December 4, 2024 • 55 mins
In 1987, long before the Marvel Cinematic Universe was a glimmer in Stan Lee's eye, Marvel promised a different kind of blockbuster: Spider-Man and Mary Jane would get married. Not just in the comics — in front of 51,000 screaming fans at Shea Stadium. And those fans were not happy about it.
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VERY SPECIAL CREDITS
Hosted by Dana Schwartz, Zaron Burnett, and Jason English
Written by Jake Rossen
Produced by Josh Fisher
Editing and Sound Design by Chris Childs
Mixing and Mastering by Baheed Frazier
Voice Actors: Katie Mattie, Chris Childs, and Josh Fisher
Original Music by Elise McCoy
Research and Fact Checking by Jake Rossen and Austin Thompson
Show Logo by Lucy Quintanilla
Executive Producer is Jason English
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Originals.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
This is an iHeart original. Stan Lee is worried he
doesn't know anything about comics. Stan of course, is the
architect of the modern Marvel universe. He created its dizzying
(00:33):
array of characters in collaboration with a number of talented artists.
But it's nineteen eighty six and Stan's been out of
the game for years. He relocated from Marvel's headquarters in
Manhattan to Hollywood in the hopes of leading Marvel's charge
into movies and television. That wasn't going all that well.
(00:59):
The first Marvel live action theatrical movie ever made was
about to come out. It was Howard the Duck, a
sci fi comedy. It featured a libidinous waterfowl who develops
a crush on Leah Thompson. It's considered one of the
biggest bombs of all time. Other Marvel characters are in
(01:22):
various stages of development hell, with Stan trying pleading to
get Hollywood to notice Marvel's potential. Now making an appearance
at a summer comic book convention in Chicago, He's concerned
he's been out of the loop for too long.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
I was at the Chicago convention, which is in the
summer of nineteen eighty six, and Stan was also a guest.
So I'm doing my thing and Stan catches me in
the hallway and he says, you got to help me,
and I said, what you know? He said, they want
me to do a one man panel on stage.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
That's Jim Shooter. In the nineteen eighties, Jim was the
editor in chief of Marvel Comics, role once occupied by Stan.
Jim's duty was to guide the editorial direction of titles
like The Uncanny X Men, Daredevil, Iron Man, and dozens
of others.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
All the questions are going to be a bycomic, so
I won't be able to answer a single question, because
at that point he was just doing the cartoons and
the TV and movies.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Jim agreed to intervene if Stan got stumped. The Q
and A was humming along, and then one audience member
threw a bit of a curveball.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
Finally we get near the end and the moderator says,
we have time for one more question, and this fellow
in the back raises in. He says, this is for Stan.
He says, when are you going to let Peter Parker
and Mary Jane get married?
Speaker 2 (02:55):
And the crowd rollers Peter Parker, the everyman of the
Marvel universe, marrying Mary Jane Watson, the red haired model.
The two had long been the it couple in comics.
Stan being the mascot of Marvel, took the question and
(03:15):
ran with it.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
Stan trying to calm everybody down, and he says, no,
that's not a question for me. He said, Jim runs
the comics. He's entirely in charge of all that, you know.
Speaker 4 (03:25):
I'm doing the.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
TV and Hollywood stuff. And then he turns in his
seat to face me, and he bounces up and down
like a little kid and says.
Speaker 4 (03:33):
Can we Jim? Can we?
Speaker 5 (03:34):
Can?
Speaker 4 (03:35):
We? Can we Jim?
Speaker 3 (03:37):
And the crowd roared, And so I thought, I'm not
getting out of this room alive if I say no.
And what I did say was, look, I said, maybe
Stan isn't in charge, I said, but he's Stanley, and
if he wants to do it, we're doing it. Crowd
roars again, and so I turned to stand and said,
(03:59):
now we have to do it.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
And so on a warm night in June ninth, teen
eighty seven, model Mary Jane Watson would marry her longtime love,
the Amazing Spider Man, but not just in the comic.
They do it in front of fifty one thousand, four
hundred and two people at Shay Stadium, home of the
(04:26):
New York Mets and where the Beatles held their famous
stadium concert in nineteen sixty five. This was the comic
book version of Lady Diana and Prince Charles, Bigger than
Madonna and Sean Penn, decades before Marvel and Spider Man
were box office giants. It was a rare opportunity to
(04:49):
see the Wall Crawler live in person and getting hitched
moments before a pivotal ballgame. Nothing like it had ever
been attempted before. A real life wedding between two fictional
characters at New.
Speaker 6 (05:07):
York Day Stadium.
Speaker 7 (05:08):
Spider Man and Mary Jane will finally.
Speaker 5 (05:10):
Get married, and we have the privilege.
Speaker 7 (05:12):
Of joining them this morning at a pre nuptial gathering
app Show Stadium.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
It's the story of one of the wildest nuptials of
all time, Spider Man and mj The NEWLYWBS. Welcome to
very special episodes and I heart original podcast. I'm your host,
Dana Schwartz, and this is with this ring I the Web.
Speaker 7 (05:41):
Hey, everybody, my name is Jason English. One third of
your usual post intro banter trio today. Just a quick
interruption here at the top, and then we'll get right
back into the story. Dana's Aaron and I would love
to do a mailbag episode. Sh'w get some pretty fun emails.
So this is a call to arms or thumbs or
whatever you type with if you've got a question about
(06:03):
Very Special Episodes, you have a topic you wish we'd cover.
A question about noble blood or ridiculous crime or any
other podcast merch ideas. You disagree with some of Zarin's
casting choices from previous episodes, send it to Very Special
Episodes at gmail dot com and we might read it
in a future episode.
Speaker 4 (06:23):
All right, back to the show.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Superheroes aren't usually marriage material. It took Clark Kent until
nineteen ninety to pop the question to Lois Lane, and
another six years to actually tie the knot. It's hard
to imagine Batman dating. DC characters in particular didn't seem
to have much of a domestic life.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
Here's a difference between Marvel and DC. Back in my day.
At DC, every character they had no financial worries. They
were probably rich, They had their own secret cave in
their own aerocar or batmobile or whatever. They had their
kids sidekick. They had met the love of their life
all ready.
Speaker 2 (07:08):
That's Jim Shooter again. In addition to being Marvel's boss,
he was a creator in his own right. He got
his start writing for Marvel's arch rival DC at the
age of fourteen. For a while, he alternated between the
two companies before settling into the editor in chief role
(07:28):
at Marvel in nineteen eighty four. He wrote Marvel's Secret Wars,
one of the first major crossover series, featuring virtually every
major Marvel superhero. It helped set the template for the
Marvel cinematic universe of today. And now he was being
(07:49):
tasked with pulling off a wedding.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
I had no objection to it. I thought it was
fine if Stan wanted to do it, and we could
do it coordinated in the strip and in the comics
at the same time. I thought that could be a
big deal, and it turned out to be a big deal.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
At the time, Stan was writing the Spider Man comic
strip that was appearing in hundreds of newspapers around the country.
If Spider Man were to get married in the comic book,
then he'd have to get married in the comic strip too.
While the two didn't share precisely the same continuity, a
(08:28):
change that large would be a little distracting, so Jim
Stan and Spider Man editor Jim Salakrup all made share
their plans dovetailed with one another. The comic would arrive
in June nineteen eighty seven, around the same time the
marriage took place in the strip. This wasn't a decision
(08:51):
that Jim took lightly. Spider Man had been a bachelor
for a long time. He debuted in nineteen sixty two,
the work of Stan and artist Steve Ditko. Like most
Marvel heroes, he wasn't a deity, but a regular guy
with regular problems, wrent that was past due, social anxiety,
(09:15):
that kind of stuff. His first major relationship was with
Betty Brandt, an employee at The Daily Bugle, where Spider
Man's alter ego Peter Parker sold his freelance photos and
where he was frequently berated by boss j Jonah Jamison.
But it wasn't long before Gwen Stacy captured his attention
(09:39):
and his heart. The daughter of police Captain George Stacy,
Gwen was a fellow college student and still one of
the most popular of Peter's many romances. In the midst
of all of this was Mary Jane. She had been
a blind date set up by Peter's aunt May. Something
(10:01):
May teased Peter about four months before Mary Jane finally
appeared The Amazing Spider Man Number forty two in nineteen
sixty six, and she makes quite an entrance. It comes
just after Peter realizes the spark with Betty Brandt is gone,
a mood expressed in the hyperbolic comic book Dialogue of
(10:26):
the nineteen sixties.
Speaker 8 (10:28):
All these months I thought about her, dreamt about her,
longed for her. So now she's returned, and nothing'sville.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
Later, the doorbell rings and Peter answers.
Speaker 1 (10:41):
You mean that's Mary Jane.
Speaker 9 (10:43):
Face it, Tiger, You just said the jackpot.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
Peter is instantly smitten. That was thanks in large parts
to artist John Remita Senior, who drew the issue and
conceived of Mary Jane's look, which was modeled after actress
Anne Margaret.
Speaker 8 (11:02):
So tell me about yourself, Mary Jane. How come I've
never run into you before? What do you do with
yourself when you're not driving helpless males out of their minds,
and all this.
Speaker 9 (11:11):
Time I was afraid you'd be the shy type. I
spend most of my time taking drama lessons.
Speaker 1 (11:16):
Oh, you plan to be an actress.
Speaker 9 (11:18):
Correction, Clyde, I am an actress. It's just a matter
of time till this big, blind, bouncy world discovers that
fabulous fact.
Speaker 8 (11:25):
What a living doll. She makes everything seem like a party.
Speaker 2 (11:29):
Peter would be torn between the vivacious MJ and the
pragmatic Gwen for years, until Gwen would tragically be killed
during a battle between Spider Man and his nemesis, the
Green Goblin, another heavy dose of the personal pathos Marvel
(11:49):
was known to put a tear through Peter did not
take it well.
Speaker 1 (11:54):
I'm gonna get you, Goblin.
Speaker 8 (11:56):
I'm gonna destroy you slowly, and when you start begging
for me to end it, I'm gonna remind you of
one thing. You killed the woman I love, and for
that you're going to die.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Peter managed to get a grip on his homicidal rage
and later wound up proposing to MJ. But the timing
wasn't quite right.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Mary Jane, will you marry me?
