The Pitch: The Royal Tennenbaums meets
Tim Burton's art direction
Price of Admission: $2.50
When: 11/22/91 at 1:50 pm
My Age: 10
Quote: Are they made from real Girl Scouts?
- Wednesday Addams
In my imaginary version of what a Hollywood producer would pitch The Addams Family as, I said The Royal Tennenbaums by way of Tim Burton's art direction. Both the Tennenbaums and the Addams are among the dysfunctionalist of families. Both movies star Angelica Huston as the matriarch holding each family together, for better or worse. Both feature relatives trying to con their way back into the good graces of the family. In this case, Gene Hackman using fake cancer to live out his "last days" and woo back Huston from Danny Glover. While, Christopher Lloyd uses his likeness to the long lost Uncle Fester as a way into stealing the family's fortune. Both are also overly art directed to great success.
My hazy synopsis of The Addams Family: Capitol punishment death jokes can be popcorn fun for the whole family. You can be Goth without listening to Bauhaus or The Cure. Christopher Lloyd looks better in a fright wig (Doc Brown) than in fright bald (Uncle Fester). Uncle Fester really is Uncle Fester!!!
This movie marks my first encounter with Christina Ricci. As a child actor, she was miles away from the aw shucks-isms of the Macaulay Culkins and Jodi Sweetins of that era. We weren't seeing Ricci play Wednesday Addams, but more like Wednesday was playing Christina Ricci. Whereas casting Sophia Coppola in The Godfather III a year before was a huge miscalculation, casting Ricci as Wednesday was perfect. Her pale skin, widow's peak, and soulless puppy dog eyes made for a role that will always typify her regardless of how many radiators she's chained to or Woody Allen/Jason Biggs romps she Keaton-Farrow's her way through. Enigmatic illustrator Gary Baseman has made a career influenced largely by Ricci's likeness.
The Addams Family soundtrack featured MC Hammer in his last forays of hip hop stardom before gangsta rap rendered his pop stylings moot. Weighted with both the classic 2 Legit 2 Quit and the specially-made for the movie The Addams Groove, the public was treated to rollicking songs of legitimacy and a remixed, repetitive TV theme song. In the late 90s I bought a CD from Circuit City that bared both these tracks. It was called Back 2 Back Hits and was a greatest hits collection of MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice. It was glorious.
As both Ice and Hammer's careers were pretty much over, both staged a revamp of their image to hilarious results in 1994. Vanilla grew dreadlocks and copped a faux-Cypress Hill pot/rapper image singing the catchy Roll 'Em Up.
MC Hammer dropped the MC title, dialed up his bud Neon Deion Sanders, and donned a banana hammock for a video that proved 2 be 2 hot for MTV. Here's your Oakland A's former batboy in all his glory. Pumps and a Bump indeed.
Up Next: Pee-Wee Herman Dumps A Baby In The Sewer
