A Mighty Wind

A fictional revival of folk music heavyweights took centre stage in the 2003 mockumentary called A Mighty Wind. Co-written by Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy, the film features an entirely original soundtrack with the cast performing the music themselves. Join co-hosts Jon and Mark as they tune into the Public Broadcast Network special "Ode to Irving" and watch out for those flower arrangements in the lobby.

Never did no wanderin' after all!

Transcript

Jon (00:00)
tonight on the Rock and Roll Theatre podcast. We're blowing peace and freedom. We're blowing equality. A mighty wind.

Hello everybody, welcome back to the Rock and Roll Theatre podcast. My name is Jon, I'm joined by my co-host, my brother Mark. Each week here on the Rock and Roll Theatre, we take a look at pop culture, music, movies, all sorts of fun stuff. And today we're looking at A Mighty Wind.

Mark (00:30)
Mighty Wind was released on April 16th, 2003. runs 92 minutes. Rated PG-13 or PG, depending on the source. I've seen a few different listings for that. It's considered a mockumentary comedy film. So Mighty Wind was co-written by Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy. It was directed and composed by Christopher Guest. At the box office, it generated

$18.7 million against a budget of only $6 million. So it made over three times its budget back. So that's a successful movie. It stars Christopher Guest, Michael McKean, Harry Shearer. That's Spinal Tap as we all know. Plus other standouts like Eugene Levy, Catherine O'Hara, Bob Balaban, Fred Willard, and many more from this Christopher Guest's mockumentary universe of films like Spinal Tap.

best in show, et cetera.

Jon (01:28)
The idea for A Mighty Wind came 20 years before the movie actually came out. The Folksmen that one of the groups we'll see tonight, which are the members of Spinal Tap, did a sketch on SNL on November 3rd, 1984, where they played these characters. They did Old Joe's Place, which is a song we'll hear in the movie, as well as Blood on the Coal. And funny enough, they wore skull caps at the time to pretend they were bald. But I think in the movie, they don't do that this time.

Mark (01:54)
So Mighty Wind is about a folk music reunion concert where three big-time folk bands, that's the Folksmen, Mitch and Mickey, and the new Main Street Singers reunite for a television performance concert for the first time in about 20, 30 years or so as a tribute to the recently deceased Irving Steinbloom. This is supposed to be a reference to a folk music producer named Harold Leventhal.

What's important to note here is that all of the music is originally written and performed by the cast. Christopher Guest insisted that the actors perform the songs live rather than lip syncing, contributing to the film's musical authenticity, and that definitely paid off.

Jon (02:39)
It absolutely does pay off. There's a great performances coming up here that we're going to talk about. But as we always do, we got a warn here for spoilers. If you haven't seen a mighty wind or you haven't seen it a long time, hit pause, go watch it, come back and we'll tell you all about it. And one quick little thing here before we get started. I know everybody asks, but it really does help out small independent podcasts like us. If you could like subscribe, comment, share, wherever you're at in the world, whatever platform you listen to this on that would really help us out. As well as we have a TikTok channel, a YouTube channel, all sorts of fun stuff going on.

over there. But for now, let's look at a mighty wind.

Mark (03:14)
When the film opens, we learn that there's been a death recently of Irving Steinbloom. So his children, led by his son, Jonathan, are trying to arrange some sort of tribute concert in his memory. He's contacting some different acts from way back in the day that were some of dad's favorites. So he wants to get the Folksmen. He wants to get Mitch and Mickey. He wants to get the new Main Street singers.

So they're working on this tribute show. They have an agreement to have it aired on the public broadcast network in New York city. He tells us a little bit about how he grew up and how his parents cared for him. Maybe a little bit too much. He was part of the Jewish polo league and he wore a helmet while he played chess. So right away we're getting this, this style of humor for the movie. Again, it is in this Christopher Guest mockumentary universe along the lines of

Spinal tap best in show that type of thing. So the humor is very Dry, but I I find it personally hilarious

Jon (04:19)
I always enjoy this type of humor myself as well and there'll be tons of it coming up here. We see a clip of the Folksmen who of course are the members of Spinal Tap kind of playing their same personalities, same roles they play in that band in this as well, but now they're a folk band. So we see them doing a clip of their big hit song, their one hit song as they kind of joke later on, Old Joe's Place

Then we fast forward to the present and they're at a barbecue, they're having a reunion. I guess they've gotten the word from Jonathan that, there's going to be this tribute for Irv. So they're kind of getting back together and seeing how things are. They reminisce about their time in the 60s and it's really funny. They first mentioned they were assigned to the Folktown label, which, you know, was a big success. They were like, right on, we're on the biggest folk label out there. But then they get demoted down to Folktown Records, which was a little of a smaller outfit. They mentioned that they had no distribution, a problem.

