Empire Records

Em: 00:01:10

Hi everyone, I'm Em and welcome to verbal Diorama, episode 351, Empire Records, also known as Me-Pire Records. This is a podcast that's all about the history and legacy of movies you know and movies you don't. That's also open till midnight.

Except on most days when I'm working and I'm busy and I have to go to bed because, you know, other than that, open till midnight. Welcome to Verbal Diorama. Whether you're a brand-new listener, whether you're a regular attorney listener, thank you so much for being here.

Thank you so much for choosing to listen to this podcast. I'm so happy to have you here for the history and legacy of Empire Records.

And if you are a regular returning listener, thank you so much for continuing to listen and support this podcast over the last seven years and now 351 episodes. Thank you so much for your support. It genuinely means so much.

It is the regular returning listeners that keep me coming back doing this podcast every week or so.

I know I've had a couple of weeks off here and there, but generally speaking, every week I come out and I do these podcasts and I do it for the regular returning listeners. If you're a brand-new listener to this podcast, you've got a lot of episodes to catch up on, so you better get to it.

Now, of course, this episode is coming after the 350th episode, which was on the original Star wars. And I never really intended to do Empire Records after Star Wars. It kind of happened.

And let me explain, because the episode that's coming after Empire Records was the episode that was supposed to come after Star wars. And for reasons as I'll come to later on in this episode, I couldn't do that episode. So I had to have a filler of some sort.

And I was going through DVDs that I've had for years and years and years, and I came up with a few options and Empire Records really stood out.

And then I made the connection that I could tease this and say, coming after Star wars is Empire meaning teasing that it could be the Empire Strikes Back. I never had any intention of doing the Empire Strikes Back after Star Wars. Never. Because Star wars was such a huge thing.

I've got so many other things going on at the moment. I don't physically have enough time to do all three Star wars movies.

Back when I did the five episode Lord of the Rings extravaganza, I actually physically planned that whole month to be doing Lord of the Rings. And I didn't do that with Star Wars. So I never actually planned to do the Empire Strikes Back at all.

But I do apologize to the people who saw the tease that I was doing Empire and thought that I was maybe doing the Empire Strikes Back. But I can tell you that the Empire Strikes Back will be coming sooner rather than later.

But technically speaking, considering this episode is coming after Star wars, this Empire did indeed strike back. Because this is a tale of misfit teens, found family, and an independent record store facing corporate takeover that bombed at the box office.

And yet somehow Empire Records returned. Here's the trailer for Empire Records.

Em: 00:06:43

Empire Records is a small independent record shop managed by Joe, the disinclined and perpetually exasperated father figure of his employees, who are all high school students and young adults. Like the employees, the store is eclectic and unique.

When Joe entrusts Lucas to close the store for the first time and bank the $9,000 takings, Lucas finds out their beloved indie record store is going to become a branch of Music Town, a large generic corporate music chain. In an attempt to save Empire Records, Lucas bets the money on a game of craps in Atlantic City and loses everything.

Meanwhile, the store is planning to welcome jaded, spoiled 80s pop star Rex Manning to sign autographs. Let's run through the cast.

We have Anthony LaPaglia as Joe Reaves, Maxwell Caulfield as Rex Manning, Debi Mazar as Jane, Rory Cochrane as Lucas, Johnny Whitworth as AJ, Robin Tunney as Deborah, Renee Zellweger as Gina, Ethan Embry as Mark credited as Ethan Randall, Liv Tyler as Corey Mason, Coyote Shivers as Burko and Brendan Sexton as Warren. Empire Records was written by Carol Heikkinen and directed by Allan Moyle.

In: 1994

All the character tropes, a banging soundtrack, the breakfast club in a record store. What could go wrong? Writer Carol Heikkenen's first teen job was at her local Tower Records in Phoenix, Arizona.

stores in the U.S. founded in: 1960

ower Records outlet opened in: 1971

And through her day to day experiences working at Tower Records, Heikkinen and wrote the script for Empire Records, then titled simply Empire. She was inspired by the Richard Pryor classic car wash, which took place over one day at a car wash, only this time at a record store.

