If you're not listening to Podcast, the terror is the winning. That's what James Morrison. Welcome to the podcast. Sit down and enjoy your point.
Welcome to the Elf episode of the podcast. Allison and Eric join me to break down this highly relaunchable Christmas classic from 2003. Just like National We Impoon's Christmas vacation or Christmas story, Elf is on TV basically every day from Thanksgiving to Christmas. And while they're both huge stars now, this was Jon Favreau's big break as a director and Will Ferrell's first starring role in a movie.
In this episode, you'll hear us put together some actually pretty good options for recasting Elf with today's actors. When we get to the memorable quotes, we're basically reading the script for the movie because everything Will Ferrell says is quote, so make your way through the candy cane forest and a sea of swirly twirly gumdrops as we break down Elf. No human being has ever said foot in his satisfying job. That is until I hear you're going on a journey to the big city.
Can't wait to see my dad. This might be the opportunity to find out who you really are. Bye buddy. Hope you find your dad.
Thanks Mr. Norwall. Office of New York is pretty different. It's like a Christmas tree.
Sorry I can't ride with you the rest of the way up. Hold on for your hug. Dad! You look like you came from the North Pole.
That's exactly where I came from. You have another son. You like sugar, huh? Is there sugar in syrup?
Yes. Then yes. We can't leave him alone. He's going to destroy the place.
No, but not cracker. He's got your bad news. Simple. How did you show you were from?
You were from? Roots praise? Wow. Tomorrow morning, 10 a.m.
Santa's coming to Santa! Oh my God! Santa, here I know him. I know him.
Elf 2003, the no nonsense plot. I can't wait for this. The plot? Wow.
I just want to know what the no nonsense description of this movie could be. Because it's all nonsense. Yeah. Right.
Raised as an oversized elf, Buddy travels from the North Pole to New York City to meet his biological father, Walter Hobbes, who doesn't know he exists and is in desperate need of some Christmas spirit. Overall reaction, if you know what you saw it, all that sort of stuff. I think we saw it in the theater. I have no recollection of that.
I've seen this movie so many times that honestly I can't remember. It's hard to remember a time where I didn't know this movie. I have no clue when it was the first time I saw it. I know it wasn't in the theater.
It was not. It was a couple of years later. I bet our was later. Liam was a year old.
I thought we didn't get out. I think it was like Susan loved it and brought the DVD home one Christmas. That was the first time I saw it. But the first time you see it, you know it's an instant classic.
It will be on every single year. It kicks off and takes on the Christmas story treatment of 24 hours on TNT or whatever. It was either this week or next week and they're already doing it. It was being played in July.
Like six months before Christmas kind of thing or later in July. I remember it. Oh my god. Sorry.
Sorry. Is this a year round movie? I mean I know I do know people that think it is. Really?
Yeah. They'll watch it any time of year. Yeah. I want to watch.
No, I mean, I can't imagine throwing this on like in May. No, no, it's a remarkable movie multiple times during the holiday season. Any time from after I'll allow after Halloween, starting November 1st through January 15th. That is the window in which else can be viewed and you are not a psychopath.
Anything outside of that? It's there's a lot of like I know there are. I know. But come on now.
It's about as Christmassy as you can get. Make it special. Yeah. Well, definitely.
That's how you should do it. What did you think when you first when you saw the trailers, what did you think of like? Did this come through the trailers when you first saw it? How cheesy it definitely gets.
But it knows it. It's on purpose, of course. All the references to the old Christmas stuff from we were carried Rudolph and Frosty the Snowman also the casting of like James Con. I don't know where.
What was your thoughts on all that? The James Con thing the first time I seen him, I'm like, what is he? Why is he in this movie? I mean, the Leon the Snowman is the burr alive snowman.
Like there were so many things that were nods to those things that those Christmas specials that of course I we all loved and it was so well done. And of course, Will Ferrell was like a hot off of SNL and like it was such a big. This was his first like starring role in a movie. Like not cameo.
Yes. But he was coming out of SNL. Yeah. Like he old school was a big hit for him, but he wasn't the lead.
Right. Old school was before this. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Right. Well, ranked the tank. It's great.
The tank stole the show, but he wasn't like the lead. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
He was good. But this movie, yeah, it's sort of. So the other thing that's so interesting now to look back at it is John Favreau directed this movie. Like he has done some really cool things.
And this was very early in his directing, if I recall. His first big one, I think, like real big one. Because Iron Man was after. Well, after, yeah.
This kind of got him Iron Man in a way. There was there was a there was a different movie in between though. It's a thorough. I don't know if any of you either would be a thorough.
