Hollywood & Wine: The "Postcards from the Edge” Episode

Tony Maietta:
Hello. I'm film historian, Tony Maietta

Brad Shreve:
 And I'm Brad Shreve, who's just a guy who likes movies.

Tony Maietta:
We discuss movies and television from Hollywood's golden age. We go behind the scenes and share our opinions too.

Brad Shreve:
And, of course, being the average guy, my opinions are the ones that matter.

Tony Maietta:
As does your self delusion. Welcome to Going Hollywood. So, Brad, I wanna ask you a question I've been wanting to ask you for a while. How'd you like to have Joan Crawford as a podcast cohost? Or Lana Turner? 

Brad Shreve:
These are my options?

Tony Maietta:
Yes. Me or Joan or Lana or Carrie Fisher. Oh, If only

Brad Shreve:
Tony, if Carrie Fisher walked in the door, you'd be history.

Tony Maietta:
I I Drop me like a hot potato, man. I don't blame you. I drop me 2. Well, obviously, to those very astute listeners out there, we are going to talk about one of my favorite movies, and it's in my top five, Postcards from the Edge. And I actually, remember when you gave me, grief because as much as I love What's Up Doc, that I it wasn't in my top five when we did the What's Up Doc bringing up baby episode. Yes. Do you remember that?

Brad Shreve:
Yes. I do

Tony Maietta:
Because of postcards. It's because of Postcards from the Edge. Because Postcards from the Edge so up until 1990, it was. But then Postcards from the Edge came out, and it kicked it to number 6 because I just I love this movie so much, and I'm so excited that we are gonna be talking about it today.

Brad Shreve:
And I'm looking forward to giving my opinion. Do you want me to give you my opinion right up front? Because I've I I I have a history with this movie.

Tony Maietta:
You do?

Brad Shreve:
Yes. Well, I think I think you should. Just my thoughts over the years.

Tony Maietta:
Okay. It's a different way.

Brad Shreve:
First, something we haven't done. And do you think we should do announce that we do spoilers in the beginning?

Tony Maietta:
Well, we've gone back and forth about this. I don't know how you can do a spoiler alert for a film that's 34 years old. Come on.

Brad Shreve:
And you know what? If they're not if somebody reads the description of this show, they they should know what there's gonna be spoilers, but not everybody does that. But you know what? We just did that. There's spoilers here, so we can ignoredid a spoiler.

Tony Maietta:
So if you haven't watched postcards from the edge, first of all, what's wrong with you? Go watch it. It is a hysterically funny, bright, smart, wonderful film. Go watch it, and then come back and listen to us because we're gonna talk about it, and we won't spoil anything.

Brad Shreve:
If you don't want to watch it, you'll still enjoy what we what we have to say? Yeah. Exactly. Thoughts on this film.

Tony Maietta:
Okay.

Brad Shreve:
I watched it years ago, and I was bored to tears. Just bored. So I watched it when we thought we were gonna do this sooner. I think I watched it, like, 2 weeks ago. And I remember telling my husband, Reese, I I'm like, I'm gonna have to watch it again because I don't remember the details. I just remember being really bored. And he goes, you weren't bored. You fell asleep.

Brad Shreve:
You were exhausted. I'm like, oh, maybe that's why I don't remember any of it. So I watched it yesterday. I am shocked to say I loved it.

Tony Maietta:
You're shocked to say that?

Brad Shreve:
Because I didn't based on the things you were asking, like, I remember really being bored with this film in the past.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. Yeah.

Brad Shreve:
And I absolutely loved it. I can tell you why I the primary reason I loved it is there are so many quips in this film that sound exactly like they're right out of Carrie Fisher's mouth.

Tony Maietta:
Well, they are right out of Carrie Fisher, by the way.

Brad Shreve:
Exactly. Wrote the screenplay. So Carrie.

Tony Maietta:
Yes. It was so cool. Let me just tell you. You know? I don't want life to imitate art. I want life to be art. Instant gratification takes too long. You're the realest person I've ever met in the abstract. I'm not a box, I don't have sides, which I have a very funny story about.

Tony Maietta:
I mean, these are just the reason I love this movie so much, this movie is kind of been the soundtrack of my adult life as a gay man. I've had more friendships and more relationships where we just quoted these lines back and forth to people. And if if you get it, you get it. You know, if you get Carrie Fisher, and I don't know how anybody could not get the goddess Carrie Fisher, then we're all in the same planet together. We're all in the same club, and we miss her so very much just as an entity on Earth, I think.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah. And you know she's one of my idols.

Tony Maietta:
See, I didn't know that until you just till you just told me that. That's wonderful.

Brad Shreve:
Carrie is one of my idols. And the reason Carrie is one of my idols is, I have a substance abuse problem, but the bigger reason or I guess I do. I don't do them anymore.

Tony Maietta:
And that's the problem. No. I'm kidding.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah. That's the problem. But the bigger deal is I have bipolar disorder. And when I've had it my whole life, but there reached a point where my whole life just fell apart because it just went out of control, and I was undiagnosed. So getting diagnosed was actually one of the best things ever happened in my life, because for the first time in my life, it makes sense. Yeah. But it was also kinda scary. And then Carrie Fisher, who is the most open person in the world, be before people really were being open and honest about having some type of mental illness, she was out there.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah. And she was talking about how she dealt with it, and she talked about that she lives with it. And I I I I just I love her. And if if you search for my name, you'll find me on other podcast talking about it, like, because she taught me. Just be on you.