The artwork for the albums is only in two colors and I thought the funniest part of all of this is there was no holes poked in the records. So if you bought a Folksmen record you had to punch your own hole in the center of the record. the bassist explains it was kind of a wobbly experience but the music in it was great.

Mark (05:25)
You would have darn good time as they say. So we learn about the Folksmen's different albums. They show some album covers on the screen. It's hilarious. They're all one word and they end with the letter N and an apostrophe. So things like wishing, singing, picking. But there's actually an outtake scene that's available on the film's DVD or I'm sure you can find it on other sources online.

where they explain how one time they broke their rule a little bit later in their career and they had an album with two words instead of one and both ended in the letter G.

It was called saying something and it actually was described as them breaking the covenant with their audience.

Jon (06:12)
It's a good scene here where they go over their history a bit. like my brother said there, the outtakes are pretty easy to find on the internet if you know where to look. But it's a good scene, a fun scene, kind of sets the tone for who the Folksmen are. Then we meet our next big group here, the new Main Street Singers, who started just as the Main Street Singers. And we go over their history a little bit. They had 30 albums in 10 years. But some of the members left to open an adult's bookstore called The Three Wisemen.

Mark (06:40)
We go back to New York City and we're with Jonathan again. He's working on the tribute concert. He's trying to convince Mitch from Mitch and Mickey to return. He's not too sure about this. Mitch has become sort of isolated. He's, he's a little bit disconnected from society, let's say, and he's really trying very hard. He's got him on the phone. He's, he's telling him, Mitch, you were dad's favorite. And he's really trying to convince him. He, he believes he's got him.

before the concert, again, Mitch is a little bit hard to deal with, so he's not 100 % sure of that. We learn about how Mitch and Mickey had a huge moment on TV for their song, There's a Kiss at the End of the Rainbow, where they actually pause in the middle of the song, they lean into one another and have a kiss on TV, the crowd goes wild, everybody loves it. We learn a little bit more about the history of Mitch and Mickey, and this is one of my favorite scenes in the movie, maybe my most favorite scene in the movie.

We meet up with an audio engineer named Steve Lang, and he tells the story of working with Mitch and Mickey in the studio a little bit later in their career and what led to the breakup. And he said there was all kinds of stuff going on. There was shouting, Mickey was throwing things at Mitch, microphone stands, guitars, they were fighting, all this crazy stuff. It's hilarious.

We move along to the new Main Street Singers and they're working at a theme park and we see that they have a whole bunch of younger members now, because obviously when we go back in time, their first generation of members, I guess, are no longer in the band. We're introduced to Terry and Lori Boner, played by Jon Michael Higgins and Jane Lynch.

They're sort of the de facto leaders of the new Main Street Singers. There's a good scene here where Terry's describing his childhood and he says that he had cardboard cutouts of the Main Street Singers in his basement made out of gin boxes and these were his friends. It's really funny.

Jon (08:42)
They freaked me right out.

Mark (08:46)
Lori goes on to explain how she was an adult actress for some of the content featured at the Three Wisemen mentioned earlier. It's a funny scene. It sets the tone. It shows a good dynamic of what's going on in that.

Jon (09:00)
Yeah, kind of the other Folksmen are kind of the old statesmen where the new Main Street singers are more the new clean cut type of group, but not so clean cut. There's like little things around the edges here. You start to think maybe Terry and Laurie aren't aren't above board here, but we'll get into that in a little bit. But for the moment, Mitch is sort of in. He sort of said yes. He didn't really come out 100 % and said yes, but Jonathan's going to take this as a yes and basically tells the secretary. Oh, he's in. We're good. He's in. So we go over a little bit about Mitch's solo career after he him and Mickey

split up. And this might be my favorite moment of the movie. They show the album covers for his solo records that he made that are just great that they're so funny. His albums are called Cry for Help. And then another one called Colin It Quits where he's digging a grave basically on the cover. A really good moment really funny really well done. I find these style of movies always do really well with the fake albums, the fake movie credits, that sort of thing. So Mitch decides to go take the Greyhound bus to visit Mickey, I guess to see if they maybe rehearse a little bit see if this is going to work out for them for

the tribute show and they gets to the house he meets her husband and it's kind of an awkward scene Mitch hasn't seen Mickey in a long time since they basically had their big fight and broke up but the husband's trying to you know smooth the waters a little bit beef really friendly to Mitch and he says to Mitch do you like trains and Mitch deadpans I took the bus

Why he's asking about the trains is because he has his whole entire train model train town set up in his basement and wants to take Mitch down to see it while Mickey prepares lunch. it's kind of seedy though. The model train station has a brothel. There's a lot of women walking around the town. Mitch seems oblivious to that part it though and says, this is beautiful. I would love to visit in the fall. And then we reminisce a little bit about the very first time Mitch and Mickey ever met. She was playing in a group called the North Four at a folk club.