Speaker 9 (12:21):
Come on, Tiger, you know, good old MJ is too
free a spirit to tie herself down to anyone swinger,
even to a brown eyed hunk like you. There's a
world of groovy guys out there, and this doll's got
to be free to find him.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
While that sounds pretty callous, readers later learned MJ wasn't
afraid of commitment so much as being pushed off a
roof by a psychopath dressed as a goblin. She had
discovered Peter with Spider Man and wasn't sure she was
ready for a life of looking over her shoulder. Other
Spider Man writers had floated the idea of the two
(12:57):
getting married, including one pitch for Peter to be left
at the altar, but it never gained steam despite a
very pro tract did courtship. In the eyes of comic
book readers. Peter and MJ had been dating on and
off for about twenty years, which is a pretty long
time to avoid the big question, but in the continuity
(13:22):
of the comic it was more like six years, and
while both had other relationships, they always seemed to drift
back to one another.
Speaker 3 (13:32):
I like the difference some personalities because when Peter Parker's
Spider Man, he's witty, he's joking, he's daring, you know.
When he's Peter Parker, he's a little more conservative, introverted.
And I like the fact that Mary Chane was good
foil for that. She was, you know, face at Tiger,
So I thought it was a good match.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Initially, Jim was only concerned with the comic book and
comic strip weddings, but this was around the time Marvel
was being purchased by New World Pictures and Entertainment, in
motion picture company that was hoping to monetize their new
library of characters. Both Jim and New World felt that
(14:15):
a live wedding would be the perfect promotional vehicle for
the story, but Jim was having issues with Cadence Industries,
the company selling Marvel to New World.
Speaker 3 (14:29):
They had decided to sell Marvel, and when you're selling
a company like Marvel, you don't want to invest anymore.
You're trying to save every nickel.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
According to Jim, the belt tightening was alienating talent who
sometimes sought greener pastures over at DC and blamed Jim
for driving them away.
Speaker 3 (14:52):
And then it's Jim Shooters driving talent away. You know,
it's just ridiculous. So I was at war with these
screaming war of these guys every day, and so in
the middle of that, we're planning a wedding. It was
kind of surreal.
Speaker 2 (15:08):
To plan the actual wedding, Jim relied on Pamela Rutt,
Marvel's director of publicity. It was Pam's job to get
Marvel's name out to the mainstream press, which still regarded
comics with a little disdain. This was an opportunity to
garner some significant attention, and it was coming at a
(15:30):
good time. In nineteen eighty six, DC had gotten lots
of coverage for their Watchmen and Dark Knight Returns series
to mature takes on the superhero genre. They were grim,
violent and in stark contrast to Marvel's wisecracking cast, and
(15:53):
DC also had the muscle of Warner Brothers behind them.
Marvel was more of the scrappy upstart that needed to
be creative. Pam made a deal with Shay Stadium, which
agreed to host the wedding on June fifth, nineteen eighty seven.
Spider Man would literally be on third base, or the
(16:16):
third base line anyway, with Mary Jane both appearing on
a heart shaped podium To make their union official, and
naturally stan Lee would be there to marry them off.
Pam was essentially Spider Man's wedding planner. In addition to
the actual ceremony, she prepared a bachelor party, yes, a
(16:40):
bachelor party. Fittingly, it took place at Toy Fair in Manhattan.
Spider Man, the guest of honor, sauntered into a conference
room filled with over six hundred people to greet his buddies,
like the Hulk and Captain America. Someone wheeled in a
giant cake the kind and exotic dancer might pop out of,
(17:04):
but that's not very family friend, so poor Spider Man
had to cope with the Green Goblin, the villain who
had caused the death of his beloved Gwen Stacy, emerging
from the cake instead. The man portraying Spider Man for
that bachelor party was kind of an understudy for the
(17:27):
actual wedding. Marvel planned to bring in the Marlon Brando
of Spider Man performers, a man who has played Spider
Man over fifteen hundred times, far more than any other actor.
Someone who could handle the pressure of the character's biggest moment,
(17:48):
someone who had been in tough situations before with Captain
America by his side.
Speaker 5 (17:54):
And you're sitting there with you know, a dozen or
twenty lucky kids who get to ride up with their
favorite superhero. I look over at Cap and he's turned white,
and he goes, yeah, I'm going to be sick.
Speaker 2 (18:13):
Comic book fans today are spoiled. Here is what we
mean by that. Right now, if you want to see
Spider Man in live action, you can head to a
streaming service and call up any of the eight Spider
Man feature films, each costing tens or even hundreds of
millions to produce, and that's not counting Spider Man's cameos
(18:35):
or major roles in movies like Avengers Infinity War. But
back in the nineteen eighties, Spider Man fans were in
a kind of drought. Yes, he did have several monthly
comic book titles along with the newspaper strip and a
few cartoons, but if you wanted to see Spider Man
(18:59):
in the flesh, you only had a few options. One
was The Electric Company, a public television kids show from
the nineteen seventies that had the character making appearances, Or
(19:24):
you could try to find reruns of the nineteen seventy
seven CBS television series starring Nicholas Hammond. Trying to do
Spider Man's wall crawling and web shooting on a seventies
TV budget was as disappointing as you can imagine. But
there was a third option. You could hope that Spider
(19:47):
Man would make a personal appearance at a mall, park
or school near you. By the nineteen eighties, Marvel opened
a new office devoted exclusively to costumed appearances. An event
could book a Marvel superhero to open a new supermarket
(20:08):
or promote a shopping center. Best of all, Marvel would
send them directly to you. The catch the selection was
fairly slim. You could get a guy in a padded
suit as the Hulk, or a pretty economical Iron Man.
There were two obscure characters, Firestar and Iceman, who had
(20:32):
appeared in an early nineteen eighties spider Man animated series,
Spider Man and his Amazing Friends, and there were a
few villains too, like the Green Goblin and Doctor Doom.
But per Marvel policy, heroes and villains never got physical
with each other. There was just a lot of well scolding.
(20:57):
All of these characters had their fans, but far and
away the most requested character for the appearances was Spider Man.
Kids love Spider Man. He's friendly, he's funny. His costume
is one of the best in comics, and even in
the eighties he was on everything from toy shelves to
(21:20):
under rus. His multiple comic titles sold a million copies
every month. According to Jim Shooter, Spider Man merchandise brought
in more revenue for Marvel than all the rest of
their characters combined. The man primarily responsible for bringing Spider
(21:41):
Man to life was Jerry Colpit's. Jerry was in his
early twenties a theater graduate from the University of Maine
when he caught word of an audition being held for
an unusual role making public appearances in Spandex.
Speaker 5 (22:00):
So they gave me a new costume, never been worn,
skin tight spanex webs with the mask which had kind
of a maze over the eyes and everything I found out.
So I remember putting it on back in the closet
in the head of Marketer.
Speaker 4 (22:18):
Marketing his office.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
That's Jerry.
Speaker 4 (22:21):
They had a small mirror there and Spandex what do
we aware of them? Did this thing?
Speaker 5 (22:25):
First of all, I don't know to come just hanging
out with the thing or should I leave my tidy
whites on. This is what you go through as an actor,
you know, And then let me try to all right,
leave my tidy whities for now, but let me all
right squeeze into this thing feet first.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
At the time, Jerry was going by his stage name
Jeremy Stewart, which is why you might see that name
in association with these costumed appearances. It's the same guy,
an alter ego if you prefer.
Speaker 4 (22:59):
And you know what I can see out of this thing.
Speaker 5 (23:01):
You have to watch my eyelashes getting stuck in the mesh.
Speaker 4 (23:05):
But here we go and adjust it. And I'll never
forget the moment I turned around.
Speaker 5 (23:12):
I looked in the mirror, and the Amazing Spider Man
was looking back At.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
The Jerry was hired. His first gig was at a
mall in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Speaker 5 (23:23):
Here is a new concept, actually a Marvel superhero showing
up at the grand opening of this enormous shopping mall
and come and get your picture taken with Spider Man.
Come and meet the Amazing Spider Man, Come and get
an autograph. And there were lines of these kids and
their families waiting in line to see the amazing Spider Man.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
To really appreciate Jerry's work as Spider Man, you need
to realize that most costume characters aren't required to speak
and verbally interact with a crowd. Think about the Disney
characters at their theme parks. You won't hear a quack
from Donald Duck or a squeak from Mickey. But at
Marvel Heroes, where expect to chat up fans. For an actor,
(24:10):
it was basically a kind of improv the Groundlings meets Superheroes.
Jerry was pretty good at this. Anything anyone could throw
at him he could handle.
Speaker 5 (24:21):
And I was given a lot of freedom over the
years to write my own speeches and dialogues. It usually
involves recycling the expected cheesy remarks. This job has me
climbing the walls.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
Jerry's performance as Spider Man was very impressive to Marvel,
who soon considered him their a list Spidey, the webhead
they dispatch when they had a valued client to satisfy.
Jerry would also get the prime gig of escorting his
co creator Stan Lee when stan made his personal appearances.
Speaker 5 (24:56):
How many times I had to remind stance zip Hop
is fly before we made an appearance. Stan, you fly,
you fly? Oh yeah, thanks, thanks Spady. He could count
on me to ormind and zip up his fly.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
But sometimes the gigs didn't go as planned, and not
because Stan couldn't remember to zip his pants. One time,
Jerry was dispatched to Hershey Park, an amusement destination in Pennsylvania.
He went there accompanied by Captain America. But on this
(25:30):
day Cap wasn't exactly the pride of the nation.
Speaker 5 (25:35):
They had a Spider Man Captain America team up right
on fourth of July. It was the hottest fourth of
July on record, and so they had this guy who
was playing Capital America.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
Spider Man and Cap made their way to a big
rotating wheel that went up in the air two hundred
feet and then CAP's long night caught up with him.
Speaker 5 (25:57):
We're about halfway up the pole. I grabbed his shield
and put it under his chin, and he like, h
let it go in front of all these kids, plus
you know, you get a crowd en below. We finally
get down and I was carrying his shield upside down,
trying not to spill it on anybody.
Speaker 4 (26:13):
And uh, I think they sent him home.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
No such mishap ever befell Jerry, but the costume did
have its pitfalls. Unlike the Space age fabrics and cgi
used in movies, Jerry's spidy suit was just stretchy spandex
one entire piece that dipped up at the shoulders. The eyes,
which are famously two white blobs, didn't provide him with
(26:41):
a terrific field of vision.
Speaker 5 (26:43):
Oh sure, you know, never broken bone, but uh yeah,
I stepped off a stage one time that I couldn't see.
You say, you have to mesh ow your eyes and
direct sunlight.
Speaker 4 (26:54):
Forget it, you're you get white.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
Out Falls weren't the only hazard, so were inebriated teens.
Speaker 5 (27:02):
Yeah, and I've had strange drunk kids sucker punch me
through the years. Yeah, I've good stories coming out of
a side swaper, you know, from behind and that kind
of thing that did happen.
Speaker 4 (27:15):
It didn't happen very often.
