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Wayne's World (1992)
In director Penelope Spheeris' crazy and wacky, absurdist
musical comedy, with the original characters (spun-off and extended
from a sketch on TV's Saturday
Night Live) - it was inspired by Bill and Ted's Excellent
Adventure (1989); the film appealed to adolescent-minded teens, and
was mostly noteworthy for its dialogue, sight gags, and catchphrases: "Excellent!", "Party
On!", "She's magically babelicious", "That's what she
said," "Schwing!", "If
you're gonna spew, spew into this", "Hurl", "A sphincter
says what?", "Fishnet!", and "Pardon
me, do you have any Grey Poupon?" - among others.
- in the opening title credits sequence, a young couple
in bed, girlfriend Elyse (Ione Skye) and sleazy TV network executive
producer Benjamin Kane (Rob Lowe) for Oliver Communications, were
flipping through the TV channels, showing typical early 90s ads
for the Chia Pet and The Clapper, until they came upon "Wayne's
World" and were thoroughly entertained
Elyse (Ione Skye) and Benjamin Kane (Rob Lowe)
Flipping Through TV Channels
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"Wayne's World" TV Show on Public Access Cable, Channel 10
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Broadcast From the Basement of Wayne's Parents'
Home
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- two stoned, heavy metal-head, slacker friends -
Wayne Campbell (Mike Myers) and Garth Algar (Dana Carvey), were
the hosts of their own local public-access cable TV show
on Friday nights on Channel 10, titled "Wayne's World" -
broadcast from their wood-paneled basement in the Chicago suburban
town of Aurora, Illinois ("a
suburb of Chicago - excellent"), in Wayne's parents' home
- their guest was quirky Ron Paxton (Charles
Noland), the inventor of a revolutionary new hair-cutting and vacuuming
product known as Suck Kut ("It sucks as it cuts") that was demonstrated
on Garth's long hair; he was soon begging: "Turn it off! It's
sucking my will to live! Oh, the humanity!"
- new viewer Benjamin was impressed by the show and
immediately phoned his producer/director Russell Finley (Kurt Fuller),
to propose that they could promote or "sell" the show to a potential
billionaire sponsor Mr. Noah Vanderhoff (Brian Doyle-Murray), the
owner of the largest video arcade chain in Chicago (Noah's Arcade)
- Wayne introduced himself to the camera (breaking
4th wall), describing how he lived with his parents, didn't have
a real career, and had a huge collection of job name tags over
the years: "I've had plenty of Joe jobs. Nothing I'd call a career. Let me put it
this way. I have an extensive collection of name tags and hair-nets.
Ok, I still live with my parents, which I admit is both bogus and
sad. But at least I've got an amazing cable access show, and I
still know how to party. But what I'd really love is to do Wayne's
World for a living. It might happen. Sh-yeah, and monkeys might fly outta my butt."
- outside his home, Wayne joined Garth and a group of friends when picked
up in their Mirth-mobile (an AMC Pacer), for a sing-a-long to Queen's "Bohemian
Rhapsody": ("Thunderbolts and Lightning, Very Very Frightening")
as they drove through town; during their drive-around, Wayne -
as usual - paused to admire a 1964 Fender Stratocaster guitar in
the shop window of Cassell's Music and to dream: "It will be mine.