Mitch was in the crowd, people were heckling the girls. It was a girl group with her sisters, I should mention. And people were heckling them, yelling, take your tops off, things like that. So Mitch went up to defend them and he got beat up and got his jaw broken and wired shut.

Mark (11:01)
There's actually a really funny newspaper article that they show on screen of Mitch in the hospital saying local folk musician got pummeled. Pummeled is the word they keep using. So Mickey actually goes into the hospital and meets him. And that's the first time that they have a meeting and he writes her a note. She says every word of it was just poetry. And he ends up saying later on in the movie, well, I just really wanted a glass of water. So we'll see that come back here in a little bit.

Jon (11:11)
That's right, I remember.

Mark (11:29)
So next up we go to the Folksmen and they're doing some jamming of their own. They're in a house, it's a nice scene, they're really into it. The song they're doing is Never Did No Wandering and they're really kind of laying into it but then they kind of trail off and they kind of stop and Jerry says, well guys, know, I just had a vision here. ⁓ You know, we're up on stage at the tribute concert, what are we wearing?

And he goes on the record to say like, ⁓ I think I'm Mr. Anti Dickies. We don't want to get the Dickies shirts out again. We don't want that. So then, you know, that's a nice lighthearted moment. It's funny.

So then we go back to New York City and we're in the Jonathan Steinbloom office and he's got his siblings with him this time. And they're going over the different things to consider for the tribute and it's not going too well. So his two siblings that are with him, he has his brother, that's Elliot Steinbloom, played by Don Lake and Naomi Steinbloom, his sister, played by Deborah Theaker. And ⁓ there's some interesting interactions here.

So Elliot tells us he's totally not into folk music at all. He moved to North Dakota because he wanted to get as far away from it as he could. Naomi's having a bit of a breakdown. She has Kleenex in her hands. She's crying. She's very ⁓ bitter towards Elliot that, you know, he's not being considerate of their father in this moment. So ⁓ things aren't going too well. We move along again.

And now we're back with the new Main Street Singers. And we see Sissy Knox, played by Parker Posey, playing Mandolin in front of a group of kindergarten students, it looks like, but it looks like a funny, ⁓ it's a funny scene. At all, at all. She goes into her history a little bit, how she was kind of living on the skids and the new Main Street Singers saved her life. So that's why she decided to join the group.

Jon (13:14)
None of the kids are smiling or laughing or singing along, so it's pretty good. Yeah.

Mark (13:27)
We go back to Mitch, he's now in his hotel room ⁓ in Albany, I believe, and he's trying to kind of get his groove on with the songs. He's got his guitar out. He's trying to kind of find his footing, let's say. But ⁓ there's some, some noise at first. He hears some banging on the wall. gets progressively louder, louder and louder to the point where he has to stop.

He just looks at the wall sort of in a daze and the scene just cuts. It's funny.

Jon (14:00)
We meet a new character, Mike Lafontaine, the new Main Street Singers manager. He has a management called High Class Management and it's played by Fred Willard and he is doing the classic Fred Willard comedic style. he doesn't come across as too high class though, most of his jokes and his demeanor. He was known for being on some 60s variety show and his big catchphrase was, what happened? So he says this nonstop. Every time anything happens, he goes, what happened? he's very proud of his work he's done for the new Main Street Singers.

He mentions how he got them booked on cruise ships, on the Starline cruise ships, but he also mentions that there was an outbreak of dysentery on the recent tour and he was glad he skipped it.

And then we move to the PBN, which I guess would be the stand-in for PBS, the public's broadcast station that's going to be in New York City, that's going to be showing the tribute to Irv. We meet Lars Ulfen, who's a big time folk music fanboy played by Egbert Glee Jr. So we got lots of stars just popping up everywhere in this movie, even if we're just for short scenes. And he reminisces about how much he loves Irv, how much he loves folk music. He listened to a boy back in Sweden. He started his own folk group. there was one time where he had no tickets. He couldn't get into the folk show.

and Irv hooked him up and put him on the guest list. So he had a lifelong love for Irving and this is why he's doing it.

Then we see that Mitch and Mickey are jamming together. starting to sound good. It's coming together. This could be possible. Mitch will be able to hold it all together and they'll be able to do the show. But then we also see the new Main Street singers jamming and Terry, the boss of the band, is being kind of a jerk to the younger, newer members. He's making one member still wear their on-stage outfit even as they're just jamming and he says, when you hit the notes properly, you can take this off. He's like, but it's really hot. And he's like, I don't care. You're wearing it until I say so. So kind of an

Authoritarian figure kind of a jerk and we kind of get a vibe is this is what the new Main Street singers are like

Mark (15:47)
Okay, so now we're back in New York City. We're working on the logistics for the live show. The public broadcast network, PBN, decides they're gonna go live. They're gonna go live, they're gonna try and get a younger demographic. There's all kinds of debate about, ⁓ you know, if they can get a few dozen young people, that would be a big plus for them. But they decide to move forward with a live show, so everybody's excited about that. Jonathan gets a call that Mitch won't leave his room. So that is concerning.