Speaker 5 (27:16):
But yeah, there are there are moments where it was
just like, well, buddy oh Man.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
Jerry was still pursuing his conventional acting career, but being
Spider Man took up a lot of his time. He
found himself jumping on planes almost every weekend, or being
shuttled to one event or another. In the nineteen eighties,
he even made several appearances in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.
(27:43):
But Jerry's most rewarding work as Spider Man came when
Marvel decided to team up with the National Committee for
the Prevention of Child Abuse In nineteen eighty four. The
company printed a comic in which Spider Man shares he
was touched inappropriately as a kid. The idea was get
(28:07):
children comfortable in sharing their own stories of abuse.
Speaker 5 (28:12):
And so I would help distribute these comic books around
the country and do an assembly for we're talking grade
schools and found a way to captivate the kids by
appearing from a high place. Usually the principal would come
out and say, we have a special guest here today.
Speaker 4 (28:31):
Anybody know who it is? Yeah, Spider Man or Spider
Man who Spider Man in the spotlight on me? Perched
up the thing and.
Speaker 5 (28:41):
I jumped down, and the kids were screaming, and I'd
try and find the scruffiest looking kid and pick him up,
and he'd beat the star of the day. And you know,
found the sours looking teacher and walk over to her
and give her a big hug.
Speaker 4 (28:53):
And so you get the kids on your side now.
Speaker 2 (28:56):
That special issue might be one of the most printed
copies of any comic book ever. Roughly sixteen million copies
were inserted into Sunday newspapers all across the country, with
another two million handed out by the committee, and Jerry
as Spider Man, made several appearances in support of the story.
(29:20):
That meant being prepared to have some serious conversations with
kids who looked up to the character.
Speaker 5 (29:28):
I got a phone call one night from a doctor
and the guy was in tears. This kid they had
in there who just you know, they'd been working with
him for weeks and he would just not open his
mouth about what had gone on, although the bruises were there.
The doctor called me and said, I'm so glad we
had you here. Timmy is finally opening up thanks to
your visit. So you kind of feel like you're making
(29:51):
a difference here, and that was really a very gratifying,
wonderful experience.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
Another highlight for Jerry was interacting with celebrities, even presidents.
He was once invited to the annual Easter Egg hunh
at the White House, where he was face to face
with then President Ronald Reagan and his wife Nancy.
Speaker 5 (30:14):
Ronald Reagan came out of the White House and I
managed to squeeze it next to him and put my
hands on his.
Speaker 4 (30:20):
Suit and he was laughing uproariously.
Speaker 5 (30:23):
The next day, I'm in New York City after coming
back from DC, and I'm riding on a bus. I
look down and the guy next to me is reading
the New York Times on the front page. Big slow
news day, I guess, but a big picture of Spider
Man and Ronald Reagan laughing his so.
Speaker 2 (30:39):
But not even meeting a president could compare to the
nerves of Spider Man's biggest gig, getting married in front
of fifty one thousand people at Shay Stadium.
Speaker 5 (30:52):
So finally he sees that they're going to tie the
knot and wow, wow, that's quite an event. And we're
going to have Shaye Stadium with the Mets play, Yeah,
the world champion Mets from the year before. But she
started talking to me about it. You're going to be
wearing a white top entails.
Speaker 2 (31:08):
Few performers, outside of magic music acts, we'll ever see
a live audience that size. With just days to go
before the wedding, poor Jerry hadn't even met his bride
to be, Mary Jane Watson was always just a little
(31:38):
bit out of Peter Parker's league. Peter was, after all,
the science nerd and shutterbug who favored sweater vests. Mary
Jane was a fashion model, a globe hopping trendsetter. For
their Shay Stadium wedding. That made finding someone to portray
Mary Jane a little challenging. Sure, they needed a red
(32:02):
haired model, but they also needed someone who would be
comfortable portraying a fictional character in front of tens of
thousands of people, in addition to making several public appearances,
all while remaining in character.
Speaker 6 (32:19):
But this was my norm, this kind of event stuff,
so that probably had a part in it. They don't
exactly run things by you.
Speaker 2 (32:30):
That's Tara Shannon, the model picked to play Mary Jane.
Speaker 6 (32:35):
You know, it was like the music videos back then,
same thing. You just showed up and twenty four hours
later you shot a music video with everyone pitching in
and helping. You know, It's like a Judy Garland movie
or something. So yeah, just basically you know, showing up,
you know, and also reference they're saying, okay, you're going
to go do this at the Mets, and then there's
going to be a party at a nightclub, and you're
(32:57):
going to stay in character, and you just show up.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
Tara started modeling in the late nineteen seventies. Like a
lot of models, she's able to communicate with a camera,
transmitting charisma in a still photo. That ability led to
covers for Vogue, Harper's Bizarre, and work in music videos,
including a Different Kind of Bride.
Speaker 6 (33:22):
I did Bride of Frankenstein in the Huey Lewis video
the same year that was hilarious Doing It All for
My Baby, where Huey played Frankenstein and his band played
Igor in the lab. In the dungeon, everyone gets killed,
the head's decapitated, theirs Sirred Underglass.
Speaker 2 (33:43):
With her red hair, Tara looked a good deal like
Mary Jane. Someone recommended her to Marvel, which got her
an invite to the company's famed bullpen full of writers
and artists cranking out dozens of monthly titles. While Tara
wasn't a die hard collector, she did relate to one
(34:04):
of the company's lesser known characters, Millie the Model, a
fashion figure navigating New York City.
Speaker 6 (34:12):
When I was aligned with Marvel for this job, I
got to go to the Marvel offices in New York
and see all the comic strip artists in their little desks,
you know, just before the word nerd came in, and
you know, both of us, you know, the comic book
artists and me as a model, where we're looking at
each other like, you know, we're like aliens, like we've
(34:33):
never been in each other's world.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
Mary Jane had never appeared in a live action setting before.
She was never a character on the seventies Spider Man Show,
so this would be the first. Once it was official,
Tara was dispatched to the offices of designer Willie Smith
for a bridal fitting. If you don't follow the fashion world,
(34:57):
you might not be familiar with Willy's name, but he
was one of the premier designers of the decade, designing
suits for Caroline Kennedy's wedding the previous summer. Marvel believed
his stature in the fashion world would be another press
coup for them, and they were right.
Speaker 6 (35:16):
Yeah, it was the eighties and fashion. First of all,
he was an African American designer and that was rare,
and he was incredibly successful, so that in itself needs
to be held with the respect that it deserves because
what he did.
Speaker 2 (35:31):
Many of the articles about the wedding mentioned Willy's involvement
and his gown. It was a lacy white number with
a high collar and a trumpet skirt. Willie also designed
Spider Man's formal wear for the event, which required a
jacket with coattails, white spats, a cumberbund bow tie, and
(35:52):
other accessories that would blend with his costume. It was,
after all, Spider Man getting married, not Peter Parker. He
had a secret identity to protect. But Willie sadly wouldn't
be around owned for the ceremony. He died of complications
from AIDS in the spring of nineteen eighty seven. Mary
(36:14):
Jane's gown would be one of his final projects. Marvel
was banking on the novelty of a real comic book
wedding to attract press, and it worked. Newspapers around the
country ran notices breathlessly reporting the couple's two decade long entanglement.
(36:38):
The duo were even available for quotes fretting that their
children would be born with eight legs or relating the
groom was so nervous he was pacing the ceiling. Pam
Rut of Marvel's publicity arm even got The New York
Times to make mention of the ceremony in a kind
of mock wedding announcement, a perk not even warm blooded
(37:02):
famous couples always get it.
Speaker 10 (37:04):
Read Friday Night as chayse Stadium, Mary Jane Watson, an actress, model,
and computer business woman, will be married to the Amazing
Spider Man, a superhero also known to comic book cognizanti
as Peter Parker, a freelance photographer for the mythical Daily
Bugle in Manhattan. Stan Lee, publisher of Marvel Comics and
(37:26):
creator of Spider Man, will officiate.
Speaker 2 (37:29):
Marvel scored another big coup when Tara, Jerry and stan
Lee made an appearance on Good Morning America the day
before the ceremony, In an era before the Marvel movie
machine started humming, this was major exposure. All they needed
now was to pull off the real thing. On June fifth,
(37:53):
the Marvel Repertory Company left their Manhattan office and headed
for shay Stadium. In addition to Spider Man, Mary Jane
and stan Lee, Captain America was on hand to be
best man. Hopefully sober this time. Firestar was there, as
was Iceman and the Hulk. Even the Green Goblin was there,
(38:17):
who we will remind you was responsible for the death
of Peter's other love, Gwen Stacy awkward. Once they were
at the stadium, the cast was directed to a spare
locker room so they could get changed and go over
their lines.
Speaker 6 (38:34):
I got to get my wedding dress in the locker
room of the Mets. That's where I got dressed.
Speaker 4 (38:44):
It's crazy.
Speaker 6 (38:46):
My attendants were, you know, the incredible Hull, Captain America,
all these other Marvel characters, so surreal.
Speaker 2 (38:56):
While they waited, Mets players began filing in, casting some
curious glances toward the comic book team up materializing in
the stadium. That led to Jerry having a very meta
moment of getting jealous of his character's fictional bride.
Speaker 5 (39:15):
Here's Jerry, I'm like pointing out, you know, that's terreal
Strawberry sauntering down the hallway. He does a double take
and he sees her standing there, and he immediately, you know,
this cheshire cat grin the saunters over to her.
Speaker 4 (39:30):
He's on his way to.
Speaker 5 (39:31):
Work, for God's sake, and she's standing there and he
said who are you? And I'm like, I'm going to
get married to this woman in a couple of hours.
You know what, Jess, should I web the guy? I go,
what a homeworker?
Speaker 4 (39:44):
You know, he's making moves on my on my fiance.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
But not everyone was happy to see them. For baseball fans,
the most significant event to happen at Shay that night
wasn't the wedding. It was the return of Dwight Goodin,
a star for the Mets, who had been absent while
attending a drug and alcohol rehabilitation program. To Gooden's treatment supervisor,
(40:10):
doctor Alan Lands, a comic book, wedding was a distraction.
His player didn't need talking to press, Doctor Lands said,
who needs this? It's horrible? In my way, it would
have been as routine an evening as possible. Marvel, however,
had booked Shay long before Goodin's return was scheduled. There
(40:32):
wasn't anything anyone, including doctor LANs, could really do about it,
and Spider Man has overcome worse odds. At seven point
fifteen pm, it was time. Jerry climbed into one limousine
and Tara in another. The two were driven out near
(40:53):
third base where a heart shaped podium and stan Lee
awaited them for Tara. It was another very weird day
at the office.