So you kind of had to experience record stores back in the 90s to know what a record store meant. Back in the 90s they were a cultural marketplace. It was where you could go to experience your taste in music.

Before streaming services, before MP3 players, before Napster and Limewire, before you had entire artists libraries. At the touch of a button, you'd go to a record store and find out your music taste.

You'd listen to CDs in booths, you'd have conversations with the staff and with other fans. Your taste was shaped in that single store.

When I was a kid, it was our local branch of our price and if we were really lucky, a trip to the Virgin Mega store in the closest city. The Virgin Mega store had posters and that was where I bought my beloved Romeo and Juliet poster.

With a premise in mind, Heikkinen began filling in the details of her script from her own experience at Tower Records. Like Empire, employees chose the store music. Each would put their CD in a stack that would make its way through the carousel.

So naturally one person's music would annoy everyone else and that CD would suddenly get damaged beyond repair. She based her characters on actual people she worked with, including naming characters after real people.

There was a real Burko and a real Corey, although they were very different people to those in the movie.

Even the stolen day's takings was a real Tower Records urban legend of an employee who took a day's takings and then showed up to work the next day with no explanation. They too were not fired. It's easy to see why.

A script set in a record store with characters from all walks of life ready made for a blockbuster soundtrack went from a spec script to a small bidding war. The script was sent to four production companies by William Morris agent Rob Carlson.

Carlson convinced New Regency to give it a look by telling producer Alan Riesch that Hykkinen had attended the same high school as him in Phoenix. Reich and his producing partner Tony Ludwig brought the script to Michael Nathanson, the new president of Regency Pictures.

It was one of the first things Nathanson bought for the company.

A new Regency would end up outbidding other companies including Warner Bros. Offering Carol Heikkinen $325,000, another $20,000 if the film was made, as well as 1% of soundtrack royalties and 5% of merchandise sales. It's worth adding at this point that Warner Bros. Would still be involved, but in a distribution only capacity.

dio hit Pump up the volume in: 1990

It seemed like a sure fire low stakes hit, but like with many coming of age movies about the current generation of teens created by the previous generation, there would be a mismatch of ideas and understanding about the Gen X indie culture. You could say that the producers were Clueless Speaking of Clueless, Michael Nathanson greenlit Empire Records on a Tuesday.

On the Thursday of that week.

Just two days later, he was sporadically approached by Amy Heckerling's agent, who with news of her new screenplay idea Heckeling, was invited to Nathanson's office where she pitched Clueless, an updated version of Jane Austen's Emma set in a Beverly Hills high school. Nathanson loved the idea, but he'd already greenlit a teen movie and he didn't want to label his fledgling production company as a teen movie studio.

He was totally buggin'. All he could say in response was I'm outtie. And he declined. Clueless.

After Clueless was a huge hit with a $10 million opening weekend and $56 million overall, Nathanson would receive a way harsh call from his boss, film financier Arnan Milchan. He'd let go of Clueless as if. But at the time it was the logical move.

They had Empire Records and that had all the criteria to be a big hit on its own, and they invested heavily into this movie. This wasn't a cheap movie for the mid-90s.

It cost $10 million, which sounds paltry, but it included designing and building a complete multi level record store set in a warehouse with views out of the windows, constructed in forced perspective, showing a bustling street with cars that in reality didn't exist, as well as exteriors in Wilmington, North Carolina which included a 20 foot high mural of Gloria Estefan roof, scaffolding the infamous Empire Records neon sign in a facility owned by producer Dino De Laurentiis, the same facility where Brandon Lee filmed the Crow the year prior, and also the same facility where Brandon Lee passed away the year prior, the cast were mostly up and comers and unknowns except for Liv Tyler, who was instantly recognizable and as Aerosmith lead singer Steven Tyler's daughter as well as having just starred in their music video for Crazy, Ironically with Alicia Silverstone, who would go on to star in Clueless. Many of the cast would come from other 90s coming of age teen movies. Rory Cochrane was in Dazed and Confused.

His girlfriend at the time was Renee Zellweger, who had small parts in Dazed and Confused as well as Reality Bites. Johnny Whitworth had a guest appearance in teen TV show Party of Five.