Oh, yes"
Late Nite In Stan Mikita's Donuts Shop
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Glen (Ed O'Neill) - Crazed Manager of the Shop
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Garth's Fantasy Dreamwoman (Donna Dixon) in the Shop
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Wayne's Ex-Girlfriend Stacy (Lara Flynn Boyle)
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- in Stan Mikita's Donuts shop (an "excellent munchie
post"), the intense, psychotic store's manager Glen (Ed O'Neill)
addressed the camera about how he had murdered a man "in the heat
of passion"; Garth had a view of his fantasy Dream woman (Donna
Dixon) inside the shop as Tchaikovsky's Romeo And Juliet: Fantasy
Overture was heard on the soundtrack
- after Wayne attempted to avoid speaking
to his troubled, low-self-esteem, persistent ex-girlfriend Stacy
(Lara Flynn Boyle) of two months ("Psycho hose beast") in the donuts
shop, the group proceeded to the Gasworks heavy metal club-bar;
there, Wayne instantly fell in love (to the tune of "Dream Weaver")
with the on-stage rock-singer Chinese girlfriend Cassandra Wong (Tia Carrere), the bass vocalist
for the group Crucial Taunt that was playing that night, who also
displayed kung-fu fighting skills
- after promoting the show and getting Vanderhoff
to sponsor it, Kane - the regional director
for Oliver Communications, met with the overwhelmed Wayne and Garth
to present them with two $5,000 checks and a contract to purchase
rights to their show, in order to create a big-budget version
- at a later band performance, Wayne
joined Cassandra on a rooftop afterwards to discuss how he had just
signed his show with a producer - and was hoping her band would
also get a break in life: (Wayne: "If
you guys got a break, you could really make it" Cassandra:
"Yeah, and if a frog had wings, he wouldn't bump his ass when
he hops" Wayne: "Interesting. Where did you learn English?" Cassandra:
"College. And the Police Academy movies"); he then
impressed Cassandra with his command of Cantonese and she complimented
him: "Campbell, it's amazing! You learned how to say I look pretty in Cantonese" -
and they began speaking the language (and even thinking thoughts),
with subtitles or captions not matching their words
- after Garth whistled the theme song to Star Trek,
Wayne and Garth had an amusing chat while lying on their backs
on their car (at the beginning of an airport landing runway) watching
shooting stars in the night's sky - about Cassandra and Bugs Bunny's
sex appeal: Wayne: "Cassandra.
She's a fox. In French, she would be called 'la renarde' and she
would be hunted with only her cunning to protect her...She's a robo-babe.
In Latin, she would be called 'babia majora'" Garth:
"If she were a president, she'd be Babe-raham Lincoln. Did you
ever find Bugs Bunny attractive when he put on a dress and played a
girl bunny?...Neither did I. I was just asking"
- after being bought out by Kane, the basement interior
for Wayne's World had been recreated in a fancy studio set;
during a rehearsal to practice using a chroma-key
blue-screen, the two were able to immediately travel to other places
with different backdrops: "OK, we've got a new feature on Wayne's
World this week. It allows us to travel through time and space. It's called
chroma-key, and it's really handy if you want to go to New York....Or
maybe you prefer Hawaii. Muka laka hickey. Come on, you wanna lei
me.. Pass the poi, Mahalo....Or say you want to go to Texas. Howdy,
partners. Let's raise and rope broncos....Or imagine being able
to be magically whisked away to - Delaware"
- Garth also described for Noah and Mimi Vanderhoff
(Colleen Camp) what it was like to be in their new professional
studio: "It's like a new pair of underwear, you know. At first, it's constrictive,
but after a while, it becomes a part of you"
- with his newfound fortune, Wayne visited Cassell's
music store with Cassandra and both of them extolled the
expensive Fender guitar: (Wayne: "There it is...Excalibur."
