[Applause] hi welcome to around the world in 80s movies I’m Vince Leo I’m the author of the film review website quipster dnet I’ve been doing film reviews since 1996 so almost 25 years now you can read all of my written work there at that website quipster Donnet qwist r.net I also do a
Different podcast I’m not as current on that one even though it covers current films there haven’t been too many that have come out this year at least not theatrically the quipster film review podcast is the name of that show and you can find the link to that at my website
Quipster Donnet today I’m going to be getting into the third of this three-part series looking at nerds from college who get revenge on the bad guys I guess Revenge of the Nerds to nerds in Paradise is the film I’m going to be covering today cuz last week we covered Revenge of the Nerds
Revenge of the Nerds 2 comes from 1987 3 years after the first film it is a PG-13 rated film unlike the first one which was R this one does have brief nudity crude and sexual humor drug content and language the runtime is an hour and 28 minutes the stars are Robert kerine
Curtis Armstrong Bradley Whitford Courtney Thorne smith with supporting roles going to Larry B Scott Timothy busfield Andrew casses Donald Gibb Anthony Edwards Barry Ed louder James Hong and Priscilla Lopez Joe Roth is the director this timeout the screenplay credited to Dan Gelman and Steve Marshall now after the surprise success
Of Revenge of the Nerds back in 1984 that movie made $40 million in the theaters in the United States and even more than that in video sales and rentals down the road a quick follow-up seemed like it was a no-brainer scripting chores were handed in 1985 not
Too long afterward to the team of Dan gunselman and Steve Marshall they were known primarily for writing and producing television shows like sitcoms WKRP in Cincinnati and growing pains as well as just the ten of us a little bit after the release of this film the first raft
Was completed in July of 1985 and it carried the title at least then of beyond the Revenge of the Nerds unfortunately the studio 20th Century Fox they continued under this misguided belief that the first film success was some sort of fluke during these years they rarely green lit sequels anyway
They wanted to maintain tight control of the quality of the Studio’s output Prestige believe it or not back then was the name of the game not profits at least not so much as it is today there were a few Exceptions there were three Fox sequels that were released in the
Three years between the first and second nerds films Porky’s Revenge the Jewel of the Nile and Aliens but Revenge of the Nerds 2 didn’t have the backing to go forward at least not until the no sequels policy was removed by incoming president of fox Leonard Goldberg he
Fast-tracked it as one of the first movies under his leadership it was ready to go because they had a script Revenge of the Nerds director Jeff Cano he turned down the offer to return for this sequel he claimed that the story was complete in the first film it warranted
No further exploration the Nerds had won there’s no place really worth going after that than to see them lose again and then come back and where’s the victory in that fox looked Elsewhere for some somebody who could deliver on this level preferably somebody who could keep control and keep costs low essentially
One director that they s initially was Todd Solin an indie darling today with a cult following but back then not so well known he had recently signed a three- picture deal with Fox after he had made an acclaimed short film at New York University Solin though he wasn’t
Interested in Revenge of the Nerds to and he managed to avoid having to get attached to it the studio then approached producer director Joe Roth Roth had produced bachelor party to success for Fox but Roth’s prior directorial effort was a boxing drama named streets of gold it was a box
Office failure and Roth poured so much of his finances into that project he was right on the verge of losing his house he needed the money and fox was willing to give him what he needed to get out of debt Roth was mulling over doing another project a more personally appealing film
Called magic man that was written by an upand cominging screen writer at that time a popular screenwriter through the ‘ 80s and ’90s named Joe esteros but Revenge of the Nerds 2 provided the shest chance for Roth to cover his debts and to make good with a studio Magic Man
By the way would later be made under the title of telling lies in America in 1997 now fox said about securing as much of the original cast from the first film as they could they immediately landed Robert kerine as well as Larry B Scott and Andrew casses and Timothy busfield
Anthony Edwards though kerine co-star from the first effort he was a hold out he didn’t want to commit before he saw the script and that was something they didn’t really want to show him because they had received some negative feedback from the other actors that they had shown it to after receiving substantial
Resistance from Edwards the executives at Fox they started to reason that they really didn’t need Gilbert his character wasn’t that funny Edwards really wasn’t a big enough box office draw to make much of a difference so they wrote the character of Gilbert out as having gone