Ethan Embry, credited as Ethan Randall, had been acting for years, most notably alongside Reese Witherspoon in a far off place.

Big names who auditioned include Angelina Jolie for the part of Debra, but they worried she would overpower the other actors, so she was replaced with Robin Tunney. Singer songwriter Jenny Lewis also auditioned, but she would end up semi retiring from acting to focus on her music career.

A young Tobey Maguire was also cast as a character called Andre. Producers wanted Green Day's Billy Joe Armstrong to play the role of Burko, but Green Day's touring schedule wouldn't allow it.

The part would go to Coyote Shivers, who lied about his age, telling them he was much younger than he was. He also didn't disclose that he was Liv Tyler's stepfather. But technically, as she was a minor at the time, she did need an adult on set with her.

to her mother Bebe Buell till: 1999

Although technically it's not Rex Manning day washed up, pompous 80s pop idol Rex Manning could have been played by a myriad of ex pop idols, and writer Carol Heikkinen is on record to say she envisaged someone like Jon Bon Jovi.

But casting Maxwell Caulfield is actually a low key work of genius because Maxwell Caulfield starred in the superior grease, which is Grease 2, alongside Michelle Pfeiffer. Pfeiffer played the lead Stephanie Zinone and Caulfield her love interest Michael Carrington. I've done an episode on Grease 2.

It's episode 171 and it's a movie I love and will defend to the very end. But at the time, considering the original Grease had made stars of John Travolta and Olivia Newton John, the same was expected for the sequel.

Of course, Michelle Pfeiffer would go on to become one of the most well respected and well known actors of her generation. But it wasn't really from her work in Grease 2. And while Caulfield braced himself to become a household name, it never happened.

And the reason why it never happened was Grease 2 flopped quite considerably, being released the same week as E.T. The Extraterrestrial. Any chances of superstardom vanished overnight.

ears following its release in: 1982

He could have easily become the Rex Manning of his situation, but he just continued working diligently and when offered the role of Rex Manning, even he would not fully appreciate the what it would give him. His own day. Over 30 years later, Rex Manning Day is still an unofficial fandom holiday, celebrated every 8th of April.

after he committed suicide in: 1994

The say no More Mon Amour video was supposed to just be a 17 second clip, but it was the first thing filmed at Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina in one day, Jordan Dawes, the music video's director, gave the producers a complete music video that was almost five minutes in length. Rex Manning wouldn't be Rex Manning without his signature look though. The bronzer, the hair and the clothes.

The legacy of Empire Records doesn't just sit with its cast or its soundtrack, but with its clothing too, most famously Liv Tyler's plaid skirt and cropped mohair sweater.

Costume designer Susan Lyall wanted a good girl look, a Harvard Exceller look, but also an element of conflict as we find out that the character of Corey is popping pills to overachieve Renee Zellweger's character.

Gina was supposed to be the quote unquote slutty one, and wears a very short skirt that her future character Bridget Jones probably would have also worn to the office. She also ends up in just an apron at one point. A cut scene would explain the origins of the red bra Corey is wearing. It's lent to her by Gina.

Robin Tunney's character. Deborah was supposed to be the sort of girl who hides away from the world, so she was given a baggy, grungy wardrobe.

Max Caulfield, though, was up for pretty much anything for Rex Manning. Lyall went for a Tom Jones meets Rod Stewart, Mike meets Trash, and Vaudeville, which was a store on St. Mark's Place in New York.

She put extra fringe on the purple satin cowboy shirt and Caulfield just went all out. Hey, Rexy, you're so sexy. Lyall also appears in multiple scenes in the background as her band.

Band of Susans has a poster just by the manager's office.

The set directors were looking for posters that could be easily cleared and Susan Lyall had been in this band and so they gave the production a load of posters. Rex Manning also has a sublime orange hue to his face and what can only be described as either a magnificent wig or extra boofy hair.

Someone who didn't need to worry about hairstyles, though, was Robin Tunney. It was her decision to completely shave her head for the role of Deb.

