we we've suddenly got a blind spot to wait a second, there's there's other groups that have been equally maligned and not given opportunity.

So that's that's what was going on in the late nineties, just from my own memory. Now this comes along, what the hell? What I want to say. The year before was Lethal Weapon four, which was one of the most egregious anti Asian films that I can possibly remember, where you had that it was his name Uncle Benny character where it like they honestly had a pride lice you plick joke in the movie and I was like, you gotta be fucking kidding me. Yeah, But again it's like it's like long after people would be triggered, as it were, by like, oh no, you cannot have an African American.

You cannot make you know a lot, you know, whatever the jokes are going to be, you know whatever, the classic stereotypes, you know, the offensive you know, oh it'll be you know, watermelons or whatever. It's like people's radar was up on that, but apparently the Asian stuff, the fried rice jokes, could you could just go right under the radar and no one was going to say a word. Do you know what I'm still so glad about is that it is still open season on Italians. You can do that cheesy Italian accent whenever you want, just that media and there you go. Because you know, every racial group has a song.

You know, it's like if it's an Asian character, right, racism comes in all colors, folks England. That that that that triggers the shit out of him, doesn't it? We got him now? Oh my god? Look, you know Anastasia the movie is based off of a stage play too, that animated movie, and it's like, why why not just follow that mold?

Why not give the elephant talking lines? Why not give the monkey talking lines? Why not just not be is he? Here's the thing, either don't be as faithful or just making its own thing completely and throw out Rogers and Hammerstein everything. But if you're going to do that, why adapt them to begin with?

Like? Right, it's it's so strange because Fox was doing it better with something like Oh, Anastasia is something that got a stage adaptation because of the musical movie animated film from the nineties like two or you know, a couple of years ago. People are still talking about that. That's still something that people actively like this could have have been that it really could have. There's very little stopping this movie.

I mean, other than you know, blatant racism, Mickey Rooney's style. When you control the estate of of you know, Rogers and Hammerstein. I was going to say, you know an artist who has a deep catalog where the principles are dead and now it's just a matter of, well, how are we monetizing this? You know, there are times when the board just decides, hey, it's been a slow ten years. We need to hire a publicist and an agent to go to Hollywood and remind everyone Rogers and Hammerstein exist and we are open for business.

Okay, so picture us your ideas because we need some money. Now. I don't know if that's what happened, but that is what can happen. And that may have been this, that may have been. Hey, a couple of things happened all at once.

We need an animated musical. Rogers and Hammerstein's rated to deal. You know, We've got you know, ranking and Bass, have got a you know, a shop set up. We could do this fairly quickly, and they're going to take us five years. And music.

We don't need Elton John either. We got the music music has written fifty years ago. We're good. And maybe that's what happened. And I think that was the mistake.

Was I mean again, like Anastasia works, so maybe not. But I don't know, Like it feels like if I'm sitting there in nineteen ninety five looking at the climate and the way things are, I would be much more in entertained at least myself by going out and being with the entertainers of the time and working with them like and Elton John. Like I mean, at this point, we're talking like a Selene Dion, like someone who someone who is contemporary enough but has that feeling of Rogers and Hammerstein, because you know, like the music and the Lion King, it has that timeless quality to it the way Rogers and Hammerstein stuff does. It's not a surprise that the Disney music in so many of these movies sound like Rogers and Hammerstein, because that's clearly what they were inspired by, because though they were the ones, especially with something like Cinderella, they did it before Disney did in a musical format.

So like those things that even the Disney things that are successful that they're kind of basing this movie off of, they can't even emulate the thing that's they're emulating. It's it's it's shocking how poor this movie is on both accounts well, which is strange because then at the end of the movie they have Barbara streisand Barbara Streisand is singing the end credits to the movie. She's singing why three songs and she is Chris movie that we just watched. In the movie we just watched, because there's there's there's a vocal performance over the final credits, and I'm like, that really sounds like Barbara Streisand and I don't know why because she's she's not a vocal talent in the body of the film.

And so I'm watching the credits and it's like, oh, yeah, this sort of metally of these three songs performed by Barbara streisand what the hell? I didn't even catch that at all. You see that and yeah yeah, so yeah, yeah, yeah, I have dreamed we kissing a shadow and something wonderful. Yeah wow yeah. So I was like, well, wait a second, was that like an original recording?

Did they bring her in to do that or was that something she'd already done and they just licensed it. But if you was, it's like, Okay, we get Barbara, but only for end credits or something. It's like weird. But it was really strange to see her there. I mean, I don't know if they were pushing that.