There's a little bit of disarray going on here.

Then we move back to the new Main Street Singers and we learn a little bit more about Terry and Lori. They're telling us about how they are part of a, well, let's say a cult, even though they say it's not, wink, which is in nature's colors. And of course they wink at the camera when they describe this. We see a scene of them wearing pointy hats, holding sparklers and sort of humming while rocking back and forth. Terry goes on to tell us that this isn't a cult. They don't believe in crazy things and

fly around on broomsticks and wear pointy hats and then he kind of cuts off because we just saw them wearing pointy hats.

Jon (16:56)
Like all good cult members, the first thing they say is, oh, this isn't a cult. Sure looks like a cult to me. And we'll see a little bit more about that later. But in the meantime, Jonathan decides, well, I'm going to try to get Mitch out of his hotel room because this is going to be a problem. Mitch isn't in a great headspace, obviously. So Jonathan sits down with him and the people next door are still getting pretty noisy up against the wall. At this point, Mitch seems resigned to it, but Jonathan definitely notices it.

Mitch is now referring to himself as a man who no longer exists, which is definitely concerning if you have a live show coming up and your main headliner is in the hotel room, refuses to leave and thinks he no longer exists.

Jonathan gives him a pep talk and tries to smooth everything out and Mitch seems like he's back on board, but we'll see.

We check in quickly on the folks men, they're also jamming. They're doing a song called Local Man, which we'll hear later. But meanwhile, Mike, the manager of the new Main Street Singers, has his own ideas of how he wants their performance to go. He thinks at the end of the set, they should be soaked in water, just covered in water. Then he looks at the camera and says, especially the girls. And he wants, you know, I want the guitar filled with water, we'll dump it out and it'll be so funny.

Mark (18:02)
Kerplunk.

Jon (18:04)
Kerplunk. And he probably throws in a what happened in there too as well that I might have missed. So it's kind of a skeezy idea from Mike of how he wants to end this very uptight elderly folk show. So yeah, it gets shot down. It's not gonna happen. So we move over to the town hall, which is the venue that's going to host it. And we meet the manager of the town hall, who refers to himself as King Larry. And a rather funny

offbeat moment he says, really enjoy singing in church as well as juvenile halls.

Mark (18:34)
Yeah, it's pretty funny. He also describes that he's been up in the highest rafter changing light bulbs and he's also been down in the basement changing the rat traps.

So now we meet up with the Folksmen. This time they are driving in New York City and they're trying to find a hotel. It's not going too well though, they're not quite sure where they are. Alan, played by Christopher Guest, is actually driving the car and the other two members are giving him some tips from the backseat. Do you have a map? Yes, I have a map, but where is it? I left it at home.

So it is really funny and that's a good characteristic of a lot of Christopher Guest movies is some of the dialogue. they freestyle it and they go into it without too many scripted lines and that really does pay off. You see it in little moments like this where it is pretty funny and it does come off pretty naturally. We meet some of the PR people who are gonna be doing some of the press and media for this big concert show. They are...

Amber Cole played by Jennifer Coolidge and Wally Fenton played by Larry Miller. So they're very different from the different cast members that we've been introduced to so far. They are clearly not from the folk world, don't know anything about folk music, don't care anything about folk music.

It is gonna be folk music day in the Big Apple, the vibes are upbeat. We're back with Mike, he's cracking more jokes, as always. and Mickey are actually doing an in-store at Tower Records and they're meeting fans and they're almost overwhelmed by this. It's just like the old days and ⁓ Mickey, played by Catherine O'Hara, is making all kinds of remarks like, people are saying, you rock.

You rock my world. This is just too much. So I guess it's good for them. They're feeling good. They're reliving the old days.

Jon (20:17)
It's a really touching scene. seem really shocked and surprised all these fans showed up for them. There's a big line for them. They sign all the autographs. It's a really nice scene. And then we move on to the cocktail party that I guess the PR team tried to through together. Kind of reminiscent of there was also a cocktail party in the movie Spinal Tap. Similar type of vibe here. So a little bit of a repeat of that scene, but I liked it anyway. And we kind of get a hint of maybe the Folksmen and the new Main Street singers kind of have beef with each other. The Folksmen aren't really feeling them. They're kind of side eyeing them as they come in like

look who it is so they're not impressed the party's clearly awkward no one seems to really want to talk to each other or do anything and in the most surreal moment they decide that they're going to hum for Irv because Irving loved humming so they all do a big long hum to end the party

They're moving on to preparing for the show. Jonathan gets to the town hall and he is a annoying King Larry like crazy. Ask him all these dumb questions about microphone stands and mics and lights. And in my other job working as a DJ and as musician, I lot of casinos and big time halls and things like this. A lot of times there's managers, production people that come in, have no idea what they're talking about and just totally derail your day. So that's what Jonathan's doing.

