HAIRSPRAY! (1988) on TCM Tuesday!

Divine is the best thing about this movie.

Although I have to say I do miss the songs from the 2007 version.

The 1988 movie is all acting, and no singing.

I miss the TCM classic, "Who Gives A Flying Fuck". I do hope they have a screening soon.

"You're terrible, Muriel."

"It's Mariel."

Two of the best things to come out of the movie Muriel's Wedding, were Toni Colette and Rachel Griffiths.

Thank, op.

Can't wait!

Is the original version of Hairspray worth watching?

Yes it is R6. It's John Waters' first real "movie movie" (Polyester is a close second). The trailer OP provided really doesn't convey how warm and funny the film is. For me, this is John's love letter to Baltimore and the early1960s before Baby Boomers were consumed by Vietnam, real rock 'n roll, drugs, and dropping out.

Ricky lake is terrific and once you see Divine as Edna Turnblad, you'll hate John Revolta all the more for his horrific performance as Edna is the musical version of the film. The cast of the original movie has so many delightful and surprising appearances too.

Free Tracy Turnblad!

So many "names" in this movie.

Sonny Bono, Divine, Debby Harry, Jerry Stiller, Ricki Lake, Ric Ocasek, Pia Zadora...

How did John Waters get them all to be in his movie?? lol

As a kid I rented this on VHS tape and I couldn't understand why my brother thought John Waters was "gross". It was a funny movie with great music. When I finally saw Pink Flamingos I understood why my brother thought JW was gross but it made me love him all the more.

In our area, Comcast (Infinity) has bundled TCM with various sports channels into a new package. I refuse to pay another cent for sports channels that I will never watch.

Bummer R10.

TCM has been showing some good movies lately.

Love BOTH movies. Thanks OP.

Muriel's Wedding always makes me weep (I know-- Mary!). Thanks for the reminder to catch it OP!

Any movie in which Divine, Jerry Stiller, Debbie Harry, and Sonny Bono play the parents . . .

I like the scene in Muriel's Wedding when Rhonda is having sex with the two American soldiers in her apartment.

They both had nice naked asses.

Interestingly, is it normal for two military guys to be having sex with one girl at the same time? That part always intrigued me.

Hmmm.....

John Waters IS gross!!!

I hated the scene where Velma squeezes Amber's zit. EW!

"One, two CHA CHA CHA! One, two CHA CHA CHA!" Haha That part always cracks me up.

Daniel Lapaine was so hot in Muriel's Wedding.

The original Hairspray is infinitely better than the awful musical remake2007 remake which is bland, Disney-like and woke. The original captures the time period more effectively and Ricki has a lot more presence than Nikki. The original is a musical in the same sense that Saturday Night fever and Dirty Dancing are musicals and I saw the Broadway musical the 2007 film is adapted from and Michael McKean, (Lenny on Laverne and Shirley) was good as Mrs. Turnblad, but the 1988 movie is the best. And I just realized that Jerry Stiller is in both film versions.

[quote]In our area, Comcast (Infinity) has bundled TCM with various sports channels into a new package. I refuse to pay another cent for sports channels that I will never watch.

If you have HBO on Comcast (or HBOMax separately), you can watch a lot of TCM stuff there.

I saw the (original) trailer several times on TCM and it's interesting that Sonny Bono gets top billing.

Divine is huge! lol

Penny Pingleton you are permanently punished!

Oooh Papa Tooney, we got a looney!

It’s the times - they are a changin’. Something’s blowin’ in the wind... Fetch me my diet pills, would you hon?

WHET Michael St. Gerard?

R23, don’t you try to cast one of your voodoo spells on me, you... NATIVE WOMAN!

This movie is currently available free on Tubi

Hey! You!

Is your daughter mulatto???

Rofl

I knew there would be a thread on DL - and you bitches didn't disappoint!

I got ironing to do and my diet pill is wearing off.

R17- Muriel's Wedding is one of my favorite movies and it gets very little love here on DL.

How is the musical any more "woke" than the original?

There’s no bugs on my baby!

WHOOORE!!

Wow, John Waters really nailed the Deplorable MAGATS, decades before people even realized who they were!

I didn't realize that Divine died the same year that Hairspray! was released.

He must have died shortly after filming.

Amber von Tussle became 90s one hit wonder Vitamin C

Hey, The Roach is a pretty good dance! lol

The soundtrack is really fabulous.

I love the title song by Rachel Sweet.