Speaker 6 (41:04):
It made me pretend like I was a rock star
or the Pope standing in the roof of the limousine
in nineteen eighty seven. They were huge and waving at everyone.
That was hilarious. It was like, Okay, I'm going to
act out all my fantasies.
Speaker 7 (41:20):
I'm the Pope.
Speaker 6 (41:21):
You no blessing to all you know I'm a rock star.
Speaker 2 (41:25):
The stadium announcer began reciting lines written for them by
comic book writer Peter.
Speaker 10 (41:31):
David lazz.
Speaker 11 (41:34):
In the United sixties, too feature legends After all Spies
beginnings one, It's the amazing.
Speaker 8 (41:41):
That's the evasy Spider Man.
Speaker 9 (41:45):
Today it's too great.
Speaker 11 (41:46):
America institutions Spider again, and that's as SI institution that
patron the manage the marvels of fighting Whomanness.
Speaker 8 (41:57):
The marriage of Spider American is.
Speaker 11 (41:59):
Not miss miss marriage at once. Now duens, cast your
guys to serve you and enjoin see wall ride.
Speaker 2 (42:11):
Jerry was poised on top of the limo in a
classic Spider Man crawl. He leaped down to the ground,
hoping his hamstrings wouldn't give out. Stanley then proceeded to
ham it up with some innocuous, if somewhat sexist banter.
Speaker 11 (42:28):
Do you, Spider Man, being of sound mind and superbody,
take Mary Jane to be your lawfully wedded wife, forsaking
all other heroines? Do you promise never to leave your
footprints on the walls or ceiling or cobwebs in the corners?
And do you agree to pinch.
Speaker 1 (42:45):
Hit for the Mets if they ask you?
Speaker 6 (42:47):
I do?
Speaker 11 (42:50):
Do you, Mary Jane, being of sound mind and spectacular body,
agree to forsake other masked Marvelites, to never swat a
spider and to huh comfort and kiss away any bruises
incurred after a long day of bashing bad guys and
stay at a net's walk off.
Speaker 3 (43:09):
I do.
Speaker 2 (43:12):
Jerry and Tara slipped custom rings onto their fingers. Each
had a spider setting.
Speaker 11 (43:19):
Please repeat after me.
Speaker 1 (43:21):
With these rings, I the web, with these wings, I
the wedde.
Speaker 2 (43:32):
With that, Tara executed a practiced swoon, allowing Spider Man
to mime a kiss with the marriage also came a
divorce of sorts. By this point, Jim was no longer
editor in chief at Marvel, his issues with Cadence Industries
(43:53):
and New World had come to a head while he
was still consulting with the company. His tenure as the
boss had come to an end, but he was still
invited to the ceremony like everyone in as Jim had
been gifted the comic featuring the wedding and other Spider
Man merchandise. To commemorate the event.
Speaker 3 (44:15):
They gave away tens of thousands of free comics to
people as entered the stadium. I never saw so many
paper airplanes and comics thrown on the trash and thrown
on the floor. See I don't think a baseball fans
necessarily a very congruent with the comic book fans, And
no one paid any attention to their wedding that was
going on in the field.
Speaker 2 (44:36):
Still, he and Stan were essentially two proud dads watching
as the characters they cared for were whisked off in
a limo. As the Mets took the field. New York
would beat the Pittsburgh Pirates that night, five to one.
Dwight Gooden pitched into the seventh inning and got the victory.
A wedding reception followed at Tunnel, a hot nightclub in
(45:00):
the city that was located and an abandoned subway tunnel.
There was a cake as well as an overheating Hulk
who had to be dragged off the dance floor before
he fainted. Nineteen eighties superhero costumes were not made for
hard partying.
Speaker 5 (45:18):
They had a big party and also with the Spider
Man with a mask with a mesh on over the eyes,
you get into a dark club or something, you know,
you just can't see for Ur's sake, so it's just
moving very slowly and kind of feeling your way around.
Speaker 4 (45:32):
More than anything.
Speaker 2 (45:33):
So of course the Shea Stadium event was just a
tease for the real thing. Marvel's business was comic books,
and in the pages of Spider Man, Peter Parker and
Mary Jane Watson had their canonical wedding, with Peter appearing
as himself rather than his crime fighting persona. The plot
(45:56):
was hatched by Jim Shooter and scripted by writer David Mcaliny.
It involves Peter having a midlife crisis, questioning his stability
in an ever changing world and looking for domestic bliss.
He pops the question to Mary Jane, who doesn't give
him an answer at first. Opting instead to head to
(46:18):
Pittsburgh to see her sister and help her father, who
happens to be a scoundrel who traffics in stolen rare books.
She does eventually say yes. The wedding, held in The
Amazing Spider Man Annual number twenty one, is tinged with suspense.
Peter can't help but worry that he might be putting
(46:40):
Mary Jane in the same harm's way as Gwen Stacy.
Mjy also has second thoughts, tempted by the flashy lifestyle
of a rich suitor named Bruce, but true love cannot
be denied. The couple eventually climb the steps of City
Hall in holy matrimony. Mj is even wearing the gown
(47:04):
designed by the late Willie Smith. It was also the
first time Marvel had ever sold a comic with two
different illustrations on the cover, one with Peter next to
Mary Jane and one with Peter in costume. The choice
of comics was something DC had done the previous year
(47:25):
with their Man of Steel miniseriies same.
Speaker 4 (47:29):
Cover with their alterations. It was a big hit.
Speaker 3 (47:32):
I didn't realize that we were probably doing the first
variant cover in comics. And I never did it again
while I was at Marvel, and never at any of
my other companies. But people realize, hey, they have to
buy two of them, and so everybody, including Marvel after
I left, started doing tons of these alternate covers. So
we ended up accidentally starting a trend.
Speaker 2 (47:56):
Stanley took a different tact. In the comic strip Mary
Jane's uncle, a judge, writes up a marriage license and
invites the two to get hitched at his house. Just
before he can make it official, Peter ducks out to
save a painter from falling off his scaffolding. Fortunately, the
fire department gets their first leaving Peter to return to
(48:18):
his bride. Even j Jonah Jamison has kind words for
the two. For Marvel, the event was worth its weight
in publicity. Mentions of the wedding appeared in newspapers all
over the country. Spider Man got a segment on Entertainment Tonight.
It was also one of the first times that a
(48:40):
media company would use multimedia, telling a story that spanned comics,
strips and live action performers that's common today in an
era of big budget movies and tie in video games.
In nineteen eighty seven, it was breaking new ground, but
(49:01):
comics readers know that nothing is ever really permanent. When
character die, they come back to life eventually. Entire universes
can be destroyed and rebuilt, histories wiped out and restored.
It's inevitable when you keep writing stories about heroes who
(49:21):
have lived on for decades. It also means that from
the time they locked lips, Peter and Mjay were on
borrowed time. Despite the cruel capricious nature of comics, Peter's
marriage to Mary Jane endured. The couple remained Peter and
Mary Jane Parker in the comics for an amazing twenty years.
(49:47):
That's actual years, not comic time. It took the demon
Mephisto to dissolve their union, forcing Peter to erase just
this one part of his life in order to spare
the life of his beloved aunt May. The story arc
was co written by Joe Quesada, who had long believed
(50:08):
the marriage hemmed in the story possibilities of the characters.
In Marvel terms, he was the green goblin bursting out
of that wedding cake. It's all a bit of a
soap opera, and not one that fans loved. Critics believed
that splitting Peter and mj up via a deal with
(50:28):
the Devil, Marvel was abandoning its core tenants of realism,
in this case the emotional toll of a consensual divorce.
But deciding what's real or not in the world of
Spider Man is a difficult task. There's comic continuity, movie continuity,
(50:48):
and comic strip continuity. In the strip, stan Lee maintained
the two were married. They remained in relative wedded bliss
for the rest of the strip's run, which ended in
twenty nineteen, not long after stan passed away at the
age of nineteen. No matter the medium, the relationship between
(51:11):
these two seems to resonate with audiences. Though Marvel held
other high profile weddings, including one between X Men Mutant's
Scott Summers and Geen Gray in nineteen ninety four, no
comic romance has ever captured reader's imaginations like the one
(51:31):
on display at Shay Stadium back in nineteen eighty seven.
That wedding was the last time Tara Shannon portrayed Mary
Jane Watson, and to memory that hasn't been wiped out
by Mefisto. The dress, unfortunately, is another story.
Speaker 6 (51:51):
The just got stolen unfortunately right after the event. Yeah,
from one of the delivery trucks. That's also a big
part of seventh that happened. If you've followed any of
the Godfather books, you know, trucks.
Speaker 2 (52:04):
Disappear, continued modeling before segging into becoming a life coach.
Speaker 6 (52:11):
That was a really memorable, fun moment to get to
be a part of, you know, this thing that now
what the Marvel universe literally is right now, I'm related
to it in this very strange and delightful way.
Speaker 2 (52:25):
Jerry Coulpit still had a lot of work to do.
He portrayed Spider Man from nineteen seventy eight until two
thousand and one, when his home of New York was
attacked in a very real way.
Speaker 5 (52:40):
I was going through my own thing and wasn't performing
in any kind of normal way at that point in
my life. But it just made it very clear that
it was time to hang up the webs chair, and
we'll give it up chair, let's move on.
Speaker 2 (52:57):
Jerry swung into the corporate world, but is still acting
today in film and on television. His twenty three years
in the webs is still very much on his mind.
Speaker 4 (53:10):
I still wake up from Spider Man dreams. I still do.
Speaker 5 (53:13):
I did it so much, you know, making appearances at
huge venues, which I did plenty of. You know, of
that anxiety about quoint no one what is going to
be happening. But I'm Spider Man, Forgot's sake, so I
can do it. That sort of thing is still waking
me up from dreams.
Speaker 4 (53:29):
I'm still dreaming about being Spider Man.
Speaker 2 (53:33):
In two thousand and two, the year after Jerry hung
up the Webshooters, Toby maguire made his debut in the
first Spider Man movie, but none of the live action
feature films have ever married off Peter Parker and Mary Jane.
That honor is still one that belongs exclusively to Jerry
(53:55):
and Tara, who have this small but crucial chapter in
Marvel history all to themselves.
Speaker 1 (54:03):
I now pronounce you spider Man and White.
Speaker 7 (54:29):
Very Special Episodes is made by some very special people.
