Leprechaun 1993

Happy St Patrick's Day Ghouls! On this episode, we're diving into the twisted world of 1993’s Leprechaun. This cult classic blends horror, comedy, and just the right amount of mischief as a small but deadly leprechaun terrorizes a group of unsuspecting victims. We’ll explore the film’s bizarre charm, its unforgettable villain, and why it’s become a beloved staple in the world of horror-comedy. So grab your four-leaf clovers and get ready for some laughs, scares, and plenty of gold! (listen all the way to the end for a wee extra laugh)
See you in your nightmares…..
@BATTpod on twitter
BillBria@billbriahttps://crookedmarquee.com/author/bill-bria/
https://www.slashfilm.com/author/billbria/
https://billbria.contently.com/
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Ashley@AshleyannCoffin https://www.instagram.com/electrical_ash/
You can find more from us and our other shows at https://www.strandedpanda.com/

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:28):
Welcome to another horrifying episode of Bill and Ashley's Terror Theater.

Speaker 2 (00:34):
On the Marquee. This week is nineteen ninety three. Is Leprechaun?

Speaker 1 (00:38):
Join us right after we get back from gathering all
the shoes we can find to keep that little monster busy.

Speaker 2 (00:44):
Welcome back, I'm Ashley Coffin.

Speaker 1 (00:46):
Joined us always by my co host in Terror, Bill
Bria Bill Darling.

Speaker 2 (00:51):
How are we today?

Speaker 3 (00:52):
Ash? You can kill anything, you just got to know
how to do it.

Speaker 4 (00:56):
Now me give me a three fifty seven magnum press
it to the little Green critics top and blam. Brains
and guts and oozing creddy stuff dripping all down its head.

Speaker 3 (01:04):
The guy's gone with a capital dead bars.

Speaker 2 (01:08):
I like that he's like blam.

Speaker 1 (01:12):
Later in this show we will be sharing our genre
accompanying recommendations. But first, sorry, you got me. What have
you read from the Necronomicon of horror this week?

Speaker 3 (01:22):
Well?

Speaker 4 (01:23):
I have some appropriate news, which I will get to
in a moment, but a few pieces. First off, this
is mus that's just near and dear to my heart.
I think it'll be maybe near and dear to yours, Ash,
as well as any other of our listeners who are
not only horror movie fans, but are physical media fans
and especially fans of pretty rare and much desired horror

(01:47):
movies to come out on four K. Now, this is
just an announcement that has been made recently this past week.
So these releases won't be coming for probably quite a
while because they're just in the works.

Speaker 3 (01:58):
They don't even have a release date yet.

Speaker 4 (02:00):
If I had to guess, If I had to guess,
they probably won't even come out for another two years.

Speaker 3 (02:05):
If that wow.

Speaker 4 (02:06):
Because this company likes to take its time, but they
do a great job, and that's Synapse Films and Red
Shirt Pictures. They recently brought the Eighties Trick or Treat
with Ozzy Osbourn and you know all about metal music
to four K just this past Halloween, and as a result,
partially of the success of that release, but also just
because they've been trying to get these movies out on

(02:29):
physical media for quite a long time, they have announced
a new slate of four k's that they're working on
right now. And they do say that quote there are
no release dates for any of these titles at this time.
We can't even say still in production, No release date
because several of them have not started production yet. Just
as it was with Trick or Treat, Red Shirt Pictures
will be overseeing the production of each release, while SNAPS
will oversee the audio, video and distribution of each title,

(02:52):
all of which will be in production throughout twenty twenty
five and into twenty twenty six. So those titles are
Fright Night Part two, Hello Mary Lou, prom Night.

Speaker 3 (03:02):
Two, My Favorite One, prom Night three, The.

Speaker 4 (03:05):
Last Kiss, prom Night four, Deliverers from Evil nine to seven, six,
Evil Too, and Angel of Heat. So yeah, these are
some of the most sought after, hoped for physical media
releases for the longest time. I think a majority of
these movies never even saw Blu ray let alone, Wow
four K. You know, they maybe got a sort of

(03:28):
cursory DVD release back in the day, and in the
case of Friday Part two that only got a VHS
I think. And there's been a lot of bootleg releases
over the years, you know, if you could import them
from Spain or something and you know, dubious quality. So
it'll be great to finally have all these movies on
you know, top notch physical media. Like I said, it's

(03:48):
gonna be a wait, you know, so, don't get super
excited yet.

Speaker 1 (03:52):
I did for a second. Prom Night two is one
of my absolute favorite movies of all time, like not
just hard like all times. It's like, if you want
to try to get somebody to understand eighties, like not cheesy,
but like how fun a horror movie can be, you
show them prom Night too.

Speaker 4 (04:11):
Hellia, Yeah, it's great again. We talked on this podcast
about how much we love Nightmare Elm Street, and prom
Night two is definitely a child Ny and Elm Street.

Speaker 3 (04:19):
For sure.

Speaker 2 (04:20):
I love showing to people and they're like, do you
need to watch one? We don't give a fuck about one. Okay,
we're just going right in too.

Speaker 4 (04:27):
So yeah, so that's pretty exciting. The next two pieces
of news I have are very themed to today's episode.
One is that director Andy Edwards, who has made such
titles as Zombie, spring Breakers and Midnight Peep Show, is
premiering his new movie at the UK's Fright Fest this

(04:48):
weekend before it hits vod in the US on April eight,
and it is an adaptation of Rumpelstiltskin. Now why is
this related today's episode because our director of today's movie
also made a movie called Rubble Still Skin in nineteen
ninety five.

Speaker 2 (05:04):
I absolutely remember it, yes.

Speaker 4 (05:07):
And so I don't think that this is intended as
a remake of that movie, but just a readaptation, imagining,
reimagining of the classic you know, fairy tale, but it's
still got a horror, you know twist to it. It
stars Hannah Baxter Eve, Joss Carter, and Adrian Bouchet, and

(05:27):
the description in the press release is quote, the film
breeds new life into the age old children's story with
eye popping, gnarly special effects and a potty mouthed female
protagonist who isn't your like that? With body humor and
devilishly delightful visuals. This new incarnation certainly packs a punch,

(05:49):
and it is sure to permeate your dreams with nightmare fuel.

Speaker 3 (05:52):
Unquote.

Speaker 2 (05:54):
Those actors, what would I know them from?

Speaker 3 (05:55):
Uh? Nothing too huge.

Speaker 4 (05:57):
Hannahbaxtereve was in augusca An Escape, Joss Carter was in
Don't Hug Me, I'm Scared in Taro which maybe maybe
you remember Taro uh, and Adrian Buche The Deal of
Time and The Last Kingdom.

Speaker 2 (06:10):
So I watched The Last Kingdom.

Speaker 4 (06:12):
Okay, Okay, Okay, so yeah, there's a trailer out online
right now if you want to see what this thing
looks like. Uh, you know, we're we're living in a
I don't want to say Golden age because that is incorrect,
but we're living in an age of fairy tale horror
movies and and children's entertainment inspired horror movies. So it

(06:33):
feels appropriate for Rumples still skitting to make a comeback
in this way.

Speaker 3 (06:35):
And why not.

Speaker 1 (06:38):
We need a Lockness monster movie. Could somebody get on that? Like,
is there besides the old one?

Speaker 4 (06:43):
No, nobody's doing it, but they should because literally, just
the other day as we're recording this, uh, there was
another lock Mess monster siding in Scotland are.

Speaker 2 (06:51):
Dding I'm not kidding.

Speaker 4 (06:53):
Yeah, there was a couple I reported seeing some mysterious
shape in the water and yeah, so oh you know
Locke I.

Speaker 2 (07:03):
Was looking when we were there.

Speaker 1 (07:04):
I was like, if anyone's going to see it's going
to be me. Oh yeah, I did not see her. Yeah,
I like, do you think she's a her?

Speaker 3 (07:10):
Right?

Speaker 2 (07:10):
Yeah of course, But okay, somebody get on that. I
would like a loch Ness Monster movie. Please. We just
did the Bigfoot. Now we got the rumpel stilt.

Speaker 1 (07:17):
Skin NeSSI, NeSSI, we got to get your original and
stop the remakes.

Speaker 4 (07:21):
Yes, absolutely, And then finally I just wanted to mention
this because it's appropriate. So apparently, in twenty twenty three,
Lion Skate did announce a Leprechaun reboot with Felippe Vargas,
who's directing a script by Mike van Wass. And that

(07:43):
was twenty twenty three, and we're now a couple of
years out and still no movement on that, so maybe
that's not happening anymore. However, what is happening is that
Lion Skate, who you know has owned the Leprechaun franchise
you know IP for however many years, has just dropped
official Leprechaun merchant time for Saint Patti's Day, including T shirts,

(08:04):
long sleeves, hoodies, bugs, and tumblers. And uh there's some
cool ones. I mean, I know this is an all
roll medium. You know you can't we can't show you images,
but uh, there's a really neat red and green style
long sleeve T shirt that says burn in hell, you
little green bastard.