I mean it almost feels like, if we do that, we're gonna sell because again, remember it's late nineties CDs, and if you can sell CDs based on your movie, like the soundtrack, Oh my god, can you imagine the amount of money that was made on the Lion King soundtrack? Well, that's I mean, that was the thing I was looking at with this movie. The soundtrack wasn't poorly received as poorly received as the movie was. The soundtrack wasn't as poorly received because again, Christiane Nole is one of the voices on there, and she was a known musical and stage actress, Like, she's not phoning it in because why would she and Martin Vidnevik is also a stage actor and in Broadway. So yeah, I don't get it.

Now again, I guess we have to circle back and say that Martin Vidnevik is not Um, is not a Thaie actor. No, so well, neither was Joe Brenner, Neither is Daniel day Kim or so many of the actors who have played the fictional King of Siam. Yeah. Well, it's funny because when you get to certain Asian roles, even that gets a little it's sort of like, well, okay, so this character is Um Korean, but we'll have a Chinese play, like all the people in the Geisha what was it my Geisha Memoirs of a Geisha. Yeah, it was like all Chinese people, not Japanese people.

Right. And then of course our buddy from Barney Miller, Jack Sue, Yeah, who was was Chinese? No, I'm sorry, Japanese America who who then performed as a Chinese American to as a work around from anti Japanese uh, you know, blacklisting and racism during World War Two. So so it's sort of like and now and now I think we are in an era where if it is a Korean character let's find a Korean actor. If it is a Vietnamese character, let's find a Vietnamese actor.

Don't just grab the first Asian person you see on the street. Let's actually let's actually see if we can do that. And you're so right, Mike, because it always comes back down to, well, okay, but you've just reduced your casting pool dramatically, and it's like, yeah, for now. But if we're if if stories about Korean Americans are being written in Vietnamese Americans and Japanese Americans and Chinese Americans, and then actors from those cultures actually play those roles, guess one twenty years and it could be hard at all, right, I mean I even use an even more contemporary example. The Last of Us cast a African American child actor who was deaf.

They put out an open call on Twitter and they got five responses. Five. Yeah, five. But to your point, that episode worked well, that that child actor who is deaf in real life was amazing in the episode. So my hope is those kinds of roles start to exist more and people start to write exactly like you said, and when on Titans, when we cast Barbara Gordon, who in our timeline of our story was already injured by the joker and was on a wheelchair.

We instantly realized we cannot hire an actor and just have them sit in a wheelchair. It's like, let's cast someone who I'm sorry, who is on a wheelchair, because that is the that is the preferred phrase to use, not in but on a chair. Yeah, which is something I learned because not only did we hire an actress, Savannah Welch, who was amazing and played Barbara Gordon was great, but we also had a kind of like a technical advisor sort of talking about okay, so so I've you know, I'm going to work with Savannah, but also work with you guys about how characters within the drama should speak, react, you know what, what's realistic to do, what isn't, how to approach certain things and questions and all that kind of stuff, which was great and very educational for us.

But you gotta believe we did not have a large tool of people to choose from. Once we said okay, this is going to be a you know, a white woman and a white woman yeah in I'm sorry on a chair. We didn't have two hundred people, right, But hey, Daryl Hammond was the best choice here. I think I think they had people banging down the door for this role. I just don't understand why it wasn't a talking animal character, because that's literally the direction you go with these kinds of things.

There's thinking of Disney movies with human characters. They often have a talking animal psychic ursula two talking eels, uh and Rob I mean Robin Hood. Those are talking animals. But like, I guess Scar has eag not Iago. What's the other one?

No, Jafar has a Iago. Michael Godfreed like, right, well, but Chris, what are you saying you want? You want, like there to be a panda bear who talks in pigeon. I don't. I don't want what we got here.

I mean, could anything. I mean a look, let me put it this way. If it's if it's a talking okay, Eddie Murphy as Mushue and Moola. There you go. Well, I mean I mean that that breaks everything completely because he's not an Asian actor.

Clearly, he's not doing an Asian accent. Clearly he's right and it's just right, And that's my point. It doesn't happen, like why make him? Why make master little this, Why not just make him care as opposed to a literal roaming stereotype of the worst kind? Well, you know, will you bring up a really interesting point, because then the animal aspect of it can become problematic and has been called out.