This show is hosted by Danish Schwartz, Sarah Burnett, and
Jason English. Today's episode was written by Jake Rosson. Our
producer is Josh Fisher. Editing and sound designed by Chris Childs,
Mixing and mastering by Beheid Frazier. Special thanks to our
(54:49):
voice actors Katie Maddy, Chris Childs and Josh Fisher. Original
music by Alis McCoy, research in fact checking by Jake
Rosson and Austin Thompson. Show logo by Lucy Kintonia. Our
executive producer is Jason English. You'd like to email the show,
you can reach us at Very Special Episodes at gmail
(55:09):
dot com. Very Special Episodes is a production of iHeart Podcasts.
Originals.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
This is an iHeart original. Stan Lee is worried he
doesn't know anything about comics. Stan of course, is the
architect of the modern Marvel universe. He created its dizzying
(00:33):
array of characters in collaboration with a number of talented artists.
But it's nineteen eighty six and Stan's been out of
the game for years. He relocated from Marvel's headquarters in
Manhattan to Hollywood in the hopes of leading Marvel's charge
into movies and television. That wasn't going all that well.
(00:59):
The first Marvel live action theatrical movie ever made was
about to come out. It was Howard the Duck, a
sci fi comedy. It featured a libidinous waterfowl who develops
a crush on Leah Thompson. It's considered one of the
biggest bombs of all time. Other Marvel characters are in
(01:22):
various stages of development hell, with Stan trying pleading to
get Hollywood to notice Marvel's potential. Now making an appearance
at a summer comic book convention in Chicago, He's concerned
he's been out of the loop for too long.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
I was at the Chicago convention, which is in the
summer of nineteen eighty six, and Stan was also a guest.
So I'm doing my thing and Stan catches me in
the hallway and he says, you got to help me,
and I said, what you know? He said, they want
me to do a one man panel on stage.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
That's Jim Shooter. In the nineteen eighties, Jim was the
editor in chief of Marvel Comics, role once occupied by Stan.
Jim's duty was to guide the editorial direction of titles
like The Uncanny X Men, Daredevil, Iron Man, and dozens
of others.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
All the questions are going to be a bycomic, so
I won't be able to answer a single question, because
at that point he was just doing the cartoons and
the TV and movies.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Jim agreed to intervene if Stan got stumped. The Q
and A was humming along, and then one audience member
threw a bit of a curveball.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
Finally we get near the end and the moderator says,
we have time for one more question, and this fellow
in the back raises in. He says, this is for Stan.
He says, when are you going to let Peter Parker
and Mary Jane get married?
Speaker 2 (02:55):
And the crowd rollers Peter Parker, the everyman of the
Marvel universe, marrying Mary Jane Watson, the red haired model.
The two had long been the it couple in comics.
Stan being the mascot of Marvel, took the question and
(03:15):
ran with it.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
Stan trying to calm everybody down, and he says, no,
that's not a question for me. He said, Jim runs
the comics. He's entirely in charge of all that, you know.
Speaker 4 (03:25):
I'm doing the.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
TV and Hollywood stuff. And then he turns in his
seat to face me, and he bounces up and down
like a little kid and says.
Speaker 4 (03:33):
Can we Jim? Can we?
Speaker 5 (03:34):
Can?
Speaker 4 (03:35):
We? Can we Jim?
Speaker 3 (03:37):
And the crowd roared, And so I thought, I'm not
getting out of this room alive if I say no.
And what I did say was, look, I said, maybe
Stan isn't in charge, I said, but he's Stanley, and
if he wants to do it, we're doing it. Crowd
roars again, and so I turned to stand and said,
(03:59):
now we have to do it.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
And so on a warm night in June ninth, teen
eighty seven, model Mary Jane Watson would marry her longtime love,
the Amazing Spider Man, but not just in the comic.
They do it in front of fifty one thousand, four
hundred and two people at Shay Stadium, home of the
(04:26):
New York Mets and where the Beatles held their famous
stadium concert in nineteen sixty five. This was the comic
book version of Lady Diana and Prince Charles, Bigger than
Madonna and Sean Penn, decades before Marvel and Spider Man
were box office giants. It was a rare opportunity to
(04:49):
see the Wall Crawler live in person and getting hitched
moments before a pivotal ballgame. Nothing like it had ever
been attempted before. A real life wedding between two fictional
characters at New.
Speaker 6 (05:07):
York Day Stadium.
Speaker 7 (05:08):
Spider Man and Mary Jane will finally.
Speaker 5 (05:10):
Get married, and we have the privilege.
Speaker 7 (05:12):
Of joining them this morning at a pre nuptial gathering
app Show Stadium.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
It's the story of one of the wildest nuptials of
all time, Spider Man and mj The NEWLYWBS. Welcome to
very special episodes and I heart original podcast. I'm your host,
Dana Schwartz, and this is with this ring I the Web.
Speaker 7 (05:41):
Hey, everybody, my name is Jason English. One third of
your usual post intro banter trio today. Just a quick
interruption here at the top, and then we'll get right
back into the story. Dana's Aaron and I would love
to do a mailbag episode. Sh'w get some pretty fun emails.
So this is a call to arms or thumbs or
whatever you type with if you've got a question about
(06:03):
Very Special Episodes, you have a topic you wish we'd cover.
A question about noble blood or ridiculous crime or any
other podcast merch ideas. You disagree with some of Zarin's
casting choices from previous episodes, send it to Very Special
Episodes at gmail dot com and we might read it
in a future episode.
Speaker 4 (06:23):
All right, back to the show.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Superheroes aren't usually marriage material. It took Clark Kent until
nineteen ninety to pop the question to Lois Lane, and
another six years to actually tie the knot. It's hard
to imagine Batman dating. DC characters in particular didn't seem
to have much of a domestic life.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
Here's a difference between Marvel and DC. Back in my day.
At DC, every character they had no financial worries. They
were probably rich, They had their own secret cave in
their own aerocar or batmobile or whatever. They had their
kids sidekick. They had met the love of their life
all ready.
Speaker 2 (07:08):
That's Jim Shooter again. In addition to being Marvel's boss,
he was a creator in his own right. He got
his start writing for Marvel's arch rival DC at the
age of fourteen. For a while, he alternated between the
two companies before settling into the editor in chief role
(07:28):
at Marvel in nineteen eighty four. He wrote Marvel's Secret Wars,
one of the first major crossover series, featuring virtually every
major Marvel superhero. It helped set the template for the
Marvel cinematic universe of today. And now he was being
(07:49):
tasked with pulling off a wedding.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
I had no objection to it. I thought it was
fine if Stan wanted to do it, and we could
do it coordinated in the strip and in the comics
at the same time. I thought that could be a
big deal, and it turned out to be a big deal.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
At the time, Stan was writing the Spider Man comic
strip that was appearing in hundreds of newspapers around the country.
If Spider Man were to get married in the comic book,
then he'd have to get married in the comic strip too.
While the two didn't share precisely the same continuity, a
(08:28):
change that large would be a little distracting, so Jim
Stan and Spider Man editor Jim Salakrup all made share
their plans dovetailed with one another. The comic would arrive
in June nineteen eighty seven, around the same time the
marriage took place in the strip. This wasn't a decision
(08:51):
that Jim took lightly. Spider Man had been a bachelor
for a long time. He debuted in nineteen sixty two,
the work of Stan and artist Steve Ditko. Like most
Marvel heroes, he wasn't a deity, but a regular guy
with regular problems, wrent that was past due, social anxiety,
(09:15):
that kind of stuff. His first major relationship was with
Betty Brandt, an employee at The Daily Bugle, where Spider
Man's alter ego Peter Parker sold his freelance photos and
where he was frequently berated by boss j Jonah Jamison.
But it wasn't long before Gwen Stacy captured his attention
(09:39):
and his heart. The daughter of police Captain George Stacy,
Gwen was a fellow college student and still one of
the most popular of Peter's many romances. In the midst
of all of this was Mary Jane. She had been
a blind date set up by Peter's aunt May. Something
(10:01):
May teased Peter about four months before Mary Jane finally
appeared The Amazing Spider Man Number forty two in nineteen
sixty six, and she makes quite an entrance. It comes
just after Peter realizes the spark with Betty Brandt is gone,
a mood expressed in the hyperbolic comic book Dialogue of
(10:26):
the nineteen sixties.
Speaker 8 (10:28):
All these months I thought about her, dreamt about her,
longed for her. So now she's returned, and nothing'sville.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
Later, the doorbell rings and Peter answers.
Speaker 1 (10:41):
You mean that's Mary Jane.
Speaker 9 (10:43):
Face it, Tiger, You just said the jackpot.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
Peter is instantly smitten. That was thanks in large parts
to artist John Remita Senior, who drew the issue and
conceived of Mary Jane's look, which was modeled after actress
Anne Margaret.
Speaker 8 (11:02):
So tell me about yourself, Mary Jane. How come I've
never run into you before? What do you do with
yourself when you're not driving helpless males out of their minds,
and all this.
Speaker 9 (11:11):
Time I was afraid you'd be the shy type. I
spend most of my time taking drama lessons.
Speaker 1 (11:16):
Oh, you plan to be an actress.
Speaker 9 (11:18):
Correction, Clyde, I am an actress. It's just a matter
of time till this big, blind, bouncy world discovers that
fabulous fact.
Speaker 8 (11:25):
What a living doll. She makes everything seem like a party.
Speaker 2 (11:29):
Peter would be torn between the vivacious MJ and the
pragmatic Gwen for years, until Gwen would tragically be killed
during a battle between Spider Man and his nemesis, the
Green Goblin, another heavy dose of the personal pathos Marvel
(11:49):
was known to put a tear through Peter did not
take it well.
Speaker 1 (11:54):
I'm gonna get you, Goblin.
Speaker 8 (11:56):
I'm gonna destroy you slowly, and when you start begging
for me to end it, I'm gonna remind you of
one thing. You killed the woman I love, and for
that you're going to die.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Peter managed to get a grip on his homicidal rage
and later wound up proposing to MJ. But the timing
wasn't quite right.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Mary Jane, will you marry me?
Speaker 9 (12:21):
Come on, Tiger, you know, good old MJ is too
free a spirit to tie herself down to anyone swinger,
even to a brown eyed hunk like you. There's a
world of groovy guys out there, and this doll's got
to be free to find him.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
While that sounds pretty callous, readers later learned MJ wasn't
afraid of commitment so much as being pushed off a
roof by a psychopath dressed as a goblin. She had
discovered Peter with Spider Man and wasn't sure she was
ready for a life of looking over her shoulder. Other
Spider Man writers had floated the idea of the two
(12:57):
getting married, including one pitch for Peter to be left
at the altar, but it never gained steam despite a
very pro tract did courtship. In the eyes of comic
book readers. Peter and MJ had been dating on and
off for about twenty years, which is a pretty long
time to avoid the big question, but in the continuity
(13:22):
of the comic it was more like six years, and
while both had other relationships, they always seemed to drift
back to one another.
