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Earth Girls Are Easy

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For the episode of The O.C., see The Earth Girls Are Easy.
Earth Girls are Easy
Directed byJulien Temple
Written byJulie Brown
Charlie Coffey
Terrence E. McNally
Produced byTony Garnett
Duncan Henderson
Terrence E. McNally
StarringGeena Davis
Jeff Goldblum
Jim Carrey
Damon Wayans
Julie Brown
CinematographyOliver Stapleton
Edited byRichard Halsey
Music byRay Colcord
Nile Rodgers
Julie Brown
Production
company
Distributed byVestron Pictures
Release dates
September 8, 1988 (Toronto International Film Festival)
May 12, 1989 (USA)
Running time
100 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$10 million (estimated)
Box office$3,916,303

Earth Girls are Easy is a 1988 American musical comedy film directed by Julien Temple. It stars Geena Davis, Jeff Goldblum, Michael McKean, Julie Brown, Charles Rocket, Jim Carrey and Damon Wayans. The film is marketed with the tagline "An out-of-this-world, down-to-earth comedy adventure". The film's plot is based on the song "Earth Girls Are Easy" from Julie Brown's 1984 mini-album Goddess In Progress.

Plot summary

The film begins with three furry aliens Wiploc (red alien, played by Carrey), Zeebo (yellow alien, played by Wayans) and Mac (blue alien, played by Goldblum) traveling in a space ship. It's been a long time since they've had female companionship and they receive a broadcast showing human females. They are titillated by these "hairless", shapely creatures and discover that the broadcast came from Earth, so they set off toward Earth and southern California.

Valerie Gail (Davis) is a valley girl manicurist who works for the "Curl Up & Dye" hair salon. When she feels her cold fiancé Dr. Ted Gallagher (Rocket) is slipping away, she attempts to seduce him with a new look; instead she catches him cheating on her with his nurse. She kicks him out, smashes his stuff and refuses to see him again. The next day, she is sunbathing when the aliens' spaceship crash lands in her pool. She befriends them and calls her friend Woody (Michael McKean) to come and drain the pool so the aliens can work on their ship and get it flying again. Meanwhile she brings them into her home and though there is a language barrier at first, the aliens prove to be quick learners and absorb American culture and language by watching television.

Wanting them to blend in to their surroundings, Valerie takes them to her friend Candy Pink (Brown, co-writer and co-producer) at the salon. After shaving off the aliens' fur, they turn out to be human looking and attractive. They all go out and party at Los Angeles nightclubs where their looks, athleticism and incredibly long tongues soon make them the envy of every female in the place. Valerie and Mac begin to fall for each other and go to back to Valerie's place. There they find out that they are anatomically compatible and make love.

The next day the pool is drained and Zeebo and Wiploc are working on their ship when Woody stops by and offers to take them to the beach. They agree and after accidentally holding up a convenience store, Zeebo and Wiploc are soon driving down the LA Freeway the wrong way, in reverse, with the police in pursuit.

Mac finds out his crew mates are in trouble and goes to help and gets arrested along with Woody in a case of mistaken identity. Valerie smashes the police vehicle in order to get arrested too so she can go with Mac.

The police pursuit ends in a crash, and Zeebo and Wiploc are taken to the ER at the local hospital. There they are examined by Dr. Gallagher who discovers they have two hearts. While he is envisioning fame and fortune through this discovery, Valerie and Mac elude the police and enter the ER disguised as a doctor and nurse, where they convince Gallagher he is delusional. They then escape back to Valerie's place where work continues on the space ship. Meanwhile Valerie and Dr. Gallagher reconcile and plan to go to Las Vegas to get married right away.

Mac is heartbroken and prepares the ship for take-off. Valerie comes out to say good-bye, followed by Dr. Gallagher who discovers the ship and wants to call the authorities. While Valerie is struggling with her fiance to keep him from calling, she comes to the realization that it's really Mac who she loves. She gets in the ship and off they head into the the sky.

Cast

Production

Originally the film was slated to go into production in 1986 for Warner Bros.[1] but the studio got cold feet when director Julien Temple's previous film, Absolute Beginners, proved to be a dismal box office failure. The role of Valerie was offered to some of the era's box-office draws such as Madonna[1] and Molly Ringwald,[1] but when they rejected it, WB dropped the project. Several other studios expressed interested in producing the movie, but none wanted Temple to direct.[1] Ultimately French bank Crédit Lyonnais agreed to finance the film with Temple at the helm (if $4 million was shaved off of the film's estimated $14 million budget)[1] and the De Laurentiis Entertainment Group agreed to distribute it.[1]

Principal photography was finally underway in early 1988[2] and Temple brought his own ideas to the table, including peppering the background with then modern sounding pop songs,[3] featuring an homage to The Nutty Professor[4] and using iconic model/actress Angelyne in a brief cameo (the director declared her "the patron Saint of Los Angeles"[4]), but Temple's studious eye for detail caused delays on the set[2] and according to producer Tony Garnett, "The first cut we had of the picture was a problem."[1] The film underwent more than five months of post-production tinkering,[1] including the removal of numerous scenes and the production number "I Like 'em Big and Stupid" (a different version of the song plays in the club; the deleted sequence appears on the DVD extras) and reshoots later commenced (the song "'Cause I'm a Blonde" was injected into the film late in the game), by which time the De Laurentiis Entertainment Group had filed for bankruptcy.[1]

