My whole family loved this TV sitcom when it was on...I was watching DVD special features on THE DEPARTED disc, and in the "Scorsese on Scorsese" featurette, I was shocked to see this entry (complete with Vic Tayback at the grill counter)...WAS THIS THE ORIGIN OF THE TV SHOW "ALICE"?! By God, how the Hell did I miss that? Well, I've got to go out and get this one, now...
"Only a fool would say that." --STEELY DAN
You're not the only one! I didn't know that either until I watched the film last night.
shareI didn't know either. It was the weirdest feeling of Deja-Vu when I was watching this and all of a sudden Mel was there. And then Flo, Vera, weird. Then all of a sudden I realized why the name "Alice Hyatt" sounded so familiar. I had no idea there was a moview before the show!
All bubble blowing babies will be beaten senseless by every able-bodied patron in the bar!
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That because this movie was a drama. The producers of the TV show took one section of this film and made it into a comedy. The Flo of the film was mean, nasty, down and dirty. The Flo of the TV show was a damn clown.
Anybody else notice the well-known acting teacher Marty Brinton (listed as Martin Brinton here) in a one-liner early in the movie?
How come I knew that 'Alice' from TV was adapted from 'ADLHA' way back when but never heard of the well-known acting teacher Marty Brinton?
Who were some of his past students that became famous?
I haven't seen the show, but I don't think the film Flo was any of those things. Where was she ever mean or nasty to anyone. She had a helluva mouth on her, but that was more amusing than mean. Only Alice didn't see it that way and eventually she got to like Flo too, so I don't see how you can say Flo was mean and nasty.
Poorly Lived and Poorly Died, Poorly Buried and No One Criedshare
I saw the movie up the theatre when I was 12 and love it. When I heard it was going to become a sitcom I had my doubts. They kept the diner and the character names and Vic Tayback--but they changed everything else. Alice's character was made more confident, her son became a blond-haired hot kid, Vera became a "funny" neurotic and Flo was loud-mouthed BUT sweet and kind. Both the movie and the show are good but the movie is a drama and the show is a comedy.
shareVic Tayback is the bridge between the movie and the TV show. He (happily for us) plays Mel exactly the same in both, especially the scene at the end of the movie when he's in a panic.
shareExactly. He was the same character in both. And I agree with you...he was just great:)
shareAnd remember that Diane Ladd joined the TV show as Belle Dupree, a waitress that replaced Polly Holliday's Flo!
Sam Tomaino
Yeah Vic tayback as in both the movi and the sitcom, as well as Diane Ladd for two or three seasons back in the 80s after Polly Holliday (TV sitcom Flo) left.
I remember watching the sitcom as a child in the 1980s (I was actually born in the year between the movie was released and the sitcom debuted. You figure out when. ) and now that I've seen the original film, I like both. I always loved the characters from the TV show, but the movie characters were great too. I also liked the difference in Vera from the show, where she was a bit of a hapless geek who loved fairytales, to now seeing the movie version where Vera was more Emo, rode motorcycles and read gothic novels...albeit still a bit hapless as a waitress.
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The TV show M*A*S*H is based on the movie MASH.
The movie Star Trek: The Motion Picture is based on the TV show Star Trek.
http://tinyurl.com/cjsy86c
Don't forget Mr. Belvedere!
shareThe biggest difference I saw between this movie and the show was that in this one, Alice is a relatively uneducated woman from the rural southwest trying to make it as a singer after her husband is killed in an accident. In the TV show, she's a relatively no-nonsense Jewish woman from New Jersey whose car breaks down in Phoenix and stuck there trying to make it a singer on the side.
I have to disagree; The film's Alice was also no-nonsense, while Linda Lavin's version was not always self-confident
shareThere's a neeeeeeew girrrrrl in town, an' she's look-kin' GOOD!
There's a fresh freckled FACE in the nei-hay-bor-hood...
dear god, why do I know all the words to this song (???)
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