Yeah. It was kind of it was the it was another adaptation of a book by the same guy that wrote Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma is Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma Juma this sort of thing for a while. This was arguably his big one besides the Thera. Yeah.
His Thera came after. I don't know that I've ever... It's a Jumanji space. Give it a take.
Yeah. I mean, that really... But he's kind of all... like he's in so many different genres.
It feels like it's interesting. Yeah. Yeah. After this movie, his career goes crazy.
Iron Man hits and then he's all over the place. He's Mr. Disney. Well, yes.
And doing like the way that they did some of the effects of this movie was very cool too. You know, a lot of the force perspective. Yeah. All of that.
It just... It had such a unique look to it too that it felt real. Like it had that stop-motion animation feeling almost. Yeah.
When there was no stop-motion animation. Like it had kind of this almost like a flat set almost. And then like the characters were all that sort of... C.G.
was largely hidden. Yeah. And all that sort of practical in-camera stuff. But he was again, he was influenced and trying to harken back to those movies when we were kids from the 70s.
But I remember kind of looking at it like thinking it kind of looked cool. Yeah. You know, the way that it was done. You couldn't quite figure out like was that C.G.
or how did they really do all of it? And it was me. Yeah. Oh gosh.
That sort of hits their brow eyes almost. Yes. Yes. Box office performance.
So this is... I thought this was interesting. I don't think we've done 2003 before. I mean, it's right on the cusp of a movie that we can do here at 20 years.
Yeah. We did the scene in Royale. That was 2006. Five or six.
Yeah. We've hinted on a few other ones but have waited. So yeah, this is one of the newest ones we've done. So the top 10 in 2003.
Number one, Finding Nemo. Oh. 339 million. Man.
When that was... It was so huge. That was everywhere. It was so huge.
339. That was when that was a big number. Yeah. Pirates of...
I mean, there are many movies now that wish that they could be 300 or 300. Yeah, they killed it. Pirates of the Caribbean, The Curse of the Black Pearl. Whichever one that was...
That is the first one. It is? Yeah. The Black Pearl is the first one.
There we go. 305 million. That's a hella open for the first one. The Matrix Reloaded.
281 million. Lord of the Rings, Return of the King. 249 million. I like that one a lot.
I like that. That's my favorite. The Last One. Yeah.
Yeah. Bruce Almighty. Number five. With 242 million.
Wow. Return of the King barely beats Bruce Almighty. Wow. X-Men 2.
2002 million. 214 million. Then elephant number seven. 167 million.
Chicago. 167 million. Terminator 3. Rise of the Machines.
150. And Bad Boys 2. 138 million. Wow.
Rise of the Machines is 20 years ago. The third one. Yeah. The other one.
I would have thought that was older. I'm surprised Bad Boys 2 was in there. I thought that was in the 90s. Yeah.
The whole thing. So there are some other notable ones outside the top 10. So we said the Matrix Reloaded was number three. Number 11.
The Matrix Revolutions. 138 million. Is that in the same year? Yeah.
They were shot simultaneously in the week six months. Revolutions is November 5th. Reloaded is May 15th. That's pretty.
Anger Management. The Hulk. Too fast, Too Furious. Lord of the Rings.
The Two Towers was number 16 and 121 million. I think of those movies as being more universally. I felt like everybody was seeing those. So that was going to be released.
Or is it a split year? It's a split year. Yeah. Because they were December.
They came on December. I have December release dates. They can't be true. So forget that one.
See Biscuit? Spike is three. I don't know. I left it.
See Biscuit? I know. I guess it's because you called it out, which is so super weird. Yeah.
Freaky Friday. How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. Oh boy. 105 million.
American Wedding. 104. Yeah. Catch me if you can.
102. But that came out Christmas. So you only get a small sample size. Charlie's Angel's Full Throttle with a 100 million.
And then there's a bunch of other nonsense. But oh, the School of Rock. Oh yeah. Nice.
79 million. That's it. So please number 35. Old School.
75 million. Came out in February. Old Bill Volume 1. Came out in October.
69 million. Carried that through until January. I don't know. So kind of an okay here.
Yeah. There's some. Yeah. But you know, whatever.
The budget was 33 million. So they spent 33 to make it and then it made 167. Pretty good return on investment. That's a win.
Rotten Tomatoes score. Let's do the audience first. Or Elf. Elf on a shelf.
Will this be? Is it an all time score? Like does it ever? As usual.