Tony Maietta:
That's the one help people.

Brad Shreve:
I wanna help people the way she helped me. This isn't how just talk about it.

Tony Maietta:
Isn't that one of the most amazing things about her aside from her incredible mind and her incredible literary skills, I don't even wanna go we will go into her gifts as a singer, which are remarkable. She her brutal frankness and honesty about her disease and her addiction and her bipolar

Brad Shreve:
were whole life.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. Were unprecedented. And that's Yeah. How can you not love someone who's how can you not love someone or admire someone so much who's so honest about who they are and help so many people in doing it? I mean, she was just an exemplary human being, and I think I said before about Audrey Hepburn. You know, when people die young now Carrie died for many reasons that were not necessarily angelic, if you're gonna judge them, but, you know, God said, you know, I'm I created you and you are amazing. I want you back. I want you to make me laugh for a while because you've been making these other people laugh for almost 60 years. And I just find I find such joy.

Tony Maietta:
It's a little bit what we talked about with somewhat with the boys in the band. There's a there's, like, a joy with the pain with Carrie Fisher. The joy is in her honesty and her relatability. That that's where the the the laughter is. That's where that's what's funny. Humor. Truth.

Brad Shreve:
Totally. And I don't have any direct quotes about it. Part of her being she was an open book and sometimes much to the chagrin of her mother. But, you know, even even about her weight, she was so funny on I I don't remember what talk show I was watching her on, but she was talking about the fact that, you know, she was doing the new Star Wars movies.

Tony Maietta:
Mhmm.

Brad Shreve:
And she was seeing all these things online, like Carrie Fisher's got gained weight. And she goes, I'm sorry. I'm 60 years old, and I don't fit in a gold bikini.

Tony Maietta:
Exactly. No. She's I think she said she she googled herself something which she did not recommend without a lubricant. And that she read a she read somebody said WTF Carrie Fisher, quest question mark. She used to be so hot, and now she looks like Elton John. And this is, like, first of all, people are reprehensible. And second of all, the fact that she could laugh about that and then turn it around so it's not hurting her. It's just part of her genius as a as a writer and as a performer.

Tony Maietta:
So you

Brad Shreve:
and I have hinted back and forth that we wanna do a Carrie Fisher episode, so we're gonna make it official. Sometime in the future, we will do a Carrie Fisher episode. If you haven't read Wishful Drinking or seen I think it's on Amazon. It's somewhere out there. She does her stage with on film. Do it. Read them. Watch it.

Brad Shreve:
It it's incredible. And then you'll be prepared. Or if you don't, we're gonna go into it because she has an amazing life.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. Well, let you know, to start with, her mother, she's the chill she's the child of Debbie Reynolds and Eddie Fisher, I mean, to Hollywood legends, which kind of leads us to this movie we're talking about because Suzanne Vale, aka Carrie Fisher, is also the daughter of a famous movie star, 1 Doris Mann. Brad, why don't you tell us a little bit about Postcards from the Edge, the film?

Brad Shreve:
Okay. Yes. We'll talk about the film Postcards from the Edge, which is based on Carrie Fisher's book. And I'll just start out by saying that Carrie and her mom both insist this is not about their relationship. And I believe them, but there is so much of Carrie. I mean, the at the I believe them that they think that's true, but it ain't true.

Tony Maietta:
Well, Carrie actually called it faction. Yes. She said it's fact and fiction together. It's faction.

Brad Shreve:
I heard her call it science fiction film about Hollywood. That's so

Tony Maietta:
true. From Princess Leia. Hey.

Brad Shreve:
You can't believe it. Exactly. So this is a 1990 film, as I said, based on Carrie Fisher's book of the same name. It stars Meryl Streep as Suzanne Vale, which is the Carrie Fisher character, and then Shirley MacLaine as Doris Mann as the Debbie Reynolds character, and was produced by Mike Nichols. And he's very important because there there's a lot that when on between

Tony Maietta:
Directed by

Brad Shreve:
Mike Nichols. By Mike Nichols. Yes. Directed. I'm and, there's a lot that went on between there, and it's good. Oh, yeah. It was good to work with according to Carey. It's a story of Suzanne Vale, who is an actress, who is the daughter of a Hollywood megastar at one time, a Hollywood elite, Maybe like Debbie Reynolds.

Brad Shreve:
I'm not sure.

Tony Maietta:
Maybe a little bit. A little bit like Debbie Reynolds.

Brad Shreve:
And it's about Suzanne coming out of rehab. And I don't I think Carrie came out of rehab at one time.

Tony Maietta:
One time? A couple times? God bless you.

Brad Shreve:
Suzanne is also in movies. She's not as big of a star as her mother, but she is in the movies. And she comes out of rehab, and the insurance company does not want her to insure her for a film that she's supposed to do. And so they're talked into insuring her if she is with a caretaker. So she moves in with her mother.