Why would you use a particular animal to represent a person from a particular race? And I bet there were people who were pissed off that Eddie Murphy was a donkey. I bet there were people who were like, hang on, that feels a little not so respectful. I bet there were people. Yeah, but like, have they seen this movie?

Has anybody seen this movie? Did you guys see the response to this movie? Like budget of twenty five million boxed off as of twelve million. When the Rogers and Hammerstein's dictionary about all of the adaptations of their works and everything go, this is the worst adaptation of the King And I yell, I mean, look they can, I mean look, I've already said I love Rogers and Hammerstein. But they said it was okay to do this, So in a way, they have only themselves to blame.

I'm sure. I'm sure it was like, well try that never doing that again. Literally, in two thousand and nine. The president of the organization, the Rogers and Hammerstein Organization, said this was the biggest mistake, was lending them the rights to do this, and that they would never do it again, never another musical. And you know what, fine, But at the same time, like you know what, yeah, because because people kind of don't care anymore, because now Wicked is a classic musical, and that's a classic now and that's being turned into a movie.

And Rogers and Hammerstein were perfect for a time and of a place, and we are not at that time and place anymore. And even musicals don't sound like this anymore. The biggest musical right now, or at least for the last couple of years, was Hamilton, which is hip hop. For fuck's sake. It's not these big, grandiose, thirty two piece orchestral piece And that's what musicals felt like they had to be for a very long time.

And they don't anywhere, right, I mean, looked at look looked at another way. Doing the King and I suddenly gives tie actors a field day with a variety of roles to play, both male and female. And if you do it, you know sort of you know, if you cast accurately. You can you can give a lot of opportunity, which which is awesome. The Rogers and Hammerstein Estate does have certain hard and fast rules about racism, the most famous being that there is a song in South Pacific called You've Got to Be Carefully Taught, and it's about racism.

It's about how racism has to be taught. It's like, look and the people you see out there who are racist, that didn't happen by a mistake. They were taught to be racist. So it's sort of a it's not sarcastic, it's a very sincere song, but it's like you you have to be carefully taught to be that way if if you're going to end up that way, you grow up in that culture. Their rule is there can be no production of South Pacific that eliminates that song.

That song must be performed in every production because they realized that when they did the show, they couldn't do it in a lot of Southern states because at the time they did it, a lot of states in the United States of America took that as a direct attack against their culture. They were correct, it was an attack and they lost money, but they said it's part of the story. It's an important part of the story. It's something we believe. It stays in and it will always stay in.

And if you don't want to do the song, then don't do our show. I wonder what the song was. I wonder what the song was in this movie that they couldn't getting to Know you? Is that? What it is is that the song that they have to leave in It is a puzzlement.

Honestly, likes that's for me, the biggest thing here. Just I wish it had just been for kids. But it had just been for kids, I think it would have been perfectly fine. I think if they had just said, all right, be racist with is not what I'm saying, sir, But thank you for that gotcha moment provided by Richard Adam, this moment in gotcha history. No how, Chris, Wow, you know what I see you in a whole moon light?

Yeah. No, I'm more speaking to the idea of and we kind of touched on it earlier. The why does the Lion King work? Because it uses Hamlet as a starting point, not the destination. And because you use that as the starting point, you're jumping off point.

It means you're not tied to the expectations and all of the trappings that come with saying we're doing a King and I animated film. There are expected Like you just said with South Pacific, if you were doing South Pacific and animated movie, you can't not do that song. There's nothing you could do about it. With the King and I, when you say we're doing the King and I, there are some things that have to show up. Otherwise, what are you doing a King and I adaptation for?

If you don't do getting to Know You and I would assume a puzzlement and the other what shall we Dance? Shall we dance? Right? Like those three songs, those are the songs you're going to do if you're doing The King and I. But like I feel like they should have just gone, well, let's let's do let's use the King and I as the starting point, but we don't have to hew as close to it as like telling the story beat for beat, And they did make changes, like you said, Richard, but they didn't make enough changes.

Well, what's interesting is that, you know, again not a traditional love story. The way the musical plays out is that they shall We Dance? Takes place sort of in the middle of the show, before the big banquet, and and it's sort of them growing very close together. And then and then they split apart when he um when it looks as if he is going to whip this person and um. And then at that point in the story, even though he declines to whip tubbed him to death, they they both sort of look at each other, you know, sort of like in the wake of that horrible moment, and they both say, this was a mistake.