Meanwhile, backstage Mitch and Mickey, they seem like they're getting ready. They seem to be pretty good. But meanwhile, Jonathan is so freaked out about the flower arrangements. He does not like them. What if someone gets trips on them? What if someone gets stabbed by one of the vines or one of the thorns? He's worried about allergies. And so King Larry in kind of funny moment just says, how about put some carnations in a beer stein? Would you like that? And Jonathan doesn't even get the joke and just goes, I don't see how that works at all.

Mark (21:57)
It is a great scene.

We're back with the Folksmen again. And this time their bass player, Mark, he's telling us about his skin routine. So he's adapted a new skin routine and he goes through the different steps and puts cream on his face. It's pretty funny. We're back out into the ⁓ tech booth where the cameras are getting set up and they're angling their different shots for the show and how are they going to record the different pieces? We have Lars joining the technical crew and giving some maybe unwanted advice about

Wouldn't it be great if we could have a big shot that pans out over the audience? And the lead crew members just like, yeah, it would be. Maybe we could get one of those cameras on a, you know, on a, on a, you know, could be flying around the top of the, top of the, ⁓ auditorium. Yeah, that would be nice, but clearly it's not happening at the public broadcast network.

We go back to Jonathan and King Larry again. Now they're looking at the different props that are on the stage. Does this really look 3D when you're out in the audience? And King Larry tells Jonathan, of course it does, it's painted to look 3D. I'm not quite sure, can you, what about this lamppost? This is an actual lamppost. Can you have this beside an element that's supposed to look 3D, but it's not really? So you can tell that King Larry's getting pretty annoyed with Jonathan at this point.

Eventually, he points up to the ceiling and says, are those, are those lights? And he says, yes, yes, they're lights. Well, what if, what if they fall on them? And he just cuts them off and smacks them on the top of the head. It is a great scene.

We see that the other Steinbloom kids are backstage and they're meeting some of the different cast members. Actually, Elliot goes to meet the Folksmen and they reminisce about how when Elliot was a teenager, he always wanted to get a card game going. He always had a pack of cards and he wanted to gamble. So they thought that was really funny. We go over to the new Main Street Singers. They're doing one of their witches in nature, nature's colors routine where they're both sitting on the floor cross-legged holding candles and

closing their eyes and humming.

Jon (24:09)
and saying a couple weird, inappropriate things. But no time for that, Ode to Irving is now beginning. we open up the show with Jonathan as the host. as could be predicted, he is an awful host. He is terrible. Rather than talking about his father or any of the music, he opens up talking about how the floral arrangements in the lobby could be dangerous, so make sure that you're very careful around them.

However, he rebounds with a good opening line here for the first act. He refers to him as the kind of infection that's good to spread around the new Main Street singers. So they're opening up the show.

however, they open with the Folksmen's never did no wandering. That is not cool. As a veteran of the industry myself, if you're opening for someone, you absolutely do not play one of their songs first before they come on. So this is clearly a diss from new new Main Street singers to the Folksmen and the Folksmen are backstage and they're listening on the little speaker in their dressing room. All of a sudden they realize they're playing our song. Obviously they're mad, but the bassist

still wants to open with it, which is a crazy idea. He's like, well, they've heard the toothpaste version. Now they can have the real version. He is clearly voted down. while this is going on, however, Mitch decides to do some wandering of his own while the song is playing and just kind of gets up from the dressing room and wanders away, which no one Mitch might not be a good idea. So the Folksmen rub elbows with the new Main Street singers, they're getting off the stage. Clearly, tensions are high. So instead, they decide to open with

old Joe's place which is they're kind of sing-along big hit they always say are big and only hit and the funny part is that the neon signs burned out so instead of saying eat at Joe's it's E I O's

Mickey realizes it's about time for them to get on stage, meaning the folks men are already halfway through their set and there's no sign of Mitch. So Mickey goes full on hello Cleveland, which is the most appropriate thing for this movie considering who made it, by wandering through the hallways, looking for him, trying to find him and goes right into the streets of New York City yelling his name. Meanwhile, the folks men basically finished their set and they say thank you, good night. And all of sudden Jonathan runs back out and says, you need to stretch, you need to keep going because the headliners aren't here.

Mark (26:17)
If the Folksmen continue to stretch, they begin by introducing their song, The Skeletons of Quinto. And they go on to sort of a long description of what it's about. It's about the Spanish Civil War and their group historian, Mark, on bass. He's going to explain it more, et cetera, et cetera.