We don't go that far to the details. I'm just trying to think like I feel like it probably became more popular the longer it was out. I had the standing rule on this podcast. Whenever you want like detailed accurate information, we don't have it.
All right. Audience score going to say 94. 94 for the audience. Eric.
I'm going to go 90. Run Tomatoes audience score for old school for Elf. 79. What?
I know. That's shocking. I was asking the question like I could see some people not getting in at first. I know.
It's crazy. It is crazy. It's crazy for the audience. It's a crazy number.
What do you think about the critics? I think they are going to appreciate the artistic nature of it and some of the writing. I'm going to say 88. What do you think, Eric?
I don't know. I feel it. I have a feeling that the critics would be a little bit more cynical. I'm going to go closer to like with the audience score.
I'm going to say 80. So the audience gave it a 79. Critics gave it an 85. Critics liked it more.
Critics like it more. I don't know how an audience member goes into this movie after seeing those trailers and says, eh, not great. Didn't live up to my expectations. Yeah, I don't know.
I know. I know. I know. You got help with the barrel.
That's what you saw and you wanted and you got it. I don't get it. Audience, the audience, the audience, the audience, the audience. Yes.
That is very strange. Okay. Let's dive straight into trivia. Whoa.
Okay. Unless we have somebody else. I'm going to add. This is kind of a straightforward one, I think.
I was going to throw in a couple of curveballs and some other nonsense, but let's just do it. Several minor traffic accidents occurred when Will Ferrell walked the Lincoln tunnel in his costume because people were so surprised and distracted seeing him wearing the Elf outfit. Do they know it was him or just they saw a giant elf walking around? I think it's a costume where it is.
That's what I mean. Yeah. That's insane. How tall is he?
Like six, three or something? Yeah. Yeah. Unless the traffic in the tunnel was moving really slow, which is a possibility, would you even see that as him?
Right. But then if it's moving that slow, I guess that would be my, that would be why it's my accident. Holy crap. Look at that idiot.
Oh, wait. It's Will Ferrell. Yeah. The scene when Buddy eats different candies and the pastries with the spaghetti noodles had to be shot twice because Will Ferrell vomited the first time.
Makes sense? Yeah. Yikes. I think we all understand.
Yeah. I think this, you saw part of this in some of the behind the scenes or extra scenes, deleted scenes. There was an elf hockey scene that was cut. You can watch it on YouTube.
Yeah. Yeah. If you, I mean, I don't know what's on YouTube, but there was a deleted scene as an extra on the digital copy. It looked like a lot of like a minute.
It's like a lot of, it's like a lot of elf shenanigans that they cut out. Yeah. It's, it's buddy checking everybody into the bleachers. And a giant slapshot at the end.
This is one of my favorite ones here. Wanda Sykes was originally slated to play the gimbal's manager back out last minute. She's replaced by Fazon Love who insisted on still wearing the name type name tag that says Wanda. Amazing.
It's interesting that it was her original name like it. Yeah. The same name. All right.
I would have loved to see him here play that part. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Although he is awesome. I love him. I mean, that's one of my memorable scenes. Like I laugh every single time.
I remember seeing him at a bunch of commercials and stuff and then I was like, Oh, that's that guy. And he was awesome. This movie. Yeah.
Yeah. I remember him. He was in the replacements, which John Faver was also in. Right.
Right. Yeah. So maybe that's where yeah. Fazon Love.
Awesome. This is one is widely known, but the elf Ming Ming who appears briefly in the beginning of the film is played by Peter Billings Lee, who started his Ralphie Parker in the classic film, A Christmas Story. Yes. All of the elves apparently except Buddy and Papa have names that are double names Ming Ming, Chuchu, right, whatever Chuchu.
The apartment in which Buddy's dad lives is the same apartment building from the exterior in which Dana Barrett lived in Ghostbusters. I had that. That's a great one. Yeah.
That's good. Marysteen Virgin who plays Emily, Buddy's stepmother and Michael's mom also plays Wolf Ariel's mother and stepmothers. This is interesting too. When she first meets Buddy, Jovie asks, did Crumpet put you up to this?
Crumpet was David Sideris's character's name when he worked as a Macy's elf and Amy Sideris, his sister is in his movie. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Oh, that's good. That's good. All right.
So it's not overtly, there's no evidence that that is what it is, but that's probably what it is. Yeah. Yeah, go ahead. I probably could have checked this to make sure it's correct, but I think I saw that John Favreau voices the narwhal.
Which I love. Narwhal is a... Why, Buddy? Sneaky is best character.
