Laker Jim’s Fletch Cast
Laker Jim’s Fletch Cast
Interview with Dana Wheeler Nicholson (Fletch)
Episode 38 - Interview with Dana Wheeler-Nicholson We're cracking open the nostalgia vault in our latest episode as we're joined by the talented Dana Wheeler-Nicholson, the captivating beauty from the movie 'Fletch'. Dana pulls back the curtain on her exhilarating journey in showbiz, starting from her first foray into acting, straight through to her stellar breakthrough at a tender age of 23. With a hearty serving of laughter, Dana narrates the amusing anecdotes from the 'Fletch' set, including Chevy Chase's improvisation antics and the peculiar intermissions between takes.
As we jumped between decades, Dana transports us back to her experiences during the filming of 'The Battle of Shaker Heights' for Project Greenlight, and trust us, it's a riveting tale. We also get to hear about Dana's singing aspirations, and her pursuit of this dream at the legendary NYC nightclub, Moomba. On top of that, Dana spills the beans on her time on the sets of 'Seinfeld' and 'Friday Night Lights', and offers her perspective on how the beautiful Utah landscape has transformed over the years.
We wrap up this engaging episode by probing into Dana's thoughts on a potential Fletch Con - and we can assure you that it's a discussion you won't want to miss! We're thrilled to have been able to invite you on this journey with us and Dana, and we're certain you'll be left wanting more. So, tune in and get ready for an unforgettable conversation with Dana Wheeler-Nicholson!
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Fletch & Fletch Lives are Copyright 1985, 1989 Universal Studios and distributed by MCA/Universal Pictures. The Fletch Soundtrack is Copyright MCA Records. Confess, Fletch is Copyright of Miramax with Paramount distribution. All images and sounds are the intellectual property of Universal Studios. They are used only with the intent of public appreciation of a great film and possible publicity for its place among the great comedies of our time. We imply no rights to the characters or intellectual propert...
Hey, this is Dana Wheeler Nicholson, and I'm very flattered that you've chosen to listen to me on the Fletchcast, but I'm also very married. You're trying to hit on me, aren't you? Take it away, guys.
Speaker:Broadcasting live and around the world from Cabana One, the only podcast that's all ball bearings, your ultimate source for everything, fletch. Thank you, doc, you ever serve time. Laker Jim and his beat reporters will stop at nothing to make sure Fletch lives forever. Forever. They don't shower much. This is Fletchcast.
Laker Jim:Thank , S ammy. Welcome everybody of Fletch Cast. I'm your host, Laker Jim, joining me today, with Bob and assignment my lone co-host, a man who just spent $3,000 on Scrub Brush the one and only Jake. Jake. We have a really exciting show today.
Jake:I can't wait for this show. I tell you what we've been. This is something we've been talking about for a long, long time. Initially I was going to take that $3,000, go buy myself some nice new tennis whites, but the paperwork had already been signed, so I guess we're just going to have to see how everything plays out. But yeah, I'm really excited to talk to Dana about Fletch.
Laker Jim:Absolutely. She's someone we talked about on our very first conversation before we started the podcast, and I said listen, jake, you both live in Austin. She's got to pump her own gas. Eventually, have your head on a swivel, let's find her, let's get her on the show. And today's the day.
Jake:Yeah, I would assume, in a town this small of Austin, that sooner or later I would run into her. But I thought maybe sooner or later I might run into her and check out why. On H-E-V. But that's okay.
Jake:We finally got her and I think it's going to be a great interview. And you're right, this is someone that was at the top of our Mount Rushmore as far as interviews when we started this podcast. Obviously, Chevy and Dana were definitely too, along with Tim as well, and obviously we'll be talking to Chevy a little bit later on in the season, but I'm excited.
Laker Jim:Yeah, absolutely, dana will be calling in any minute now. You've got your boyd aviation mug. I've got my boyd aviation shirt. We're ready, but I got to admit I'm a little nervous. It'll be fine, just that natural. I was afraid you were going to say that, yup, and there she is.
Jake:All right, go ahead.
Laker Jim:In-N-Out Burger. Can I take your order please?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Hi y'all.
Jeff Smith, Clue the Movie Podcast:How are you?
Laker Jim:We are doing fantastic. Fletch Fans joining us on the show. The former, mrs Stanwyk. Dana Wheeler- Nicholson. Dana. Welcome to Fletchcast.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Thank you so much for having me. It's very exciting to relive this amazing funny film.
Jake:No, thank you very much. We really appreciate it.
Laker Jim:Now, this is something that FletchFans have been clamoring about for quite a while, so I'm glad we could finally make it happen.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yeah, you know, I don't mean to be coy about doing this. I just am pretty shy and so I just tend to not do anything like this. You know, that's my bed, I know. Anyway, thanks for having me. It's nice to be here.
Laker Jim:And knowing that there are not really any interviews with you out there, it truly is an honor to be able to talk to you today. Thank you, I appreciate that.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Boyd Aviation, haha
Laker Jim:Of course. Are you crazy? Both just wanted to support the family business. Plus, we'd like to get them on as a sponsor. All right, let's get started. Talk a little about how you got into the business yes, how you got the acting role. I know you were in your early 20s at the time.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I was in art school my whole life. I'm from New York City and I was a very internal child and drew and read and that's basically all I did and rode horses and I was. I was in art school. I was at Parsons School of Design in New York. I was in my foundation years and I took an acting class in New York because I was so shy and this you hear this a lot from actors that they're so shy and they're so kind of. You know, I've learned more about what that's about in my later years, but I just felt like I needed to be around people and not just in a studio painting and drawing by myself.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:And my life was difficult at that time. I was a teenager and my family life was hard and I just started taking an acting class at a studio in New York called HB Studios, which was Herbert Berghoff, who was a great theater method guy and I loved it, and he the teacher that I had at the time at the studio was extremely supportive and said you should really think about doing this, getting into a real school. And so I changed colleges and I ended up at ended up at a college in New York called Sarah Lawrence College where they had a great theater department. So I started trying to talk in front of people and do plays and I very quickly got scooped up by a professional situation and very quickly got an agent.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:And that's a story in and of itself and because this sort of thing I don't think happens anymore the exact story. But I ended up getting an agent really quickly while I was still in school and then really quickly getting cast in movies and stuff. So I just kind of went from there. I left school. I've never finished school, sadly, and you know, had a big splash and getting Fletch was happened very quickly too. I think I was 23 years old, I hadn't even finished school.