Tony Maietta:
With her mother.

Brad Shreve:
Comedy and distress ensues from that point.

Tony Maietta:
And almost drug use ensues. Yeah.

Brad Shreve:
Yes. It is their simultaneous, tumultuous, yet deeply loving and funny relationship.

Tony Maietta:
It's just yes. That's exactly that's exactly what it's about. And I think the reason why people, obviously, as we were saying before, faction. So much of the reality bleeds into the fiction and vice versa. Now so the the the book that the film Postcards from the Edge is based on Carrie Fisher's book, Postcards from the Edge. And the thing is is that Carrie Fisher, she had a drug overdose in 1985 and went into rehab. And after rehab, she decided she, you know, she was obviously she got she got sober and she got into a 12 step program and began looking at her life, she decided she wanted to rebuild her career, and she had a pretty bad, she had a had had a pretty bad reputation after some of her. As it turns out, behaviors on other film sets because of drugs, but also because of her undiagnosed bipolar 2.

Tony Maietta:
So, she the thing is is about Karius is that she was such a even when she was doing these films like Under the Rainbow, like, the Star Wars films, She was still had a reputation as a very smart, bright, funny, funny woman. And, she had a lot of friends. 1 of her friends was a writer from Esquire named Paul Slansky, who knew how bright and witty she was and wanted to recommend her for a short q and a with Esquire Magazine, and it was called the unparalleled wisdom of Carrie Fisher or something like that. And, it was the beginning of a lot of of her, quote, unquote, fisherisms, like, you know, calling her family blue blooded white trash, and, you know, she's how she's spent her entire life trying to get to the end of her personality. I mean, just these things which are so bright and sharp and witty and wonderful. And it had such a great response that, they wanted her to write, kind of a short, insider dishy series of essays on Hollywood and Beverly Hills, and Carey was gonna call it Money Dearest, which is a fabulous title. And this was gonna be a series of essays. Isn't that great? A series of essays like Fran Lebowitz.

Tony Maietta:
So you think about Fran Lebowitz in her New York version, well, this would have been Carrie's Beverly Hills version, but Carrie didn't like the tone. She didn't like the snarkiness. She decided she wanted to write a novel about her recovery in about rehab and her recovery afterwards and her attempts to rebuild her career. So the book Postcards from the Edge is really about that. It's about it's about addiction and recovery, and it's about her efforts to rebuild her career after her overdose. And the mother character is only incidental in the book Postcards from the Edge. The book Postcards from the Edge consists of the first few parts are epistolary. They're, you know, memos.

Tony Maietta:
They're postcards. Hello. Title Postcards from the Edge. They're letters that Suzanne is writing to people, and then, there's a male character who comes in named Jack who's the Dennis Quaid character in the movie, and they have a series of relationships. So it's the book was a great success, I guess that's what I'm trying to say. And it caught the attention of Mike Nichols, the famed director Mike Nichols, who optioned it to make a movie of it. And he wanted Carrie to write the screenplay. And she got some help from some of her screenwriting friends because she'd never written a screenplay before, and she talked to, like, Buck Henry and some of her other screenwriting friends.

Tony Maietta:
And she gave one scene to Mike Nichols, and it was a scene with her mother. And Mike said, that's it. This is what I want this movie to be about. Your book was about the recovery after substance abuse. This book is about the relationship between these two women, and that's how Postcards from the Edge, the movie, came about.

Brad Shreve:
And I think he made a good decision, though I will well, I've never read the book. I need to read the book. I I'm a sure decision.

Tony Maietta:
It's fun, but you keep waiting for Doris to come in. You know, you're like, where's Doris? I wanna see Doris Mann because it's just so memorable. And and Mike Nichols, we haven't really talked much about Mike Nichols. We haven't covered any many of his films. We'll have to do that. But, you know, Mike Nichols was one of the greatest directors, probably, of the in Hollywood history, and, you know, he directed some of the great he the The Graduate. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? I mean, this man knew his stuff, and he was so highly respected. But sometimes he could pull a couple a couple boners, for lack of a better term.

Tony Maietta:
He originally wanted to call postcards from the edge Hollywood and Vine. Okay. I think Hollywood and Wine is a better title, but Hollywood and Vine.

Brad Shreve:
That even makes sense.

Tony Maietta:
And then Carrie's like, no. And then he said, what about entertainment tonight? Uh-huh. And she's like, Mike, why don't we just call it postcards from the edge? That's what they did.

Brad Shreve:
Hollywood and Vine is definitely a better title. Hollywood and Vine is so vague. It doesn't tell me anything.

Tony Maietta:
So one of the great things about Mike Nichols is that Mike Nichols was very close with a certain actress slash goddess named Meryl Streep. And because of Mike Nichols, Meryl Streep said, yes, I want to play this part. So can you imagine your first film granted you're Carrie Fisher, so it's, you know, life ain't too shabby. But to have your first film that you've written be in your character that is based on you being played by Meryl Streep, not too shabby.

Brad Shreve:
And what Carrie said about Meryl Streep is, she forgives Meryl for being luminous, And she also said that, Meryl is a smart, funny actress, and I'm the drug pro.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, so true. It's so true. It's so true.