Tunney actively lobbied for the shaving, insisting it was foundational to Deb's narrative and she'd heard word that the producers thought she was too cute and wanted to fire her. The scene was filmed in one take, obviously using three cameras, because they couldn't afford for one camera to fail.

The movie Robin Tunney made after this was the Craft, which has been on my list to cover for this podcast for so long. I loved that movie as a kid. And throughout the Craft, Tunney had to wear a wig because she'd shaved her head for Empire Records.

As I mentioned, the set was a collaboration between art director John Huke and production designer Peter Jamison. The whole set was designed meticulously from top to bottom with ornate 20 foot high ceilings.

Even the exteriors of the store were inside the warehouse. There was no open street.

They built a street with curbs and a pavement and used forced perspective to approximate the line of cars in the used car lot that was supposed to be across the the street. While all this design work was going on, the cast moved into condos at Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

They rehearsed together while the crew was building the elaborate set. They did Pilates together, they smoked together weed and cigarettes, and director Allan Moyle hosted huge cast dinners at his house.

They had nothing to do but hang out with each other and develop the sort of closeness and camaraderie you get from being a teenager or working in a store with other teenagers. And Moyle encouraged it all. He wanted the relationships to develop organically.

These kids were actually friends, and all of them who've spoken about it have come out publicly to say that working on this movie was one of the best experiences of their careers, including Liv Tyler, an actor with a career on some of the best movies ever made. And Empire Records is by far her favorite.

But while he's credited for the movie, Tobey Maguire left early in Production it's said that Maguire was struggling with alcoholism at the time and asked to be released from the film. All of his scenes were cut. However, he remains credited as Andre.

Shortly after, he sought help for his drinking problem, became sober, and seven years later he became Spider Man. But the theatrical cut of this movie wasn't exactly the cut that Alan Moyle wanted.

After screening Moyle's Curt, which began with Lucas pulling up to the record store on a motorcycle, Regency felt the film as a whole was lacking in exposition. They wanted to film a prologue spelling out exactly how Lucas lost the money, including establishing shots in Atlantic City.

So they created a casino set constructed out of the Coconut Grove Room at the Ambassador Hotel.

Heikkinen's original script didn't include the opening, so we can't blame her for the line you sex, which was said by Regency president Michael Nathanson's then girlfriend, Kimber Monroe.

The movie was originally set to be rated R, with characters smoking marijuana, swearing and behaving like actual teenagers, but Regency insisted the movie be PG13. So many of Eddie's scenes were cut because he had a weed operation running on the roof of the store that could no longer be shown.

Much of the connecting tissue in the movie was also cut, leading to storylines going nowhere and random characters just seemingly popping up. Eventually, Regency took the final cut away from Allan Moyle.

It's said they cut over 40 minutes of footage from the final film and it's time to segue into the obligatory Keanu reference of this episode.

And if you don't know what that is, it's where I I try to link Keanu Reeves with every movie that I feature on this podcast because he is the best of men.

alled Love, which came out in: 1993

So that is the easiest way for me to link Keanu Reeves to Empire Records.

But we can't talk about this movie without talking about the music, because music is so integral to the DNA of Empire Records, and Mitchell Lieb was brought on to executively produce the soundtrack and Karen Glauber, who was heading up new music marketing at A Records and served as the music consultant.

The original plan for the soundtrack was to emulate the popular format of the time, where snippets of dialogue and Commentary functioned as bumpers between songs, but it ended up a collection of B sides from prominent artists, covers and new artists between songs from major artists like the Gin Blossoms, Till I Hear it from youm and the Cranberries. Liar.

There was also Toad and the Wet Sprocket with Crazy Life, A Girl like youe from Scottish artist Edwin Collins, Free from the Martinis, plus some more obscure artists like the Mises. Ready, Steady Go and Liv Tyler sang back up for the soundtrack version of Evan Dando's cover of Big Star's the Ballad of El Godo.

And of course, Coyote Shivers.

Sugar High features prominently in the movie, but but the only version that made it onto the soundtrack doesn't have Renee Zellweger's vocals from the finale of the movie.

Warner Brothers wanted the Gin Blossoms so badly that they rerouted the soundtrack from Atlantic Records, who were one of their affiliates at the time, to A&M Records because A&M had the Gin Blossoms on their roster.