Laker Jim:Now your your last name, wheeler Nicholson. I mean as a, as a preteen watching Fletch and prior to the internet or being able to look anything up. I just assumed you were maybe an ex of Jack Nicholson or you know, but the hyphenated Wheeler Nicholson name actually has a lot of history behind it.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yes, it does. So my grandfather was called the major Malcolm Wheeler Nicholson and he founded DC Comics, is the accredited founder. It's a complicated story but basically he created DC Comics but was bought out, shoved out, sort of pushed out very, very early on. So he doesn't. The only recognition is by real comic book fans aficionados and he, you know it is it's, it's his legacy, but he was bought out very, very early. So our family doesn't have much to do with any of it Hasn't really ever, except for certain biographers and things coming to us. And he was inducted into the comic book Hall of Fame at Comic Con a few years ago, several years ago. So that was really great. And my dad is still alive. His only remaining son is my father, who's 95. And he's actually writing a biography, or co-writing or I guess, with a comic book historian and journalist, about my grandfather.
Laker Jim:Right now, as we speak, we're getting his stories finally recorded and hopefully you know putting this biography so yeah, and it would seem like common sense to turn that biography into a movie because, number one, comic book movies are the only ones making any money these days, your husband being a filmmaker, you being an actress, and your family having a story, and it being the story of somebody who founded something and then got screwed, seems like the perfect recipe of what people are looking for these days.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yeah, very much so, and it's very Tesla, I mean, it's very American you know story where someone sort of stumbles into because of their creative head brain, the way it works. He was, you know. Now I know what his you know mental thing brain was like. But yeah, he, his story, is kind of a typical American story.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:In those days, everything so new, you know, everything in this culture was so new, and the only thing that existed at the time were comic strips.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:There were no books and artists weren't being paid as so, in in, in a way, he was sort of doing a startup, what would be the equivalent of a startup today, and he, you know, had to scrap around for money and he was, you know, historically it's always like he never paid people and you know things like that that you think, well, yes, okay, I'm sure there was some lousy business sense.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Obviously, because he got bought out so early by people who really knew a lot better and had a longer game in mind, which he did not have. He had no business sense. He had no sense of what he was even doing. He was trying to feed five children and had a very fancy wife who was not okay with the way he was just sort of like. He was like an inventor and he was a military man and he was used to sort of moving around and there was a lot happening at the time that didn't really lend to his particular the way his mind worked and he was just creating something that didn't exist and scrapping around and I think DC has done very well. Have you heard?
Jake:of them? Yes, so was that your initial goal? Was he influential on you to maybe go like the art track? You said that's what you were initially and obviously so. That was that your initial goal. Career is something like that.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yeah, I was always out of my siblings and family. I seem to be the only one who really pursued anything creative. It was definitely my brain is only creative. I don't have, you know, I have executive function disorders and ADHD and all these things that showed up, as you know, things later that I could name and I could say, oh, that's why I can't do anything sensible. But yeah, I mean, I've always only wanted to make things and create things and I only act. I sing, I work with you know drawing, and I started out wanting to design costumes for film and TV and that was my end fashion, like I was really interested. That's what I went to Parsons for was to end up designing clothing, specifically costuming. At the time I thought theater and film and ballet. You know that was my idea as a kid.
Laker Jim:You mentioned going after Fletcher 23, probably 22 at the time. Yeah, I was listening to an interview that Michael Richie did right before he died and they were talking about screen testing and they weren't necessarily talking about Fletcher, but it made him bring up the role your role of Gail Stanwyck and how that was an important role to be screen tested. So let's take a listen to Michael Richie talk about it and then I'd love to hear your comments afterwards about your experience.
Jeff Smith, Clue the Movie Podcast:Is the screen test part of the process to for you with any casting? Have you ever done that?
Michael Ritchie:Oh sure you can't avoid it. I mean it's for the major star support roles. Fletcher certainly Fletcher's wife, not wife Tim Addison's wife, fletcher's girlfriend in the movie was a part that had to be screen tested. I don't do it that often. I try to avoid it because inevitably if you do a screen test the person gets shot down. Screen tests have terrible track records, really. Oh yeah, just because it isn't the finished film. It's not that even if the supporting actor is there, he's not giving the supporting actor performance, something looks wrong and it makes people edgy and then they don't approve. And it's never for you. Screen test is never for you personally, it's always for the studio.
Laker Jim:Wow. So if it doesn't work, how did you overcome the odds and get the role?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Well, from what I can remember, my memory is so I was cast in a movie at the time called Into the Night that John Landis was directing. I got cast in New York just in a regular audition. It was a movie starring Jeff Goldblum who at the time was trying out a leading man thing. It was a big deal. But I was also cast in a little movie called Mrs Soful, which wasa period piece, starring Mel Gibson and Diane Keaton and Matthew Maudine, directed by Jillian Anderson. So I had a small, I had a supporting role in that. It was a beautiful movie, I loved it.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:But it got pushed because of a weather situation. There was no snow. The whole movie took place in snow, waiting, waiting, waiting. So it started to bump into I know this sounds like a long story, but it leads back.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:It bumped into the timing of Into the Night, where I had the lead in that film and I was coming out of nowhere. I had just come out of school. So I had to choose between staying in the lead and into the night and staying in the supporting part in Mrs Soful. And I chose to stay in Mrs Soful, which was like my agents went fucking batshit. They were like what are you doing? And this is the lead in strong land is blah, blah, blah. And I at the time I was like 22. I was like so what? You know? I like this one better, I like the park better. I get to have a Polish accent and wear period costumes, which was my thing, you know, and it was Mel Gibson, I mean, oh my God. So I stayed in the smaller part. All that to say is that Landis lost his mind.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:He, you know, after he had his you know meltdown about it. He said, well, oh, who should I cast? And I was like I've heard of this wonderful actress named Michelle Pfeiffer I don't know if you've heard of her. She seems like she'd be great cut to. And that leads to they were casting. They were starting to cast for Fletch and Landis's offices were right in Universal with the Fletch people, with Alan Griezman and Sean Daniel and all them, and so they were cast. They were casting around and it was like every actress in town wanted to be opposite Chevy and do this big movie. And Landis bothered them and harassed them and harangued them and kept. You know, said Dana Wheeler Nicholson, you've got to look at her, you've got to look at her. And they were like who he was, like I cast her in my movie. She turned me down, you know like that. And so they met with me and you know we hit it off.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I don't remember a screen test, which is so weird. I remember getting flown back out there. I was back in New York. I remember getting flown back out there and actually meeting everybody in a room at Universal and meeting Chevy in a room and connecting with him personally. And I don't actually remember a screen test, so that's, I'd have to really look at it to remember it. I just remember laughing a lot in that room with Chevy and feeling extremely in the moment. I had no, I was so young that I had no problem just being in the moment and, you know, being completely present and responding to him completely naturally from my you know I adored him and he made me laugh so hard. That was my memory and my Donna Karen shoulder pad situation which I picked out.