[quote]Two of the best things to come out of the movie Muriel's Wedding, were Toni Colette and Rachel Griffiths.

Well Toni Collette anyway.

Michael St. Gerard was dreamy.

He was, R41! MSG had such a beautiful ass.

I didn't know he became a pastor.

Muriel's Wedding is up next.

"No more bloody fucking Abba!" - Bernadette Bassenger

Followed by Georgy Girl and then .... Shag!

MSG really had the perfect look for this film. I had such a crush on him.

I forgot Josh Charles was one of the council members.

I used to crush on Shawn Thompson, who played Corny Collins.

YES to everything you wrote, R45!

On all three guys.

[quote] Two of the best things to come out of the movie Muriel's Wedding, were Toni Colette and Rachel Griffiths.

[quote] Well Toni Collette anyway.

Rachel was on Brothers & Sisters (aka The Sally Field Programme) not long ago, so she is still relatively famous.

R31, where do you think DL's Muriel got her name? Now, she doesn't get a lot of love anymore, but she'd older than RuPaul.

How dare you forget her as Brenda on 6 Feet Under?!?!

Squeals from Gays around the country

Diedre Chambers!

Look everyone, it's Diedre Chambers!

Penelope shift over!

Great photo, R42

Damn, sometimes it sucks to be a Canadian.

We got Hairspray but no Muriel.

I sometimes wonder if Muriel's Wedding is a tragedy, and not a comedy.

It's actually quite a depressing movie.

R32 The pro integration is theme is brought more to front as Tracy leads a march for integration. In the 2007 film the whites teach the blacks how to fight for their civil rights the protest rally that has more political weight than this silly , flimsy film can bear.

Josh Charles kind of looks like a MALE version of Helen Hunt.

there will never be another John Waters/ Divine match up. How it ever happened is a miracle.

[quote]I didn't realize that Divine died the same year that Hairspray! was released.....He must have died shortly after filming.

No, actually John Waters and Divine made personal appearances at the four theaters it played in New York on opening night including The Waverly. That was February 26, 1988. Divine flew to LA to play a recurring role guest on "Married With Children" but died the day before filming. That was March 7, 1988.

I saw Hairspray at the Waverly.... vivid memory!

Great theme song, should have been Oscar nominated but the Academy will never go anywhere near Waters. The musical should have been nominated for production design and costumes, and Kathleen Turner should have been for her hilarious "Serial Mom".

Fat whores, rejoice -- it's YOUR night on TCM!

Is it just me, or did Rachel Griffiths totally out shine Toni Colette in this movie?

[quote]Divine is the best thing about this movie.

I’m here in spirit, bitches!

This thread is as good as an ABBA song

R7 Divine as EDNA is ......divine.

But Travolta was cute as a bug.

Can't we like both?

R65- NO

I had fun watching this tonight.

It's hard for me to hate Travolta. I did at first, but on repeated viewings warmed up to him. He knew he couldn't come close to Divine's portrayal, so he chose to do it a completely different way. Millions of viewers never saw the original, so to them he was just fine.

[...]

R10: The same happened to me. I don't get TCM, anymore.

Shag is on now (at least on the Canadian station).

I forgot how many late '80s films were set in the early '60s such as Dirty Dancing, Hairspray, Shag, The In Crowd.

What is Shag about, R71?

It sounded interesting, but wasn't sure if I wanted to sit through the movie.

Is it worth it?

R10 They did that all over the country. It was such an obvious money-grab, so disrespectful to subscribers. It was the last straw for me and I ditched Xfinity/Comcast.

It's cute r72. Four girls go to Myrtle Beach for fun and boys in 1963. Not much of a story but the music is good, it has sexy Robert Rusler and the cast is charming.

It's probably better as a rainy Sunday afternoon matinee than a late-night watch but it's still worth seeing.

Muriel's mother was such a sad figure.

I felt so bad for her, but the movie just basically glossed over her death.

I hated the way she was treated, and even more so the way that she died.

I think this is the reason people are confused by this movie.

It sells itself as a comedy, but it's not really a comedy.

Cute as a bug, r65??? He looks like he has Down syndrome.

OP’s hair is probably all ratted up like a teenage Jezebel!

It’s *feathered*, not “ratted.”

[quote]"No more bloody fucking Abba!" - Bernadette Bassenger

Better stay off of TCM, then.

Airing tomorrow.

(And Grease 2, with DL icon Lorna Luft is showing on Friday.)