I would actually say this is one point in the movie where I think they actually missed an opportunity for something really, really funny. We heard a little bit of this song earlier in the film when they were jamming and it's a very different sounding song. The guitar and the mandolin are almost at a very, very high, high tempo. They're going really, really fast. And Alan played by Christopher Guest goes into a ⁓ high baritone voice. He's speaking Spanish.

And then ⁓ Mark on bass comes over him with a very deep booming voice saying the silver tentacles of moon. This is really funny. I really wish they actually played some of this song. I thought they were going to the first time I saw this movie, but they don't. They just talk about it. So I really think that was a missed opportunity.

Jon (27:26)
not to spoil being into the soundtrack here in a moment, but I also thought that as well too, it has a very like almost more of a Spinal Tap feel in any other song that they do. And definitely reminiscent of like the Stonehenge scene in Spinal Tap, where I mean, it's just this over the top myth, crazy song, probably copy heavy metal ballads from that era, from that time. So you're right, I think that would have, they should have gone a little bit longer and actually played some of the song and had the crowd get really awkward and really weirded out by what they were playing at the folk jam.

Mark (27:56)
We go back to Mitch, he wanders back in to the dressing room. Mickey's pretty upset, but he pulls out a rose that I guess he got while he was out. So she sort of understands it. It's a heartfelt moment. She's, softens her, her anger leaves her and they're ready to take the stage. they're playing. The crowds loving it. The evening's progressing nicely. They're doing.

They're about to do their song, Kiss at the End of the Rainbow, and Mickey tells the story that we talked about earlier about how Mitch was the folk musician who was pummeled in the club and ended up in the hospital. she went to go visit him he wrote the poem for her. Every word of it was poetry. I really just wanted a glass of water is what Mitch says.

everyone is curious. They're gonna play kiss at the end of the rainbow, but it's been, 25, 30 years since they've performed. Are they going to do the kiss that made them so popular way back when?

Jon (28:52)
The side stage is sold out for this. That's an expression we often use when all like all the techs, all the performers on the bill, everybody's at the side of the stage to watch performer. It's a really good thing, by the way. So everyone is curious. Are they going to kiss? What's going to happen? It's been so many years. And most likely they all know that Mitch has been through some stuff, shall we say, since his heyday. So they're definitely very curious. And yep, they do the kiss. It's a great moment. It's a great way to end their set. Crowd goes nuts. They love it. But then everybody comes back on stage for

an all-star jam all the performers are there and they do the song a mighty wind is blowing which is the title of the movie of course the soundtrack song and it's a great way to end it great way to end the show I'm sure Irv would have been happy wherever he was

Then we fast forward to six months later, which is kind of catch up here at the end of movie to where everybody ended up. Mike Lafontaine, manager of the new Main Street Singers, is pitching TV show ideas. Most of them are really bad. He has an idea that they're all babies. They're all baby Main Street singers. Isn't that cute? In these really creepy photos of their heads on babies. And his other ideas for them to be called supreme folk, where they're like supreme court justices during the day. And then at night they have all they live in a house altogether and have these arguments about, who did the

being a woman. So good for them for living their full life. And we've pretty much gone full circle ending with that song. And that's A Mighty Wind.

Mark (30:44)
Looking at the film's soundtrack, we have a mighty wind, the album. So there's a full album of nothing but original songs from the film. It was released in 2003. It's called a folk rock parody album. Let's go through the songs. We're already familiar with many of these from the film.

First up, the Folksmen, Old Joe's Place.

Jon (31:13)
Old Joe's Place, their big hit, their only hit. Somebody tells me, and this is also the star of the SNL sketch, this might be the song that launched the whole idea of the Folksmen once they wrote this. It's a real round style singing type song where each lyric adds to the next lyrics, like the peas in the pod, the chickens in the farm, it just goes on and on and on and on like.

that we have to remember each line and keep repeating them and they do a good job of it it sounds authentic you know doesn't necessarily sound like a joke song it sounds like a real folk song from that era it's also kind of like a CBC vinyl cafe type of thing if you're into that sort of stuff but yeah well done by the Folksmen

Mark (31:50)
The new Main Street Singers, just that kind of day.

Jon (31:54)
New Main Street Singers, as we've said many times in this podcast, I have it all abbreviated here as NMSS, which is kind of a cool acronym. we like a lot of punk music. There's a lot of acronyms floating around. So that's not a bad one. It's a well produced song. It's kind of corny on purpose, but there's good harmonies in it.

Mark (32:11)
Mitch and Mickey, when you're next to me.

Jon (32:13)
This song can be cut right out of that folk era as well too. It's one of those kind of like talking pop song type of things, almost like a conversation. Well done. Catherine O'Hara sounds great. Eugene Levy sounds great.

Mark (32:25)
Up next, one of the most memorable ones from the film for sure, the Folksmen never did no wandering.