My coming here was a mistake, and he's and he is like, yes, you're coming here was a mistake. And then in the timeline of the story on stage, she goes to the house outside the palace and they do not speak for three months. They do not speak again until it is clear that he is dying. She goes to be with him as he dies, and it's as he is dying and they and they they find sort of an analogous moment here in the animated version in the show, he really is dying and he is turning over his reign to his son, and it's clear that he is saying to his son, you have my permission, and I am urging you do things differently. I could not bring us into the future, you must, and that future must be one that is represented in the ideals of this woman, her ideals of equality education, you know.

And so that moment comes in then and he dies and she leaves and that's the end of the musical. But it's but it's this sort of they have they have realigned in terms of their friendship and their philosophy to whatever degree they can um. A more romantic version of that occurs in this version where at the end they do shall we dance? And he has been completely heroic and completely transformed, and then they dance and it's the end. So it's in a way, it's kind of nice if you're telling a less nuanced, less complicated story, right, that part that has nothing to do with with Asian stereotypes and and weird evil wizards.

Yeah, because that's all for the like that I think is the real strange thing. It's like the stuff that's for kids is the offensive stuff. Yeah, And and like again, like we always joke about like kids entertainment, and like the best kids entertainment, at least in my opinion, is one where the adult can sit down and enjoy it, like Shrek, Right, I mean, Shrek is a kids movie. Theoretically, I think it's got a lot more going on, which is why it does work. But they I mean, you can't just say Rogers and Amerstein.

That's going to get the adults in the door. But that's what this feels like, like, oh yeah, and changing the story, I think. I think it's like you said, it's a very romantic, very family appropriate version of the story. Right, nobody dies, everybody has a good time. The guy who totally tried to usurp the throne is just now now with the animated movie logic, he just scrubs the stables as opposed to, you know, being decapitated, like what really happened.

And the king with his backward notions, really does transform into a modern thinker and a modern character. And yeah, and there is a it's a romantic ending, right, and it's a very sweet ending. Yeah. But Beauty and the Beast, I mean it literally is. I mean they're dancing in a ballroom.

Yeah, he's the brute, she's the beauty. You know, they're they're cribbing f a lot of things here in terms of what they're hoping the end result will be. I do wonder if they had done an animated version of this, like say now, right, say you approach this now, because again, given the distance and time and the expectations of the audience, Now, if you were to adapt this now as an animated feature, you would not do it this way at all, obviously, but you do it for adults, but the play right, But you would do it this way because they halfway did it this way. You would do it this way. You would just not do all the other bullshit that they slapped on top because again, for the parts that's trying to be faithful to the musical with the music, it still is.

Okay, that scene of him performing a Puzzleman's not bad. That's the scene that I keep coming back to because it's such a stark contrast of like the panther is dancing around trying to stop him from being attacked by these robot statues, but he's just singing doing the song's right. It's literally the way it would be presented any other time. And that's the scene where if you're sitting and watching this movie, you go, Okay, here is the clear disconnect between the expectations of one audience and the expectations of another, and how they are trying to be matched and met in the same scene and that never works. And here is just one more example of how it doesn't.

And unless you really know what that scenes about, I mean, it's so distracting. You think it's a scene about a guy sort of foolishly talking to himself while being unaware that he's in imminent danger. But there's a whole other character thing going on that you can really gets kind of sidelined and you can miss it, which is a character struggling internally with the notion of I have always been told that everything I do and say is correct simply because I do or say it. This person who I respect and kind of like tells me that's wrong. What do I do?

That's a fairly sophisticated place to be in a theater, and when you're singing about it, I mean, that's and it's interesting and it's not about statues coming to life, right that such a stranimation style is so bizarre. Yes, well, and again like even then, like you have them checking back in with this other sorcerer who is on screen with the king twice once maybe if that like all it even feels like the framing narrative of this story feels so like two stories running at the same time, and it's just okay. Not only that, but I mean forgive me for even saying it, because this is not the biggest problem. But when you have an evil wizard, can't he just make it so that he gets to be king? He can make statues come to life.

Can't he just kill a few people and do a few things through magic and then it's done, if that's what he really wants. Whatever, all he has to whistling is his weakness. Okay, whistle a happy tune and the giant water dragon goes away. Before we wrap? Can I give a shout out to a book everyone should read, Sure, The biography of Mary Rogers, Richard Rogers daughter Shy, The alarmingly outspoken memoir of Mary Rogers.

This is great. It just came out. It is wildly entertaining. Her voice comes through and she is an amazing person. She went on to have a career in theater.

