1999: The Podcast

We continue our celebration of the 25th anniversary of 1999 with our eighth installment, April 21-30 1999! In the last ten days of April we got: The premiere of WWF Smackdown on UPN! Jay Leno goes HD! The Dawson's Creek soundtrack! Aerosmith! Election! eXistenZ! Idle Hands! And some other fun diversions, including the horror that was pan and scan movies! CageClub icon Mike Manzi joins John for a short look at the end of one of 1999's worst months, and the Star Wars content yet to come!

Blast from the Past was 75th highest-grossing movie of 1999, opening at #4 at the box office on Valentine’s Day weekend and going on to take in $40 million worldwide on a $35 million budget. The first of two 1999 collaborations between director Hugh Wilson and star Brendan Fraser, Blast from the Past included a stellar supporting cast, including Alicia Silverstone, Christopher Walken, Sissy Spacek, Dave Foley, Nathan Fillion, Joey Slotnick, and the legendary Jennifer Lewis. Critics were pretty even split on it - partly because it was inevitably compared to 1998's Pleasantville - and none were especially effusive in their praise, but it went on to find a charmed audience on home video and has emerged as the quintessential "hidden gem" in the years since. One if its fans is actor Samm Levine, who graced the small screen in 1999 in the beloved (and prematurely canceled) television series Freaks and Geeks. He joined John and Jenn to talk Walken, swing dance, and his most famous creation, the beloved character Zoot Suit Ryan.

We're taking a slightly different approach to this one, covering 20 days of April 1999 instead of 15, and, frankly, we're focusing mostly on the 20th, because that's when the Columbine massacre occurred. Columbine was not the first school shooting, but it was - at the time - the most unthinkable one in terms of scope and scale. 25 years later, it has become significantly less unthinkable, as so many instances of gun-based mass murders in schools have occurred in the meantime that it's difficult to name them all. But Columbine is also a hotbed of misconceptions and misinformation, and since Jenn works in true crime and John works in a high school they couldn't not talk about it. But they do sandwich their thoughts on this horrific tragedy with SOME fun, including John's rant on Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine and a brief chat about Tal Bachman's "She's So High". Here is the essay John references in the episode: Retrospective: 20 Years Later, "Bowling for Columbine" is a Disgrace to Documentary Filmmaking

Pushing Tin was the 135th-highest grossing film of the year, grossing 8.4 million dollars on a 33 million dollar budget, opening April the 23rd, 1999 as the #4 movie at the Box Office behind The Matrix, Life, and Never Been Kissed. Directed by Four Weddings and a Funeral and Donnie Brasco director Mike Newell and written by Cheers co-creators Les and Glen Charles, Pushing Tin felt like a sure thing, especially given its very of-the-moment core cast of John Cusack, Cate Blanchett, Billy Bob Thornton, and Angelina Jolie. But it never left the runway (get it) with audiences or critics. What went wrong? And is Pushing Tin a forgotten gem, or was everyone right about it 25 years ago? This week, John and Jenn are joined by comedian Joe Kwaczala to talk about this weird, uneven, confused, and very pre-9/11 romcom-dramedy thing! You can find Joe on most of the socials @joekjoek

We continue our celebration of the 25th anniversary of 1999 with our sixth installment, March 16-31 1999! In the second half of March, we got: The Oscars! Roberto Benigni jumping on chairs! Harvey Weinstein buying the Best Picture Oscar for Shakespeare in Love! The premiere of Futurama! Jack Kevorkian! Ricky Martin unleashes La Vida Loca upon an unsuspecting world! Fabio gets hit by a goose! The Melissa Virus 10 Thing I Hate About You! The Matrix! and more! John and Jenn also accidentally create a true crime podcast and wonder if they've pinpointed the moment Gwyneth Paltrow came up with GOOP.

Mickey Blue Eyes was just the 61st-highest grossing movie of 1999. The only major US release of the weekend of August 20, 1999, Mickey Blue Eyes opened in third place while The Sixth Sense continued to dominate the box office. It would go on to make $54 million on a $75 million budget. Directed by Kids in the Hall alum Kelly Makin and written by Robert Kuhn and Adam Scheinmann, it was ostensibly a romcom vehicle for Hugh Grant and Jeanne Tripplehorn but works better as a romcom between Hugh Grant and James Caan. Critics were iffy, with most still praising Grant for carrying the movie with a pitch-perfect performance playing to all his strengths as both a comic and dramatic actor and acknowledging the fun of the premise as well as the strength of the jokes but faulting it for failing to carry those things through. Many also pointed to the fact that, upon release, Mickey Blue Eyes was already the inferior Hugh Grant movie after Notting Hill, and the inferior mob comedy after Analyze This. Joining John and Jenn to talk about it this week is writer Meghan Leigh Paulk. You can find out more about Meghan on her website.