Jon (32:31)
All right, version number one here is a storyteller type of song about the drifter, that sort of motif. The riffs a little bit heavier than most of the other things we hear. Could use some more percussion in my opinion, but I realize that's a full paw in the folk world, so none of that.

Mark (32:47)
We're back with the new Main Street Singers, this time for Fare Away.

Jon (32:52)
It kind of has an East Coast type of feel to it, like a sea shanty or something of that nature. it has the line, call me Jim. And that's when Mike wanted their manager, them all soaked with water, especially the girls, as he mentioned several times. That's the song he wanted that to be done to.

Mark (33:09)
Mitch and Mickey one more time.

Jon (33:11)
⁓ Good voices here almost a Joni Vitchell type vibe to it. It's a real standout track. It's a good track a strong one

Mark (33:20)
We're back with the Folksmen, this time for Locoman, under two minutes.

Jon (33:25)
Yeah, I guess this is their kind of like Latin feel, tropical type of feel song. It's got a lot of upright bass, like right up front in the mix there, almost like an under the sea or like day old by Harry Belafonte type of thing.

Mark (33:36)
The new Main Street singer's The Good Book song.

Jon (33:41)
This sounds like a religious jingle basically. There's like Noah's Ark mentioned. It's really over the top, but of course it's meant to be over the top on purpose maybe hints a little bit at their culty ways.

Mark (33:52)
Folksmen with Skeletons of Quinto.

Jon (33:56)
They almost did it live on the special. They couldn't get through the intro that they were talking about. Like we mentioned earlier, it reminds me of Spinal Tap a little bit. The Stonehenge type of vibe to it where they're writing the huge epic, almost like Iron Maiden, Rime of the Ancient Mariner, if it was a folk song type of thing. And one of my favorite bands writes about the Spanish Civil War. And we may cover them on a future episode of the Rock and Roll Theatre here. The Clash also have a song about it.

Mark (34:22)
I said it before, I'll say it again. I really would have liked to hear that one in full in the movie. Next, the new Main Street singers, never did no one.

Jon (34:29)
⁓ the folks will not be happy about this. Those posters, the Main Street Singers, they're covering it. And this is more of a polished version of it. I kind of liked it better. It was a little bit faster, a little more angrier. So I kind of liked it. It kind of has a weird edge to it that, the culty Main Street Singers kind of have going for them.

Mark (34:46)
Mitch and Mickey, the Ballad of Bobby and June.

Jon (34:51)
This is a really good one too, it has a 70s sound to it. Almost even a 90s sound, a little bit to it as well too. It reminds me even a little bit of like The Pogues, that type of thing. I mean, not The Pogues, but kind of like that. It's a war ballad and it's a nice little surprise on the album here at track 11.

Mark (35:07)
Folksmen, blood on the coal.

Jon (35:10)
Similar vibe to the skeletons. I didn't like this one as much. I found it little bit repetitive. I found it little bit hard to get through, but it is also in the SNL sketch they did back in 84.

Mark (35:20)
Up next is the shortest song on the album, at 58 seconds, the new Main Street singer's Main Street Rag.

Jon (35:29)
It's a party song, it's a fun song, good. It has a good intro to it as well too.

Mark (35:36)
The Folksmen start me up.

Jon (35:39)
Yes, that song started me up. The Rolling Stones start me up. It's not in the movie, but apparently they did play it on lot of talk shows and performances around the time promoting the movie. I saw some clips of them doing that. I personally think it was unnecessary and I did not enjoy it.

Mark (35:57)
We're back with the new Main Street Singers again. This time it's Potatoes in the Patty Wagon.

Jon (36:02)
we got more of the Cornball Main Street Singers going on here. I'm starting to burn out on them pretty hard at this point. I don't think we needed this many tracks from the bands. I think this would have been a stronger album at maybe like 12 tracks, but we're gonna go right through the end here. We got two more.

Mark (36:18)
Mitch and Mickey, a kiss at the end of the rainbow.

Jon (36:21)
It's their signature song, of course it features the kiss that they're known for. It's a really good song, it's well done, it's almost like a small moments type song. great moment in the movie.

Mark (36:33)
Now we have the title track, which is an all-star lineup here. We have the Folksmen with Mitch and Mickey and the new Main Street Singers, A Mighty Wind.

Jon (36:42)
It's a strong ending to the record. It's the ensemble song where everyone's taking a turn. Everyone sounds really good. I'm a little surprised they didn't open the record with it. It's really fast. It's really upbeat. I might've switched around the track list here and make it a little bit shorter. But I mean, overall, the soundtrack to me, it's great. I mean, all the actors and actresses are singing, playing, what have you on this record. So I think that's a real good achievement, whereas most of the time they would just use a bunch of studio musicians and call it a day. So I really appreciate Christopher Guest taking the time and the effort to really make this something special.

special.

Mark (37:13)
Yeah, for sure, it's legit. If you look through the credits, you'll see most of the acting cast are here and they're contributing vocals and instruments and composition. It's very well done.