Yeah. I think I also read that he did the voice of narwhal, but he also, so when James Kahn receives the lingerie in the box, he opens the card and there's a picture of Buddy drawing inside the card, John Favreau drew that picture. That's awesome. That's awesome.
That's good. The other thing that I kind of liked was that the Jack in the Box when Buddy was doing the testing was controlled via remote control. Yeah. So he never knew when it was actually going to go off.
So those, all of his surprise looks were because he didn't know what it was actually going to happen. So it's a surprise from every time, which I really liked. That's always good. And there are two separate sort of references in some way to Lord of the Rings.
One was something about the throne of lies. So I think that had to do with the guy that was sitting on the... The guy who's possessed. Yes, correct.
And then the other is that the Central Park Rangers were modeled after the ring rates in Lord of the Rings, which you look at that now and you're like, oh my god, that's totally what they are. I read something different. Oh, did you? They are many, many visually they are.
They're supposed to represent the four horsemen of the apocalypse. I read both of those. Yeah. Both of them are equally valid.
Yeah. That's good. The Christmas tree being too big for the living room is a nod to National Lampoon's sophistication. I do like the scraping on the ceiling part.
Oh my god, that thing being forced in there. That's exactly how two kids would do it. Yeah. And then Buddy running and jumping into it.
Yes, it's such a good element with the kid in the foreground. Will Ferrell walking out of frame and the stuntman running into frame? Yep. Yep.
It's so good. What do they call that? There's like a specific name. Yes, yes.
Yeah. When Buddy is walking and talking with Leon, the snowman. Buddy leaves no footprints in the snow while the path is made by Leon's scooting across the snow. So, like the Elf in Lord of the Rings, he doesn't leave any.
Oh my god, that better be a third. That better be a third. I love it. No.
This is not really a trivia thing, but I found it weird that I don't see this very much. The real gimbals went out of business in 1996, but they hold this thing at gimbals in 2003. Yeah. Yeah.
Like, why not just use a... You make use of it. Yeah. Buddy, you want to go to gimbals.
Yeah. I wonder if I had to do with not having to pay for the rights to use the name. Yeah. Yes, probably, but you think there's like a sponsorship possibility or like, you know, product placement.
Well, maybe they didn't want it to be connected to. Or even just like the nostalgia of having the old. Yeah. Well, yeah.
Call back to those ear of those ear of those ear of those ear of those 34 street. Yeah, that's good. That's a good one. Anything else?
Otherwise, I've got a couple of casting things. I didn't have any other trivia that necessarily stood out. I mean, there was actually a lot of behind the scenes and different things, but I didn't kind of read through all of it. Well, even looking up the trivia that's published out there, it's not a lot of super interesting stuff.
It's a lot of like boring things. Yeah, all the stuff I've read like 10 different things about using force perspective. Right. They did it in the rings.
It was just the same thing over and over again. Right. Yeah. Got it.
They did stuff in camera. Congrats. Wow. They were proud of it.
It worked. Great. So casting issues. Like, who is almost cast, etc.
I really only have a couple that I think are for real. The other ones are very loosely, I don't put a lot of stock in these. Okay. One is like, is the gimbals manager.
I think that's legit. Okay. Buddy the Elf. The script was written in 1993.
Really? So, originally the script, the two names I saw connected with it when it was written was either Jim Carrey or Chris Farley and Buddy the Elf. I mean, Chris Farley would be pretty funny. It would have been a very different movie, but it would have been funny.
Yeah. And Jim Carrey would have been great. Yeah, Jim Carrey in 1993 or that was right before Asfintera. So if it was a couple years later, it was like 9697 years.
So this is the first script. It went through other iterations. Who knows what was in it. But yeah, so those are the two names I saw.
I mean, there would have been a lot more of the physical comedy with Chris Farley. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know about Jim Carrey.
I mean, I like him in certain things. You can imagine half the movie is Farley being too big for stuff in the North. Of course. Of course.
So then here's all the other ones that I saw that are spurious at best. Jovi, the only name I saw was Katie Holmes. Really? Oh, yeah.
Okay. What's her name in Dawson's Creek? I've never watched any of Dawson's Creek. Really?
Wow. I know. Jovi. In Batman.
Jovi. Right. 2003 that would have been was that at the peak of Dawson's Creek? Was that gonna be around?
Might have been towards the end of the series. I feel like that was a mighty show. Walter, the only name I saw was Gary Shandley. I kind of want to see that movie.
That would have been pretty good. That would have been pretty good. Oh my God. Gary Shandley as Buddy's dad.