To India to to study animal diseases now with Edwards looking like he was going to be absent from the sequel Robert kerine he really kicked into overdrive he knew he had to secure Curtis Armstrong to return as the fan favorite character Dudley Dawson AKA booger if
Nerds 2 was going to remain viable he needed to get on board Armstrong was one of the actors who had read the script he deemed it as awful he decided to pass he was already committed anyway as a regular on the popular television comedy Moonlighting and he didn’t want to skip
Out on the season’s finale and the premere episode of the next season to do a terrible film Fox offered though so much money that his agent begged him don’t throw away such a lucrative deal but he still said no so desperate was Fox to get Armstrong on board that the
Head of Film Production for Fox Scott Ruden insisted on meeting him immediately face to face and find out what would it take to resolve his issues Armstrong told him the script was terrible and Ruden assured him that the script was never going to be used they were bringing in Larry gilbart the
Creator of the TV version of mash to doctor the script Armstrong had a lot of respect for gilbart he really couldn’t say no with working with a legend like him so he signed on he found out later though that he had been kind of had there gilbart had nothing to do with
Revenge of the Nerds 2’s script in fact he was never even asked and we still they got a completely inexperienced writer at the time likely Ed Solomon before he co-wrote Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure Venture as well as other big films like men in black and now you see me anyway an inexperienced
Writer was put in charge to produce this uncredited rewrite working long hours and then that Rider left Without a Trace after suffering a near nervous breakdown meanwhile Fox decided that they could bring in a new nerd that would actually be funny to fill in the gap of any
Missing nerds while also trying to secure the Beasty Boys to perform a rap for the film Roth hired standup comedian Barry soel at that time because in his act he would rap occasionally he felt that soble could perform both tasks filling out a supporting role as well as
Rap on stage for a lot less money than trying to secure the Beasty Boys unfortunately soble was not much of an actor as funny as he might be on the stage so his inclusion didn’t really quite work out as well as they’d hoped Ted McGinley the main heavy of the first
Film he had become a regular in the interim on Dynasty and he really couldn’t fit the shoot into his schedule so they moved on to a relative newcomer to play the heavy in this film Bradley witford known pretty well today not so much at that time he was going to play
The main douchebag of Alpha Beta Roger ladimer Whitford asked his agent before he signed on if he felt Revenge of the Nerds 2 was something that might hurt his career his agent though said he didn’t have any career yet to damage so his only significant role at that time
Was a small one as the two-timing boyfriend in Adventures and babysitting it turns out it actually did help whitford’s career immensely to be in Revenge of the Nerds too Whitford during this time met Timothy busfield while he was making the film they got along very well they both had been in Stage Theater
And they became good friends during the production when busfield later got a part in Aaron sorin’s stage play called A Few Good Men he played the lead part that was later played by Tom Cruz in the movie adaptation of course from 1992 busfield recommended to sorin to look at
Bradley Whitford for the role of Captain Jack Ross that was the Kevin Bacon character in the movie this this relationship with sorin eventually led witford to star in sorin’s television show down the road called the westwing or one of the supporting players at least of that show in 1999 as well as
One of the co-stars of Studio 60 on the sunset stripped in 2006 busfield also regularly appeared on both shows and when Whitford won an Emmy Award for best supporting actor in a dramatic series in 2001 he glibly mentioned while he was doing interviews that what he was
Thinking as he walked up to receive his Emmy Award was how great it is that Revenge of the Nerds 2 is no longer going to be in the first line of his obituary although the character of Lewis Robert kering’s character did not break up with Betty child’s his kind of love
Interest toward the end of that film we see him at the beginning of this film still clinging to her framed photograph that’s an indication they’re probably still together but in this film future Melrose play Star Courtney Thorn Smiths Sunny is set up as another potential love interest for Lewis she’s an
Attractive Hotel employee Bo that we later find out is also a secret nerd Julia Montgomery was supposed to be in this film she had a role in The Script but she refused to appear in the sequel after reading the script because it was written that she was having an affair
With a jock from Alpha Beta as her introduction into this film and she insisted that Betty would not cheat on Lewis after all that happened in the first film she was in love and she didn’t want her character to be anything but and the writers had intended to use
The affair in Revenge of the Nerds 2o so that they could free up Lewis so he could Cort with a lot of hot college girls in Fort Lauderdale where the film is set Roth told mcgomery that if she signed on they were going to rewrite