So, following the release of the film, was also a promotional tour that went on along with it. That was in the fall of 2003. It was to promote the film on DVD. It went to different cities like Philadelphia, New York City, Washington DC, Boston, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, and Vancouver. So I guess there was some legit live performance going on for this. I tried to find footage of this, but I couldn't.

Jon (37:50)
I was gonna ask you the same thing. I also, when we were preparing for this, I thought I would take a look and see where I could find it, and I couldn't find anything really about it other than what the dates were and where they played. That's all I could really find.

Mark (38:07)
Looking at the critical reception of A Mighty Wind, on Rotten Tomatoes, it currently has 87 % on its tomato meter, 75 % on its popcorn meter, 7.2 out of 10 on Internet Movie Database. I honestly think those numbers are a little low. I do agree with the 87 % on the tomato meter. I could see critics liking this movie, but I actually thought that it would have more audience, kinda big fans giving it a boost there.

Jon (38:38)
Yeah, when I saw it was 7.2 out of 10, I thought, that's a little low. I would have figured it would have been like 8, 8.5. I mean, if you're fan of that style of humor, I'm sure you love this movie. And I know lots of people when I was talking to them said, I'm doing a Mighty Wind, they were like, oh, I love that movie. So I know there's fans of them out there. I guess it just didn't really translate here this time on the numbers.

Mark (39:00)
The film does have a few awards though. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song for the song, A Kiss at the End of the Rainbow. And that was actually performed live at the 76th Academy Awards by Eugene Levy and Catherine O'Hara and they did it in character. It also won Best Song Written for a Motion Picture, Television or Other Visual Media Award. That's for, cause for guests Eugene Levy and Michael McKean at the 46th

Grammy Awards.

Jon (39:30)
I it deserves all the awards it got. Win a Grammy? Yeah, of course. I I doubt there was another song in a musical better than that one that year. So they deserve all the awards they get. However, we have a tradition here in the Rock and Roll Theatre for everything we like everything we think is cool or interesting. There's always a hater out there. So each episode, my brother scours the bowels of internet to find a one star review of what we just watched. So what do you got for me this week?

Mark (39:54)
This week we're on Internet Movie Database and we have a review by QPID, that's Q-U-E-P-I-D from March 25th, 2004. One star out of 10. The title of the review is How to Bore Yourself Silly for 95 Minutes and it goes like this.

This movie redefines with every single frame of video the term boring. This movie is a mockumentary of folk bands from the 60s trying to score a comeback. This has to be one of the dullest films I have ever tried to sit through in the past 10 plus years. The story lacks any type of climax or real plot. It is simply a lousy, fake documentary that attempts unsuccessfully

to make a mockery of folk music. One may expect that this film has at least a tinge of humor about it, but alas, no. The only good thing I can say about this film is that it discourages procrastination. Every single moment I watched the movie, I found a thousand other things I would rather be doing elsewhere. So if you want to clear the living room of kids, or need motivation to clean out the gutters or tackle some other menial chore,

then please do give it a watch. 12 people have found that helpful, 23 thumbs down.

Jon (41:27)
don't think the film is actually mocking folk music. They seem to put a ton of time and effort and love into creating all of those songs that are folk songs. So I would disagree with that. Also, I would think this reviewer lacks any sort of sense of humor because his dull boring movie with no humor had tons of humorous moments, many of which we just described.

Mark (41:44)
looking at the lasting legacy of a mighty wind. So this movie is definitely a cult classic. I consider it a staple in this Christopher Guest mockumentary universe. I think it's an excellent example of actors that are truly playing original music in film. You definitely don't see that every day. So it's very cool to see that. As we talked about the soundtrack, I think it is a standout for that reason as well. There's really strong performances by lead cast members like Catherine O'Hara and Eugene Levy.

And I know that this film has been celebrated by many recently in different theatres as part of tributes to Catherine O'Hara who passed away recently. I actually saw it in person in a theatre in one of those tribute showings.

Jon (42:28)
That's amazing. Catherine O'Hara and Eugene Levy starred in many, different things together. Going right back to the early 80s on SCTV. Of course, she's known for being in Home Alone. And more recently, they were known for Schitt's Creek, which is a Canadian show made by CBC Television that a lot of people discovered even after the show was over on Netflix and absolutely loved the characters. She has so many iconic lines now that are part of pop culture. A Mighty Wind is an excellent part of her repertoire of her resume. A film I would recommend you check out.

Thank you very much tonight for joining us in the Rock and Roll Theatre. I'm very quickly here before we go. I know you get tired of hearing of it, but it really helps us out. If you could like, subscribe, comment, share, whatever the case may be on whatever platform you prefer. We really appreciate it here at the theatre. It really helps out small independent podcasts like us get the word out. But for now, the theatre is closed.