Oh my God. That's that's it. I mean, there is a fabric connection, right? With Iron Man.
Yeah. This one, I don't really get it's fine, but Miles Finch, Brendan Fraser. What? Yeah.
It's a different character. Right. I mean, fine. I would have had to manufacture some of the reason to I wonder what that script is.
Yeah. Could have been any actor. Just throw in there. Fine.
Here's one. It's gonna live up in like the Hugh Grant as a new ballooper. Oh, hold on. I hope that there's perspective Brendan Fraser as an elf.
That's quite a thing. Santa has some interesting ones. First one, Steve was shemmy. He would be Cassus Santa in an Adam Sandler movie.
Or a Portlandia sketch. Yeah. John Reese Davies. Stella from Indiana Jones or the Lord of the Rings.
Or the Rings again. We come back to that. Gary Marshall, which is interesting. I mean, I Santa.
The Jewish Santa. Well, I mean, Kahn and what else is Jewish in this movie? Papa Elf. No.
It has no. It has no Jewish? I think it has no. One of the two old guys.
It's either Ed Asner or it's a pop elf. Bob Newhart. He's Bob Newhart. Either way.
He's a huge one. Two of our crew was already Jewish. And the last one I saw was James Garner. Santa.
Whatever. I do like the John Reese Davies. I like the idea that Elf is somehow in the Lord of the Rings universe. If it lives.
Yeah. Absolutely. All right. We're already here.
We're flying through this one. Let's do it. It's a recasting debate. It is time to recast debate.
Better go the door. It's time to be consturbate. I am going to have a situation. Yeah.
I got problems. So our main ones are Buddy, Jovie. I guess we go Walter and Emily. I don't know how it's really Buddy Jovie and Walter are the big three.
I've got a Santa and I've got a pop elf. Yeah. I've got some. I've got a couple of extras.
Yeah. I've got some. One of my extras I love. That's where I feel the strongest.
I like my pop elf and pretty much nothing else. All right. Interesting. Should we start Buddy?
Sure. This was my hardest one. I struggled here. I struggled here.
Yeah. There's no real reason why Will Sparrow still could not just step into this role again and play it now. Yeah. That's why doing these recent movies is tricky because we can't think the most impossible.
I will do mine. I have four. I have three and then I have a fourth bullet. I am playing fast and loose with all ages throughout this whole thing.
See, I tried to. I tried. I'm kind of close because I've been criticized for going outside it. So I really tried to stay and that's why I struggled.
Otherwise if I could have maybe done a bit better. I'm only playing with it with I think with regards to Buddy's age versus his father Walter. I'm doing a Harrison Ford, Sean Connery, father son situation. I'm only 11 years different.
I'll do my fourth which is not a real selection but I like it anyway. Jack McRayer from 30 Rock. I thought he would have been too old. He is definitely funny.
Yeah. He should be in his 30s. He's 52 or something. Yeah.
That's a good one. So my real number three is Mikey Day. Yep. I'm SNL.
I'm real number two. Too old is Andy Samberg. I would like Andy Samberg like when he was on SNL. Yeah.
And my number one again better if he's on SNL but would be Bill Hader. Yeah. Yeah. I thought about him too.
Yeah. I mean all the stuff will be, I think Bill Hader. Wow. Can you nail?
Okay. Allison, go ahead. All right. This was the character I struggled with the most because it's trying to find somebody that's going to come with the energy that really doesn't like can turn it up to 11 doesn't quite care about how people perceive them in some way.
It's a wild. It's an attitude. A wide-eyed innocence being funny. Right.
That's hard. So I've got Charlie Day. Yeah. That would be one actually.
Yeah. I thought I could serve. I do consider it. Yeah.
He's a little old but I kind of like that. It would be a slightly more snarky but also if you think about characters this person has played it would be great is Bon Yang from SNL. Yeah. I thought about him too.
Yeah. And then I've got a gender swap is Sarah Sherman. Oh. I like it.
She's so different than this. I know. I know. But we're doing it today.
So you get kind of a quirky twist to it. So that's where I am. So I got it. What do you think Eric?
All right. I also, this was the one I struggled with the most. I said Will Ferrell could still play us today. Yeah.
I did write down Andy Sandberg. Yep. But the one that I ended I think the one that I would go with it's a little bit different but getting into like the innocent sort of manage boy Michael Sarah. Oh.
That's actually pretty good. That's really good. That's pretty good. He would be nearly as high energy.
He could maybe turn it up but it'd be different. It'd be a different super bad Michael Sarah. Yeah. Or Lego Batman Robin.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.