We take a quick detour to discuss the 1999-adjacent Investigation Discovery series QUIET ON THE SET, which looks into the toxic, harmful atmosphere at Nickelodeon in the 90s and 2000s under showrunner Dan Schneider, as well as the subsequent instances of child sex abuse as detailed by DRAKE AND JOSH star Drake Bell. You can find Jenn's coverage of the documentary and some of its fallout on Distractify, including this breakdown of what's been going on with Dan Schneider of late: https://www.distractify.com/p/where-is-dan-schneider-now

This week, we take a look at one of 1999’s biggest surprise hits, the 38th-highest grossing movie, which took in a very impressive $103 million on a budget of just $10 million, She's All That. She's All That opened at #1 on January 29, boosted by being nicely timed around Valentine’s Day and by coming out in one of the least-competitive box office periods of the year. Directed by Robert Iscove and written by friend of the show R. Lee Fleming Jr, She's All That boasts one of the most incredibly deep casts of 1990s icons, as well as launching the career of the titular "she" Rachael Leigh Cook. It is the very definition of the nostalgic favorite, and it finds charm and humor in places not typical of the teen rom-com genre. So this week, we invited comedy writer Chase Mitchell to join us down by the broken treehouse to talk all about it, so bring your flowered hat as we see if, all these years later, this ugly duckling is still a swan. You can find Chase on Twitter @ChaseMit

We continue our celebration of the 25th anniversary of 1999 with our fifth installment, March 1-15 1999! In the first half of March, we got: -Cher Believe-ing her way to the top of the charts! -The untimely death of the legendary Dusty Springfield -Cruel Intentions! Analyze This! The Rage: Carrie 2! -Marilyn Manson taking a tumble (but, alas, not enough of one!) -And, of course, the deaths of both Stanley Kubrick and "Joltin'" Joe DiMaggio... and more! John and Jenn also discuss KateGate (WaterKate?), Love is Blind, and tease our next episode.

Runaway Bride, the other 1999 Julia Roberts rom-com, was the 9th-highes grossing movie of the year, sandwiched between The Mummy at 8th and The Blair Witch Project at 10th. And while Runaway Bride did far worse with the critics to the vastly superior Notting Hill, its box office performance was likely boosted by two factors: unlike Notting Hill, it didn't open against Star Wars, and - more importantly - it was billed as a spiritual sequel to the movie that put Julia Roberts on the map, 1990's smash hit Pretty Woman, reuniting stars Roberts and Richard Gere and director Gary Marshall. Runaway Bride is a written-by-committee tonal, structural, and thematic mess. But it has its charms, and it boasts an insanely talented supporting cast (and a picturesque Maryland town) that keep the comedy and appeal afloat. Jenn's person Greg Pilgrim joins the show to talk about eggs, lamps, and the scientific term for a group of orioles.

We continue our celebration of the 25th anniversary of 1999 with fourth installment, February 15-28 1999! In the second half of February, we got: -The death of Gene Siskel! -Jawbreaker! Office Space! October Sky! -OJ Simpson news! -Lauryn Hill breaking a record at the Grammys! -Eminem's "The Slim Shady LP"! and more! John and Jenn also discuss celebrity doppelgangers, The Crow, remakes/boots, Jenn's birthday, and more!

Notting Hill was the 16th-highest grossing movie of 1999, opening Memorial Day Weekend, May 28th, and in 2nd place earning $27.7 million (behind #1, The Phantom Menace, which, then in its second weekend, earned $67 million). It would go on to make $116 million domestically and $364 million worldwide on a $42 million budget. Notting Hill was the second of several successful ventures between Grant and writer (and Mr. Bean creator) Richard Curtis, following 1994’s Four Weddings and a Funeral and predating 2001’s Bridget Jones's Diary (which Curtis adapted from Helen Fielding's enormously popular novel) and 2003’s Love Actually. It has gone on to be one of the most revered and beloved romantic comedies of all time, so to kick off our round on 1999 RomComs, we give you our longest episode ever: A love letter to great comedy, peak Hugh Grant, and the joy of close friendships. John's wife Courtney joins the show for the first time, and John and Jenn also talk to a very special guest - the iconic extra who Hugh Grant refers to affectionately as Cookie Monster in the opening voiceover.

We continue our celebration of the 25th anniversary of 1999 with our third installment, January 1-14 1999! In the first half of February, we got: -Blast from the Past! -The worst *NSYNC song! -GMO hysteria! -Stupid ideas to fix the Y2K bug! -Where in the World is Osama bin Laden?? and more! John and Jenn also discuss REM, G Love and Special Sauce (again), Valentine's Day, the rerelease of The Phantom Menace, and our next episode: Notting Hill!

Audition does not rank anywhere in the 1999 box office. This is largely because it had no theatrical release in 1999. Rather, Audition played a single screening at the Toronto International Film Festival that year, and would only go on to make a few hundred thousand dollars worldwide during its run. But it developed an enormous cult following since, and has become one of the most revered horror films of its time. And it's easy to see why - Audition is gruesome, inventive, and stunningly unique. And, also, due to circumstances beyond her control, Jenn couldn't watch it. So John did, shares his thoughts, and then they both discuss Penelope Spheeris's unreleased OZZFEST 99 documentary We Sold Our Souls For Rock 'N Roll, which might finally be released at some point in the near future, but, if not, is available in a fairly grainy Vimeo upload. It's great. So is Audition. Watch them both, if you can stomach the latter! If not, just listen to us talk about them!