This partnership paved the way for Till I Hear it from youm, which wound up being the band's first top 10 hit on the Billboard chart, peaking at number nine.

Jim Blossom's frontman Robin Wilson called it a highlight of the band's tenure, saying, Empire Records is a classic film that only a handful of people really saw, but it definitely made an impact on that generation. It was the peak of our career, a once in a lifetime experience really. Unquote.

The soundtrack for Empire Records sold more than 2 million copies, which is remarkable considering not many people actually saw the movie the soundtrack came from. And the GWAR cameo was a complete fluke.

It wasn't in the script, but GWAR were performing a show in Wilmington during filming and so it was decided that they had to be included. And so the character of Mark devours a plate of weed brownies and finds himself inside the GWAR video he's watching on one of the store's TV screens.

ire records because in August: 1994

In September: 1994

This time the screening was in a lower class Hispanic neighborhood in the Valley and the result was the complete opposite. It was a complete disaster. This was not a movie aimed at that market.

A bunch of white, reasonably privileged, young, beautiful teens playing fast and loose in a record store with such concerns as possibly not getting into Harvard didn't sit well with the Latinx audience. Regency and Warner Bros. Saw the audience scores from the second screening and they balked. They completely dumped the film.

Instead of 1,250 cinemas, they put it on 87. There was no premiere, there was no national advertising campaign.

They did everything they could to not show Empire Records, despite the success of Clueless, which had come out two months prior and catered to a crowd who were not extremely wealthy, successful and privileged high school kids, because you didn't need to be any of that to enjoy Clueless.

nd September: 1994

But look on the bright side, it wasn't Renee Zellweger's worst performing release that week because she also starred in Texas Chainsaw Massacre the Next Generation alongside Matthew McConaughey, which actually came out the same week as Empire Records. And that was 20th to Empire Records 17th. But also, that's another movie that has developed a bit of a cult following in recent years.

When Empire Records only managed to gross $273,188 for its $10 million budget in the US and was removed from screens after two weeks, it was almost as if Warner Bros. Expected it to do better and were then appalled when it didn't. It's had several Special Edition releases. It was of course released on vhs, where it started to build a fan base. Slowly but surely.

Remix Special Fan Edition in: 2003

It's just the theatrical release with the cutscenes added as extras.

It is unlikely that we will ever see the full director's cut that Allan Moyle intended, though on Rotten Tomatoes, Empire Records has a rating of 35% with a consensus of Despite a terrific soundtrack and a strong early performance from Renee Zellweger, Empire Records is mostly a silly and predictable teen dramedy. But the story doesn't end there for Empire Records. Following its release on VHS and then DVD and then Blu Ray.

It somehow found an audience, and that audience grew up loving the movie enough to fully embrace Internet meme culture.

With #RexManningDay becoming a recurring trending hashtag on Twitter every 8th of April, it became a time capsule of its era, of its cast, and of 90s nostalgia. As vinyl surged, so did Empire Records.

Rex Manning Day continues to be celebrated with a resounding shout of the film's slogan, damn the man, Save the Empire.

With the cinemas like the Prince Charles in London hosting screenings annually while members of the cast commemorate the day on social media, the cast, its writer and director, didn't fully know that Empire Records was anything other than a massive flop until they started getting invites to fan screenings of the Movie, Q&As and most recently podcasts to talk about their experiences making the movie.

or so years, but in the: 2000

usical, originally due out in: 2020

sey from September to October: 2024

It was produced by a studio, but clearly designed to appeal to the young hip crowd that was fueling the indie film surge. It embraces the 90s cultural resistance instance of selling out by focusing on a small music store threatened by a corporate chain.

Bands of the 90s shaped the cultural landscape just as indie directors of the 90s shaped cinema. While the boomers were booming, the youth was nihilistic and anti commercialism.

Empire Records rejection of corporate monotony and capitalism has felt increasingly prescient in a time where huge corporate monopolies are own everything.

Recent decades have seen the shuttering of countless record stores, the cease in printing of myriad music magazines, the consolidation of radio stations, and the further homogenization of popular music.