Speaker 3 (08:22):
There's one with a hoodie that says your luck just
ran out.

Speaker 4 (08:26):
And then there's a coffee mug that says, I'll not
rest till I have my gold.

Speaker 2 (08:30):
I love it, I love it so much.

Speaker 3 (08:32):
So these are so Yeah.

Speaker 4 (08:33):
If you go onto the shop dot Lionskate dot com website,
you should see the Leprechaun merchant collection there and uh yeah,
get your get your loved ones.

Speaker 3 (08:44):
Some Saint Patty's Day gifts.

Speaker 2 (08:45):
They don't have one that says fuck you Lucky charms.

Speaker 3 (08:48):
They don't, which is damn it, which is.

Speaker 2 (08:49):
A shame perfect Yeah.

Speaker 3 (08:51):
Yeah, but anyway, that's all the news I have today.

Speaker 1 (08:54):
All right, And with that, we're going to take a
quick break and we'll be right back after these miss
ups from the great that we have no control over.
And now it is time for our feature film.

Speaker 2 (09:09):
Okay, Lepricaun.

Speaker 1 (09:11):
So I remember seeing this movie at nine ten, and
I remember being more scared of the cover of the VHS,
Like that's the first thing when I think of this movie,
The first thing that pops into my mind is that
little VHS cover.

Speaker 2 (09:25):
It's dark and it.

Speaker 1 (09:27):
Was just a little you know, the little leprecan creeping
creepily peeking through the doorway. But what I remember about
it is the more you stared at it, the scarier
he kind of got. But we grew up in an
age of amazing eighties fantasy movies, so I don't know.
I was not scared of him or the movie as
much as other kids my age were, because I had

(09:48):
already watched so many PG movies with scarier imagery and
that like shit, When I think of Legend, I think
of the Pazuzu statue in meg Swamp and Meg and
other things like Dark Crystal.

Speaker 2 (09:59):
So for me, the this was like a lot more fun.

Speaker 1 (10:01):
It kind of reminded me of like Gremlins, where he's
doing horrific.

Speaker 2 (10:06):
Shit and the body count here is much higher.

Speaker 1 (10:08):
But I was laughing the whole time as a kid,
and I'm laughing even harder when I watch it as
an adult now.

Speaker 4 (10:14):
Uh So I'm fully okay with admitting that I have
no history with this movie. This was an Ashley request because.

Speaker 2 (10:23):
She was like, we want to be Saint Patrick's Day.

Speaker 4 (10:25):
I do leprechan for Saint Patty's Day, and I'm like, oh,
I guess that'd be an excuse for me to finally
watch that. Obviously, you know, growing up in the era
that it came out, and at being a horror fan
for life and all that, I have of course heard about it,
you know, since it came out, and the whole really
so much of it being the lore of like, oh,

(10:47):
there was Jennifer Anderson's first movie and blah blah blah,
or one of her first and you know how Jo
she didn't like to talk about it, blah blah blah.
And of course I knew about Warwick Davis, you know,
from his work and Willow and Richard of the Jedi
and later you know he was doing Life's Too Short
with Ricky Gervaise and everything. So I know about it
in terms of I knew about it in terms of yes,

(11:07):
it was an existing thing, and of course I've heard
about all the sequels. I suppose since I bothered to
uh to start my journey on Leprekun, I will finish
out the series in some way with.

Speaker 2 (11:17):
You kind of have to.

Speaker 4 (11:18):
Yeah, And I'm eager to see him because I know
that there's some some of my favorite genre directors involved.
I think rodmin Flinder from Idle Hands directs the second one.
I'm pretty sure Brian Trunchard Smith is involved with one
of them. He's directed The Demons too, as well as
a lot of other you know, great genre sequels and films.
So yeah, I'm excited to see where the Leprechaun goes everywhere.

Speaker 2 (11:43):
He's going to Vegas.

Speaker 4 (11:44):
He's going to the hood, of course, of course. But yeah,
I think the reason why I never leapt in earlier
is because Saint Patrick's Date. And this is by virtue
of the fact that I for fifteen years was a
New Yorker. I lived in New York City. Saint Patrick's

(12:04):
Day is a is a point of contention with me
as a holiday because you know, I really never drank,
or when I was even drinking a little bit before
my transplant, you know, wasn't much. So every Saint Patter's
Day as a New Yorker, you just knew to avoid
the streets, avoid the bars, like don't don't you know
give the New.

Speaker 2 (12:23):
Jersey always probably me a couple of times to come
up for New York.

Speaker 4 (12:26):
No, Philly people don't bother as much as the Jersey folks.
The Jersey folks, the bridge and tunnel folks are like
definitely like you know, come on, like take it down
several notches please. Yeah, So yeah, I but I'll also
even just pass the whole drinking aspect of Saint Patty's.
There was the whole oh you got a weird greed,
You're gonna get slapped or pinched or whatever. And I
resented the hell out of that. I was like, don't

(12:47):
even touch me, come on now, cares and uh. And
of course, you know, I'm of zero Irish descent, so
I don't have any connection to my ancestry and that
way either, even as a white person. And yeah, so
I think it was all of that mixed in with
just never never hearing enough about the franchise to be like, oh,
you gotta see blah blah blah. But it's it's a

(13:09):
good time because I feel like in the last several years,
I've finally dived into the franchises that passed me by,
you know, when I was growing up, and uh, and
this is one of them.

Speaker 2 (13:19):
Good I'm glad to do you had a good time,
because it is. It's pretty crazy.

Speaker 1 (13:23):
Okay, So the plot is Dan O'Grady steals that thou no,
I'm on the whole time. Really, Dan O'Grady steals one
hundred gold coins from the or from all Leprechaun while
on vacation in Ireland. The leprecan follows him home, but
Dan locks him in a crate held by UH held
at bay by a four leaf clover.

Speaker 2 (13:42):
Ten years later, JD.

Speaker 1 (13:43):
Redding and his daughter Tory ren O'Grady's property for the summer.
When their new neighbor accidentally releases the Leprechaun, he goes
on a murders rampage to claim his gold. You could
write the longest goddamn plot for this, or you could
just write leprecauns going after his gold.

Speaker 2 (13:58):
Because there's a lot of subplots in here.

Speaker 3 (14:01):
Yeah, there are.

Speaker 4 (14:02):
But the so ill what I didn't say in my
intros is, you know, my thoughts on the movie. It
is one of these franchise starters that you know, when
we talk about franchises, we're usually discussing like some absolutely
stone cold classic first movie that you know, it's so amazing,
it's so life changing, watershed, you know whatever. That it's like, oh,

(14:23):
of course they would make a sequel to this because
like this first movie was like broke box office records.

Speaker 3 (14:28):
It was so popular.

Speaker 4 (14:29):
It like you know, changed the lives of so many
you know, merging filmmakers blah blah blah. Yeah, when you
talk about Alien or The Exorcist or Carrie or like whatever,
like you're like, oh my god, like these are like
just stone cold classics. Nobody confront on that. Nymer, ELM
Street whatever. Uh Leprechaun is a great example of like
a mid and I use mid lovingly, a mid movie

(14:50):
where it's like this is fine, this is this is cool.

Speaker 3 (14:53):
I don't see how.

Speaker 4 (14:54):
It's like, wow, this is so amazing, we have to
make twenty sequels right now. But like Trimark, Trimarket team
at this point was just desperate looking for their horror franchise.
They you know, really thought that you know, this is
still the early nineties. This is when yeah, Freddy was
kind of on his way out, Jason was kind of
on his way out. Pinhead was starting to ramp up
a little bit, you know, hell Raiser, but that was

(15:16):
gonna peter out soon anyway. So it was that odd
time in the horror franchise land where you know, a
lot of the older you know, franchises were starting to
die out and.

Speaker 3 (15:24):
These new ones were staying in there.

Speaker 4 (15:26):
They were hanging in there, but they weren't you know,
as strong as say, you know, Nightmare at its peak
or Friday thirteenth that it's peak. So everybody in town,
you know, who was producing low budget horror was you know,
trying to find their own and because video was so
big too, the you know, the whole video market, video
rental and video purchasing.

Speaker 3 (15:44):
So initially, uh.

Speaker 4 (15:47):
Mark Jones, the writer director of Leprechaun, was I think
what how he tells it on his commentary track as
well as the interviews that he gives on the on
the Blu ray, is that he initially did write a
version of the which was intended in the way that
we see it at the end, which is you know,
our rated you know, rebald very violent like evil Leprechaun movie.

