12/04/2017
Entertainment Weekly film critic Nashawaty (Crab Monsters, Teenage Cavemen, and Candy Stripe Nurses) tackles the rocky production and eventual success of the raucous 1980 golf comedy Caddyshack. The story of Caddyshack, Nashawaty shows, was very much that of its producer/cowriter Douglas Kenney, who died in an accident at age 35 soon after the film’s release. A one-time Harvard Lampoon writer who subsequently helped found the spin-off National Lampoon, Kenney crossed paths with members of Chicago’s Second City improv troupe and of the fledgling Saturday Night Live in the mid-’70s, resulting in the blockbuster film Animal House. As a follow-up, Caddyshack was expected to be a surefire hit, but competing egos, the inexperience of first-time director Harold Ramis, and ample drug use plagued the filming from the beginning. In Nashawaty’s hilarious depiction, the production is shown to have been utter chaos, albeit with some creative genius tossed in—notably from star Bill Murray, who turned his throwaway groundskeeper role into Caddyshack’s signature character. Moreover, the film’s fans may be surprised to learn that upon its completion, both Kenney and the film’s distributor, Warner Brothers, were convinced that it would be a flop. Nashawaty’s book provides both an entertaining showbiz chronicle and, by the conclusion, an unexpectedly moving tribute to Kenney’s short life and lasting comic legacy. Agent: Farley Chase, Chase Literary Agency. (Apr.)
"Chris Nashawaty doesn't settle for mere behind-the-scenes gossip or trivia. He tells a novelesque story full of gigantic characters—some of whom happen to have famous names—that shows us where comedy comes from and how classic movies are made, usually unbeknownst to the people making them. Wonderfully written and impeccably researched, Caddyshack is a treat for fans of the movie or anyone who cares about comedy and its flawed practitioners."
— Jennifer Keishin Armstrong, author of Seinfeldia
“An incisive, definitive portrait of an epoch in the evolution of comedy - told through the improbable saga of the making of a beloved, oddball classic - that solves one of the enduring mysteries of the movie business: How in the name of Bushwood’s gopher did this fractured fairytale ever come together?”
— Mark Frost, Co-creator of Twin Peaks, author of The Match: The Day the Game of Golf Changed Forever andThe Greatest Game Ever Played: Harry Vardon, Francis Ouimet, and the Birth of Modern Golf
“I opened this book thinking, 'Why Caddyshack?' I closed it completely exhilarated by the way it answers that question. This is a tough, sharp history of comedy and competitiveness, of rising stars and brilliant upstarts. Of difficult egos, awful behavior, fragile friendships, bursts of inspiration, and blizzards of cocaine—told by the survivors and shaped by Chris Nashawaty's welcome insight and perspective.”
— Mark Harris, New York Times bestselling author of Pictures at a Revolution and Five Came Back
“Funny? Of course. But Chris Nashawaty's book is also a vivid, surprisingly poignant history of a generation that revolutionized American comedy. Well, and of drugs. Lots of drugs.”
— Chris Smith, author of The Daily Show (the Book)
“Chris Nashawaty has written a ridiculously funny book that is also tragic, sweet, profane and profoundly entertaining. It's full of sex, drugs and gopher holes, of course. But Nashawaty also tells, through Caddyshack, the origin story of modern comedy. The result is a richly reported book as rollicking and quotable as the film at it honors.”
— Steve Rushin, writer for Sports Illustrated and author of Sting-Ray Afternoons
"Caddyshack is an American classic born out of both design and happy, slacker accident. The story behind its making is in a way as fascinating and hilarious as the movie itself. This made me love the movie more. And I didn't think that was possible."
—Will Leitch, author of Are We Winning? and God Save the Fan, founder of Deadspin.
"An everything-you-ever-wanted-to-know-about look at a cult movie whose reputation has grown in the four decades since its initial release. Nashawaty provides an eye-opening pleasure for Caddyshack fans."
— Kirkus
“In Nashawaty’s hilarious depiction, the production is shown to have been utter chaos, albeit with some creative genius tossed in... [Caddyshack] provides both an entertaining showbiz chronicle and, by the conclusion, an unexpectedly moving tribute to Kenney’s short life and lasting comic legacy.”
— Publishers Weekly
2017-10-30
An everything-you-ever-wanted-to-know-about look at a cult movie whose reputation has grown in the four decades since its initial release.Entertainment Weekly film critic Nashawaty (Crab Monsters, Teenage Cavemen, and Candy Stripe Nurses: Roger Corman: King of the B Movie, 2013) ventures that Caddyshack (1980) first took shape as a kind of lesser entry in a flurry of films born of the nexus of Saturday Night Live, the National Lampoon, and massive piles of cocaine: The Blues Brothers, Meatballs, Animal House, etc. It was also a more pointed exercise in class warfare at the outset than when it eventually emerged, many drafts later, to critical indifference. Putting on his Peter Biskind hat, Nashawaty connects this subversiveness to more serious films such as Mean Streets and Easy Rider while seeing it as a generational repudiation of comparatively treacly fare such as Clint Eastwood's orangutan comedies and the Smokey and the Bandit franchise. Though born of the free-wheeling, madcap cohort of fledgling director Harold Ramis (who called the movie his "$6 million scholarship to film school") and writers Brian Doyle-Murray and the doomed Doug Kenney, Caddyshack was thoroughly vetted by studio hacks—fortunately, no one listened to them. Nashawaty steers readers through now-familiar scenes, such as Bill Murray's near-lethal wielding of a pitchfork and Chevy Chase's suave twitting of the uber-rich Ted Knight, brought to warp speed with the arrival of Rodney Dangerfield. What is constantly surprisingly, and most pleasantly so, is how these scenes could have been very different had other roads been taken—e.g., had the overburdened Bill Murray not found a spare few weeks to film and not been given free rein to improvise or had the casting director been able to land Mickey Rourke in the place of Michael O'Keefe for the central (though, in the final product, somewhat diminished) role of Danny Noonan.The book doesn't quite hit the insightful levels of those by Scott Eyman or David Thomson, just as the film isn't quite The Maltese Falcon. Still, Nashawaty provides an eye-opening pleasure for Caddyshack fans.
01/01/2018
Nashawaty (Crab Monsters, Teenage Cavemen, and Candy Stripe Nurses: Roger Corman, King of the B Movie) provides a thorough look at the 1980 golfing comedy classic and the sex, drugs, and Kenny Loggins soundtrack that drove its making. Starting in the mid-1960s, Nashawaty traces Caddyshack's genealogy starting with writers from the Harvard Lampoon forming National Lampoon magazine, the shift in emphasis from writing to acting with National Lampoon's radio show and albums, the loss of talent to higher-profile gigs on Saturday Night Live, and finally, National Lampoon regaining importance with the wildly successful film Animal House. By the time Caddyshack is given the green light (roughly 100 pages in), the reader has a comprehensive knowledge of the 1970s New York comedy scene. Among the book's large cast of characters (Chevy Chase, Bill Murray, Harold Ramis, Rodney Dangerfield), Doug Kenney stands out as the central, tragic figure—a boy genius who helped launch National Lampoon and who cowrote and produced Caddyshack but died mysteriously shortly after its release. VERDICT Casual readers will be better served by skipping the first half of this book and diving into the pot- and cocaine-fueled high jinks, cast and crew memories, and Hollywood drama collected here.—Terry Bosky, Madison, WI