Jake:I remember that, I remember polka dots.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:There were 80s polka dots involved in very big hair, so that's my memory. I'd have to be checked, fact checked on that.
Laker Jim:Did you well. Unfortunately Michael's not with us to fact check, but now it was. It's something where you read lines with Chevy, or was it just informal meetingery?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I feel like it was both. I feel like we were in the room, I feel like there was, there were scenes, but it was mostly improv, you know, which is how it ended up.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I think they wanted to see if I could hang with him you know, if I bounce back with him, because he was like, you know, he was like Muhammad Ali at the time, you know, comedy wise, and I think they wanted somebody who could, you know, be in the moment with him and respond to him, naturally, and not be all worried about their accuracy stuff.
Laker Jim:Now we heard some name actresses and even some A-listers were vying for this part. Do you remember who you might have been up against?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Farrah Fawcett. Wow, freakin Farrah Fawcett. I mean everybody in town and she was at the time she was like wanting to do a whole thing and she became. You know, she was a fantastic actress. Obviously wasn't quite known for that at the time, but she was crossing over into very serious stuff.
Laker Jim:Definitely Can you remember anybody else.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:That's the only person I remember, but they told me everybody I mean it was everybody at the time and I remembered her. I guess she wasn't like A-list at the time necessarily in that milieu, Definitely in TV and stuff, but there were other actresses at the time that were giant stars, who everybody wanted this part and I was absolutely nobody, you know, obviously. So it was big, it was big ripple sort of apparently went through. You know that this girl, whoever she was, with the polka dots, you know so when you got the role.
Jake:so how did you approach it? Did you know? Obviously she's a character in the book. Did you know anything about the books? Did you read the book? Did you just get notes from you know Michael Ritchie and the producers? How did that work out?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I was not aware of the books and they and Michael definitely presented the books to me. I don't remember specifically reading them but I at the time I think I was just more focused on because he said he wasn't very concerned about me, he was just playing, you know, directly from the book Because it was Chevy, there was going to be so much that was sort of invented and so on, and so what they were focused on was her being someone who was very privileged, very moneyed, very protected, and so the betrayal that she has with her husband and her attraction to the Fletch character. You know it had to read. It had to read like this young, wealthy woman would actually be attracted to someone like this character. That's sort of what we were working on, you know. Did you ever?
Jake:meet Gregory McDonald. I didn't even know. I know he was on the set a few times he was.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:He was on the set and we met and I was again very shy so I'm sure I didn't, you know, present in any real interesting way for him. But yeah, he was on the set and we met. He was thrilled, I think. I think there's, you know, more documentation than he was not, but he seemed very happy with what was going on Well.
Jake:Actually, I knew Greg. We were actually friends for years, oh did he like it? He loved it. He always spoke very highly of you.
Laker Jim:Oh cool, I'm sure I know it was a different time in the early 80s, but not until recently I really thought about a 23 year old and Chevy at the time was 41. So really pairing you together was an odd gap of age and even Matheson was 37 or 38 at the time. But for some reason it just, it just worked. It didn't seem odd at all.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Well, that's because I'm so goddamn mature.
Jake:He pulled it off, he really did.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:And I had good hair?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:No, I mean, I think that was sort of part of it. Is that, even though I mean I'm obviously very young in the movie? But at the time, like I think about and I do not mistake me when I compare myself to but I look at old movies and you think about Lauren Bacall or somebody who was 19 when she did to have and have not and met Humphrey Bogart. You know, I think it's got something to do with and again, I'm not selling myself in this way, but I think it has something to do with when being someone I was born and raised in New York City. It was the 70s. When I grew up.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:It was a tough town at the time. My family life was tough. I was extremely independent. I was pretty mature for my age. I came from a background where young people were treated like adults, meaning we took care of ourselves and we had jobs and we were allowed to drink wine at dinner. We weren't as infantilized or as young people seem to be today. Listen to me right now. Oh my God, I sound like grandma.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:But you know, I think there's been this move toward 23 year olds seem really young now and I just didn't seem that young because I didn't feel that young. I felt like a grown-up. I was treated like a grown-up my whole life and so I don't know, maybe that's something they were looking for was someone who wasn't trying. I also don't have the kind of vanity where I was concerned about how I looked or how it read. I was just trying to play that this woman would be married to this sort of older man, that maybe that led to her being so betrayed because she is young and she's in this protected bubble with her daddy, and so I don't know, I was really young, but I didn't feel that way. I didn't behave that way.
Laker Jim:Something we always joke about on the podcast is that people in the 80s appeared older than they really are, Like George Went, for example. In the movie Fat Sam seemed like he was like 48, 49 years old. George Went was in his early 30s.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:He was, like always, a grown-up.
Jeff Smith, Clue the Movie Podcast:Always.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:He was always that guy, probably at birth, yeah, but that's right. So the hair and makeup at the time. I'm sorry people out there but it aged you. The stuff that I had in my hair was so matronly. Everything was really really matronly and kind of the big hair and big shoulders and nothing sort of streamlined. It was a weird time for fashion and for that stuff and it definitely aged all of us, all the actresses at that time, and we all look so much older than we were.
Laker Jim:You brought up your co-host your hair. That thing was a force to be reckoned with. Did you wear it like that at the time, or was that specifically for Fletch?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I was so horrified. I remember I will never forget this sitting in hair and makeup because I was like a hippie kid from New York. My hair was like long and blonde and curly always, but they did this thing. I remember it in hair and makeup, looking at myself, and I was so new, I was so young, I just thought I couldn't say anything and I just had to do it. And I remember, specifically after that movie, thinking I will never keep my mouth shut again about and it's going to live in perpetuity, this hair and this is nothing against anybody.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:My God, it was 1983 or whatever. That was what was happening hair-wise. It wasn't happening for me personally and I had to really convince myself that this character would be having this hair. It was also the first time I had colored my hair, which I'd never done. They wanted it. I forget my hair was quite light and I think they wanted I can't remember it was either they wanted it lighter or darker, I don't remember. It was the first time I did that. It was the first time I did a perm. It was all very 80s. The whole thing was like a big 80s mashup, hair-wise Too funny.
Laker Jim:All right, take us back to the first day on set. Now, is that something where you kind of just thrown to the wolves, or do you have a chance to rehearse with Chevy? How does day one, first scene, how does that work?