Brad Shreve:
I want I want to emphasize one more thing about Carrie. If if you guys know Carrie from just Star Wars or even Postcards from the Edge or whatever movies, you really need to watch her be interviewed or read her books. She is hysterically funny, and I really wish she did more comedy films.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. It's it's kind of amazing. The the films that, you know, after she after the success of Postcards, she said she definitely made a mental shift in her mind where she was more a writer who acted as opposed to an actor who writes. And she said the only reason she really did films was to, you know, ease up on the loneliness because writing is such a lonely profession and to make money.

Brad Shreve:
Another thing she said is that after this movie and and when she really got back into acting again, she became the friend. She because she was asked what what movies really made a difference in her career. And she said, well, Star Wars, of course. But then she said, Harry met Sally. And the reason she said Harry met Sally is because she was the friend. And she then was the friend. She was in all the movies as a friend, and she said, you know, that's not so bad. It's better to be typecast as the friend and have work.

Brad Shreve:
Because there if you're typecast as a princess, how many films need a princess Leia?

Tony Maietta:
Well, it turns out quite a few. By the end of her life, she played Leia what? Well, I guess, I'm really 5 times? Yeah. That's funny. Yep. So so Meryl, Meryl read the script, and, Meryl said that the line that that she that prompted her to wanna play this part was the line near the end of the film when, Suzanne says to the Gene Hackman character, director character, I know a lot of my life is great. Problem is I just can't feel my life. And that struck Meryl, and Meryl thought, I wanna play this part. So when you've got Meryl Streep playing you in a film, you're doing pretty well.

Tony Maietta:
And when you get Shirley MacLaine to play your, quote, unquote, mother in the film, I think you're doing even better. But there was another actress who really thought she would be good to play Carrie Fisher's mother. Do you know who that was, Brad?

Brad Shreve:
Who was that? Carrie Fisher's mother. Oh. Debbie Reynolds.

Tony Maietta:
The story is is that when they decided they were gonna make a film of it, Debbie Reynolds contacted Mike Nichols and said, Mike, I would really like to read for the part of Doris, of of Suzanne's mother. And Mike wrote back to her and said, Debbie, you're just not right for it.

Brad Shreve:
Which first of all, I wanna say what Carrie said about Shirley MacLaine. Okay. She's because she was asked how she thought Shirley MacLaine did, and she said, well, she was an actress playing an actress, so it was seamless. Her demeanor was created by the studios like my mother. Yeah. And that's where I think I think Debbie Reynolds would have been perfect for this, except it would have been a little too spot on. Yeah. I don't I don't know what Debbie's like you know, what she was like in personal life, but her what she projected to the public, Shirley MacLaine was Debbie Reynolds in every way she performed and the way she talked and the way she thought and her opinions.

Tony Maietta:
I do love I do love Debbie Reynolds as an actress, but I have to confess that I I kind of prefer Shirley. I think that I think that Shirley MacLaine is such a skilled skilled technician, and I think that the character she creates is different from Debbie. Actually, I think it's always funny because when I first see her in Postcards on the Edge, I don't think she's not reminding me of Debbie Reynolds. She's reminding me of Lucille Ball. I mean, she's got the red hair and she's got the dark glasses, and Gary Morton, hello, as in the side, does a cameo as Suzanne's agent, uncle Morty, he calls himself, which I think is hysterically funny.

Brad Shreve:
That is true. I I don't know. I can't maybe I wouldn't have noticed had I not known that it was based on Debbie.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. Well, I think that Shirley MacLaine doesn't really play Debbie. She plays a movie star named Doris Mann, and that's the thing that Carrie Fisher always tried to say about this film is when people would say, oh, you poor thing, you know, all the things you went through in your life, I saw the movie, and she'd be like, well, okay, some of that is true. Some of that stuff happened, but some of that stuff didn't. Some of that stuff made up. Carrie Fisher got very upset about the scene a couple scenes. She didn't like the scene where Doris is pouring the vodka into the smoothie. She said, you know, she ups it upset her that people would think her mother did that because she always maintained that her mother was not an alcoholic.

Tony Maietta:
Her mother liked her wine, just like Doris Mann liked her wine, but she was not an alcoholic. She didn't drive up a tree with her Mercedes, and so she got kind of upset, about that. But she also knew that people were going to make that assumption because when you write a book which is emotion what Carrie called it an emotional autobiography, you know, again, we're back to faction, Some of it's true, some of it's not. People are gonna assume it's all true, and, you know, some of it was, some of it wasn't.

Brad Shreve:
Carrie said the scene on the staircase where her and her mother were fighting, that never happened. She said her and her mother didn't fight. She said we fought when we I was a teenager, and I did base a lot of this on that. But as adults, we don't.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. When she said that this her skirt, there was a party, and Debbie Reynolds' skirt did accidentally twirl up, and she indeed was not wearing any underwear. But the fact because so that story is real, but the fact that they would have that argument as adults on a stairway, Debbie did not or Carrie did not think was true to life. She didn't think that was a true situation, and that's very true. But Shirley MacLaine, you know, she knew Debbie Reynolds. They were had been friends forever. Shirley MacLaine was supposed to do Molly Brown in The Unsinkable Molly Brown, the film version, but she couldn't get out of her contract to Hal Wallis, so Debbie got it. So Debbie was always very grateful to Shirley for giving her the for not being able to do Molly Brown because Debbie played Molly Brown practically the rest of her life.