The finished print of the film had several very positive previews,[1] which captured the interest of potential distributors Nelson Entertainment, New World, MGM and 20th Century Fox, but ultimately Vestron Pictures picked up the distribution rights.[1] The film debuted at the Toronto Film Festival in September 1988[1] and was slated to be released the following February,[1] but legal entanglements delayed its release until May 1989.[5]

Reception

The film received generally mixed, but mostly positive reviews. Roger Ebert concluded, "Earth Girls Are Easy is silly and predictable and as permanent as a feather in the wind, but I had fun watching it."[6] Leonard Maltin called it an "infectiously goofy musical"[7] and went on to cite some "good laughs and an endearing performance by Davis."[7] Pittsburgh Post-Gazette editor George Anderson gushed over the absurdity of the movie, declaring the film "is so cheerful about so many stupid things that you cannot, in good conscience, endorse it, but you may be tempted to adopt it."[8] Some criticized the film for being "less a movie than a stretched-out, padded [music] video."[9] Box office returns were low; the film garnered only a little over a third of the $10 million production cost[10] -- but the movie ultimately developed a cult following. Earth Girls Are Easy currently holds a 63% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 32 reviews.

Award nominations

Fantasporto

Independent Spirit Awards

  • Nominated: Best Cinematography, Oliver Stapleton (1990)

Golden Raspberry Awards

  • Nominated: Worst Supporting Actress, Angelyne (1990) (To note, Angelyne appears in the film for less than two minutes.)

Soundtrack

Main article: Earth Girls Are Easy (Soundtrack)

A soundtrack album was released on vinyl,[11] cassette[11] and CD[11] by Sire Records on May 9, 1989[12] to coincide with the May 12 release of the film. Most of the songs on the album are different mixes than were heard in the movie, several songs from the film were omitted altogether and Geena Davis's song "The Ground You Walk On" was replaced with a rendition by Jill Jones. The album is out of print.

Royalty's song "Baby Gonna Shake" was issued as a single (available in several formats with numerous remix variations)[13] and Hall & Oates' rendition of "Love Train" was released as a single backed with the film's title song, performed by The N.[14]

Stage show

Beginning on September 16, 2001,[15] there were several staged reading/performances of a musical play version of the film. Based on the movie's screenplay and written by Charlie Coffey and Michael Herrmann, Julie Brown reprised her role of Candy, Kristin Chenoweth took over the role of Valerie, Marc Kudisch assumed the role of Ted and Hunter Foster was cast as Mac.[15] Although costumes and props were utilized, there were no sets and the actors carried their scripts around the stage—these stagings were merely devised to find investors for the show.[15]

The play did not feature any original songs; the performers sang renditions of '80s pop songs[15] along with several numbers from the film. The play followed the film's story and scenes pretty closely, but a lot of new dialogue was written, a few characters were omitted and there were some other slight deviations here and there. Audio and video recordings of the September 30, 2002 staging are circulating, and several video clips from this performance have surfaced on YouTube.

Despite positive reaction,[15] the timing of the initial staging was bad (coming mere days after the September 11 attacks), and even after subsequent readings, the show never attained the investors needed to become a full-blown production.

Notable differences

  • Zeebo, Woody and Valerie's nosy neighbor are omitted.
  • Candy's role is expanded.
  • The dance club is changed to a karaoke bar.
  • Ted discovers Mac and Wiploc are aliens much earlier.
  • Two security guards (a combination of all of the policemen seen in the film) attempt to arrest Ted for breaking into his own home, but they ultimately become cohorts in Ted's attempt to expose the aliens.
  • Valerie is wealthy, having received a million dollars from the insurance policies of her deceased parents, and she bought the Curl Up & Dye salon, much to the chagrin of gold-digger Ted.

Cast

Musical numbers

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Rebello, Stephen (November 1988). Grounded By Earth Girls And Lawyers, American Film Magazine. Billboard Publications, Inc. p. 39.
  2. ^ a b Rochlin, Margy (November 1988). "Has Julien Temple Gone Hollywood?," American Film Magazine. Billboard Publications, Inc. p. 32.
  3. ^ Rochlin, Margy (November 1988). "Has Julien Temple Gone Hollywood?," American Film Magazine. Billboard Publications, Inc. p. 35.
  4. ^ a b Rochlin, Margy (November 1988). "Has Julien Temple Gone Hollywood?," American Film Magazine. Billboard Publications, Inc. p. 38.
  5. ^ "Earth Girls Are Easy (1988) - Release Dates". Retrieved 2009-11-30.
  6. ^ "Earth Girls Are Easy - rogerebert.com - REVIEWS". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved 2009-11-30.
  7. ^ a b Maltin, Leonard (2005). Leonard Maltin's 2006 Movie Guide. Signet Books. p. 369.
  8. ^ "Spacey 'Girls' Easy to Like". Retrieved 2009-11-30.
  9. ^ "Deseret News Movie Reviews: Earth Girls Are Easy". Retrieved 2009-11-30.
  10. ^ "box office/business for Earth Girls Are Easy". Retrieved 2009-11-30.
  11. ^ a b c "SoundtrackCollector: Soundtrack Details: Earth Girls Are Easy". Retrieved 2009-11-30.
  12. ^ "amazon.com: Earth Girls Are Easy". Retrieved 2009-11-30.
  13. ^ "Royalty Discography at Discogs)". Retrieved 2009-11-30.
  14. ^ "Hall & Oates Singles 1985-89". Retrieved 2009-11-30.
  15. ^ a b c d e "Talkin Broadway: What's New at the Rialto?". Retrieved 2009-11-29.
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