Jake:Yeah, and do you remember what your first few scenes were that you shot?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Memory says it was the stuff in the mansion with Alan in the library. I remember starting with that stuff, so it felt like an easy start, meaning it was in a house. We were there, I think, a couple of days at least. The scenes were pretty fun and straightforward. It was the discovery of the betrayal, obviously, and Alan revealing who he is. So there was real acting. That was happening for everybody. Tim really wanted to play this guy, his struggle at that moment, and to come off very manipulative and a bad guy. Really, chevy was really working. There was acting going on and it was really fun.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I remember we were shooting in a place in Beverly Hills or in Bel Air, beautiful home in Bel Air. I was landing on Mars for me. I didn't know where I was. It was so beautiful. It was so Hollywood. I had a car rented. I was living at the Chateau Marmont in a bungalow where John Belushi had died, next door. Moments before I felt like I'd landed in.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Were you nervous? I mean I had done two smaller parts. I had done a part in a movie called the Little Drummer Girl with George Roy Hill as the director. That's where I really learned how to even get on your mark and where cameras were. So I had a little bit, and Mrs Soful too, which was a complicated shoot. So I had a little bit of chops, just a tiny, tiny bit of chops. I could pretend I kind of knew what was happening and Michael Ritchie and Chevy were so kind and supportive and helped me, even when I was a dummy. So I felt like I think that was the beginning or maybe it's when I woke up out of my stupor of being doing this thing. I mean, I was in such a complete altered reality. So that's my memory. I could be wrong.
Laker Jim:No, I think you're right, because when we talked to Tim Matheson, he mentioned that his first scenes were also filmed at the Hearst Mansion.
Jeff Smith, Clue the Movie Podcast:Yeah, that's what I thought.
Laker Jim:Hearst had bought for his mistress, marion Davies, and he just could not get over how gorgeous the house was and how extravagant it was, how beautiful the library is and just that people lived like that.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:We were all just like what, and to me it was possible that people lived like this. I'd seen it in movies, but I don't think I'd ever walked around.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Not even, like my dad, rode horses. He was a fox hunter. We were in this very waspy backdrop in New York and Long Island Not that we were fancy, it was just his sport of choice and so we were around east coast stuff, but nothing like this. I mean old waspy east coast. People's places are crumbling and there's no food in the fridge. So this was quite something. This house Wow.
Laker Jim:Now you bring up horses. The Hearst Mansion is also the Godfather House, and that's where the horse's head was left in the bed in the famous scene in the Godfather.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Oh really, I didn't know that. That's a great little bit of news.
Jake:Joe Don Baker was in that scene too. Recall working with him.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yeah, I guess he'd just come out of walking tall. He was a deal. I feel like they had really, you know, they really got a big. It was big get getting Joe Don Baker. He was extremely serious, sort of intimidating, which was good for the part. I remember thinking he didn't really. He was extremely serious in terms of, like you know, approaching the scene and what had to happen. He kind of was a little bit like commandeering you know, rightfully so.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I remember he would really sort of change it up a lot, and so did Tim and I think so did I. I was never very consistent in general I never am, which is annoying for everybody else. So I remember feeling like I liked watching him because he really did shift around his character and what he was up to. So but yeah, he was kind of in his own world. He wasn't super personable or chatty or anything, and again I was like this girl who cares, you know, lady, but I could be wrong about that too. That could be my, just my impression. Everybody was very respectful of him and tiptoe around him a bit.
Laker Jim:Yeah, that seems to add up from other things we've heard about him. Yeah, I want to talk a little bit about the improv. Yes a lot of people credit Michael Rich's being the perfect director for Fletch because he had the ability to rain Chevy in and shoot stuff by the script and then allowed Chevy to kind of do his own thing for a few takes. Is that something you were made aware of or something you kind of just had to learn on the fly?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:So, yes, all of that to me tracks. Again, I was so new that I was very and I was clocking everything and Michael included me. He treated me like a co worker and an equal in a way obviously not only in the way that he would. He wasn't secretive. There wasn't any like let's tiptoe around the movie star stuff. He was. He was in his own world with Chevy, for sure, but it was very clear that he was walking that line Because on the day we'd all be walking that line and aware that Chevy had his agenda and the way he liked to work and the way he was used to working and the reason he got cast was because he works that way. So that was a B.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:There was a story and and a director who was trying to tell a story and make that track, and so, yes, I feel like that's exactly right that Michael was in this constant sort of walking that line with Chevy and they worked it out like they really did. Obviously they did because it's evident in the movie, chevy was uncontainable In a great way. He's, he's a genius. And so Michael wasn't trying to, I don't think, contain him as much, as just sort of guide things so that he could get the choice of having the story. A lot of times he ended up throwing out that stuff and what you see in the movies, chevy just being a genius, and those are the things that Michael was talented enough, I think, obviously, to know when he had gold, and at the time with Chevy, it was just a lot of gold, you know how often did the actors on the set break character and just start dying laughing and ruin the take on a Chevy improv every?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:day, every minute of every day, like everything he said to me was not ripped and you know when he, when he was off camera and my close ups, he was just throwing things out there and you're seeing me just respond to him, you know, and his improv stuff, and then it made me have to, you know, jump in there, which was why I think I got cast, was that I loved it and I loved him. You know, I just loved him.
Jake:Hey, let's talk about the cabana scene, which is probably the most famous scene that you're in. Do you remember rehearsing that, or was it? Was it a lot more improv was? Was it more of a script? Do you recall?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yeah, again we were at the Riviera tennis club in Brentwood, which was also incredibly fancy and and again I wasn't a stranger to you know, clubs or anything, but this again it was at a level that was like you know, next level for me. So we were in these cabanas again for a few days. I know that I think most of the rehearsing was for me because I was fucking things up. It seemed to me a lot, I don't know, I couldn't hit Mark's. There's this one moment where I think, where I have to jump into frame and say something to him, like he's going, he's going out the window and I come into frame and I'm like, whatever I say, I could not hit that mark. And it's like 500 takes for me to just land in there and say this. And then finally it was like one of the camera guys jumped in and did it and then, like the wardrobe girl jumped in and they would everybody like doing my shot because I couldn't do it, and they're all like, see, it's really easy, and that it seemed to me and the tennis stuff was incredibly real because I couldn't hit the ball and it was all just really real.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:But I don't remember Chevy us rehearsing. It was mostly just like open the door, save a thing, close the door. I don't feel like he was really that interested in rehearsing that stuff a lot and that's just where we're sitting and kind of blocking. It seemed like more than anything, because a lot of that stuff is just improv. There's the information we have to get across, obviously the story of about you know, my husband has done this and he's not, he's a bad guy and me kind of like wait, what? So we had to get story stuff across, obviously. But in between all that was all the stuff that you see that gets quoted endlessly, which was all Chevy, I mean just all him in the moment.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:He that shot where he walks in and says can I borrow your towel? I don't know if you've heard that line before. He just said that as he walked in the door. That's like that was the take and you know, I had to kind of hold it together sort of.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yet know, this character is completely charmed by this guy, you know, and that was the thing was that I found him so charming and so I don't remember a ton of rehearsal except a lot of blocking. Also, something really weird happened which I remembered kind of recently, when I knew I was going to talk to you guys and I was kind of trying to think about things, I had a really weird thing happen, which was someone put a note in my the bathrobe that I was using. On that because I was in a towel, so that was kind of, you know, had tape and stuff Between takes, I would put this bathrobe on and someone slipped a note in the pocket. That was kind of stalkery and weird. It was like a you know, I love you, you're my some creepy note was in my wardrobe towel that had been sitting on my chair and it was extremely shocking and scary and I immediately, like, showed it to Heron Makeup, who are your, you know, robert Duvall and the godfather.