(16:09):
But at some point, given his history with working on television,
he was a writer on the Adventures of Superboy TV show.
He also, I guess wrote a bunch of episodes of
What's New Scooby Doo, or not What's New but Scooby
like the New Adventures, or it's like one of the
Scooby Doo like revival shows. He said he wrote a
lot of scrappy do episodes which didn't get you know,

(16:31):
Scooby Doo fans happy at him. He he thought, Okay, actually,
let me make this interesting because I can make this
a very kid friendly horror movie. What you were saying,
Ash where it's like, you know, let's really freak out
some kids and make it not violent but like, you know,
still creepy to them sort of. You know, you can
almost imagine like the way that The Witches, you know, was.

Speaker 1 (16:54):
Right with Angelica, which my that's what I took from
it when I watched it as a kid, and then
I remember showing to friends and then like freaking out
and it's like, what are you guys?

Speaker 2 (17:03):
You babies. Continue.

Speaker 4 (17:05):
But at some point during the production or the pre
production process, Trimark went back to Mark Jones and said, actually,
what we really want is and actually this was during
the production process. They were shooting you know, more PG
thirteen kind of script and Trimark was like, actually, we
really would love it if this was super violent and

(17:25):
we could rate it R and we could you know,
blah blah blah. And this movie sat on a shelf
for two years I think it was. I think it
was shot in ninety one and it didn't come out
until January of ninety three because of this shift in
the tone and in the approach, because I think what
happened is Trimark maybe tested a version of the movie
in a screen testing somewhere in the US and it

(17:47):
tested well. And at that testing they also were told
by the audience that was there, well, we would have
loved it if this was like a hard R and
like you know, the vpicom was gripping people's faces off
or whatever, and so Trymark was like, actually, we should
fucking do that, and so then they went back and
did some reshoots.

Speaker 3 (18:03):
And all that.

Speaker 1 (18:04):
Well, it's like you kind of feel bad for Warwick
Davis because he acted a whole bunch of scenes like
he was doing a PG thirteen movie.

Speaker 2 (18:11):
And I think he is phenomenal in this.

Speaker 1 (18:13):
I think you're just seeing having the best time and
he is really selling this role like he nails it.

Speaker 2 (18:19):
But he was like, it would be a little It would.

Speaker 1 (18:22):
Have been nice to know because I might have played
some things a little bit differently if I thought I
was going to be doing, you know, a more violent
rated R character. So that, you know, that kind of
stinks for him, But I'm so glad that they did it,
and you can kind of see it in the scenes
when they came back and did a whole bunch of
reshoots for like a couple of weeks after it was
done and after a tested because it did test well,

(18:43):
and I think they did two different tests.

Speaker 2 (18:45):
And yeah, like the scene with the cop, it's.

Speaker 1 (18:49):
Supposed to just kind of end with him grabbing his
face and then you're left to kind of make up
what you think happened. But they're like, now and that
was part of the reshoots, is him chasing him down
in the woods, and then when he breaks his neck.

Speaker 2 (18:59):
You damn that was pretty harsh, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (19:03):
Because it's not how you expect this magical creature to
kind of kill that guy. Because you just killed someone
with a poo stick ten minutes earlier, that makes a
lot more sense. But just like you're like, whoa.

Speaker 4 (19:14):
Yeah, yeah, now there's a real interesting I think I'll
use the term tonal disparity in the movie in the
sense that like it it looks very it's it's very
well shot, and it looks, you know, pretty friendly in
terms of you know, warm tones to it. You know,
it's shot in somewhere in the you know, uh, outside

(19:36):
La area of California, which they should. They might as
well have just said that's where it was set to
I don't know why they bothered to the whole North Dakota.

Speaker 2 (19:44):
Thing Valencia Studios where they filmed Terminator too.

Speaker 4 (19:47):
Yeah, so that's not Yeah, that's like a couple hours
outside LA And yeah, I don't know why they bothered
to say, oh, it's definitely North Dakota.

Speaker 3 (19:54):
It's like just making Yeah it doesn't look like it's fine.

Speaker 2 (19:57):
Yeah, is that what North Dakota looks like? Because I
didn't think they were desert y, but yeah, I didn't think.

Speaker 1 (20:02):
But they also filmed other scenes at Big Sky Ranch
where they filmed Little House on Their Prairie, and Davis
Letter said he was like, felt a little blasphemis to
be doing what we were doing on the set of
the Little House of the Prairie.

Speaker 4 (20:14):
Yeah, but yeah, that's the that's kind of the vibe
that they ended up with where it's this even though
it's it's like pretty much a soft r If you're
like a gorehound, don't come to lepreca On thinking you're
gonna get you know, your fill. Yeah, and if you're
looking for like, you know, I don't know, like Evil
Dead style gags, or there's maybe one that's like you know,

(20:37):
with his hand getting lopped off and coming back on which.

Speaker 1 (20:40):
There's a couple of real dead and like Nightmare on
Elm Streets.

Speaker 3 (20:45):
Yes, yes, you're totally right.

Speaker 4 (20:47):
Yeah, the third act of this movie is almost like
a horror's greatest hits, you know. Yeah, like, uh, there's
the floorboards, you know, hands coming up on the floorboards
shot from Evil Dead, there's the phone thing from Nightmare
el Street. There's you know, at one point, Jennifer Andison's
character has to go to the hospital where Daniel Grady's
character is at, and you know there's all sorts of

(21:08):
Sheenetigan's happening there.

Speaker 3 (21:10):
So yeah, so it it really.

Speaker 4 (21:12):
Is this kind of weirdly offbeat feel to it, which
isn't Yeah it's not fully horror, but it's not fully kiddy,
and it's definitely trying to be funny, and it is funny,
but it's also just odd in the way. So it
has this weird, you know, mixture to it which is
definitely its own thing.

Speaker 1 (21:33):
Well, and then Jones said he was inspired to create
it after watching Crutters and then by Lucky Charms I'm like, well,
that is a perfect explanation. And I think for a try,
Mark this was their first uh like first film produced
in house, and it was only nine hundred thousand, I believe,
and I think it made eight million at the box office.

Speaker 4 (21:55):
Yeah, well, I mean we do have to say. This
feels like maybe we should talk about it later. Brought
it up now. The marketing campaign for this movie is fantastic.
As you were saying earlier in your intro, the poster
ard alone is like really creepy. Really, it really does
give you that vibe of like, oh, there's something off
about this, and in a way that's like compelling but

(22:16):
also you know, unsettling.

Speaker 1 (22:19):
Do you remember when he showed up on remember MTV
the VJA Is that what they were called?

Speaker 2 (22:24):
Vjays?

Speaker 1 (22:24):
I can't remember, Kennedy, I'll never forget when all of
a sudden Warwick Davis dresses the Leprechaun comes out from
under her dress and is like, hey, we're here, and
it was definitely nineteen ninety four, and I'm like, I'll
never forget that.

Speaker 4 (22:37):
Hell yeah, hell yah, yeah, just to talk a little bit,
we'll talk more about the marketing later, maybe a little
bit but just to talk a little bit about Trymark too.
I do enjoy Trimark, as I would say, maybe you
could call them like the third wave of an exploitation

(22:58):
or genre or independent film company. After you know, you
like you had your maybe third or fourth way if
you had your American International Pictures in the fifties and sixties,
you had your New World Pictures, you know, the Roger
Corman company in the seventies, you had a lot of
you know, Roger Corman still working with stuff like Concord

(23:18):
New Horizons during the eighties, but he also had the
continuing New World Pictures under Bob Ramy's tenure, and that
was like the studio that went on to you know,
make the first Hell Raiser as well as you know
movies like Heathers and.

Speaker 3 (23:31):
Stuff like that. In fact, one of the.

Speaker 4 (23:35):
New Old Pictures productions that got dumped when that company
went bankrupt at the end of the eighties was the
first Warlock, and you know, Warlock got switched over to Trimark,
and so therefore Trimark made the sequels, including Warlock of
the Armageddon, which is pretty great. And yeah, so Trimark
was you know, kind of doing this mix of genre

(23:58):
pictures like Warlock Kickboxer two. They were also doing like,
you know, more edgy art housie sort of you know,
on the edge movies like Ken Russell's Whore, the distributed,
Peter Jackson's Dead Alive aka brain Dead. They did Return
to the Living Dead three, which is one of my favorites.

(24:20):
They did Death Wish five, you know, and but stuff
like like Curse of the Starving Class, which was based
on Sam Shepherd play which I studied in theater school.
And yeah, that was a very independent, you know, not
necessarily qute unquote commercial movie that they were taking a
chance on. So yeah, trimarks interesting one because they they

(24:40):
were trying to serve both a theatrical, indie sort of landscape,
but also they were definitely invested in the whole video market.
So Leprechaun was something that started theatrical and then of
course went to a video series soon after that. But
but yeah, they're an interesting company, and they're one that
doesn't have as lear and identity as say, you know,

(25:02):
American International Pictures or New World Pictures. But I think
that for the nineties they were they were pretty cool.