Tony Maietta:
So when Shirley got this part, I guess she was kind of like, okay. I had mine. You have yours. It's okay. So I just think it's it's it's, fascinating that and Shirley actually, even though she knew Debbie for years, went to Debbie's house and hung out with her for a couple days to try to get to just I don't know why because as I said, I don't think she's doing Debbie Reynolds. I think she's playing an original character named Doris Mann, who just is based on all these broads that she knew back from the fifties sixties.

Brad Shreve:
Tony, I'm stopping our conversation real quick. Why? Why, Brad? We're we're in the middle of a podcast. But this is about the podcast, and it's very important. Okay. Listener, whatever app you're listening on, whether it's on the computer or on the phone, reach your finger or your mouse over. It usually says follow. Some still say subscribe and click that. And what's gonna happen when they do that, Tony?

Tony Maietta:
They're gonna get notified when a new episode is available, and they can listen to us again. You know, you don't wanna miss that.

Brad Shreve:
No. Can we get back

Tony Maietta:
to the episode that we were recording? Of

Brad Shreve:
course. Please? Of course.

Tony Maietta:
Alright. Thank you. Don't forget to subscribe and follow. So I'd like to talk about a couple scenes, specific scenes in the film that kind of highlight this relationship because this film is about the relationship between these two women, And one of my favorite scenes we already talked about the stairway scene, the it twirled up scene, But one of my favorite scenes is what I call the morning after scene. It's kind of when when Suzanne comes home from her date with Jack, with Dennis Quaid With quite the scoundrel. Yes. The scoundrel. And it's gotta be early in the morning.

Tony Maietta:
It's very early in the morning because it's dark, and she thinks she's, you know, sneaking into the house, but, no, Doris is waiting up for her in the living room with a bottle of wine, drinking alone in the dark in the middle of the night, just like God intended. But she doesn't have a drinking problem.

Brad Shreve:
No. No drinking problem at all.

Tony Maietta:
At all. Because, you know, she drinks socially, and Suzanne took acid socially, which I I love this scene, but what I what I think it illustrates is this film is about relation the relationship between these two women. And the media scenes and the most wonderful scenes are the scenes just between these two women. And that's what you really live for in this movie. I mean, the banter are back. We've started this podcast with, how'd you like to have Joan Crawford for a mother? These are my options, you or Joan or Lana. It's just it's it's so funny because you can really picture Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds having this debate, maybe not in the middle of the night while Debbie's drinking her wine because she likes her wine. But it's just it's it's so so rich with character and the humor of these exchanges.

Tony Maietta:
And they're so bright, and they're so witty, and I just love that scene.

Brad Shreve:
Yep. It's pretty it's it's funny. It's kind of sad, but funny at the same time. It's more funny than sad.

Tony Maietta:
Yes. Exactly. And it's the whole, you know, I I don't need anybody to to watch over me. I'm old enough. And, she goes, you know, I'm middle aged. And Doris says, I'm middle aged. And it's the famous, how many 128 year old women do you know? Which I always think about. It's a wonderful scene.

Tony Maietta:
I love that scene. It's it's probably my favorite scene in the entire film.

Brad Shreve:
I wanna go back to people thinking that this was about Carrie and Debbie. Because Debbie made a quote on Larry King, and I love it because it really shows what love these 2 women had for each other. I mean, her mom died one day, 2 days after Carrie died.

Tony Maietta:
1 one day.

Brad Shreve:
She was so heartbroken. Yeah. Larry King, like everybody else said, is this about you guys? And she said, it's not about me. Carrie wrote a novel. People will think it's true because of Carrie's brilliance.

Tony Maietta:
Mhmm. Yeah.

Brad Shreve:
She loves She said she loved the novel except it was shocking because it was so graphic in the language.

Tony Maietta:
And Debbie did call people dear. She said Carrie tells very funny stories of saying, hello, dear. It's your mother, Debbie. And Carrie would say, was opposed to my mother Vladimir, was opposed to my mother Sam? But so so there were certain things in there, and Debbie would also have Carrie sing Carrie Fisher's voice. Okay. First of all, let's just talk for a minute about Carrie Fisher's voice. Carrie Fisher's voice was remarkable. I mean, this girl was the daughter of Eddie Fisher, who was one of the greatest singers of the mid 20th century, and Debbie Reynolds.

Tony Maietta:
And so Carrie's voice was was was much different that was very deep and so strong, And all you gotta do is Google Carrie Fisher singing, and you'll just be blown away because she sings a Bridge Over Troubled Water on one of her mother shows, and it's stunning. But Debbie Reynolds would have parties, and they do this in Hollywood or they did this in Hollywood, and people would get up and perform. And she always wanted Carrie to get up and perform, and Carrie hated it. And then Debbie would get there and sing a song just like Shirley did, I'm Still Here, you know, with special lyrics for Shirley MacLaine written by Stephen Sondheim, so thank you, Stephen Sondheim. And so there were enough similarities that people really thought it was real, but, yes, it was a it was a mix, a brilliant mix of fantasy and reality that comes up with this perfect little gem of a film.