Laker Jim:Oh, consigliari yeah.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:That's your hair make up, isn't that? And so I went straight to them and I was, like you know, again, a kid. I didn't know what was happening. And they alerted, you know, producers and it was kind of this very weird thing. And so then I was scared because someone on set it was presumably someone on set or someone who had gotten into my trailer. It was all really scary and I just remembered this, and so I remember that day, whichever day that was I was extremely uptight and I was frightened and I didn't know, you know. So that was kind of in the background. So I remember thinking at the time it was the day he was telling me about who Alan was and I remember just thinking just let that come through. You know this scary, you know alternate reality, feeling so protected and then having this super creepy thing pop into your pocket. You know, I just tried to let it live in a sequence, so I never found out what happened with that.
Laker Jim:Man, that is kind of scary. You think it was under Hill? Yeah, I do.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I definitely do, you know. Obviously he was a criminal.
Jake:That was that was actually leading to. My next question was so? Another famous character is Ted Underhill, and that was a play by William Trailer. You know banging at your door, at your cabana door. Do you remember how was he as an actor? Do you remember much association with him?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:No, because he was sort of outside in his I don't know where they had him. I was in the fancy cabana with all the you know fancy stuff and we didn't interact that much. I think we, you know, had a quick rehearsal about blocking again the door has to open and close his thing and I had to be in the right place and receive the information and grab the bill and you know that stuff. But I don't, I don't remember having talks with him particularly and I could just be not remembering well enough. But obviously he was a well character guy and a teacher and I wasn't that aware of him at the time. I became aware of him later. You know more about people I knew took acting class from him and so on.
Jake:Do you remember any scenes that you shot that didn't make the movie, or pretty much everything you shot was that.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:That's a really good question. I really don't. I don't recall, I don't remember. I think there were things that were cut in scenes that did make it that I was such a novice when I saw the movie I was like hey, where's that ball? But I don't know that I could remember that. If I were to be reminded, that would be great All right.
Laker Jim:Maybe this will jog your memory when Fletch first sees you. He's in the mansion looking out the window with binoculars and you're sunbathing. There are some photos of Chevy out there with you. Now, was that maybe a fantasy in his head as he was looking through the binoculars? Or was that just promotional shots that you guys took outside?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:That was promotional. That was a vantage of the fact that we were poolside, I was in a bathing suit and we were at this mansion, at this beautiful place. So, yeah, the photographer came out and took pictures. It wasn't in the movie. I don't think that he ever comes out there. That was yeah, he's looking out the window. Yeah, no, that was just promotional.
Laker Jim:Okay, okay, that makes sense. How about this shot? Look at. Take a look at this shot that we found Now. It's Chevy in his Mr Poon outfit, minus the glasses and the bandage on the nose. You are in a striped jacket outfit with very big shoulder pads. Any reason why you two would be together while you're dressed like this? Was this some sort of a scene or anything?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Did I request double shoulder pads? Let me think about that.
Jake:They're significant. They're definitely significant.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I might have said I might need another set. It was a very shoulder. Paddy time in a woman's life. Let's see, do I remember? I don't remember that, sorry.
Jake:Hey, so tell us about the Rio shoot. You went down there and you were down there a long time and you guys, the weather was bad. Tell us all about that.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:That was wild. That was wild. We flew to Rio to get this one shot, which that's so back in the day. When does that happen really? Yeah, we all flew down. We got stuck for weather. We were in the hotel and Alan Griezmann had just married or was going to marry Sally Field. She was down there too. We had a lot of time on our hands but we had to stay in the hotel for will notifies. If the cloud cover would move, they'd bring us out and start shooting. We couldn't really go out or do anything. We're kind of in the hotel.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Chevy was climbing the walls. He was going out of his mind. He was just like a child in a padded room. He was in my room quite a lot goofing around. He was calling my friends back in New York, prank calling them. We'd be up at ridiculous hours. I was dating Tim Hutton at the time and he was prank calling Tim and my girlfriends. It was just so silly. I would just be reading a vogue in my room waiting for my will notify and he'd be calling every two seconds like what are you doing, dave? I'm still reading a vogue, chev, just still reading the magazine Two minutes later what are you doing?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Dave. I'm now ordering room service. I thought maybe I'd give myself a pedicure. What are you doing, chev? He would just come over and start prank calling people. He did this thing. That was hilarious. He probably did it every five minutes. He would fill a giant pitcher of water. Have you heard this? This was his favorite thing. He would fill a giant pitcher of water, then call somebody like my girlfriend, dolly or something, and start chatting. As he was chatting, he'd be pouring the water into the toilet as if he was taking the most giant piss on earth during the phone call and just seeing if anybody would break and be like what's happening right now. It was just he, just this joke. He just did it like to 10 people and I would just sit in my room laughing my head off.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:There was quite a lot of partying In those days. That's what we did. We partied quite a lot. We were entertained by the local Rio glitterade. We went to parties and were entertained in people's homes and things like that. I went to clubs and Sally Field and I got kicked out of a club there for dancing together. They thought we were lesbians or something, I don't know. I was like it's Sally Field, she can dance wherever she wants people. They were having none of it. We got tossed out of place. I guess they're very Catholic there, I've heard. I don't know anything.
Laker Jim:You guys were too hot for Rio.
Jake:Yeah, really, which is rare, it's real, I mean, come on.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I don't know what it was. Maybe it was something else. We just assumed it was a girl on girl thing. Maybe it was something else.
Laker Jim:Alright, I think we all need a minute after that girl on girl scenario. Um, were you guys able to shoot any of the original scripted ending, which was much more than you guys walking on the beach? I know that was kind of like let's get something and go. Yeah.