It may not have been seen at cinemas, but Empire Records gained a strong following on VHS and cable because it resonated with Gen X and older millennials.

Fans connected with its genuine portrayal of teenage angst, mental health challenges and its rebellious anti corporate fight against the music town chain buyout. But even with the recent shift towards physical media DVDs, Blu Rays, CDs, and vinyl.

It's easy to see how 30 years later, a new generation is falling in love with Empire Records. It harkens back to an almost mythical time when getting your first job meant making friends for life.

And yes, it also meant going to your place of work, even if you weren't working just to hang out. These shops were more than just shops. They helped shape your identity in a world that was telling you to be something else.

Empire Records celebrated the lost, the unpopular, the less than perfect. You could be a cliched character, but but actually you were a lot more than what you were on the surface.

Deb hates Corey because Corey puts across a sheen of always being perfect. But when her drug taking is exposed, it's Deb who takes care of her and finally sees through the charade.

In many ways, the movie serves female characters much better than male characters because all of the women get given reasonably interesting arcs, even if much of it ended up on the cutting room floor. It's worth adding as well that I remember when I first saw this movie and I didn't quite get it.

I didn't understand why it was such a cultural phenomenon, but were rewatching the movie for this episode. I see it now.

I fully appreciate Empire Records for what it is, for what it's trying to say, and for what it means to the countless fans who embrace this movie. It fully deserved to be a hit back in the day, but the fact that it wasn't means that it's actually the underdog that it's talking about.

We wouldn't be talking about Empire Records if it was a music town. It's not music town. It's Empire Records.

Warner Bros. Made Empire Records flop, but the outcasts, the dreamers, and the music obsessed who believed that music could change the world, they damned the man and they saved the Empire. Thank you for listening. As always, I would love to hear your thoughts on Empire Records and thank you for your continued support of this podcast.

And as I mentioned, the actual next episode was supposed to be this episode, but it was postponed to next episode. And the reason for that is I thought I had the movie, but I didn't.

So I basically had to buy the movie because I like to watch the movie before I do the episode. And Empire Records may not be the critical darling, but there's one movie that remains a constant at the top of most critics lists.

In fact, as long as I can remember, it's been the number one movie on IMDb's top 250 as voted by the general cinemagoing public, a movie better than the Godfather, better than the Dark Knight, better than The Godfather Part 2, but not better than Grease 2, at least not in my eyes. But then I don't make the IMDb top 250.

It's a movie that if you've not seen, you'll get a Paddington Hard stare and a you've never seen, as I myself did many years ago by a work colleague because I had never seen the Shawshank Redemption and I eventually redeemed myself. But it's time to go into the history and legacy of the Shawshank Redemption.

So join me next episode for that thank you for listening to Verbal Diorama, a totally free and independent podcast that relies on listener support. If you want to show your support in multiple different ways, you could leave a rating or review wherever you found this podcast.

You could tell your friends and family about this podcast, or you could find me and follow me on social media and you can share the podcast that way. I am Verbal Diorama across social media where you can share posts like posts, comment on posts.

It all helps really to get the word out there to hopefully get other people to know this podcast and know the recent episodes that I've put out. I genuinely love doing this podcast and anything you could do to help would be so appreciated.

A huge thank you to the incredibly generous patrons of this podcast. I could not do what I do without their support.

To Simon, Laurel, Derek, Kat, Andy, Mike, Luke, Michael, Scott, Brendan, Ian, Lisa, Sam, Jack, Dave, Stuart, Nicholas, Zoe, Kev, Danny, Stu, Brett, Xenos, Sean, Ryno, Philip, Adam, Elaine, Aaron and Steve. Please consider joining them and supporting this podcast on Patreon if you have the means to.

If you want to get in touch, you can email verbaldioramail.com you can also go to verbaldiorama.com and you can fill out the contact form. You could say hello, you can give feedback, or you can give suggestions as well. I would genuinely love to hear from you.

You can also DM me on social media as well if that's an option available to you. I love to hear from people and I always try to respond as quickly as possible.

Thanks again for listening and thanks for supporting independent podcasting. It means more to us than you know. And finally. Bye!