Brad Shreve:
And I do wanna give one more thing that I know that Carrie did say about her mom in in the connection with the movie. Mhmm. She said, mom is always right, which is annoying. So I put it in.

Tony Maietta:
Well, they their relationship really came full circle, and you can kinda see it, in this movie, you know, they're very much in the beginning of the movie when Suzanne finds out she has to live with her mother, I'll live with her, no pain, no gain. You see the progression. You see the the you see the love. You see the tenderness. You see the kindness. You also see here's another, you know, romanic clef or here's another reason why people think this really the grandmother, the great Mary Wicks, plays Suzanne's grandmother, and, you know, Carrie Fisher talks a lot about her real life grandmother who she got a lot of these sayings from, like, cry all you want, you'll pee less, and was the one of, a fly is just as likely to land on pie as it is on shit. So, I mean, it's these great so her grandmother was this big mountain of a woman very much like Mary Wick's place. So, yes, it's a blending.

Tony Maietta:
It's a blending of truth and fiction, and it just, I'm so glad the lines blur because for me, it gives it an extra edge of fun. The The fact that you're thinking, I wonder if that really happened with Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds or if this is made up. It's fun.

Brad Shreve:
And Mary Wicks was awesome as as the grandmother. And that is another thing Gary said. The the things that happened, and she like that, you know, none of this is true. But she said the grandmother is probably one of the more true things. And the fact I was in rehab, and that's about it.

Tony Maietta:
And the fact that I, overdosed on drugs. You know, it's funny Carrie Fisher, I I these these lines, I think one of the reasons I know one of the reasons why I love this movie so much is just the incredible dialogue that's out of the mind of Carrie Fisher and then comes out of the mouth of Meryl Streep. So if you're gonna have somebody say you're incredibly brilliant, funny, witty lines, nobody better than Meryl Streep. And I had a situation with, I met Carrie Fisher on a couple occasions, but I'll I'll never forget the first one. Let's tell a little The first time, are you familiar with Pageant of the Masters in in Laguna Beach, Brad? Do you know about Pageant of the Masters?

Brad Shreve:
I have heard about it, and right when I moved to LA about 20 years ago, I wanted wanted to go. And in 20 years, I still have not. It's like on my list of, oh, these are things I wanna do.

Tony Maietta:
It's a it's a very interesting it's a very interesting event. And I went one time in the nineties with, my boyfriend at the time. I was dating I was dating someone, and his brother, well, still is kind of a a big deal in Laguna. And, so we went, and his brother said I there's gonna be somebody there I want you to meet because he was his his brother was friends with Arnie Klein. Now for those of you who don't know who Arnie Klein well, Arnie Klein is now kind of the infamous plastic surgeon to the stars, mostly because of his connection to Michael Jackson, But he was also good friends with Carrie Fisher. In fact, he gets a shout out in postcard from the edge. She mentions doctor Klein in postcard from the edge. Who does who and they ask those 2 gay guys ask who did Doris's work, and they say doctor Klein, he does them all.

Tony Maietta:
So, anyway, so we're there and we meet we meet Arnie Klein, and, of course, who's with him, but Carrie Fisher. So my my boyfriend and I just fanboyed out, so embarrassing, fanboyed out all over her to saying how much we love Postcards From the Edge, how, you know, how we were constantly repeating lines from it to each other and back and forth. And she said, oh, great. What lines? And I couldn't remember a single one. I was horrified. And then some and neither could he, by the way. And so we're standing there like idiots. And then somewhere in the back of my mind, I reach back and I say, I'm not a box.

Tony Maietta:
I don't have sides. One side fits all. And I thought, oh, that's the stupidest line to quote to her. And she said, oh my god. That's my favorite line too. So out of the mouths of babes and idiots.

Brad Shreve:
No. The question is, does she say that no matter what line people give her?

Tony Maietta:
I probably she probably did. So that was that was a really she was so sweet and lovely, and it was, it was, such a memorable thing. But to be able to see her and and talk about postcards from the edge with her was just it was astounding because it it was such it's such a touchstone in my life, for different for reasons that are different for you, but isn't it amazing that we can come at it with these 2 different aspects and, and still love this movie?

Brad Shreve:
Yeah. And I gotta tell you, you you have me so envious. Carrie is one of the few celebrities that when when I was out here and I said, god, who do I know that would know Carrie? And I never pursued it. I wish I had because I would love to have just seen her and thanked her.

Tony Maietta:
Yes. So I'm And for for everything for everything that she did.

Brad Shreve:
Exactly. For for everything. For her talent, for her personal life, being open about just everything. So I wish I'd pursued it further. I've never really pursued anybody, but, I would have done it with her.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. Well, it was a very sad day. Very very sad Christmas when we lost both of them together. But look what look look at the legacy, Carrie Fisher's legacy. I mean, the just you can you can pick up Postcards from the Edge and watch it, or you can watch Wishful Drinking or read Wishful Drinking or shockaholic. And just they're just as funny and bright and sharp and touching as the woman herself was.