Speaker 3 (13:32):
I like the difference some personalities because when Peter Parker's
Spider Man, he's witty, he's joking, he's daring, you know.
When he's Peter Parker, he's a little more conservative, introverted.
And I like the fact that Mary Chane was good
foil for that. She was, you know, face at Tiger,
So I thought it was a good match.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Initially, Jim was only concerned with the comic book and
comic strip weddings, but this was around the time Marvel
was being purchased by New World Pictures and Entertainment, in
motion picture company that was hoping to monetize their new
library of characters. Both Jim and New World felt that
(14:15):
a live wedding would be the perfect promotional vehicle for
the story, but Jim was having issues with Cadence Industries,
the company selling Marvel to New World.
Speaker 3 (14:29):
They had decided to sell Marvel, and when you're selling
a company like Marvel, you don't want to invest anymore.
You're trying to save every nickel.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
According to Jim, the belt tightening was alienating talent who
sometimes sought greener pastures over at DC and blamed Jim
for driving them away.
Speaker 3 (14:52):
And then it's Jim Shooters driving talent away. You know,
it's just ridiculous. So I was at war with these
screaming war of these guys every day, and so in
the middle of that, we're planning a wedding. It was
kind of surreal.
Speaker 2 (15:08):
To plan the actual wedding, Jim relied on Pamela Rutt,
Marvel's director of publicity. It was Pam's job to get
Marvel's name out to the mainstream press, which still regarded
comics with a little disdain. This was an opportunity to
garner some significant attention, and it was coming at a
(15:30):
good time. In nineteen eighty six, DC had gotten lots
of coverage for their Watchmen and Dark Knight Returns series
to mature takes on the superhero genre. They were grim,
violent and in stark contrast to Marvel's wisecracking cast, and
(15:53):
DC also had the muscle of Warner Brothers behind them.
Marvel was more of the scrappy upstart that needed to
be creative. Pam made a deal with Shay Stadium, which
agreed to host the wedding on June fifth, nineteen eighty seven.
Spider Man would literally be on third base, or the
(16:16):
third base line anyway, with Mary Jane both appearing on
a heart shaped podium To make their union official, and
naturally stan Lee would be there to marry them off.
Pam was essentially Spider Man's wedding planner. In addition to
the actual ceremony, she prepared a bachelor party, yes, a
(16:40):
bachelor party. Fittingly, it took place at Toy Fair in Manhattan.
Spider Man, the guest of honor, sauntered into a conference
room filled with over six hundred people to greet his buddies,
like the Hulk and Captain America. Someone wheeled in a
giant cake the kind and exotic dancer might pop out of,
(17:04):
but that's not very family friend, so poor Spider Man
had to cope with the Green Goblin, the villain who
had caused the death of his beloved Gwen Stacy, emerging
from the cake instead. The man portraying Spider Man for
that bachelor party was kind of an understudy for the
(17:27):
actual wedding. Marvel planned to bring in the Marlon Brando
of Spider Man performers, a man who has played Spider
Man over fifteen hundred times, far more than any other actor.
Someone who could handle the pressure of the character's biggest moment,
(17:48):
someone who had been in tough situations before with Captain
America by his side.
Speaker 5 (17:54):
And you're sitting there with you know, a dozen or
twenty lucky kids who get to ride up with their
favorite superhero. I look over at Cap and he's turned white,
and he goes, yeah, I'm going to be sick.
Speaker 2 (18:13):
Comic book fans today are spoiled. Here is what we
mean by that. Right now, if you want to see
Spider Man in live action, you can head to a
streaming service and call up any of the eight Spider
Man feature films, each costing tens or even hundreds of
millions to produce, and that's not counting Spider Man's cameos
(18:35):
or major roles in movies like Avengers Infinity War. But
back in the nineteen eighties, Spider Man fans were in
a kind of drought. Yes, he did have several monthly
comic book titles along with the newspaper strip and a
few cartoons, but if you wanted to see Spider Man
(18:59):
in the flesh, you only had a few options. One
was The Electric Company, a public television kids show from
the nineteen seventies that had the character making appearances, Or
(19:24):
you could try to find reruns of the nineteen seventy
seven CBS television series starring Nicholas Hammond. Trying to do
Spider Man's wall crawling and web shooting on a seventies
TV budget was as disappointing as you can imagine. But
there was a third option. You could hope that Spider
(19:47):
Man would make a personal appearance at a mall, park
or school near you. By the nineteen eighties, Marvel opened
a new office devoted exclusively to costumed appearances. An event
could book a Marvel superhero to open a new supermarket
(20:08):
or promote a shopping center. Best of all, Marvel would
send them directly to you. The catch the selection was
fairly slim. You could get a guy in a padded
suit as the Hulk, or a pretty economical Iron Man.
There were two obscure characters, Firestar and Iceman, who had
(20:32):
appeared in an early nineteen eighties spider Man animated series,
Spider Man and his Amazing Friends, and there were a
few villains too, like the Green Goblin and Doctor Doom.
But per Marvel policy, heroes and villains never got physical
with each other. There was just a lot of well scolding.
(20:57):
All of these characters had their fans, but far and
away the most requested character for the appearances was Spider Man.
Kids love Spider Man. He's friendly, he's funny. His costume
is one of the best in comics, and even in
the eighties he was on everything from toy shelves to
(21:20):
under rus. His multiple comic titles sold a million copies
every month. According to Jim Shooter, Spider Man merchandise brought
in more revenue for Marvel than all the rest of
their characters combined. The man primarily responsible for bringing Spider
(21:41):
Man to life was Jerry Colpit's. Jerry was in his
early twenties a theater graduate from the University of Maine
when he caught word of an audition being held for
an unusual role making public appearances in Spandex.
Speaker 5 (22:00):
So they gave me a new costume, never been worn,
skin tight spanex webs with the mask which had kind
of a maze over the eyes and everything I found out.
So I remember putting it on back in the closet
in the head of Marketer.
Speaker 4 (22:18):
Marketing his office.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
That's Jerry.
Speaker 4 (22:21):
They had a small mirror there and Spandex what do
we aware of them? Did this thing?
Speaker 5 (22:25):
First of all, I don't know to come just hanging
out with the thing or should I leave my tidy
whites on. This is what you go through as an actor,
you know, And then let me try to all right,
leave my tidy whities for now, but let me all
right squeeze into this thing feet first.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
At the time, Jerry was going by his stage name
Jeremy Stewart, which is why you might see that name
in association with these costumed appearances. It's the same guy,
an alter ego if you prefer.
Speaker 4 (22:59):
And you know what I can see out of this thing.
Speaker 5 (23:01):
You have to watch my eyelashes getting stuck in the mesh.
Speaker 4 (23:05):
But here we go and adjust it. And I'll never
forget the moment I turned around.
Speaker 5 (23:12):
I looked in the mirror, and the Amazing Spider Man
was looking back At.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
The Jerry was hired. His first gig was at a
mall in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Speaker 5 (23:23):
Here is a new concept, actually a Marvel superhero showing
up at the grand opening of this enormous shopping mall
and come and get your picture taken with Spider Man.
Come and meet the Amazing Spider Man, Come and get
an autograph. And there were lines of these kids and
their families waiting in line to see the amazing Spider Man.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
To really appreciate Jerry's work as Spider Man, you need
to realize that most costume characters aren't required to speak
and verbally interact with a crowd. Think about the Disney
characters at their theme parks. You won't hear a quack
from Donald Duck or a squeak from Mickey. But at
Marvel Heroes, where expect to chat up fans. For an actor,
(24:10):
it was basically a kind of improv the Groundlings meets Superheroes.
Jerry was pretty good at this. Anything anyone could throw
at him he could handle.
Speaker 5 (24:21):
And I was given a lot of freedom over the
years to write my own speeches and dialogues. It usually
involves recycling the expected cheesy remarks. This job has me
climbing the walls.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
Jerry's performance as Spider Man was very impressive to Marvel,
who soon considered him their a list Spidey, the webhead
they dispatch when they had a valued client to satisfy.
Jerry would also get the prime gig of escorting his
co creator Stan Lee when stan made his personal appearances.
Speaker 5 (24:56):
How many times I had to remind stance zip Hop
is fly before we made an appearance. Stan, you fly,
you fly? Oh yeah, thanks, thanks Spady. He could count
on me to ormind and zip up his fly.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
But sometimes the gigs didn't go as planned, and not
because Stan couldn't remember to zip his pants. One time,
Jerry was dispatched to Hershey Park, an amusement destination in Pennsylvania.
He went there accompanied by Captain America. But on this
(25:30):
day Cap wasn't exactly the pride of the nation.
Speaker 5 (25:35):
They had a Spider Man Captain America team up right
on fourth of July. It was the hottest fourth of
July on record, and so they had this guy who
was playing Capital America.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
Spider Man and Cap made their way to a big
rotating wheel that went up in the air two hundred
feet and then CAP's long night caught up with him.
Speaker 5 (25:57):
We're about halfway up the pole. I grabbed his shield
and put it under his chin, and he like, h
let it go in front of all these kids, plus
you know, you get a crowd en below. We finally
get down and I was carrying his shield upside down,
trying not to spill it on anybody.
Speaker 4 (26:13):
And uh, I think they sent him home.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
No such mishap ever befell Jerry, but the costume did
have its pitfalls. Unlike the Space age fabrics and cgi
used in movies, Jerry's spidy suit was just stretchy spandex
one entire piece that dipped up at the shoulders. The eyes,
which are famously two white blobs, didn't provide him with
(26:41):
a terrific field of vision.
Speaker 5 (26:43):
Oh sure, you know, never broken bone, but uh yeah,
I stepped off a stage one time that I couldn't see.
You say, you have to mesh ow your eyes and
direct sunlight.
Speaker 4 (26:54):
Forget it, you're you get white.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
Out Falls weren't the only hazard, so were inebriated teens.
Speaker 5 (27:02):
Yeah, and I've had strange drunk kids sucker punch me
through the years. Yeah, I've good stories coming out of
a side swaper, you know, from behind and that kind
of thing that did happen.
Speaker 4 (27:15):
It didn't happen very often.
Speaker 5 (27:16):
But yeah, there are there are moments where it was
just like, well, buddy oh Man.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
Jerry was still pursuing his conventional acting career, but being
Spider Man took up a lot of his time. He
found himself jumping on planes almost every weekend, or being
shuttled to one event or another. In the nineteen eighties,
he even made several appearances in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.