Speaker 1 (25:08):
The fact that they were cool enough to take such
a risk on this movie, and they did have to
fight with the heads a lot. I mean I know
that they were telling the director if they didn't like
his dailies for two days in a row, he was
out of there.

Speaker 2 (25:22):
And it's like nobody wants to live like that. How
do you get a week? But luckily they were good.

Speaker 1 (25:27):
And they didn't want him to direct it at all
until he showed them some concept stuff that they were
like into.

Speaker 4 (25:32):
Oh yeah, yeah, he storyboarded like almost the whole movie
or something like that, right mm hmm.

Speaker 1 (25:37):
Which I mean, you gotta do what you gotta do.
It's also yours, Yeah, totally. No, it's it's the classic.
The more you delve into like stories about first time filmmakers,
the more you'll hear that time and time again, where
it's like people just really have to keep fighting for
themselves and for their vision, you know. And it's not
just movies like Leprechaun. Famously, Francis port Coppola was almost

(26:00):
fired off The Godfather like seven times or something.

Speaker 2 (26:02):
They almost fire to everybody.

Speaker 4 (26:03):
In the right So no, but yeah, so it's like
that's that it's a classic Hollywood nonsense where it's like
the Catch twenty two. If oh you, we're not going
to let you do it unless you prove that you
can do it. But you can't prove that you can
do it until you do it, so, you know, but the.

Speaker 1 (26:17):
Right combination of mistakes created the perfect film.

Speaker 4 (26:22):
Do you want to talk about the cast, Well, let's
start with Warwick because we've talked to a little bit
about it. But he is absolutely great in this movie. Yeah,
it's a really cool choice because he talks about it
on his commentary track. It's a cool choice that he
doesn't do the obvious thing and give his leprechaunic character
a very blatant Irish accent. It's more of a unique

(26:44):
to him voice. It's Irish esque.

Speaker 3 (26:47):
You know. Occasionally he'll say I've got me.

Speaker 4 (26:50):
Gold, you know, or whatever, but he's not he's not
doing you know, an impression of you know name.

Speaker 3 (26:57):
He's yeah, uh, he's.

Speaker 2 (27:01):
Like, teach you to steal me gold.

Speaker 1 (27:03):
But he does such a good like his voice, like
we were laughing the whole time every time.

Speaker 2 (27:06):
He's like black just because he does it so well.

Speaker 1 (27:11):
He was very committed and like he was saying when
he got in the costume and he put his little
shoes on. He had a certain little walk for him,
and it all kind of helped him create the perfect
little character. Yeah, and he did all his own stunts too,
until he got that lung infection. And I feel like
you can kind of see when they switch out the
uh when the when the kid, uh, not the kid,
the one guy's leg get stuck in the bear trap outside.

Speaker 2 (27:33):
Oh, and they're fighting them off. There's Stephanie Allow. I
was like, is that a teenage kid?

Speaker 3 (27:38):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (27:38):
No, it had to because you know, doubling a little
person is pretty difficult. I mean, uh, you have to
really play around with camera angles and lenses and everything
to you know, get even the smallett like a five
foot woman or something to look as you know, as
short as a little person is.

Speaker 3 (27:54):
So yeah, Warwick is uh.

Speaker 4 (27:56):
Yeah, He's talked a lot about how he's usually the
one to do his own stunts because there's just nobody
else that they could find with his build and his height.

Speaker 3 (28:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (28:03):
He set up for the one scene where he's chasing
Jennifer Anison in the wheelchair, Aison had to run in
slow motions so that he could keep up and it
would look more realistic because you know, he'd had trouble
moving the wheel, so she's literally just doing this slow
motion run and I was like, looks great on film.

Speaker 3 (28:21):
Yeah, hell yeah.

Speaker 4 (28:24):
We probably should mention in addition to Warwick, you know,
just being the great actor that he is, so much
of the success of I would say, the whole movie,
but certainly the Leprechawn character is the work of Gabe Bartolos,
the makeup effects designer who designed the look of the
Leprechaun character, you know, for Warwick and really did a

(28:47):
great job in terms of giving him a very iconic
or instantly iconic, you know face and the sort of
sunken eyes, the big nose and the protruding features and
all that. And there's actually several stages of Mecca on
the Leprechaun during this movie.

Speaker 2 (29:02):
He was me by the end of it.

Speaker 1 (29:04):
He's like, f this project smack smacked all this stuff
on there, and they're like, we love it, and he's like,
what this okay?

Speaker 4 (29:13):
Yeah, And and Bartolo's had, you know, a hell of
a upbringing in the makeup of effects world. I mean
he worked on Thirteenth Part six, Jason Lives, Texas, Chainsawmascar
two from Beyond you know, dolls, and he even worked
with Frank Kennon latter. I think he had a hand
in creating Aylmer for Brain Damage Anywhere.

Speaker 2 (29:36):
A favorite little guy.

Speaker 4 (29:37):
Yeah, he's so great, and the and the basket Case sequels,
which were I think just just before, just around the
same time as leprechan was shooting. So so yeah, he
was on a roll during this time and it really
shows in his work on the movie because I think that, yeah,
so much the success of Leprecaun is on that design.

Speaker 3 (29:54):
Huh.

Speaker 1 (29:55):
Warwick said, he you know, obviously makeup is never kind
of pleasant.

Speaker 2 (30:00):
It was three hours to get it in, forty minutes
to get out.

Speaker 1 (30:02):
And he said he used to have the most bizarre
conversations with Barlatos, who.

Speaker 2 (30:07):
They got along really well, but he was like, we
would say some weird.

Speaker 3 (30:09):
Shit totally all right.

Speaker 4 (30:13):
So now we could talk about the elephant tests in
the room, which is Jennifer Aniston.

Speaker 1 (30:17):
So going back up to the cast, well, I feel
like she's embraced it a little bit more.

Speaker 3 (30:21):
You know.

Speaker 2 (30:22):
I was able to find a couple interviews, but you know,
she should. They had to fight to get her to
be in there.

Speaker 1 (30:28):
And you know what, I don't think she would be
anything if it wasn't for Leprechaun, So I said it.

Speaker 4 (30:32):
You know, and I know that that Anniston had already
really proven herself as like a type, the type that
she essentially plays in this movie. And then of course
Rachel Green in The Friends Show, right, rocketed her to
start him, which is that sort of not bitchy but like,
you know, snooty, you know, princess type sort of.

Speaker 1 (30:51):
Yeah, but also I can take care of myself and
I don't need your help.

Speaker 4 (30:54):
Right, which is great because you know, I know that
there were some critics, contemporary critics at the time Leprechaun
came out, who were complaining about her character and her
performance because they were like, we would actually rather see
her die, like she's so bitchy and me or whatever.

Speaker 2 (31:07):
People are harsh.

Speaker 4 (31:09):
Yeah, and it's like, what's cool is that, Yes, she
starts the movie that way with you know, this sort
of attitude, but then by the time she's cock in
the shotgun and you know, yeah acting a.

Speaker 1 (31:19):
Listen, it takes one hot guy to make you stand
stay in town.

Speaker 4 (31:23):
You know, yeah, and she quits herself well, and she
looks great, distressed and crying like it may.

Speaker 2 (31:30):
Be fake crying.

Speaker 1 (31:32):
I have problems with the fake tears that they have
on her in the uh in the elevator.

Speaker 2 (31:37):
Especially looks like I know, but you know what scene.

Speaker 1 (31:40):
I'm talking about when the tears we're talking to her
for a minute and they don't move it all because
it's you know whatever that Yeah.

Speaker 4 (31:47):
So but what I was going to say though, is
that it makes it made me wish that, you know,
it took a little bit longer for her to rocket
to start him, you know, with friends, because it's like
I would have liked to see a couple more Jenniferanson
Final Girls.

Speaker 3 (31:58):
You know.

Speaker 2 (31:59):
Yeah, I think it's been fun behind that, but yeah,
I know.

Speaker 4 (32:03):
She she she clearly has the charisma that she was
always obviously always going to have as a star already.
So even at this whatever age she was when she
made this, you know, like, she clearly has it.

Speaker 2 (32:14):
Twenty four We looked it up.

Speaker 1 (32:15):
Okay, cool because Warwick Davis I think was like thirty four,
right because he was born I believe in nineteen seventy. Yeah,
and or I guess it wouldn't have been I'm sorry
because that you said it was actually filmed in ninety one.

Speaker 2 (32:29):
Right, right, so everybody's probably a little younger than that little.

Speaker 3 (32:31):
Younger, but but not only like what two years ago something.

Speaker 2 (32:36):
It's two years made a lot when you get to
this old age to take my two years from me.