Brad Shreve:
And I was trying to remember where I was when I heard that Carrie died, and I don't remember. I'm really shocked. I don't remember, but I do remember I cried.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. It was so it was unbelievable. It was one of those things with, like, no. What? Carrie Fisher couldn't have died. And then the whole thing with Debbie, I mean yeah. It was almost it's almost so unbelievable that it has to be true, and it was true. It's one of those instances where it's so you couldn't write. Truth truly is stranger than fiction in that instance.

Brad Shreve:
You know, they had the day the music died. This is the day the film died for me. Mhmm. I got over it, but I really felt that way.

Tony Maietta:
Yes. Absolutely. So why don't you tell us a little bit about how this film did, when it was released?

Brad Shreve:
The film cost $22,000,000, which to me seemed kinda high because there weren't well, actually, there were a lot of special effects. It made $39,000,000 in the US. So it did really well. No complaints there. And then, globally, it did huge. Critics loved it, though I will say, Roger Ebert didn't. But, I'll say what he had to say because I totally disagree with him. It has a 7 out of 10 rating on IMDB, which is an aggregate of score people that score on there.

Brad Shreve:
And then Rotten Tomatoes has an aggregate of professional critics. They have one aggregate for critics and one aggregate for people that vote themselves. And the critic aggregate is at 83%. So this was a well received film.

Tony Maietta:
Yeah. Yeah. Well, Meryl Streep was nominated for best actress. Shirley MacLaine was not nominated for best supporting actress, although she thought she should have been. I have a tendency to agree with Shirley. But here's the thing I love about, this is the thing I love about this film and about Meryl Streep. Okay? And the contemporary reviews of this movie bore this out. This was the performance that so many people were waiting from from Meryl Streep.

Tony Maietta:
Mean, now think about this. It was 1990. Okay? So what did we have for Meryl Streep? We had Sophie. We had Karen Silkwood. We had Out of Africa. We had these heavy dramatic performances. And then Meryl Streep did one comedy before this, She Devil, which I personally love, but it's a very stylized, very broad performance. This is the Meryl Streep that everybody knew was there.

Tony Maietta:
This she's funny. She's real. She's kinda loose, and you could see you believe that Suzanne Vale is walking around was walking around the earth because she's so real, but so funny and self deprecating. And, you know, we know Meryl Streep now, 34 years from this, you know, from talk shows and from award shows. Yes. We know she's a funny, smart woman, but we people didn't have that idea about her. She was just that Dame who did all the accents all the time. So she was a real revelation in this film as a very funny comic actress.

Tony Maietta:
And I know that's what made me fall in love with her even more was seeing her in this film. I thought, I need to see more and more of this woman. And, of course, she went on to incredible comedic performances, death becomes her. Julia and Julia, which I would love to talk about sometime. Just fabulous work.

Brad Shreve:
And as I watched this movie, I was thinking about Meryl on Only Murders in the Building. I don't know if you've seen that series.

Tony Maietta:
I did.

Brad Shreve:
Yeah. She was in this was it the 3rd season? Yes. Yes. She isn't good. She is gonna be in the next season, and she is great in that role, and she's very funny. And I was all I was thinking was, wow, she's so good in that role and so funny. And she is the same in this role, but they're very different roles. And I really it really endeared me to her, and it made me really impressed by her talent.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, and by the way, she sings. I mean, PS Yes. She does. The woman can sing. Hello. I mean, my god. Come on. How does one person have so much talent? I mean, this this is just astounding.

Tony Maietta:
I love that song. I'm checking out. It's a Shel Silverstein song, the guy who wrote Where the Sidewalk Ends, also a friend of Mike Nichols. I also wanna mention too that because you had heavy hitters like Meryl Streep, because you had Carrie Fisher, because you had Mike Nichols, this movie is so full of guest cameos. It's, I mean, it's hysterically funny. You know, Richard Dreyfus, who was a very good friend of Carrie Fisher's, who was also diagnosed with bipolar and had a substance abuse problem, plays the doctor who pumps Suzanne's stomach, who sends her flowers, which actually happened to Carrie Fisher in the rehab. We already mentioned, Gary Gary Morton. We've got, Simon Callow.

Tony Maietta:
We've got Robin Bartlett, Anthony Hill, Dana Ivey, Oliver Platt, Rob Reiner. I mean, these people were like, I'm gonna be in a movie with Meryl Streep directed by Mike Nichols. Yes. I'll say 2 lines. Just put me in there. It's wonderful. Annette Bening Annette Bening made her one of her very first film appearances in a cameo. Crazy.

Brad Shreve:
And it was so fun to see them because they were cameos, but they weren't distracting. They can really be distracted, and they weren't.

Tony Maietta:
No. They were all in their best behaviors.

Brad Shreve:
The only thing I found distracting when Rob Reiner came on the scene, I thought he was gonna play Rob Reiner. But once once I realized he wasn't, I was past that.

Tony Maietta:
He kind of always plays Rob Reiner. But,

Brad Shreve:
yeah, he's like

Tony Maietta:
a side point.