Also a little bit. She did two interesting things. She wrote Once Upon a Mattress, which you've probably heard of, which gets performed a lot. Excuse me, rather a musical made famous because it was the debut of a unknown actor, singer, comedian named Carol Burnett who made Once Upon a Mattress famous. And then she also this woman wrote the book Freaky Friday.

Oh, I had no idea. So she's had a really interesting life. So if anyone is listening to this show because they're a big Rodgers and Hammerstein person, read this book ton of Rodgers and Hammerstein stuff plus stuff you've never heard. And she pulls no punches and drags her mom and dad for sure. And this movie does a pretty good job of dragging her dad's legacy on its own.

So yeah, yeah, true. And you know what I think to your point, Richard, to bring this episode towards its inevitable crashing conclusion, this this doesn't. This doesn't feel like ranking in bass. No, no, Snowman, no no. If this had been ranking in bass, I might I might have.

I would have expected more from them. Yeah, I would would have expected Moray Laws to be doing all the songs Jingle, jingle, jingle, I'm the King off. So yem Maury, we need a few extra songs in this Rogers and Hammerstein thing. Can you heride a couple of classics songs? You have two weeks.

Just we just need like three, just fire it off. For whatever reason, I thought that one of the songs in this was the Herman's Hermit song I'm Henry the Eighth, but I am the King as I am. I thought that was a song in this. For whatever reason, I was singing and I was like, we're gonna watch King and I it's got that one song I Am the King assium and one of my friend my friend was like, that's not a that is not a song from music. I was disappointed to learn this.

That was very go through the whole movie. Then you're like, wait a second, why didn't that Why didn't that tigers start singing that song that I know in a Cockney accent? Right? So what are we doing on the next episode, Mike Wow or even say that. I want to thank everybody for tuning in.

I want to thank Abby Stabby for our artwork, as well as the Greedy Octopus for our theme music. Yeah, on our next episode, we are going to come back next month and we're gonna look at the Mad, Mad Mad Comedians, which thankfully is only half an hour long. We deserve a little bit of a break after this episode. So yes, on this movie three times, guys. Yeah, I could take a break.

Mike. Are you talking about Rogers and Hammerstein's Mad, Mad Mad Comedians? No, I'm talking about ranking in basses, Mad Mad Mad Comedians from the s year nineteen seventy. No, Rogers and Hammerstein in the next one Weird Weird, Okay, Yeah, I'll do it. Maybe that song will be in this one, Mad Mad Mad world.

What is the Mad Mad Mad Comedians, Mike, I'm not exactly sure yet, other than it's probably a whole collection of current day comedians, all animated. I'm pretty sure that there's Tommy Smothers and Dick Smothers in there. Honestly, there might have been a little controversy about the March Brothers around this, But yeah, we'll be sure to share the whole thing next month when we come back and talk about it. I'm excited. So until then, Chris, what is keeping you busy?

Sir? Everything over at weirding Way Media, That's what's keeping me busy. Where you can hear me, you can hear yourself, you can hear Richard, you can hear Richard's better half over at eight holding right now, Oh my gow burning the midnight Oil over there this household. I'm telling you two podcasts, no waiting. I was just saying, and Richard, how about yourself?

What are you working on? Well, we have concluded production on Titans Season four. The part one is now available along with seasons one, two, and three on HBO Max. The final six episodes will air, I believe, starting in April on HBO Max. So check those out.

It's it's a nice four season show. It comes full circle and you will you will not be left hanging. There are some shows it's disappointing the end and you're like, oh, I went down a road and the road just petered out in the middle of the desert and I'm stuck. This one, doesn't it. Actually it concludes in what I think is a pretty great way, So check it out very next due.

We actually could see the Nightwing fuck Batman after you brought that up in the first episode. No, we don't. We we don't cash every check that we write a right, it was just kind of hanging out there for all these years. I thought for sure maybe we would get that. I think it was more colloquial.

But hey, you know what, fan, that's what that's what Slash fictions. Fore. Yeah, as for me, I am over writing a lot of slash fiction about Nightwing and Batman, about Bones and Kirk and Bones and Spock and Perkins Box. So it's you know, that was the classics, Checkov and Spark. What the hell man?

Well yeah, I mean it's a little hard to do a Russian when you don't have the big boots. But I always wanted Spot to call Checkov Chieko. Whatever flows your boat, Chris, So be sure to come back next month to hear us talk about the Mad, Mad Mad Comedians. Until then, be sure to rate and review the podcast where we get it, Tell your friends, tell your family, stay weird. The