(27:43):
But Jerry's most rewarding work as Spider Man came when
Marvel decided to team up with the National Committee for
the Prevention of Child Abuse In nineteen eighty four. The
company printed a comic in which Spider Man shares he
was touched inappropriately as a kid. The idea was get
(28:07):
children comfortable in sharing their own stories of abuse.
Speaker 5 (28:12):
And so I would help distribute these comic books around
the country and do an assembly for we're talking grade
schools and found a way to captivate the kids by
appearing from a high place. Usually the principal would come
out and say, we have a special guest here today.
Speaker 4 (28:31):
Anybody know who it is? Yeah, Spider Man or Spider
Man who Spider Man in the spotlight on me? Perched
up the thing and.
Speaker 5 (28:41):
I jumped down, and the kids were screaming, and I'd
try and find the scruffiest looking kid and pick him up,
and he'd beat the star of the day. And you know,
found the sours looking teacher and walk over to her
and give her a big hug.
Speaker 4 (28:53):
And so you get the kids on your side now.
Speaker 2 (28:56):
That special issue might be one of the most printed
copies of any comic book ever. Roughly sixteen million copies
were inserted into Sunday newspapers all across the country, with
another two million handed out by the committee, and Jerry
as Spider Man, made several appearances in support of the story.
(29:20):
That meant being prepared to have some serious conversations with
kids who looked up to the character.
Speaker 5 (29:28):
I got a phone call one night from a doctor
and the guy was in tears. This kid they had
in there who just you know, they'd been working with
him for weeks and he would just not open his
mouth about what had gone on, although the bruises were there.
The doctor called me and said, I'm so glad we
had you here. Timmy is finally opening up thanks to
your visit. So you kind of feel like you're making
(29:51):
a difference here, and that was really a very gratifying,
wonderful experience.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
Another highlight for Jerry was interacting with celebrities, even presidents.
He was once invited to the annual Easter Egg hunh
at the White House, where he was face to face
with then President Ronald Reagan and his wife Nancy.
Speaker 5 (30:14):
Ronald Reagan came out of the White House and I
managed to squeeze it next to him and put my
hands on his.
Speaker 4 (30:20):
Suit and he was laughing uproariously.
Speaker 5 (30:23):
The next day, I'm in New York City after coming
back from DC, and I'm riding on a bus. I
look down and the guy next to me is reading
the New York Times on the front page. Big slow
news day, I guess, but a big picture of Spider
Man and Ronald Reagan laughing his so.
Speaker 2 (30:39):
But not even meeting a president could compare to the
nerves of Spider Man's biggest gig, getting married in front
of fifty one thousand people at Shay Stadium.
Speaker 5 (30:52):
So finally he sees that they're going to tie the
knot and wow, wow, that's quite an event. And we're
going to have Shaye Stadium with the Mets play, Yeah,
the world champion Mets from the year before. But she
started talking to me about it. You're going to be
wearing a white top entails.
Speaker 2 (31:08):
Few performers, outside of magic music acts, we'll ever see
a live audience that size. With just days to go
before the wedding, poor Jerry hadn't even met his bride
to be, Mary Jane Watson was always just a little
(31:38):
bit out of Peter Parker's league. Peter was, after all,
the science nerd and shutterbug who favored sweater vests. Mary
Jane was a fashion model, a globe hopping trendsetter. For
their Shay Stadium wedding. That made finding someone to portray
Mary Jane a little challenging. Sure, they needed a red
(32:02):
haired model, but they also needed someone who would be
comfortable portraying a fictional character in front of tens of
thousands of people, in addition to making several public appearances,
all while remaining in character.
Speaker 6 (32:19):
But this was my norm, this kind of event stuff,
so that probably had a part in it. They don't
exactly run things by you.
Speaker 2 (32:30):
That's Tara Shannon, the model picked to play Mary Jane.
Speaker 6 (32:35):
You know, it was like the music videos back then,
same thing. You just showed up and twenty four hours
later you shot a music video with everyone pitching in
and helping. You know, It's like a Judy Garland movie
or something. So yeah, just basically you know, showing up,
you know, and also reference they're saying, okay, you're going
to go do this at the Mets, and then there's
going to be a party at a nightclub, and you're
(32:57):
going to stay in character, and you just show up.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
Tara started modeling in the late nineteen seventies. Like a
lot of models, she's able to communicate with a camera,
transmitting charisma in a still photo. That ability led to
covers for Vogue, Harper's Bizarre, and work in music videos,
including a Different Kind of Bride.
Speaker 6 (33:22):
I did Bride of Frankenstein in the Huey Lewis video
the same year that was hilarious Doing It All for
My Baby, where Huey played Frankenstein and his band played
Igor in the lab. In the dungeon, everyone gets killed,
the head's decapitated, theirs Sirred Underglass.
Speaker 2 (33:43):
With her red hair, Tara looked a good deal like
Mary Jane. Someone recommended her to Marvel, which got her
an invite to the company's famed bullpen full of writers
and artists cranking out dozens of monthly titles. While Tara
wasn't a die hard collector, she did relate to one
(34:04):
of the company's lesser known characters, Millie the Model, a
fashion figure navigating New York City.
Speaker 6 (34:12):
When I was aligned with Marvel for this job, I
got to go to the Marvel offices in New York
and see all the comic strip artists in their little desks,
you know, just before the word nerd came in, and
you know, both of us, you know, the comic book
artists and me as a model, where we're looking at
each other like, you know, we're like aliens, like we've
(34:33):
never been in each other's world.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
Mary Jane had never appeared in a live action setting before.
She was never a character on the seventies Spider Man Show,
so this would be the first. Once it was official,
Tara was dispatched to the offices of designer Willie Smith
for a bridal fitting. If you don't follow the fashion world,
(34:57):
you might not be familiar with Willy's name, but he
was one of the premier designers of the decade, designing
suits for Caroline Kennedy's wedding the previous summer. Marvel believed
his stature in the fashion world would be another press
coup for them, and they were right.
Speaker 6 (35:16):
Yeah, it was the eighties and fashion. First of all,
he was an African American designer and that was rare,
and he was incredibly successful, so that in itself needs
to be held with the respect that it deserves because
what he did.
Speaker 2 (35:31):
Many of the articles about the wedding mentioned Willy's involvement
and his gown. It was a lacy white number with
a high collar and a trumpet skirt. Willie also designed
Spider Man's formal wear for the event, which required a
jacket with coattails, white spats, a cumberbund bow tie, and
(35:52):
other accessories that would blend with his costume. It was,
after all, Spider Man getting married, not Peter Parker. He
had a secret identity to protect. But Willie sadly wouldn't
be around owned for the ceremony. He died of complications
from AIDS in the spring of nineteen eighty seven. Mary
(36:14):
Jane's gown would be one of his final projects. Marvel
was banking on the novelty of a real comic book
wedding to attract press, and it worked. Newspapers around the
country ran notices breathlessly reporting the couple's two decade long entanglement.
(36:38):
The duo were even available for quotes fretting that their
children would be born with eight legs or relating the
groom was so nervous he was pacing the ceiling. Pam
Rut of Marvel's publicity arm even got The New York
Times to make mention of the ceremony in a kind
of mock wedding announcement, a perk not even warm blooded
(37:02):
famous couples always get it.
Speaker 10 (37:04):
Read Friday Night as chayse Stadium, Mary Jane Watson, an actress, model,
and computer business woman, will be married to the Amazing
Spider Man, a superhero also known to comic book cognizanti
as Peter Parker, a freelance photographer for the mythical Daily
Bugle in Manhattan. Stan Lee, publisher of Marvel Comics and
(37:26):
creator of Spider Man, will officiate.
Speaker 2 (37:29):
Marvel scored another big coup when Tara, Jerry and stan
Lee made an appearance on Good Morning America the day
before the ceremony, In an era before the Marvel movie
machine started humming, this was major exposure. All they needed
now was to pull off the real thing. On June fifth,
(37:53):
the Marvel Repertory Company left their Manhattan office and headed
for shay Stadium. In addition to Spider Man, Mary Jane
and stan Lee, Captain America was on hand to be
best man. Hopefully sober this time. Firestar was there, as
was Iceman and the Hulk. Even the Green Goblin was there,
(38:17):
who we will remind you was responsible for the death
of Peter's other love, Gwen Stacy awkward. Once they were
at the stadium, the cast was directed to a spare
locker room so they could get changed and go over
their lines.
Speaker 6 (38:34):
I got to get my wedding dress in the locker
room of the Mets. That's where I got dressed.
Speaker 4 (38:44):
It's crazy.
Speaker 6 (38:46):
My attendants were, you know, the incredible Hull, Captain America,
all these other Marvel characters, so surreal.
Speaker 2 (38:56):
While they waited, Mets players began filing in, casting some
curious glances toward the comic book team up materializing in
the stadium. That led to Jerry having a very meta
moment of getting jealous of his character's fictional bride.
Speaker 5 (39:15):
Here's Jerry, I'm like pointing out, you know, that's terreal
Strawberry sauntering down the hallway. He does a double take
and he sees her standing there, and he immediately, you know,
this cheshire cat grin the saunters over to her.
Speaker 4 (39:30):
He's on his way to.
Speaker 5 (39:31):
Work, for God's sake, and she's standing there and he
said who are you? And I'm like, I'm going to
get married to this woman in a couple of hours.
You know what, Jess, should I web the guy? I go,
what a homeworker?
Speaker 4 (39:44):
You know, he's making moves on my on my fiance.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
But not everyone was happy to see them. For baseball fans,
the most significant event to happen at Shay that night
wasn't the wedding. It was the return of Dwight Goodin,
a star for the Mets, who had been absent while
attending a drug and alcohol rehabilitation program. To Gooden's treatment supervisor,
(40:10):
doctor Alan Lands, a comic book, wedding was a distraction.
His player didn't need talking to press, Doctor Lands said,
who needs this? It's horrible? In my way, it would
have been as routine an evening as possible. Marvel, however,
had booked Shay long before Goodin's return was scheduled. There
(40:32):
wasn't anything anyone, including doctor LANs, could really do about it,
and Spider Man has overcome worse odds. At seven point
fifteen pm, it was time. Jerry climbed into one limousine
and Tara in another. The two were driven out near
(40:53):
third base where a heart shaped podium and stan Lee
awaited them for Tara. It was another very weird day
at the office.
Speaker 6 (41:04):
It made me pretend like I was a rock star
or the Pope standing in the roof of the limousine
in nineteen eighty seven. They were huge and waving at everyone.
That was hilarious. It was like, Okay, I'm going to
act out all my fantasies.
Speaker 7 (41:20):
I'm the Pope.
Speaker 6 (41:21):
You no blessing to all you know I'm a rock star.
Speaker 2 (41:25):
The stadium announcer began reciting lines written for them by
comic book writer Peter.