We continue our celebration of the 25th anniversary of 1999 with our second installment, January 16-31 1999! In the second half of January 1999, we got: -She's All That -The release of Super Smash Bros. -The premiere of Family Guy! -The Blair Witch Project debuts at the Sundance Film Festival and more! Plus, John's conversation with She's All That writer R. Lee Fleming, Jr! John and Jenn also discuss the 1999 Golden Globes, Gwyneth Paltrow, ODB, and G. Love and Special Sauce.

A dismal critical and commercial failure that has gone on to be a genuine cult classic, Idle Hands came in at 162nd at the box office, earning less than $2 million on a $25 million budget. It probably didn't help that it was released 10 days after Columbine, and audiences maybe weren't in the mood for a high school-set slasher film. Or maybe it's that Idle Hands is a bafflingly, deliriously confused movies, with tones shifting wildly, sometimes within the same scene. But either way, it can't be accused of being lazy, and everything that makes its way to the screen is endlessly interesting (if for not always the best reasons). And it also includes some great performances, including a lot of improvised banter between Seth Green and Elden Hensen, and a tirelessly committed performance (along with some excellent physical comedy) from Devon Sawa. Plus a pre-Dark Angel Jessica Alba slinking all over the place. Joining John and Jenn this week is comedian, photographer, writer, and Idle Hands evangelist John-Michael Bond, who you can find on Twitter @BondJohnBond

It's been 25 years since 1999, and to celebrate, your favorite the only 1999 podcast is going to take a look back on the time that was twice each month, starting with January 1-5, 1999! In the first episode of a series we are calling 99@25, we cover: -The Clinton Impeachment! -The (slow) release of movies (including Varsity Blues) -The debut of The Sopranos -Jon Stewart taking over The Daily Show and much more! John and Jenn share some personal anecdotes of their younger selves at the time, and reveal their true feelings about Fatboy Slim's "Praise You", Sugar Ray, and that Val Kilmer movie At First Sight.

House on Haunted Hill was a huge failure with critics, but at 50th in the 1999 box office, and having made back its budget, it was a reasonable commercial success. It opened number one during Halloween weekend, likely finding an audience in moviegoers eager for anything spooky (and it is pretty spooky...) A remake of William Castle’s 1959 film starring Vincent Price, this House on Haunted Hill was directed by William Malone with a written by Dick Beebe, who also penned Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2) with effects by the legendary Greg Nicotero and Robert Kurtzmann. With a delightfully loopy, hammy performance from Geoffrey Rush and pretty great supporting cast who all understood the assignment, House on Haunted Hill is an imperfect but genuinely enjoyable horror thrill ride. It's also a favorite of our guest Stephanie Gagnon, host of the horror book podcast Books in the Freezer, who joined us way back in Round 1 for The 6th Sense and rejoins us to talk mustaches, Chris Kattan, bad endings, and which is the best Scream movie. Check out Books in the Freezer here: https://booksinthefreezer.com/

Charles Dickens' 1846 A Christmas Carol is one of the most adapted works of all time. And his protagonist, Ebenezer Scrooge, has been portrayed by the likes of Jim Carrey to Bill Murray, George C. Scott to Mr. Magoo, Alastair Sim to Scrooge McDuck, and Michael Caine to Will Ferrell. And spins on A Christmas Carol have appeared in everything from Beavis and Butthead to Doctor Who. But rarely have they been as faithful as the version from 1999 starring Patrick Stewart as the miserly businessman whose life changes one fateful night after a visit from three ghosts. Starring an incredible cast including Stewart, Richard E. Grant, Dominic West, Ian McNiece, Breaking Bad's Laura Fraser, and Ted Lasso's Jeremy Swift, the TNT original movie is a jewel in the vast sea of Christmas Carol adaptations. So this Christmas, we invited our friend Alex Steed back to share in the Christmas spirit...er...ghost?...as we dig in to this wonderful version of a classic story. Merry Christmas! And, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!

Sleepy Hollow qualifies as one of the biggest movies of the year, and it was certainly one of the most anticipated - an expected return to form from a slumping Tim Burton. But it didn't quite work out that way. Released on November the 19th of 1999, Sleepy Hollow was one of the most expensive movies ever made at the time, with a budget of $100 million, and while it wasn't a flop, it only barely broke even. While Burton reteamed with some of his most reliable collaborators - star Johnny Depp, composer Danny Elfman, and production designer Rick Heinrichs - and while what appears onscreen is unquestionably beautiful to look at, critics and audiences found Sleepy Hollow...well, hollow. This week, Dan Colón, of CageClub's very own The Monsters That Made Us podcast guests as our old friend Becky Ellis subs in the co-host seat as we wrestle with our feelings for Tim Burton's most beautiful gorefest.