That and keep her on board but by that point she had already resolved that she wanted nothing to do with this sequel it was poorly written and she really didn’t trust what was going to happen Joe rotho went to Curtis Armstrong because he wanted to see if he could cono her on
Board they had a very close relationship during the making of the first film very close and he wanted him to reach out to to her and see if he could talk her into it but that proved to be a dead end in the end as well now due to the money
Offered Larry B Scott he turned down a chance to be in Spike Lee’s second film school days to be in Revenge of the Nerds 2o there was just a lot more money to go around and that’s why a lot of people were coming back here the only original trilam that’s a member of
Lambda Lambda Lambda the Nerds fraternity the only significant one not to make an appearance here is tekashi because his portrayer Ryan toi had been a regular in the police academy series of films and fox thought that they really shouldn’t cross-promote his popularity if they didn’t need to tram
President Bernie Casey he actually came in to shoot a scene for Revenge of the Nerds to it didn’t make the final cut as well as David wall who was playing Dean ulick in the first film his part ended up on The Cutting Room floor as well
James Cromwell did do a scene that made the final film but he was supposed to play a much more significant role at least at the beginning of this film but that role was drastically reduced in editing also cut was a sequence with much more nudity featuring the screen
Debut of Teresa Lynn kind of an actress that would come to be known as a scream Queen in later years but they decided instead to go for a PG-13 rating so a lot of that was cut out as well even if they didn’t completely get everybody on
Board they did get a solid Supporting Cast of Heavies Bradley Whitford as I mentioned but also Ed louder and James Hong and Priscilla Lopez deliver some very memorably funny caricature work here comedic stereotypical but still funny in that regard for its era Fox though did realize during the production
During the shoot that it was the character of Gilbert that grounded the first film the wackier characters could provide spice but they should not be the main cores not having Gilbert meant giving more time to these wacky supporting players so they really had nothing to ground the film The Recipe
Had no chance here to produce the same results so they made a final push to incorporate Anthony Edwards Fox got him finally to agree to appear in a recurring bit Cameo part for the same fee as he would have accepted for a starring role they contrived a few short
Scenes to establish that Gilbert couldn’t come with the rest of the Nerds from Lambda Lambda Lambda to the convention he had broken his leg during a chess match Edwards admits that they paid him way too much for whatever they got out of him for this sequel but he
Did go on to name the swimming pool that he built with the money that they paid him the Revenge of the Nerds to pool the director Joe Roth he shared certain traits with the director of the first film Jeff Cano to be sure both had never directed A comedy before but they were
Willing to accept the money in exchange for doing whatever the studio needed in order to turn their film on time and under budget however unlike canoe Roth was not a nerd himself and he didn’t even have much of a personal sense of humor and that became an obvious
Detriment as the film went on to the rest of the cast and the reason why Roth was different was that while the cast dis like the scripts going into each film canoe allowed the actors to improvise that script during the shoot vastly improving the overall film the
Cast hoped that Roth would be as open as canoe to letting them rewrite their characters and to come up with ad lib bits but they were shut down at almost every turn immediately to such Notions Roth’s only mission was to make the film fast and inexpensively not to worry
About whether the end product was going to be as funny as the first film this film was strictly to show Fox executives that Roth could make a film their way not the way that the actors or any potential audiences were expecting or wanting the only sequence in which he
Let the actors have some leeway was the musical number toward the middle of the film now Roth might be a talented producer and to some extent a competent director but nobody outside of Studio exec felt that he was the right fit for nerds 2 by the end this was seen within
Fox as no more than an initiation to give Roth experience before they’d allow him to do bigger and better things and indeed this test paid off for Roth just 2 years later after he had left to start his own film company Morgan Creek Roth came back to Fox to replace the man who
Greenit Revenge of the Nerds 2 Leonard Goldberg Roth became Fox’s new president in 1989 now Revenge of the Nerds 2 begins with voiceover narration it has the words scrolling up and out kind of like Star Wars style it reminds us how the Nerds at Adams College started an inclusive fraternity and overcame
Prejudice they became Heroes as we witnessed in the first film and now they are going to take their mission National at the United fraternity conference in Fort Lauderdale Florida and there they hope to increase the bonds of Brotherhood to set new and less discriminatory guidelines and to get