Laker Jim:Um, but the original scripted ending you are guys are kind of poolside, playfully meet each other again, the same way you met earlier with uh, I haven't seen you since the wedding, kind of thing, Right, and was any of that shot, even if you didn't finish it? Was it any of it shot?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yeah, we couldn't do any of that. That was disappointing and it felt on the fly and we did our best, but, um, you know, I think they were in a constant state of just trying to get something. The weather was not cooperating and you know we could have shot it in Malibu. You know, frankly, where the weather was quite nice. So we heard the entire time from the studio, I think it's like you know, um, malibu's nice, um. So, yeah, that was disappointing, but you know, again, michael worked it out.
Laker Jim:Was there ever any rumblings of you returning for a sequel, especially because they went away from the books and Flex lives? Never.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Um no never.
Laker Jim:Even though your character pops up in one of the sequels or the book sequels, which actually wasn't a real yeah, you see, in the book Fletch doesn't go to Rio with Gale, he goes by himself and then she follows him there and that's how the second book starts Right. And, um, they actually tried to do that in the ending of the of the original script that you guys in shoot but she chases them down there. Yeah, yeah, that's how it, that's how it's originally goes down. See that's good.
Jake:Yeah, she ends up. Her character ends up working in a fish restaurant outside of Rio and Mary's a local. That's how her character ends.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:See, wouldn't that have been. That would have been fun to see.
Laker Jim:One more little side fact about your character In the book. Her name was Joan Collins and it was Collins aviation, yeah.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Interesting. I don't remember that yet. I wonder they had to change it.
Laker Jim:Anyway, that's the arc of how they could have gone with your character.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yeah, no, no, no. No one ever ever spoke to me again. I don't know if it was me or what.
Laker Jim:Do you have some time for some voicemails? Yeah, awesome. Yeah, we asked some fans to call in with some questions. Now I'll give you a heads up. Sure, I'll give you a little call. That just asked you to borrow your towel. Yes, we'll spare you listening to all that. I'll give you a little sample.
Jeff Smith, Clue the Movie Podcast:And can I borrow your towel for a second? My car just hit a water bubble.
Michael Ritchie:Dana, you're never going to believe this, but my car just hit a water bubble.
Jeff Smith, Clue the Movie Podcast:Okay, here's my question, dana, can I borrow your towel for a sec?
Jake:Does anyone have a towel I can borrow Repeat? Does anyone have a towel I can borrow? Dana? God bless them.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I mean really, if I had a nickel for every time I hear that line, I'd be a rich woman.
Jake:You are a rich woman.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Well, we're on strike, so I beg to differ.
Laker Jim:All right, let's do a couple of these calls.
Jeff Smith, Clue the Movie Podcast:I'm ready. Hey, laker, jim, this is Jeff Collin from Fullerton, california, and I have a question for Dana Wheeler-Nickelson. Dana, it's a non-fletch question, by the way, so my apology, dana. You were in a movie in 2003 called the Battle of Shaker Heights, which was a part of the TV series Project Greenlight, a series that I was obsessed with and watched over and over and over again, and I was just wondering what it was like making the movie the Battle of Shaker Heights, while Project Greenlight was also filming the TV show, and in the TV show, the directors of the Battle of Shaker Heights, kyle and Ephraim, weren't necessarily depicted as awesome. So I was wondering what was your experience working with Kyle and Ephraim and the writer, erica Beatty and Chris Moore and Affleck and Damon? I told you I watched the show many, many, many, many times. So yeah, battle of Shaker Heights, thanks.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Hi, jeff. Wow, what a great question. Okay, so, hi, nice to meet you first of all, and thanks so much for this question. Way to see if I have any memory synapses left.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:So, yes, the Battle of Shaker Heights, so Project Greenlight was an HBO thing that Matt Damon and Ben Affleck created, and at the time it was quite groundbreaking. It preceded reality TV by a minute and, yes, we were shooting a movie. It had been a competition. They went through the whole thing of choosing the script, so it was all pretty experimental in a way and, yes, the directors were extremely green, ha ha, and it was, let me put it this way, at that time I had gotten very interested in for several years at that time, in doing indie movies, basically mostly out of New York, and worked with a lot of first time directors and I loved it, and I loved being part of a movie when it was somebody who had really never done it and new scripts, and it was always. It always felt like a real crapshoot, which I liked, and so this project was really interesting to me. Obviously, the actors in it were wonderful. I don't know if you've heard of Shia LeBeouf, but he was with my son or not. My son he was, I forget. Anyway, it was really fascinating because, like you say, there was a camera crew filming, us filming.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:And for me this was very difficult. As I've mentioned, I'm extremely shy, I don't. I don't like to talk about myself, I didn't know how to. I pretty much tried to stay out of their way. I didn't like to be interviewed or paid any attention to, so that I wasn't a great fit in that way. I was shocked at the time with how camera savvy everybody was Hair makeup, young actors, everybody like snapped into their personas when the cameras were on them. This camera crew and I just was very, very taken aback by that.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I remember there was a day that we were shooting and Ben came, ben Affleck came to the set with his then girlfriend, jennifer Lopez, and it was a big, you know, oh my God. And we were shooting a scene where it was like a dinner table scene and you know it wasn't the greatest script I'm sorry, it wasn't, and it was. We were getting stuck and something wasn't working and I don't know, I felt shitty that day. I felt like I was a terrible actress and I, you know, went home just thinking, oh God, this is going to be on the show. It's going to be. They're going to be talking about what a terrible actress I am and that sort of stuff was hard to be.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Boning it and stinking up the place when there was a camera crew, you know, filming you with Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez watching from behind the camera. It was, it wasn't. It didn't make me feel particularly great, but the project itself was fantastic and you know, obviously reality TV has become a part of our culture. It's sort of like my grandfather starting comic books and now obviously that's done very well in this culture. So it feels like it was a moment culturally that was really happening and those guys are very, very, they have, you know, they're thinking they're very prescient that way. I think they're right now creating some kind of alternative studio system as we speak. I mean.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:So that was really the driving thing behind this whole thing. But, yeah, the directors I think they were in over their heads. The script was, you know, it was okay, we had fun, but for me it was difficult to manage the reality of the cameras when it aired and there was actually an episode where they're talking about the scene that I felt like I stumped up the place. Ben Affleck is actually on camera and says the actress was so good that she made it sound like. It's there on film, where he actually points out that I got through it and was good. I remember watching it with a friend of mine and just being like, oh, thank.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:God, oh, thank God, Because I really did feel like it was pretty stinky.
Laker Jim:Thanks for your call, jeff. I actually recognize the voice. That was Jeff Smith, co-host of Clue Movie Podcast with Brad Gilmour Another great movie from 1985. Podcast check out.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Remember that that's cool All right Next call.