Speaker 10 (41:31):
David lazz.
Speaker 11 (41:34):
In the United sixties, too feature legends After all Spies
beginnings one, It's the amazing.
Speaker 8 (41:41):
That's the evasy Spider Man.
Speaker 9 (41:45):
Today it's too great.
Speaker 11 (41:46):
America institutions Spider again, and that's as SI institution that
patron the manage the marvels of fighting Whomanness.
Speaker 8 (41:57):
The marriage of Spider American is.
Speaker 11 (41:59):
Not miss miss marriage at once. Now duens, cast your
guys to serve you and enjoin see wall ride.
Speaker 2 (42:11):
Jerry was poised on top of the limo in a
classic Spider Man crawl. He leaped down to the ground,
hoping his hamstrings wouldn't give out. Stanley then proceeded to
ham it up with some innocuous, if somewhat sexist banter.
Speaker 11 (42:28):
Do you, Spider Man, being of sound mind and superbody,
take Mary Jane to be your lawfully wedded wife, forsaking
all other heroines? Do you promise never to leave your
footprints on the walls or ceiling or cobwebs in the corners?
And do you agree to pinch.
Speaker 1 (42:45):
Hit for the Mets if they ask you?
Speaker 6 (42:47):
I do?
Speaker 11 (42:50):
Do you, Mary Jane, being of sound mind and spectacular body,
agree to forsake other masked Marvelites, to never swat a
spider and to huh comfort and kiss away any bruises
incurred after a long day of bashing bad guys and
stay at a net's walk off.
Speaker 3 (43:09):
I do.
Speaker 2 (43:12):
Jerry and Tara slipped custom rings onto their fingers. Each
had a spider setting.
Speaker 11 (43:19):
Please repeat after me.
Speaker 1 (43:21):
With these rings, I the web, with these wings, I
the wedde.
Speaker 2 (43:32):
With that, Tara executed a practiced swoon, allowing Spider Man
to mime a kiss with the marriage also came a
divorce of sorts. By this point, Jim was no longer
editor in chief at Marvel, his issues with Cadence Industries
(43:53):
and New World had come to a head while he
was still consulting with the company. His tenure as the
boss had come to an end, but he was still
invited to the ceremony like everyone in as Jim had
been gifted the comic featuring the wedding and other Spider
Man merchandise. To commemorate the event.
Speaker 3 (44:15):
They gave away tens of thousands of free comics to
people as entered the stadium. I never saw so many
paper airplanes and comics thrown on the trash and thrown
on the floor. See I don't think a baseball fans
necessarily a very congruent with the comic book fans, And
no one paid any attention to their wedding that was
going on in the field.
Speaker 2 (44:36):
Still, he and Stan were essentially two proud dads watching
as the characters they cared for were whisked off in
a limo. As the Mets took the field. New York
would beat the Pittsburgh Pirates that night, five to one.
Dwight Gooden pitched into the seventh inning and got the victory.
A wedding reception followed at Tunnel, a hot nightclub in
(45:00):
the city that was located and an abandoned subway tunnel.
There was a cake as well as an overheating Hulk
who had to be dragged off the dance floor before
he fainted. Nineteen eighties superhero costumes were not made for
hard partying.
Speaker 5 (45:18):
They had a big party and also with the Spider
Man with a mask with a mesh on over the eyes,
you get into a dark club or something, you know,
you just can't see for Ur's sake, so it's just
moving very slowly and kind of feeling your way around.
Speaker 4 (45:32):
More than anything.
Speaker 2 (45:33):
So of course the Shea Stadium event was just a
tease for the real thing. Marvel's business was comic books,
and in the pages of Spider Man, Peter Parker and
Mary Jane Watson had their canonical wedding, with Peter appearing
as himself rather than his crime fighting persona. The plot
(45:56):
was hatched by Jim Shooter and scripted by writer David Mcaliny.
It involves Peter having a midlife crisis, questioning his stability
in an ever changing world and looking for domestic bliss.
He pops the question to Mary Jane, who doesn't give
him an answer at first. Opting instead to head to
(46:18):
Pittsburgh to see her sister and help her father, who
happens to be a scoundrel who traffics in stolen rare books.
She does eventually say yes. The wedding, held in The
Amazing Spider Man Annual number twenty one, is tinged with suspense.
Peter can't help but worry that he might be putting
(46:40):
Mary Jane in the same harm's way as Gwen Stacy.
Mjy also has second thoughts, tempted by the flashy lifestyle
of a rich suitor named Bruce, but true love cannot
be denied. The couple eventually climb the steps of City
Hall in holy matrimony. Mj is even wearing the gown
(47:04):
designed by the late Willie Smith. It was also the
first time Marvel had ever sold a comic with two
different illustrations on the cover, one with Peter next to
Mary Jane and one with Peter in costume. The choice
of comics was something DC had done the previous year
(47:25):
with their Man of Steel miniseriies same.
Speaker 4 (47:29):
Cover with their alterations. It was a big hit.
Speaker 3 (47:32):
I didn't realize that we were probably doing the first
variant cover in comics. And I never did it again
while I was at Marvel, and never at any of
my other companies. But people realize, hey, they have to
buy two of them, and so everybody, including Marvel after
I left, started doing tons of these alternate covers. So
we ended up accidentally starting a trend.
Speaker 2 (47:56):
Stanley took a different tact. In the comic strip Mary
Jane's uncle, a judge, writes up a marriage license and
invites the two to get hitched at his house. Just
before he can make it official, Peter ducks out to
save a painter from falling off his scaffolding. Fortunately, the
fire department gets their first leaving Peter to return to
(48:18):
his bride. Even j Jonah Jamison has kind words for
the two. For Marvel, the event was worth its weight
in publicity. Mentions of the wedding appeared in newspapers all
over the country. Spider Man got a segment on Entertainment Tonight.
It was also one of the first times that a
(48:40):
media company would use multimedia, telling a story that spanned comics,
strips and live action performers that's common today in an
era of big budget movies and tie in video games.
In nineteen eighty seven, it was breaking new ground, but
(49:01):
comics readers know that nothing is ever really permanent. When
character die, they come back to life eventually. Entire universes
can be destroyed and rebuilt, histories wiped out and restored.
It's inevitable when you keep writing stories about heroes who
(49:21):
have lived on for decades. It also means that from
the time they locked lips, Peter and Mjay were on
borrowed time. Despite the cruel capricious nature of comics, Peter's
marriage to Mary Jane endured. The couple remained Peter and
Mary Jane Parker in the comics for an amazing twenty years.
(49:47):
That's actual years, not comic time. It took the demon
Mephisto to dissolve their union, forcing Peter to erase just
this one part of his life in order to spare
the life of his beloved aunt May. The story arc
was co written by Joe Quesada, who had long believed
(50:08):
the marriage hemmed in the story possibilities of the characters.
In Marvel terms, he was the green goblin bursting out
of that wedding cake. It's all a bit of a
soap opera, and not one that fans loved. Critics believed
that splitting Peter and mj up via a deal with
(50:28):
the Devil, Marvel was abandoning its core tenants of realism,
in this case the emotional toll of a consensual divorce.
But deciding what's real or not in the world of
Spider Man is a difficult task. There's comic continuity, movie continuity,
(50:48):
and comic strip continuity. In the strip, stan Lee maintained
the two were married. They remained in relative wedded bliss
for the rest of the strip's run, which ended in
twenty nineteen, not long after stan passed away at the
age of nineteen. No matter the medium, the relationship between
(51:11):
these two seems to resonate with audiences. Though Marvel held
other high profile weddings, including one between X Men Mutant's
Scott Summers and Geen Gray in nineteen ninety four, no
comic romance has ever captured reader's imaginations like the one
(51:31):
on display at Shay Stadium back in nineteen eighty seven.
That wedding was the last time Tara Shannon portrayed Mary
Jane Watson, and to memory that hasn't been wiped out
by Mefisto. The dress, unfortunately, is another story.
Speaker 6 (51:51):
The just got stolen unfortunately right after the event. Yeah,
from one of the delivery trucks. That's also a big
part of seventh that happened. If you've followed any of
the Godfather books, you know, trucks.
Speaker 2 (52:04):
Disappear, continued modeling before segging into becoming a life coach.
Speaker 6 (52:11):
That was a really memorable, fun moment to get to
be a part of, you know, this thing that now
what the Marvel universe literally is right now, I'm related
to it in this very strange and delightful way.
Speaker 2 (52:25):
Jerry Coulpit still had a lot of work to do.
He portrayed Spider Man from nineteen seventy eight until two
thousand and one, when his home of New York was
attacked in a very real way.
Speaker 5 (52:40):
I was going through my own thing and wasn't performing
in any kind of normal way at that point in
my life. But it just made it very clear that
it was time to hang up the webs chair, and
we'll give it up chair, let's move on.
Speaker 2 (52:57):
Jerry swung into the corporate world, but is still acting
today in film and on television. His twenty three years
in the webs is still very much on his mind.
Speaker 4 (53:10):
I still wake up from Spider Man dreams. I still do.
Speaker 5 (53:13):
I did it so much, you know, making appearances at
huge venues, which I did plenty of. You know, of
that anxiety about quoint no one what is going to
be happening. But I'm Spider Man, Forgot's sake, so I
can do it. That sort of thing is still waking
me up from dreams.
Speaker 4 (53:29):
I'm still dreaming about being Spider Man.
Speaker 2 (53:33):
In two thousand and two, the year after Jerry hung
up the Webshooters, Toby maguire made his debut in the
first Spider Man movie, but none of the live action
feature films have ever married off Peter Parker and Mary Jane.
That honor is still one that belongs exclusively to Jerry
(53:55):
and Tara, who have this small but crucial chapter in
Marvel history all to themselves.
Speaker 1 (54:03):
I now pronounce you spider Man and White.
Speaker 7 (54:29):
Very Special Episodes is made by some very special people.
This show is hosted by Danish Schwartz, Sarah Burnett, and
Jason English. Today's episode was written by Jake Rosson. Our
producer is Josh Fisher. Editing and sound designed by Chris Childs,
Mixing and mastering by Beheid Frazier. Special thanks to our
(54:49):
voice actors Katie Maddy, Chris Childs and Josh Fisher. Original
music by Alis McCoy, research in fact checking by Jake
Rosson and Austin Thompson. Show logo by Lucy Kintonia. Our
executive producer is Jason English. You'd like to email the show,
you can reach us at Very Special Episodes at gmail
(55:09):
dot com. Very Special Episodes is a production of iHeart Podcasts.
Hosts And Creators
Zaron Burnett
Dana Schwartz
Jason English
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