Speaker 4 (32:40):
No, but yeah, no, it's it's it is cool, and
I think it's one of these horror movies that only
gets better in retrospect. Once you have this, you know
what's the stars or the actor. This actress has the
reputation that she has so that you could go, oh
my god, it's great seeing her. Whereas you know, when
this first came out in ninety three, people were like, Okay,
that's just a random gal.

Speaker 2 (33:02):
Okay, this is just a cute little gal.

Speaker 1 (33:05):
She lived not too far from where my old apartment was.
Her family had moved over. The only reason I know
is because you know local heroes. She'd moved over from
la and then lived in Eddystone, which is right down
from where I lived for a very long time. But
they didn't live there very long. They moved in with
their grandmother and then they moved up to New York.
So I was like, we're in the middle, fair enough.
But she moved in with the Greek, and that area

(33:26):
down there around in Upper Derby where I lived was
very Greek, so that's you know.

Speaker 2 (33:31):
I was like, I understand, Sure.

Speaker 3 (33:33):
Yeah, that makes sense.

Speaker 4 (33:36):
I will say that, you know, because of the haphazard
production and writing and rewriting and all that of the movie,
I feel like it is a bit of a missed
opportunity in the sense that her character starts the movie
being very materialistic, and the whole you know, gimmick of
the movie is the leprechaun, what's his gold? I thought
she might have found the gold and decided to keep

(33:57):
it or something like that.

Speaker 3 (33:58):
Yeah, some sort of thing like that.

Speaker 2 (34:01):
Gotta be innocence.

Speaker 3 (34:02):
It's got to be innocence.

Speaker 4 (34:03):
But our our our engine of oh, one of our
characters has some of the gold and they're not giving back.
Is Mark Holton as Ozzie? Now, of course, if you'd
seen Pee Wee's Big Adventure or the Teen Wolf films,
you would have seen Mark Holton as like, well, alternately, like,
I guess in Pee Wee he's kind of the Nemesis, right,

(34:24):
and then yeah, in Teen Wolf he's more like a
comic relief character.

Speaker 3 (34:27):
But but here he is also.

Speaker 4 (34:30):
Comic relief, but in a way that could have been
very offensive, but they managed to keep it not offensive
in the sense that he's a he's simple jack, but
but it's more on the side of like, I don't
know Lenny from of Mice and Men or something like that, where.

Speaker 2 (34:46):
He's just he's just a pure friends nine.

Speaker 4 (34:49):
Yeah, yeah, exactly, he's a he's a he's an adult child.

Speaker 2 (34:52):
But not a cold nitpick.

Speaker 1 (34:54):
But what what color were they paint in that poorhouse?
It was primary red and primary blue, and that is
just not okay, where's the adult in the room.

Speaker 3 (35:03):
I just really wanted to make that house uglier.

Speaker 2 (35:06):
It was so I was distracting.

Speaker 4 (35:09):
Yeah, yeah, No, it's funny too, because I'm fully on
Torri's side. As soon as she sees the place, She's like,
I can't be here, and I'm like, yeah, I agree
with you, and I'm not. You know, I do live
in Beverly Hills. Okay, so fine, But like I was
gonna say, I'm not some snooty Beverly Hills guy.

Speaker 2 (35:26):
I'm like, look at you, Look at you in your sweater.

Speaker 3 (35:28):
Wait a minute, I guess I am so Yeah. So
she was right, she was always right.

Speaker 4 (35:32):
She should always be appreciated for her rightness, and that's
the end.

Speaker 2 (35:37):
I'm with her. I'm with her.

Speaker 3 (35:39):
Mark Colton is cool.

Speaker 4 (35:41):
It is an interesting performance because it could have become
like I said, it could have been offensive, but it
also could have been annoying, you know, it could have
been he could have been a really annoying character and
fortunate Well that's.

Speaker 2 (35:51):
Where the sorry.

Speaker 1 (35:52):
I feel like the run time helps this movie because
just when it starts to kind of feel like it's
dragging a little bit, it picks back up because I
don't know, going to the hospital, I feel like there's
a whole little bit there that could have kind of
got cut out.

Speaker 2 (36:03):
But it's only what an hour and a half?

Speaker 3 (36:06):
Yeah, no, it's not long.

Speaker 2 (36:08):
Hour twenty four? Would it tighten that right up?

Speaker 1 (36:10):
But there's also just a lot of like following him
around in his little tricycle and in his little car,
which reminds me of Gremlins.

Speaker 2 (36:17):
Just like the GisMo in the car. He's just very
funny until he's not.

Speaker 1 (36:20):
I think the teeth make him a little bit more
scary too, because he's not. He's really not like if
you're cool with him, he's kind of cool with you
and I always I always watched these movies and I'd
be like, me and him would be.

Speaker 2 (36:31):
Fine, you know what I mean?

Speaker 1 (36:33):
I mean, I'm I thought I was one hundred percent
Irish for my entire life until my grandpa let it slit.

Speaker 2 (36:38):
I was like, well, what do you mean. My grandmother
was Germany.

Speaker 1 (36:41):
And he was like, well, everybody wants to be like
some proverb, you know, everybody who is an Irish wishes
they were Irish or something like that, you know, something
eighty five year.

Speaker 2 (36:50):
Old irishmen say. And I was like, you lied to me.
My entire life, I've lived like an irishman. But that's why.

Speaker 1 (36:56):
Like when they opened the movie with the the Irish
stereotype guy pound in the bottle of Jamison, like, oh,
mister old Grady, and I was like, this is perfect
because that is exactly my grandfather.

Speaker 2 (37:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (37:10):
And when this movie remembers its own lore, it's really
fun in the sense we have rules now the rules
the rules are fun. I do think that there's parts
of the movie where it kind of is loose, like
you were saying, like, it feels like the Leprechaun should
be maybe a little bit more understanding to people that
don't seem to be involved, you know, but that's good

(37:31):
question Leprechaun, right, yeah, Like it's like, let's let's use
our words first lap.

Speaker 3 (37:34):
Okay, By the way, I love that this movie.

Speaker 4 (37:38):
I feel like it events the term lip for Leprechahn,
which sounds like a slur.

Speaker 2 (37:43):
Yeah, but it's fine. He's mythical.

Speaker 3 (37:45):
He's mythical, So I guess they can't get offended.

Speaker 1 (37:48):
We googled it the other day and it says that
there are no longer any Leprechans alive, and we're like,
how do you know?

Speaker 2 (37:53):
Google?

Speaker 4 (37:54):
And also what yeah, oh what no longer what? That
implies that there they with like the Dodo there at
their extent. Yeah. But yeah, so it is funny that,
like because we again we you know, I know, I
bring this up almost every episode with this idea of
characters and transgression and like what did they do wrong?

Speaker 3 (38:15):
Blah blah blah.

Speaker 4 (38:18):
It does feel like the Leprechaun could have or there
could have been maybe a bit more of back and
forth in terms of these characters actually screwing up instead
of just this. What it really is is just miscommunication.

Speaker 2 (38:31):
Yeah, the poor.

Speaker 3 (38:32):
Coin guy, the poor guy.

Speaker 1 (38:34):
He would have given him here's your here's your coin,
get out of here. And he gets like the worst
death of everybody, and he was the most kind of innocent.

Speaker 3 (38:41):
He gets rigged, you know, killing the cop. It's like, okay, so.

Speaker 2 (38:44):
That guy kind of deserved it.

Speaker 4 (38:45):
Wash your mouth, served it, wash your mouth. But but yeah,
the coin sellar.

Speaker 1 (38:49):
It's like, dude, man, Also, mister drunk ass, oh Grady, Uh,
probably tell your wife that you have the leprechaun zipped
up in your suitcase.

Speaker 2 (38:57):
That's the first thing you say.

Speaker 1 (38:58):
After I stole a pot ofgle from a leprechaun and
he's in the living room in my suitcase, don't go
in there.

Speaker 3 (39:04):
You know.

Speaker 1 (39:05):
He doesn't even give her heads up and she dies
within the first five seconds.

Speaker 4 (39:09):
What I do love though about the world building or
the lore of the movie is is introduced with the
ol Grady where you know, it's this idea that if
you find Leprechaun's pot of gold, yes you can take it,
but he has this insatiable hunger for it.

Speaker 3 (39:22):
You can't kill him. You can only hope to stop him,
you know.

Speaker 2 (39:25):
So he can travel, he can travel through shadow.

Speaker 1 (39:28):
I guess there's a lot of powers there that we
do not have explained.

Speaker 4 (39:32):
We don't have explained explanations for that. But yeah, so
it's that sort of you know, be careful what you
wish for idea or theme of like you know, yeah,
I guess you could take this money, but like yeah,
and he's like.

Speaker 2 (39:41):
He who steals me gold won't live through the night. Yeah,
and you're like what.