Tom from the UK:Hello Dana and my mates from Fletchcast. This is Tom from the UK, the United Kingdom, and I was just wondering if you were aware how big Fletch has become internationally over the past four decades. Anyway, love the show. Thanks for keeping Fletch alive for fans around the world.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Hi Tom, thank you so much for your kind words, and I am vaguely aware of things outside of my little world in Montana. Yeah, no, of course I'm aware of it and I'm thrilled about it endlessly and it's brought me nothing but fun and laughter and great memories, and I really appreciate everything that's come because of this film.
Laker Jim:All right, I think we have time for one more call. Let's take a listen.
Greg Mottola:Hey Dana, this is Greg Metola. I don't know if you remember me, but am I correct in saying I used to see you at Moomba, the defunct New York City nightclub? It doesn't have much to do with Fletch, just wondering if maybe you have a great story from there and, like everyone else, I loved you in Fletch.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:My God, greg, of course I remember you. Are you crazy? You must be crazy. Yes, hi, greg, it's been such a long time and so great to hear your voice. Yes, moomba. So thank you for listening, for cheering me on, and thank you for sending me this bizarre. Let's just okay, let me rewind. So I don't know if you've heard y'all, but actors are on strike because everybody has to have a side hustle. I have several over many years. One of them is that I sing very seriously and often have bands and sing out, and at that time so I was in New York I had left LA in a dead run again with my hair on fire, like I'm never doing this again.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I hate this. Ah, I'm gonna finally start singing for real. And so, once again, I fired all my agents and went back to New York and I started singing. And I started singing at Joe's Pub in New York and I put a great band together. It's a long story it's actually a great story, and I was in a condition of starting something new. I didn't have a lot of savings. I'd been working just gig to gig, just long periods where I wasn't working. I'm not particularly a self promoter. I didn't ever figure out the business really. I bumped around and sometimes got work, and so when I wanted to start singing for real, I had to pay musicians and I had to not wait for jobs and I had to not wait for what existed I don't know if you've heard of in the olden days. We had residuals.
Laker Jim:I remember that.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:And we could exist in between jobs, so, but I just couldn't wait around. I had to pay people and they were really great musicians and expected to be paid and I wanted to pay them well, and so I took a job, a job job running a VIP room of a friend of mine's nightclub in New York called Moomba, and it had a moment of being this incredible spot where everybody came and I ran the VIP room and I think everybody just assumed I was an owner of the place and my friends who owned it never disputed it. People would be like I love your club and I'd be like thanks so much, thank you so much. Michael Keaton and Greg Metola. And.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Robert De Niro and Sean Penn and whoever the hell was in there, Benicio del Toro. Everybody came to that place and I was sort of running it.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:And so I needed money. I had to pay people and that is how I started singing seriously in New York. I could get great musicians because I could pay them and I was hustling. That's it, and the Moomba story is a story in and of itself. I think we're all too drunk to write it, but remember anything Some day somebody's gonna tell that story for real. My friend who ran the restaurant part of it is a wonderful woman called Lori Molleste and she has restaurants in LA now and she said the Q-tip reached out to her recently to see if we would the Moomba management would like throw a party for him or something. It was such a spot. It was like Q-tip and you know Russell Simmons and like everybody came into that place. It was like, wow, it was great fun, Too much fun. But I started by singing stuff really seriously because of it.
Laker Jim:So I was very grateful about that hustle and Greg is such a jazz enthusiast that it must have just been a really crazy experience and it must have just been a really cool scene there in New York City at that time.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Oh yeah, I mean I was playing with musicians, my piano I got a residency at a jazz club right then called Deanna's that doesn't exist anymore on the Lower East Side, on Ribbington Street, and that was my first residency, and then Joe's Pub. I had a residency there for like two years and, like, my piano player was a guy who played with Billy Holiday, I mean, this old, old African-American dude who just like took me to school, like every time we played he would just teach me how to sing by his playing. It was a great time. It was a great time and I was running this fabulous nightclub and it was really it was fun.
Jake:What was the years? When was this? What was the years on this?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Late 90s. I think I was out of there by 9-11. I had already quit by 9-11 easily.
Jake:Did you have the opportunity to see Confesclutch? Have you seen it yet?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yeah, I saw it on a plane recently. I was very excited to see it, especially because of Greg Metola, who I love and loved it. I loved the tone, I loved that it was a little darker and I loved it. And you know John Hamm and Marsha Gay Hardin I mean, wow, I didn't know the girl, did I? Who was the girl? I forget. Anyway, I wasn't being facetious there, I really didn't remember.
Jake:I'm not that fat.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Who were the women, I don't really remember who did it with me. No, I loved it, I thought it was great, I wanted more. I want, you know, I and I. It was such a weird story about how it kind of got buried. I guess I read because I was interested to know about it and then it was this weird story, right, you guys must know more than I.
Laker Jim:Yeah, the studio basically decided they weren't going to put any money into advertising. They had Metola 20 million to make it. It came out in 400 theaters.
Jake:Yeah, and it went right on demand. That's so weird, but the reviews were fantastic too. You know, the reviews were overwhelmingly positive.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Well, you know, as we know, these movies find their audiences and in this day and age, they can become. You know what they are meant to be, regardless of studios. Should we talk about the studios at all or no? No, it's a different show.
Laker Jim:Well, greg was in the middle of writing the sequel, so then we hit the writer strike. They were punching it out.
Michael Ritchie:They hit the writer strike.
Laker Jim:So he still thinks it'll be a bit of an uphill battle. But keep your fingers crossed. Hopefully we'll see it soon, Maybe next year yeah.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Oh, I hope so. I hope so. I just want you know like I want Greg Metola to work forever, so I hope he does. I hope that works. I really do. It's a great idea. It's a great thing to pick up John Hamm is, you know, the perfect iteration of this character in this day?
Laker Jim:and age and I know you mentioned you don't remember reading them, but John Hamm's portrayal of Fletch is a little closer to the book version than Chet and they thought it was better to do that version than attempt to do Chevy's version.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Agreed. Yeah, he's wonderful. The whole thing is a great idea and I'm going to send yes beams to Greg.
Laker Jim:Now, if John Hamm's Fletch returns to Rio, would you consider?
Jake:well, you have to be.
Laker Jim:Joan, because you have to be the book character. Could you return as Joan in a future movie?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Oh for sure I could be like, for instance, just the old, you know the old prospector, beachcomber lady, you know half mermaid, half jazz singer, who's had the life that everybody wants to hear about. She's like a fountain of knowledge. Maybe she gives Fletch a lot of information out of her intuition. Yeah, I'm just riffing here, I'm just spitballing here. Hey, they still make Aquanut, Can you talk?