Cassandra: "Wow, '64 Fender Stratocaster in classic white, with
triple single coil pickups and a whammy bar." Wayne: "Pre-CBS Fender
corporate buy-out." Cassandra: "I'd raise the bridge, file down
the nut, and take the buzz out of the low 'E'"); Garth
showed off an amazing riff on a drum set ("I like to play"), and
then Wayne offered to impulsively buy the guitar: "I'm
feeling saucy. I think I'm gonna buy it - do you accept cash? Cha-ching"
Their Views on Selling Out to Promotional Ad Endorsements
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Wayne For Pizza Hut
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Garth for Reebok
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- after moving up to the revamped prime-time TV network
in the new studio, Wayne realized that the contract he had signed
stipulated a weekly, promotional interview ad spot for Vanderhoff,
but refused to be obliged to honor the agreement; he told TV executive
producer Kane: "Contract
or no, I will not bow to any sponsor," while contrarily holding
up a slice of Pizza Hut pizza, and then a bag of Doritos Tortilla
Chips; when Kane argued: "It's the nature of the beast," Wayne continued: "Maybe
I'm wrong on this one, but for me, the beast doesn't include selling
out. Garth, you know what I'm talking about, right?"; Garth
was wearing Reebok clothing as he responded: "It's like people
only do things because they get paid. And that's just really sad"
- at the Donut Shop one evening, Garth again viewed
his fantasy Dream woman, and felt like he was going to "hurl"; Wayne
encouraged his friend: "I say hurl. If you blow chunks and she
comes back, she's yours. If you spew and she bolts, it was never
meant to be"; Garth acted out his fantasy -
he hip-thrusted toward his fantasy dream girl while lip-synching
to the tune of Jimi Hendrix's "Foxy Lady"
- while lying together in bed, Wayne asked Cassandra
about her responses to various phases of his future fame: "Tell
me, when that first show is over, will you still love me when I'm
an incredibly humongoid giant star?...Will you still love me when
I'm in my hanging-out-with-Ravi-Shankar phase?...Will you still love
me when I'm in my carbohydrates-sequined-jumpsuit, young-girls-in-white-cotton-panties,
waking-up-in-a-pool-of-your-own-vomit, bloated-purple-dead-on-a-toilet
phase?" - when she responded positively, he replied: "OK.
Party. Bonus"
- meanwhile, Benjamin Kane offered to produce a music
video for Cassandra's band Crucial Taunt; he invited Wayne, Garth,
and Cassandra to his 23rd floor luxury apartment, where Wayne was
tempted: "From this height, you could really hawk a loogie on someone";
Garth called the place a "fully functional babe lair"; he found
Kane's datebook with a reminder: "Purchase feeble public access
cable show and exploit it," but remained clueless; to get Wayne
and Garth out of town so he could romance Cassandra during her
music video shoot for "Why You Wanna Break My Heart," Kane
offered them all-access backstage passes to an Alice Cooper concert
in Milwaukee the next evening
- at the Milwaukee rock concert, Alice Cooper sang
"Feed My Frankenstein" before giving a history
lesson lecture on the city of Milwaukee in his backstage dressing
room after the show: "Well, I'm a regular visitor here, but Milwaukee has certainly had its
share of visitors. The French missionaries and explorers were coming
here as early as the late 1600s to trade with the Native Americans...Actually,
it's pronounced mee-lee-wah-kay, which is Algonquin for 'the good
land'...I think one of the most interesting aspects of Milwaukee
is the fact that it's the only major American city to have ever elected
three socialist mayors" - Wayne responded: "Does this guy know how to party or what?" - when asked to
stick around and party, the two bowed down and praised him: "We're
not worthy!"