Brad Shreve:
You talked about Shel Silverstein and the song I'm checking out. That was actually also nominated for an Oscar. Right. I'll tell you this about that song. I hated the music for the song, but I absolutely loved the lyrics. They had me laughing.

Tony Maietta:
It's a great song, isn't it? It's it's one of those songs that you play when you're feeling depressed, and you're like, I'm gonna put on Meryl Streep belting the hell out of I'm checking out of this Heartbreak Hotel. It's just yeah. Very Bonnie Raitt like.

Brad Shreve:
I I need to tell you what one of my biggest laughs was, and it wasn't supposed to be a laugh. Right when the film opened, the very first person we see is Dennis Quaid, whom I used to like, and he he now he's turned into as much of a nut job as his brothers have, but there's a whole different story.

Tony Maietta:
A whole different

Brad Shreve:
Dennis Quaid. And the for the reason I laughed is it showed Dennis Quaid, and he had his shirt off. And this was the era where Dennis Quaid I think it was in his contract that every movie, he had to take his shirt off. And I just let shower shot. Course. Oh, the shower shot. Yes.

Tony Maietta:
The shower shot was enough to lay me down. I'm like, holy shit. All you saw was the side of him. And you saw the side of him. I love the fact that I love the last scene, the hospital scene, not the the scene before the, I'm checking out, because it has of all these lines I've quoted, it has my absolutely my favorite line, my laugh out loud funny line for me is when Shirley's getting dressed, Meryl has put her back together, which is such a beautiful scene. You see, you know, they were built for public display, Meryl Streis. You know? They you see how they come together in crisis like war buddies, like like the silent Sid says. Sid speaks.

Tony Maietta:
I'm getting all these lines, but but Shirley's about to go out and she turns to Meryl, and she goes, never let him see you ache. That's what mister Mayer used to say. Or was it ass? Never let him see your ass. It's just such a great line.

Brad Shreve:
And then she stretched down and she has the press in her in her hands.

Tony Maietta:
She does. And she's gonna keep on drinking.

Brad Shreve:
And as much fun as it was to watch Meryl Streep sing, I kinda wish that's where it ended because that would have been a perfect ending.

Tony Maietta:
Oh, yeah. Yeah. We've had to have a little coda. That's a little that's a little allusion to the bad and the beautiful, not that this is apropos of anything, but that scene, of her the filming of her singing the song, the same kind of situation, and the camera going up and up and up and up and up until you see Shirley MacLaine looking at her, which is a beautiful shot and Shirley MacLaine looks fabulous. It's kind of like a, throwback to the bad and the beautiful, which is a very famous film about Hollywood. So that's kind of why that shot's in there because this is also a film about a very different Hollywood, but one that I would go to in a New York second.

Brad Shreve:
This is the Hollywood that you moved out here for.

Tony Maietta:
It well, no. The Bad and the Beautiful was more the Hollywood I moved out here for, but I would have taken I would have taken the postcards from the edge Hollywood. Maybe not with so much the drugs, though. There were a lot of drugs. A lot of drugs.

Brad Shreve:
And something I wanna say about Carrie and Mike Nichols, because, again, I I'm really impressed with how Mike Nichols handled this film. She was asked if she's the one that chose Meryl Streep, and she said, no. That was Mike Nichols. He did all the casting. And she said, I I like what he chose. And she has no complaints about the final project, which we know is not true because you mentioned a couple things.

Tony Maietta:
Mhmm.

Brad Shreve:
But she said it regarding the changes that were made in the movie. The book had no plot, and it had to be adjusted. So in some way, they almost had to throw out the book essentially. Yeah. Because you had to have some kind of story. So she said it's not a biography. She called it a prophecy, which but regarding the conflict with with the mother and the daughter not being real about her mother, her relationship with her mom. She said, who wants to see a movie about 2 people who get along and then get along even better at the end? And she's right.

Tony Maietta:
Love Carrie Fisher. Oh, I miss her. God, I miss her so much. Anything else to say about postcards from the edge, Brad?

Brad Shreve:
No. I think that's everything. Oh, that's everything I have to say about Postcards of the Edge. But something I meant to bring up earlier and I wanna bring up now, if they go to the website, goinghollywoodpodcast.com, we have a playlist of songs from all the movies we talk about. The ones that there are movie there are songs to pull from.

Tony Maietta:
Right. All the songs I can't sing.

Brad Shreve:
Playlist. Yeah. So Tony pulls out some songs sometimes. I pull out some songs sometimes, and and we put them on there. So you find that playlist on the website. It's also on Spotify. It's probably easier to find on the website and click the link. And we wanna hear from you.

Brad Shreve:
We're we're getting some nice reviews, but we wanna hear from you because we wanna hear what you think of our opinions of these films, and we would like to hear what you want us to talk about.

Tony Maietta:
Yes. Absolutely. That would be great. That would be great. And we were asking for suggestions for endings, but, Brad, I think I have one.

Brad Shreve:
Oh, okay. Good.

Tony Maietta:
And I and I said it earlier, but it bears repeating. Just remember, never let them see you ache. That's what mister Mary used to say. Or is it ass? Never let him see your ass. Bye, everybody. Goodbye.

Intro Clips:
That's all, folks.