Speaker 4 (39:46):
And I know I haven't seen that of the sequels,
so I'm sure maybe this get's addressed in the future
Lepricaun film. But I was thinking in this entire movie,
like what would happen if somebody spent it? What it
would happen if, you know, would have Leprechaun have to,
you know, go to an exchange currency exchange thing, like actually,
can you you know exchange it's like these bills for
my gold coin.

Speaker 3 (40:06):
I don't know, I don't know.

Speaker 1 (40:08):
I'd have a turn into jewelry real fast. Or what
if you take it to the bank and they melt
it into bricks and you put it in like a
safe deposit box, right, because I'd be like, that's not your.

Speaker 3 (40:15):
Cold yes, clearly that's newly made. Yeah, idiot, idiot, go
back home to Ireland. Well, we don't want to get
racist here.

Speaker 2 (40:25):
No, I'm you're with me, I'm a lot.

Speaker 3 (40:26):
Yeah, sure that's true. You're you're, you're, you're a for
all of us.

Speaker 4 (40:33):
But yeah, so it's it's this, Uh, it is interesting
how there's some rules, there's somewhere. I do love the
whole aspect of the poor Leaf Clover. It's it's pretty good.
But yeah, there's also just as many questions about Okay,
well how much can happen and what can you do?

Speaker 1 (40:47):
Yeah, he can get blam blam blam blam like shotgun
shot like I ripped out. He doesn't die, But they're like,
what what did they say? Just the four leaf clover?

Speaker 2 (40:58):
But I was like, you know what, a fire would
probably work too. Fire kills everything.

Speaker 4 (41:03):
Yeah, and you know, we start the movie with the
Jamison stereotype. Why don't they ever offer the poor leprek
on a drink?

Speaker 2 (41:09):
Have a drink? He does not seem like a drunk lever,
con does he?

Speaker 3 (41:12):
Oh no?

Speaker 1 (41:13):
Just the shoe thing is my favorite. Ask shoeing is
also I think it's hilarious. He'll kill somebody for anyone
who's not watching. He'll kill someone and be like, oh
your shoes just need to be a little bit tidier.
And then there's a whole sequence of them getting away
by throwing shoes at him and he has to pick
each one up and clean it and it is just masterful.

Speaker 2 (41:33):
Apparently that so happy.

Speaker 4 (41:34):
Yeah, Apparently that moment was a point of contention that
Jones had with the suits at Trimark, where the suits
really one of them to cut that scene, and he's like, no,
don't you get it, Like this is what the movie's about.
This is the whole reason of making this movie is
that we have this.

Speaker 2 (41:47):
You have to be able to distract him somehow, or
you would, you know.

Speaker 1 (41:51):
It's kind of sequences get annoying, like when he's in
the cabinets and they have the shotgun and they're just
wasting on their shelves. I'm like yelling at the TV,
just staying room. He's coming for you. Why are you
chasing him down? And he's doing all this weird shit
on skateboards and this and that, and I'm like, I
would just post up in a corner and come on,
little guy, because in the end he's still I feel

(42:12):
like I could take him until you get up close
and then you realize, Oh no, I absolutely can't.

Speaker 2 (42:16):
He's going to rip my throat out or but he's
a bier.

Speaker 3 (42:20):
He's a bier man.

Speaker 4 (42:21):
Yeah, he's really good with getting vehicles.

Speaker 2 (42:24):
Together and he's a great driver, great driver.

Speaker 3 (42:30):
Can I just say too.

Speaker 4 (42:30):
I don't know, it's kind of unrelated because we haven't
been talking about it. But the other thing that made
that I was thinking when watching this was the you know,
the plot point of the clover patch outside with the
green light, with the green light on it, which makes
it look like what happened is like radioactivity material spill
over the ground.

Speaker 1 (42:49):
It really looks like the ooze, and they don't try
to hide it at all, Like what was I understand
a low budget, but you couldn't just go to like
Michael's and get some moss and put it on the ground,
Like even if it was plastic, it would look better
than whatever was.

Speaker 2 (43:02):
Going on with that.

Speaker 3 (43:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (43:04):
Yeah, but I do feel for them because there is
some raw behind the scenes footage that they put on
the release, and because on the commentaries and the interviews
they talk about, oh, you know, it was such a
miserable shoot because it was a lot of nights and
when we were outside. When they were outside, it was
miserable because you know, apparently it was very very cold,
and you can see in so much of that behind
the scenes footage just people's hair flying in the wind,

(43:25):
and you know, coats and costumes blowing, which you know,
if you know anything about wind and wind chill, like
you can already tell like that definitely looks super cold.

Speaker 3 (43:34):
And you know, take it from me, mister.

Speaker 4 (43:37):
You know, East Coaster for life until a couple of
years ago moving out here to the West Coast. Shit
gets cold at night, It can it can get really
cool because it's that desert you know weather and desert
climate where during the day it's mostly fine and you know,
you can get away with wearing shorts, you know in
California or southern California at twenty four to seven or
well twenty you know, seven days a week. But during

(43:59):
the night, you know, I'll bets are off and you
can really be in some pain there. So uh yeah, no,
I feel for them because you know, Jennifer Aniston wasn't
wearing much.

Speaker 2 (44:09):
Clothing and his tiny little shorts.

Speaker 4 (44:11):
Even even Warwick said that, you know, even he was
you know, he had this whole you know, get up
on but it was still freezing for.

Speaker 1 (44:16):
Him to Yeah, well the October to December seems like
not the best time.

Speaker 3 (44:21):
No, it's really not the best time.

Speaker 4 (44:23):
This is probably why they got permits or something for
that time, because of course, you know, nobody else is
trying for it, and that's how you say, buddy on
a little budget and blah blah blah.

Speaker 2 (44:31):
This is gonna sound awful, but I'm gonna say it anyway.

Speaker 1 (44:34):
When we were watching Jennifer Anison and her dad show
up at the at the house, I just turned to
Ken and I was like, if this is twenty twenty five,
they would be a couple. They were having there was
these long, weird stairs, and I was like, okay, mister Palmer,
why don't you go get in the house, like what
is happening? And then he's letting this random guy who
he doesn't know grope his daughter when she's on the ground.
Not grope, but you know, like touching her leg and

(44:55):
this and that, and.

Speaker 2 (44:56):
I was like, wait a minute, maybe she's is she
in high school?

Speaker 4 (45:00):
Well?

Speaker 1 (45:00):
What what are the ages of anybody in this movie?

Speaker 3 (45:03):
We really don't know. And that is the thing.

Speaker 4 (45:04):
We don't have much backstory on any like why did
this father buy this house? Was it some sort of
he kind of hints at the idea that it was
a great deal, but who cares, Like, it's obviously a
piece of crap. You have to do so much work
on it. And by the way, I should say that
Mark Jones and his commentary said that the actor playing

(45:25):
the dad, let me look up his name, real quirk,
It was John Sanderford. I believe when he auditioned for
the role, he had this he had grown this full
beard for whatever, you know part he was playing on
stage or in another you know project at that time.
And Jones was like, oh, you're perfect, you look great.
You know, we totally buy it. By the time he

(45:47):
showed up on set, he had shaved it all off
because Heath, the actor, thought, you know, I'd look better
without it. And Mark Jones was like, what are you
talking about, Like, we hired you for your beard, so
that not to usually do that. Yeah, no you're not.
But this is obviously his first film, and you know,
being a little budget like they maybe not, everybody was
like kind of keeping their eye on the ball on
every aspect. So what they ended up doing is they

(46:10):
ended up putting on a fake so that's a fake
beard for this movie on him.

Speaker 2 (46:14):
So it's a pretty good one.

Speaker 4 (46:15):
Yeah, so they did a good job. But but yeah,
so he would have looked even younger then.

Speaker 1 (46:22):
I was also laughing about the kid Alex because I
was like, that's how I used to dress as a kid.

Speaker 4 (46:27):
Oh yeah, we have, well, we haven't really talked about
him yet too. He's the he's the kid character in
the movie.

Speaker 2 (46:32):
And uh, he guys, boy, I could go for a
beer right now. I was like, me and you both
ten year old?

Speaker 4 (46:38):
Yeah, and uh, sorry, Who's who's Nathan? Who's Ken Olant
as Nathan Murphy. I'm just trying to figure out why
he's the third bill.

Speaker 2 (46:49):
That's the Alex's brother, the love interest.

Speaker 3 (46:54):
The hunk, right, okay, yeah, so all right and then.

Speaker 2 (46:58):
Yes, women al brothers. That's the same hairstyle.

Speaker 3 (47:01):
I think you think you thank you? I was so lost.

Speaker 4 (47:03):
So yeah, well that just goes to show you that that, Yeah,
Ken Oland as Nathan is the requisite hunk of the movie.

Speaker 3 (47:13):
He's uh, he's fun.

Speaker 1 (47:15):
He thought his career was going to skyrocket after this.
And you're just like, oh honey.