Laid once in Florida however they find that the alpha betas their rival fraternity from the first film have once again taken their rooms at least at their hotel no other hotels in town will take nerds except for the dumpiest one and try as the Nerds might to bring
Unity to all the Fraternal Brothers the alphab is determined to shut them out through conniving acts that result in shutting down the trams for good and it’s up to the Nerds themselves to get revenge if they’re going to be successful to Bringing Unity to Brothers INF fraternities all over the nation now
The script had originally had the paradise setting of Puerto viarta Mexico but Fox decided to shoot the film and irely on location in Fort Lauderdale it was more expensive to shoot there but they would avoid hassles like customs and having to gather supplies and all the travel the slum Hotel the nerd
Stayed in dubbed the Hotel Coral Essex which later makes a funny Psy gag when some of the neon lights for Hotel Coral Essex burn out so that it reads hot oral sex that was filmed at a hotel that was scheduled for demolition the G Ocean Mile hotel near the beach in Fort
Lauderdale and it also served as their full service Studio during the shoot they could do such things as have a an amphibious tank crash through walls there they wouldn’t have to pay for its replacement so this was economical to them they could also use the empty parking lot for all of their trailers
And their equipment and their storage and the empty rooms within the hotel were used for such things as editing facilities and other film making space they began shooting in March of 1987 for a summer release the shoot was set for only 40 days most major Motion Pictures
Began a year prior to the release date preparing anything less than that was especially difficult for comedy because they needed to test the film in front of an audience to determine what might work and what doesn’t so they didn’t have that opportunity other directors also had 10 weeks after rap to edit the
Picture but rth did not have that he worked at the time every day with Academy award-winning editor Richard Chu to try to get this film done in half of the normal time Chu did rough cut editing as the film was shot each day from the editing Bay that was in a hotel
Room behind the scenes the actors who got to know each other from the first film they continued their friendship here they partied a lot less but the one person who didn’t party with the others in the previous film did have a memorable experience this time out for some extracurricular fun Tim busfield
And Larry B Scott decided that 15-year-old actor Andrew casses he should be a virgin no longer they made it their mission to get the lad laid in real life they invited him up to the they invited him up to a hotel room where they were hanging out there was a
24-year-old woman there this is completely inappropriate I’m sure to most people listening and then busfield and Scott leave the room with casses with this strange but very attractive woman and she proceeds to seduce him with sexy talk and but he chickens out from losing his virginity with her even
Though he told the other two actors that he lost his virginity he actually did not go through with it now as for the soundtrack there’s a memorable song in this film called back to Paradise it was co-written for the movie by Canadian rock pop artist Brian Adams Pat benatar’s husband and musical partner
Neil Geraldo also co-wrote that as well as Jim Valance whose group 38 Special performs the song for the soundtrack it was released as a single it nearly cracked the top 40 billboard chart in the United States it peaked at number 41 though it did score bigger on the US
Mainstream Rock charts it peaked at number four the film is scored by d’s Mark mothers ball this was his first film in work among many that he continues to do today he scored the film with his fellow bandmate in dvo Jerry cassali dvo as a group also provides a
Cover of the song itsy bitsy teeny weeny yellow poka dot bikini for the soundtrack Revenge of the Nerds 2 it when it was released was respectable at the box office it debuted at number one in its opening week of release and it garnered $30 million in the United
States just 10 million shy of the previous film off of a similar $8 million budget now as far as what I think of Revenge of the Nerds do well it’s basically a PG-13 attempt to recreate the first film it only has a local change to really differentiate it
In terms of its basic formula laughs can be had with Revenge of the Nerds too but they’re pretty mild by comparison to the first film most are due to the wacky and energetic performances of these actors rather than anything witty within the script the rep part te in particular
Between booger and an older Asian fellow played by James Hong he has a similar gift for being disgusting and his name is unlike booger is snotty that provides some funny moments in the film that can meet or exceed the level of humor that you would find in its predecessor The
Cameo by Anthony Edwards really doesn’t add a lot comedically or story-wise to the film and Robert kedin shtick as Lewis where is pretty thin his honking laugh gets really annoying throughout this film the film does end completely going off the rails the nerds getting their Revenge using this amphibious