- once the duo returned to Chicago and they went on-air,
their TV show had been revamped and emphasized Noah's Arcade's
sponsorship of the program; during the show's interview,
Wayne deliberately embarrassed and humiliated their sponsor,
arcade billionaire Mr. Noah Vanderhoff, by using
insulting cue cards (notes written on the back of his question
cards visible to the audience), such as "SPHINCTER
BOY -->" and "HE BLOWS GOATS. I HAVE PROOF" and "THIS
MAN HAS NO PENIS"; as a result, Wayne
was fired, and was told by Kane: "We own the show," leaving Garth
alone to host by himself; Garth complained to Wayne: "You shouldn't
walk out on your friend without telling him first," and was suspicious
of Kane's behavior: "Benjamin had you so snowed...He's
got it for Cassandra"
- Wayne began to distrust Cassandra, and insultingly
accused her of unfaithfulness with Kane, her video producer: "Maybe
he's pokin' ya....First he screws me, then he screws you. It's
Dutch door action" - she ordered him to leave and they broke up;
Wayne was upset and addressed the camera-audience: "I lost my show,
I lost my best friend, I lost my girl, I'm being s--t on"
- Wayne and Garth joined together to
find an alternative record deal for Cassandra with rock music promoter-producer
Frankie "Mr. Big" Sharp (Frank DiLeo) of Sharp Records; as
Cassandra finished performing her song "Touch Me" in
a Tarzan jungle setting, Wayne arrived to embarrassingly beg to
get her back with promises of having her perform on his new show;
his heartfelt Oscar-bait speech convinced her to leave Kane
- Garth and Wayne brought Cassandra to Wayne's Aurora
home and his basement studio, and transmitted the live performance
of her music video "Ballroom Blitz" via satellite to Mr. Big's
limousine; however, after Sharp declined to give Cassandra a record
contract because it was "the wrong time" - she decided to permanently
break up with Wayne ("You screwed my career"), and Kane added:
"I always knew you were small-time"; Stacy
revealed she was pregnant with Wayne's child, and electrical shorts
ignited a fire in the house and Garth perished in the flames; at
a tropical island resort, Cassandra whispered to Kane on a beach
lounge chair ("Last night was the most incredible night of my life")
- in an attempt to lampoon disastrous film endings
and rewrite the conclusion: ("As if we'd end the movie like
that. Let's do the Scooby-Doo ending"), Wayne and Garth
decided to alter the ending with proposed alternatives; their
first attempt at editing rewound the scene back to the basement, where
the two literally unmasked Kane as "Old
Man Withers" who
ran a haunted amusement park in town
Revised Endings
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Kane Unmasked as 'Old Man Withers'
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Cassandra Offered a Six-Album Record Deal by Mr. Big
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Garth With His Dreamwoman
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- then in a revised "mega happy ending," the ending
was again rewound, and Cassandra received a six-album deal with
Mr. Big, Wayne and Cassandra were reconciled, Garth began to date
his Dreamwoman - the waitress in the donut shop, and Benjamin reformed
himself and admitted: "I've learned that a flawless profile, a
perfect body, the right clothes, and a great car can get you far
in America-- almost to the top-- but it can't get you everything"
- after the rolling credits, the film concluded with
the TV's show's signoff, and Wayne's hope for the audience: "Well,
that's all the time we have for our movie. We hope you found it
entertaining, whimsical and yet relevant, with an underlying revisionist
conceit that belied the film's emotional attachments to the subject
matter"; Garth added: "I just hope you didn't think it sucked"
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The Two Hosts (l to r): Wayne (Mike Myers) and Garth (Dana Carvey)
On the Show, The Suck Kut Was Demonstrated on Garth's Hair
Wayne's Introduction of Himself - Breaking 4th Wall
Sing-a-long to 'Bohemian Rhapsody'
On Rooftop, Wayne With Rock-Singer Chinese Girlfriend
Cassandra (Tia Carrere) - With Mismatching Captions
An Amusing Conversation on the Hood of their Car
Use of Blue-Screens on the New Studio Set to Create Different
Backdrops
Both Wayne and Cassandra Extolling the Fender Guitar
Wayne's Purchase of a Fender Guitar in the Music Store:
"Cha-ching!"
Fantasy: Garth's "Foxy Lady" Dancing and Hip-Thrusting Toward
His Dream woman in Donut Shop
Wayne's Questions to Cassandra: "Will you still love me...?"
Rocker Alice Cooper's Backstage History Lesson on Milwaukee
"We're not worthy!" to Rocker Alice Cooper
Wayne's Insulting Cue Cards to Ridicule Their Show's Sponsor
Mr. Vanderhoff
Cassandra Insulted by Wayne's Accusations - They Temporarily Broke Up
Cassandra's Music Video Shoot with Kane in a Tarzan Jungle Setting
Wayne Begging For Cassandra To Come Back to Him
Cassandra's Live Music Video Was Transmitted Via Satellite to Mr. Big's Limousine
Happy Ending For Wayne and Cassandra
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