Speaker 4 (47:20):
Yeah, Well, because it does because in order to have
you know, our final girl, you know, cock shotguns and
run around and you know, blah blah blah, he is
sort of relegated to being a little bit useless.

Speaker 3 (47:30):
I mean, as soon as he's caught in the bear trap, it's.

Speaker 1 (47:32):
Like, oh, well, at least they're realistic with that, because
most people it would just be like not a thing,
and they just keep going.

Speaker 2 (47:38):
And he was like, no, no, he bit me too,
you have to go.

Speaker 3 (47:44):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (47:45):
But I think kind of to go with what we
were talking about earlier, I do really appreciate the the
low budgetness of it in the sense that it does
fit in with a lot of contemporary, you know, little
bit hard movies like Critters, like Pumpkinhead, like you know,
these rural you know obviously clearly shot you know somewhere

(48:08):
in the desert areas of California, you know these these things,
because it gives it that sort of you know, free
production design, sort of that free look of the dusty
you know, desert around. It's kind of you have the
desolation there already, so you don't need to worry about
why aren't they running to the police, or why aren't
they running next door?

Speaker 3 (48:25):
You know all that stuff.

Speaker 1 (48:26):
Well, my favorite is that they cut the you know,
the Leprecaun and cuts the phone lines, and then out
of nowhere, Jennifer Aniston has a brick phone cell phone
in her bag that immediately is dead, and I was like,
what and one.

Speaker 3 (48:40):
It's like, you know, okay, that's kind of impressive.

Speaker 2 (48:43):
Yeah, and it was a red one too.

Speaker 1 (48:45):
I was like, okay with their brick or flip brick phone,
but that was course dead immediately.

Speaker 3 (48:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (48:52):
No, it doesn't last long, but at least at least
it's there. And I think for yeah, modern day audiences
coming to this for the first time, how funny that
it's not even going to phase them. It's sort of like, oh, yeah,
of course they're gonna use your cell phone. It's like
they weren't alive the the early nineties when that was
a real sign of wealth.

Speaker 2 (49:10):
Yeah right.

Speaker 1 (49:13):
I love that the Leprechaun keeps using the twinkle twinkle
little Star thing over and over again to get people
to come over to him.

Speaker 2 (49:20):
I'm like, he knows what works for.

Speaker 1 (49:22):
Him, and he continues to use it, and I appreciate
that it does definitely keep the story going with simple
kind of usage. To kind of get people to fall
into things because of course the old lady's going to
go for a little boy. You know, it's little children singing.
And the part that really gets me, there's two scenes
that made me jump when I watched it on a
repeat and it made me laugh. And it was one

(49:43):
when he jumps out of the safe at the coins
place because I would.

Speaker 2 (49:47):
Have died of a heart attack.

Speaker 1 (49:48):
He wouldn't have had to kill me if I went
to open my safe and he jumped out heart attack.
And then when Jennifer Aniston's in the jeep about to
drive away and he just pops up out of nowhere
next to the side.

Speaker 2 (49:58):
And now I.

Speaker 1 (49:59):
Remember being a fri of jeeps as a kid because
I just felt like you weren't safe and then like
anybody could just run up and kind of grab you.
And that was definitely maybe part of it. And I
was like, he was just right there, and it made
me jump equally as much as I feel like I
did as a kid.

Speaker 2 (50:12):
And you know, Ken laughed at me. I was like, yeah,
he got me, He got me again.

Speaker 3 (50:16):
Man.

Speaker 4 (50:16):
You saying that makes me think. The same year that
this was released was, you know, the year of Jurassic
Park and those super jeeps too, right.

Speaker 3 (50:24):
Oh yeah, yeah, you.

Speaker 2 (50:25):
Are not safe in a jeep.

Speaker 1 (50:27):
In a horror movie or action movie, they could just grip,
just rip you right out.

Speaker 3 (50:31):
Yeah. Okay.

Speaker 4 (50:32):
You know, maybe that explains the declining sales of jeeps
because our generation was too traumatized by oh my god,
you got a jeep.

Speaker 3 (50:40):
We're not gonna be safe.

Speaker 2 (50:43):
That poor guy.

Speaker 1 (50:43):
Back to the coin thing, I would have thought it
was ghosts before I thought it was a leprechaun because
he's just like pushing stuff around the room and this
guy is like, what is happening? And then when he
gets them, and then he's like, can't have dirty shoes?

Speaker 2 (50:56):
A poor guy?

Speaker 3 (50:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (50:58):
You know Kim and tom Lee Jones in Batman Forever,
they kind of make the same kind of like sounds
like the.

Speaker 3 (51:07):
Oh Man.

Speaker 4 (51:07):
I would love to have it confirmed that Tommy Lee
Jones was a leprechaun fan and when he was oh
my god, you're right two face characterization, she's like, you know,
I can't do it, Tommy Lee Jones. But it's like
I better do a better do a leprecaw thing or
something like that.

Speaker 1 (51:23):
But yeah, the tropes are so fun like they don't
shy away from it, like the we got the donut
eating cop and then my favorite thing about the cop scene,
for it's the middle of the night and he's still
like eating donuts and you're.

Speaker 2 (51:33):
Like, yeah, you are you cop. But I love that
the cop just kind of gives up.

Speaker 1 (51:38):
He's just like, I'm so tired, no more running, just
like kill me. I guess, like he just gives up,
and I'm like, okay, script.

Speaker 3 (51:47):
Yeah, it's so funny.

Speaker 1 (51:49):
Yeah, it's a lot of little funny scenes. I'm like,
my cheeks hurt after I laughed the entire time.

Speaker 4 (51:56):
Uh. Yeah, it's it's an interesting horror comedy in the
sense that the comedy is very I guess slapsticky and
you know, a gag based. It's not it's not like
a it's not a satire. It's not like a you know,
a very intellectual, like you know, wordplay comedy. It's just
very like straight ahead yeah, yeah, goofy.

Speaker 1 (52:15):
And it's like he ransacks their house looking for the
gold and they come back in they're like, oh.

Speaker 2 (52:19):
My god, someone ransacked the house.

Speaker 1 (52:21):
But all of our shoes look great because he is
piled everybody's shoe in the kitchen table and cleaned all
the shoes in the house. And Jennifer Anderson's like, does
anybody else think that this is weird? And everyone's like,
shut up, your stupid woman, you know, like, you don't
know what you're talking about. You look a little skinny
tory with a y, which he said to her, and
I was like, damn nineties.

Speaker 4 (52:39):
Yeah, and she even says that at one point, She's like,
it's the nineties, Shell.

Speaker 2 (52:44):
Oh god, what did she say?

Speaker 1 (52:45):
Listen, Bud, this is the nineties and women are treated equal.

Speaker 3 (52:48):
Yeah, that was a novel idea, right.

Speaker 2 (52:53):
Yeah, it's totally fixed now.

Speaker 4 (52:55):
It's totally yeah, we have we fixed it, We solved it.
It's all solved, thank goodness. But yeah, so so this
you know, movie really kicked off a huge franchise because
it's just how how much this you know, this idea,
this concept.

Speaker 3 (53:12):
But certainly the marketing campaign worked on people.

Speaker 1 (53:16):
Oh yeah, the marketing campaign. So what was crazy with
that is they had aggressive marketing campaigns with what it
did the National Baseball Association, the American Stock Exchange, and
then after failing to secure deals with either corporations like Headquarters,
they individually franchised with Dominoes and Subway, and it was
just that movie.

Speaker 2 (53:37):
It's so crazy good.

Speaker 4 (53:39):
For them though, yeah, no, it's it's wild because it
really does indicate how much I'm trying to think of
how to put this, because certainly promotion was always part
of you know, genre and exploitation movies, like you know,
producers and studios inherently knew that. So there was never

(54:00):
a time when they weren't taking advantage of of promotion.
You know, you go all the way back to uh,
you know trailers which are like touting like, you know,
don't don't come in the movie you know alone, and yeah,
don't last ten minutes if you have a heart condition,
We're going to give you a bar back all the
bahullabaloo or ballyho that they used to do, and you know,
the whole William Castle thing and all that. But I

(54:20):
do think that Leprechaun might mark a time when studios
kind of became more aware of the entirety of a
marketing campaign. And that's probably due to the influence of
you know, Freddy Krueger and renelve Street and how many
tie in products you know, we're you know, had his
face on it, and you know how just the image
of the glove and his face like just became, you know,

(54:40):
so ubiquitous and was plastered everywhere, especially towards the end
of the eighties. And so yeah, in a big way,
they were hoping that Leprecaan was going to become their
Freddie or their Jason or you know, whatever equivalent character
you want to say, and they went for it.

Speaker 1 (54:54):
You know, yeah, it did, and it kind of in
its own little way did yeah, and its little he
gets to go to space just like Jason.