Sorry ... my ABBA link messed up.

Trying again. (I was not aware this movie even existed.)

When I get high I **AM** Odetta!

"Why, even our First Lady, Jackie Kennedy, rats her hair!"

I liked Travolta’s version of Edna just fine. His Edna had a vulnerability that Divine’s Edna needed.

“Segregation today. Segregation tomorrow. Segregation forever!”

- the Von Tussles

Not a fan of the film but I do love how the iconic Miss Connie Francis gets mentioned in it.

All three, original, Broadway and movie musical are all pretty fabulous and hilarious to think the director of Pink Flamingos doesn't really have to work another day in his life.

[quote]Four girls go to Myrtle Beach for fun and boys in 1963.

Where the Boys Are set in South Carolina. Without the rape.

[quote] And Grease 2, with DL icon Lorna Luft is showing on Friday.

I was molested on a Friday.

Me yike blue.

R75 I disagree that the mother's death gets glossed over. It gives so much emotional heft to a film with so many characters that are downright unlikable, Muriel included. After her mom dies Muriel undergoes an extreme shift, and while it's tragic that it took a death to realize it all Muriel goes from making a scrapbook of her fake weddings to viewing her mother's with a seemingly real, loving life contained therein-- photos of Muriel growing up, ending with newspaper clippings and a Polaroid of a seemingly happy & content mom from Muriel's wedding of convenience. It's devistating, but in the end Muriel and friend are running and wheeling off to some more authentic life, for once.

So, I agree that it is NOT a particularly comedic movie. It's still criminally underrated imo.

"Everyone has their limits. Divine met Richard Simmons and became homophobic!" 😂

John Waters is hilarious during this stand-up gig, discussing his life and movies. Gets going pretty steady after about 20 minutes or so.

What did you guys think of the TV version with Harvey as Edna? I enjoyed it overall and thought parts of it were even better than the film but neither as good the stage show. I really like both the musical and Waters' original film but it's hard compare them. One's a stage musical, the other's a film with songs and they are different in tone and intentions. But only one has Divine.

Weinstein, R93?

R94 Fierstein. But you knew that.

[quote] What did you guys think of the TV version with Harvey as Edna?

All I remember is Garrett Clayton flaming up the stage with his dancing.

The cast of the live tv version was awful.

Especially that stupid Ariana Grande.

[quote] How is the musical any more "woke" than the original?

As someone said above, it's tone.

The original treats earnest integrationism as just one more thing to make fun of ("We SHALL overcome some day!" "Not with that hair, you won't."), and also mocks segregationism and racism (".Pardon me, but is your daughter a mulatto?").

The musical remake is deadly serious about race relations.

[quote] Pardon me, but is your daughter a mulatto?

Rofl, that is one of the funniest lines in the movie, because it literally comes out of nowhere.

"Hey! You! Can I ask you a personal question? Is your daughter mulatto??"

The absurdity of it, makes the line so hilarious.

r99, so is this line. LOL

The NBC live version was completely forgettable. Save for Firestein as Edna and loudmouth yell-singer JHud as Motormouth Maybelle, I have no recollection of who was in it.

Also, both filmed versions of the Broadway musical cut out the best, most John Waters-y number -- "The Big Dollhouse"; for this they can both go to hell.

The Hairspray musical is on HBO Max, and it was interesting to watch it a few days after watching the John Waters original. The musical has three fun songs (Good Morning Baltimore, Welcome to the Sixties and You Can't Stop the Beat) and a bunch of mediocre ones. The original movie zips by with its 90 minute running time, but the musical feels quite padded at two hours. I found John Travolta's performance okay but nowhere near as good as Divine's, and that rubber face mask on Travolta was quite distracting. Christopher Walken was a blank as Tracy's father, and poor Michelle Pfeiffer had the crappiest song in the musical and not much variety in her dialogue. The scene where she seduced Tracy's father in the joke shop seemed to go on for days, as did Motormouth Maybelle's marching song.

THAT fat thing?

The 2007 musical is fine but as has been said, it takes itself a little too seriously but it still has some of the quirks and charms of the 1988 film, but they're all smoothed over in an attempt to make it more palatable for a wider audience.

I thought Amanda Bynes was very good as Penny. Loved Allison Janney as her mother. That aspect of the musical still felt like it had the Waters DNA.

I think if they had remade Hairspray as a musical today it would be really insufferable.

She was right in the car in plain sight of just everybody at the hop, She was nude.