Assault vehicle against their perceived foes I mean it really loses its way at some point it was barely holding together through the rest of it anyway this is pretty mediocre stuff unfortunately the moments of humor come too few and too far between to let these nerds pass the test with anything
Remotely close to Flying Colors so that’s why I’m going to give Revenge of the Nerds to nerds in Paradise two stars out of four two stars on my skill means that I do think that this film lacks something vital that would keep it from being something I could recommend to
Most people and that which it’s lacking is a really funny script and somebody to put it all together in a much more satisfying way obviously this was a rushed production there was a lot of heart into it they just wanted to get it out there and make some money the actors
That were doing the film did it for money the director did it for money and when you do everything for money and not for pleasing the built-in audience that was there who really enjoyed the first film you’re going to get a lackluster result and that’s why this film only
Gets two stars out of four from me now Revenge of the Nerds it did continue after this as a franchise but not theatrically there were two made for television films that were actually written by the screenwriters of the first Revenge of the Nerds Jeff Bui and Steve Zacharias they did 1992’s Revenge
Of the Nerds 3 the Next Generation that actually was a pilot that was made to be released in 1991 for this series that went on to be unproduced it was going to bring bring back many of the characters from the first film at least for the
Pilot and then introduce a new batch of nerds at Adams College later on they did one more film bringing all the gang back together for 1996’s Revenge of the Nerds for nerds in love and by the way that one was directed by one of those screenwriters Steve Zacharias and it did
Have the novelty of bringing back some of the actors that did not appear in Revenge of the Nerds 2 namely Julie Montgomery as well as Ted McGinley Timothy busfield and Anthony Edwards though stopped at number two Flash Forward 10 years after Revenge of the Nerds 4 there was a remake of Revenge of
The Nerds in the works that was going to be directed by Kyle Newman of Fanboys Fame and that was going to be for the newly created film brand at fox called Fox Atomic it filmed for 2 weeks they were making this movie before Emme University in Atlanta where it was shot
Decided that they really didn’t want this runchi comedy to be shot there and the studio Executives they didn’t like what they were seeing in the dailies enough to consider paying even more money to relocate to another place so they decided to pull the plug on Revenge
Of the Nerds 2 weeks in in more recent years and back in 2019 just a year ago from this recording Disney who bought out Fox they started to think about Reviving the franchise Robert kerine was interested in returning possibly bringing back many of the gang from the first crew as possible but nothing
Really has come of it other than those early discussions so will we see Revenge of the Nerds again I don’t know and as I mentioned in the Revenge of the Nerds episode nerd culture today is the dominant culture for the most part so do they really need to get revenge when
They are making millions of dollars in technology and science and industry and all of that maybe this is a concept that has been long in the tooth by the way there was a reality show that was hosted by two of the members of the Nerds Curtis Armstrong and Robert Kine called
King of the Nerds nerdy people battle to become the King of the Nerds that was a reality competition that they made for about three seasons 24 total episodes and it appeared on TBS from 2013 to 2015 so I guess that’s kind of a tie in there Curtis Armstrong also wrote a book of
Memoirs based on his Diaries as he was making movies including his time on Revenge of the Nerds as well as Revenge of the Nerds 2 and the subsequent movies and I used that book as a source for a lot of what you heard in the review for
Revenge of the the Nerds too so I do encourage you to check out that book revenge of the nerd by Curtis Armstrong if you’re interested in this film franchise as well as Curtis Armstrong’s other work on mood lighting and Risky Business and all other juicy tidbits are in there so definitely highly
Recommended anyway if you have your own thoughts on Revenge of the Nerds or Revenge of the Nerds 2o and you want to impart them to me you can find my contact information on my website that’s a quipster Donnet qwist r.net links to my Twitter feed Facebook page and Instagram are also
There you can get in touch with me any of those ways that you feel comfortable with I always look forward to hearing from you as far as what I’m going to be covering next week well I’m going to stick with a fraternity Style movie even though the film has so much more to
Offer from 1986 this is definitely a cult film Night of the Creeps will be the film I cover on the next episode so if you haven’t seen that yet you’re in for kind of a campy treat if you want to watch that movie and keep up with the
Reviews as I get to them and until next time thank you so much for listening and joining me on this trip around the world in 80s Movies
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