Speaker 3 (55:03):
And sooner I think too, and does it less movies.

Speaker 4 (55:07):
But yeah, it opened on January eighth, ninety three, so
it was a January dump back when you know, just
wait a month, right. It's like it's funny because Jones
does admit that one of his ideas when he was
conceiving the movie was to make a movie to exploit
Saint Patrick's Day in a horror context, you know, because Halloween.
I'd done Halloween and Black Christmas and you know, Slid Night,

(55:28):
Deadly Night, you know a lot of Christmas ones as
we know. But yeah, he you know, they were like, oh,
nobody's done the Saint Patrick's Day horror movie yet, so
this was intended as that, and then of course the
studio goes and doesn't take advantage of that.

Speaker 3 (55:39):
So that's one trick they missed for sure.

Speaker 4 (55:42):
But yeah, so you know, obviously lever Con went on
to spawn this long running franchise that, as I said
in the news piece earlier in the episode, may still
be going on. Who knows if this is a new
revote's gonna happen or not. I don't know if I
obviously I haven't seen any these equels, which means I
haven't seen Leprechaun Origins, which was the last reboot, which
I don't know who played the Leprecaun in that, but

(56:03):
clearly they did not set the world on fire, So
I don't know who they could get in order to
take over that role. That would you know, even approach
Warwick Davis's work, save obviously like you know, ha ha,
you could do Peter Diglitch, but like that's never gonna happen.

Speaker 2 (56:21):
Yeah, And there's just something to like the voice.

Speaker 1 (56:23):
It's so iconic, And I was saying, like, I'm not
scared of him, but if I ever met Warwick Davis
and he did that laugh, it would freak me.

Speaker 2 (56:30):
The fuck out. I probably would fall out of my
chair like a you know.

Speaker 1 (56:34):
It open something up in your mind, you know, when
you see something like that so young and it's another movie.
I feel like that's just always been around, especially in
my Irish family.

Speaker 2 (56:42):
My mom thought that shit was hilarious.

Speaker 1 (56:44):
And I remember immediately seeing the second and the third
and the fourth, I think I stopped somewhere around uh
uh Leprechaun in in the Hood and that one is
it's just its own masterpiece, That's all I can say.
It's very different from this, it's very different from the
other sequels, and it is a masterpiece. It's it's the
end of Jason Takes Manhattan, but it's the whole movie,

(57:05):
you know what I mean. And it's God, It's it's gold.
It's just gold.

Speaker 3 (57:09):
All right.

Speaker 4 (57:10):
I'll have to see but yeah, what you said a
second ago is echoed a bit of comment that Mark
Jones made on his commentary track, which is that in
his mind he thinks that part of the success of
the first Leprechaun was, you know, due to the character
and also just you know, Warwick playing the part, because
in his mind he thought kids could ironically relate to

(57:31):
it more because that's a character that's their height, you know, yeah,
so that you know, it's not some big, hulking, you know,
giant of a man that obviously would be scary, but
you know, be scary to anybody because you know they're
big at hulking. But with the Leprechaun specifically, it's more,
you know, there's a one to one relationship there that's like,
oh that this person is you know, could figure out

(57:52):
where I might be hiding or you know whatever.

Speaker 2 (57:54):
And he goes after a kid.

Speaker 1 (57:56):
You know, I'm like, come on, and then he is
ended by a kid as well, which is pretty fun.

Speaker 3 (58:00):
It's pretty fun.

Speaker 1 (58:01):
Very who has the best one of the best lines
in the movie.

Speaker 4 (58:03):
Great line again, another thing Mark Jones had to fight
for to keep in because they were like, you know,
they they were like tick that out and you know,
oh my god, it's going to be a cheer moment.

Speaker 3 (58:13):
And yeah.

Speaker 4 (58:13):
The death is very Gremlins in terms of him melting
away and falling into a way and.

Speaker 1 (58:17):
Then coming back and then and then they mushroom cloud
explode him with some gasoline.

Speaker 3 (58:22):
Yep, the end, the end, but only for now, only.

Speaker 2 (58:26):
For no you can't actually kill a lebregun.

Speaker 4 (58:29):
No, there's no way to do it. But yeah, so
I'm I'm I'm interested. I'm excited to see what other
Shenigan's Leprechaun can get into. And you know, Happy Saint
Patty's Day, everyone.

Speaker 1 (58:42):
Hey, Happy Saint Patrick's Day. What's your What do you
got for recommendations?

Speaker 4 (58:47):
So my recommendation would be another franchise that I've recently
delved into. I'm still in the middle of it, and
I think it it. It's applicable because it is a
very long running franchise of its own, and similar to Leprechaun,
the first movie is not an instant classic where it's like,
oh my God, this thing is like so good, like

(59:09):
you can't wait to see seven more sequels. In fact,
I think it's not as good a movie as Leprechaun,
but it is puppet Master from That's fun.

Speaker 3 (59:18):
Yeah do you mean do you?

Speaker 2 (59:20):
Uh? Okay, I think I'm confusing not New Moons or
not Dark? What is it the subspecies?

Speaker 3 (59:28):
Okay?

Speaker 2 (59:29):
Is there another puppet Master that's a horror as well?

Speaker 1 (59:31):
I think I always get those two confused, so I
always need like people to explain it to me which.

Speaker 4 (59:35):
One, I mean the one with Blade and Blade and yeah,
the puppets that are andre series. Yeah, yeah, it's a
it's a fun one, similar idea of like it's very
low budget, all in one location.

Speaker 3 (59:52):
Uh you know, little creatures ring around women. Yeah yeah, and.

Speaker 4 (59:59):
Uh it's all also got just bizarre subplots or you know,
additional plots, kind of similar to to Leprechaun, but even
more so because there's this whole idea of like these
psychics and they've all convened on this one hotel for
completely unrelated puppet master reasons but you know, or something
like that, and there's also the puppets there.

Speaker 3 (01:00:16):
So yeah, it's an interesting one.

Speaker 4 (01:00:17):
And you watch it, you go, wow, there's like twelve
more of these, Oh my god, so what do you got?

Speaker 1 (01:00:23):
Ash Mine wasn't as successful as those ones as a franchise.
Well maybe more uh troll So there was what two
two trolls maybe three? And I always made me laugh
about trolls because I was like, what's her face?

Speaker 2 (01:00:35):
Who made Harry Potter?

Speaker 1 (01:00:36):
Definitely watch because it's about a wizard trying to get
his life back. There's a Harry Potter and it's all
this magical stuff and you know, you just have to
see it. And what's funny about that that movie scared me.
I probably saw it younger than that because it's PG. Thirteen,
but that was nineteen eighty six, so I probably saw
that younger than when I saw Leprechaun, but I remember
he scared me. And he doesn't you know, he's just

(01:00:58):
the makeup, the eyes. He's very I don't know, toggle
from a Labyrinth kind of look but evil.

Speaker 2 (01:01:05):
And I was just like, I don't like you.

Speaker 4 (01:01:07):
Yeah, And of course Troll two has its own very
famous reputation now as oh yeah, as the best worst movie,
so to speak.

Speaker 2 (01:01:14):
It's definitely up there.

Speaker 3 (01:01:15):
It's something, all right.

Speaker 4 (01:01:16):
But yeah, So I think if you put all those together,
you're going to have yourself a very magical, goofy, comedic,
low budget horror marathon right there.

Speaker 3 (01:01:27):
That's something to check out.

Speaker 2 (01:01:28):
I think you should do it.

Speaker 3 (01:01:29):
You should do it. What else are you going to
do on Sid Patrick's day? Drink? So watch these movies
and still drink.

Speaker 2 (01:01:34):
Absolutely I encourage that.

Speaker 4 (01:01:36):
Actually, thank you all for joining us for this episode
of Bill and Ashley's part of the Stranded Panda Network.
You can find my work in the show notes links below.
Check us out on social media. You can find the

(01:01:56):
show at strandedpanda dot com and everywhere else you get
your podcast. If you have questions or comments, please feel
free to write to us at Bill and Ash Terror
Theater at.

Speaker 3 (01:02:05):
Gmail dot com. We're dying to hear from you.

Speaker 4 (01:02:08):
See you in my areas?

Speaker 3 (01:02:13):
Wow?

Speaker 1 (01:02:14):
Is that me?

Speaker 3 (01:02:15):
Gold?

Speaker 1 (01:02:16):
What hell are you? I'm Letricon join us right after
we get back from gathering all the shoes we can
find to keep that little monster busy.

Speaker 2 (01:02:24):
Join us right after we get back.

Speaker 1 (01:02:26):
Oh, I'm Ron Burgundy can cut it right after busy
because that was perfect? But I had another line there,
go fuck yourself, san Diego. Now I know I would
fucking do it, and I wouldn't think twice about it.

Speaker 2 (01:02:44):
Blooper