Jake:about the hairspray. Yeah, I mean, so you could poop your hair back up again. I mean, yeah, absolutely. Oh, that would be great.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yeah, that would be great. That's a great idea. No, but I'm all for playing the old prospector, which is sort of, you know, an unsung part in movies. Namdaar Hills, yeah.
Laker Jim:Can we talk a little about Seinfeld, just really quick.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Oh sure you can talk about it if you want. I'm in Montana, it's not like I'm busy.
Laker Jim:OK, so you have no hard out. That's good. Yeah, the thing about Seinfeld which is amazing is and we talked to Rick Overton too, who fans will hear later on this season, but he had a role in Seinfeld. He played the Drake. Right, he played the Drake and when you think about him he's a memorable character, but he's not on screen very long Same with you but yet when you think about your episodes, you think about the guest stars. Talk to us a little about the Seinfeld process, of what makes the guest stars so memorable.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yes, again, it was a very coveted audition for Jerry and I think he just wanted to laugh. He wanted somebody who he would laugh at and he's an easy laugh. So, trust me, it was not necessarily that I was so goddamn funny. He is a really easy laugh, which is a great quality in a comedian. It was very clear even just going into an audition that the system of the show, the world that they were in, was very, very specific tonally and in every other way. You had to either kind of fit in or you didn't.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:And I think it mostly became clear in table reads, which was new to me. Sitcom was new to me. I'd done a little maybe I can't remember which came when, but it might have been the first time I did a sitcom and I was not used to the sort of table read with all the producers and everybody there. That was stressful because people literally would get fired after a table read when you're not really fully in a character yet you haven't even read with your actors and you're not particularly maybe funny at a table, you're really like me, but everybody's on their game. At the table read I was like, oh god, I don't even know what I'm doing yet, and that to me was a big introduction to how a sitcom works. Especially that machine was very well-oiled at that point. It was a very successful show. Larry David was there running.
Jeff Smith, Clue the Movie Podcast:And.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Brad. So it was intimidating, except that everything I had to do was with Jerry. So he was fantastic. He just, you know, he thought I was funny. He let me do my thing. I was the straight man, obviously, but that was the thing about that show. Ok, back to your question, right? So they were so good, the machine was so well-oiled that the way that they put you in a scene was memorable. That is how it worked. They got their guest stars to carry the episode along story-wise, so you had to. You know, that was them sticking you in driving the story. I don't think it had much to do with me in the end, you know.
Laker Jim:And how can we forget you wanting Jerry to use a toothbrush? But is Seinfeld something you recognize when fans see you on the streets?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Oh, yes, that and Sex in the City and the big shows where your characters are. You're asked to do things that are, you know, extreme things, extremely funny things, extremely extreme characters, and you get cast for that reason that you're able to do that right.
Jake:Being here in Round Rock. They shot a lot of Friday Night Lights here, you know, in this area. Talk about that, because I guess it was good for you too, because it was so close, it was right here in town.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yeah, I was living in Austin. We had just moved down there.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:My husband is a filmmaker, a great filmmaker, indie filmmaker. He got hired by UT to run a part of their film department. So we moved down there and I booked Friday Night Lights kind of quickly and yeah, it was shot all real locations. There were no sets, it was all in and around Austin and it was incredible. It was an incredible time, Beautiful time Again.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:A lot of improv, a lot of actors the young actors a lot of them had never really worked before to speak of. Everybody was improving. You know, I think maybe Jesse Plemons was the only one of the kids who had a real child career, kind of Maybe Amy anyway, yeah, the kids were all pretty new to it and we were all new to the way they shot it, which was a lot of improv three cameras, cameras that were moving around at all times catching behavioral things that other shows just didn't do, and we all got really spoiled by that kind of technique. In the end we really were let loose as actors. It was beautiful, it was a really great time. Great acting came out of it.
Laker Jim:Now you mentioned you no longer live in Round Rock. Can we bring up the irony of you now living in Utah? I mean, utah is not exactly the care for boredom.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I know right when we did the movie.
Jake:I remember it's Provo right that he goes to.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:And I remember thinking at the time like where the fuck is Provo? Where's Utah? I'm from New York City, man. I was born and raised in New York City. I don't know anything about the middle of the country at that point. It's like California and New York and Europe. Everything for me was like I don't even know where Jersey is at the time. So, yeah, provo was like Mars or something. And now, yeah, I'm in Utah, which is very Big fan of the Mormon Tabernacle.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Yeah, my husband, like I say, is a filmmaker and got hired there at the university to teach in the film department, as did I. I'm teaching acting.
Jake:Do you enjoy? It?
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:I do enjoy it. I'm going to get what the kids call it canceled for my dream of consciousness way of teaching and bringing up subjects that the children get all triggered about now. So I'm waiting for the cancel culture to kick me out, but that's OK, I don't mind.
Laker Jim:I got other things to do. I know we've got to wrap this up, but I wanted to ask you what quotes or scenes from Fletch still make you laugh after all this time.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:So there's that scene. I don't know why this makes me laugh so hard. So he's in the house. He's in the house where there's a mattress, and one actor who's there, I'm going to forget comes in with the gun it's Salyan's brother, I guess and Chevy goes across the room and his head gets stuck in the lamp for a second. Yeah, and that makes me laugh still too. That moment to me is like him in his spot, in his what's the word I'm thinking of. I said spot, what was that? What? That is Chevy in his element, just using lamps and things for comedy. It still makes me laugh. Let me think All of his stuff, like the Rosen, rosen and Rosen Penis and all that stuff. He was just divine. He was just wonderful and funny in that movie when he's driving a car and the kid is like, ah, you know, he's lying to him about who he is, he's driving a million miles an hour and that kid's face and like mock speed with his weird overbite.
Jake:Yes, His braces.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Oh his braces. Oh my god. He's so freaked out. That was hilarious. There's a lot I laugh at still.
Laker Jim:Well, dana, this has been a lot of fun. I know Fletch fans listening at home. They got what they were looking for. It was well worth the wait and hour plus of you talking about Fletch. It doesn't get any better.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:Well, that is so sweet. Thank you all so much, and please give my love to Greg Matola and Tim Debbie and everybody. I really keep hoping that maybe we'll do a Fletch signing convention thing together.
Laker Jim:FletchCon, that would be great. Yeah, that would be All right. So if we put this together, you'll be a guest, of course. I mean, we might have to work on that.
Dana Wheeler-Nicholson:That's so great.
Laker Jim:Well, that about wraps up this episode of Fletchcast. We're Jake and Dana, I'm Laker Jim. We're going to go catch the other, joan Collins, on the last 10 minutes of Dynasty See you.
Jake:Thank you so much.
Jeff Smith, Clue the Movie Podcast:Bye.
