6/28 - David Letterman Auditioned for What Iconic '80s Movie?
Plus trivia on The Nutty Professor, Smooth, Disney animation, Apollo 13, and more
The ‘80s & ‘90s pop culture you loved, forgot, or never knew existed
June 28th, 2024 • Issue 210
Be Kind, Rewind
What happened on this day in the ‘80s and ‘90s — plus lots of bonus trivia
June 28th
1982 - Microsoft released its new logo.
1985 - St. Elmo’s Fire hit theaters.
1990 - Go West’s single King of Wishful Thinking was released.
1991 - Naked Gun 2½ hit theaters.
1992 - The original Dream Team played its first game, an exhibition against Cuba.
1995 - Real World’s London season premiered on MTV.
1995 - Joe Smith was the number one pick in the NBA Draft by the Golden State Warriors.
1996 - Demi Moore’s Striptease hit theaters.
1996 - The Nutty Professor hit theaters.
Jerry Lewis — who played the nutty professor in the 1963 film — was an executive producer of the 1996 remake but turned down a cameo over “fart jokes.”
Jerry Lewis was an executive producer on 1996’s The Nutty Professor as well as the sequel in 2000.
But… he didn’t exactly like the movies. He says he should’ve fought harder to stop a remake from happening: “What I did was perfect the first time around, and all you’re going to do is diminish that perfection by letting someone else do it.”
And he turned down a cameo in the movie, allegedly because the script had too many “fart jokes.”
June 29th
1983 - National Lampoon’s Vacation hit theaters.
1984 - Bachelor Party hit theaters.
1987 - Tiffany’s self-titled debut album was released.
1990 - Days of Thunder hit theaters.
1993 - Aerosmith’s single Cryin’ was released.
1994 - Glenn Robinson was the first pick in the NBA Draft, by the Milwaukee Bucks.
1995 - Real McCoy’s single Come and Get Your Love was released.
1995 - The Canadian Football League came to America as the Memphis Mad Dogs played their first game.
1998 - Every baseball team had an off day for the first time since 1973.
1999 - Santana’s single Smooth was released.
Even though Rob Thomas wrote the music and lyrics to Smooth, he wasn’t originally supposed to be the singer.
Rob Thomas of Matchbox Twenty was brought in to rewrite the lyrics and melody to a song Santana was working on — the song that was originally called Room 17 but ended up being called Smooth.
However, the original plan was to have George Michael sing on the track.
Michael was going through his legal trouble at the time, though, so Rob Thomas got to sing after all.
1999 - LFO’s single Summer Girls was released.
June 30th
1971 - Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory hit theaters.
1986 - Steve Winwood’s single Back in the High Life was released.
1986 - Madonna’s album True Blue was released.
1987 - Canada unveiled the loonie.
1989 - Karate Kid III hit theaters.
1989 - Do the Right Thing hit theaters.
1990 - New Kids on the Block’s single Step by Step hit number one.
1992 - Boyz II Men’s single End of the Road was released.
1993 - Chris Webber was the #1 pick in the NBA Draft by Orlando (then traded to Golden State).
1993 - The Firm hit theaters.
1995 - Apollo 13 hit theaters.
The Apollo 13 cast did more than 600 controlled plane dives in a special NASA-owned plane to get all the zero gravity shots.
The Apollo 13 team used NASA’s KC-135 airplane that can fly up then plummet down in repeated “parabola” motions to get all the zero gravity shots.
The cast went through more than four hours of these ups and downs every day.
At one point, one of the camera operators got so sick from the process he vomited all over Bill Paxton.
1995 - The series finale aired of Love Connection.
1997 - There was a leap second added to the calendar.
1997 - Lil Kim’s single Not Tonight was released.
1998 - NSYNC’s single Tearin’ Up My Heart was released.
1998 - The Sega Channel, the first attempt at an on-demand video game service, shut down.
1999 - South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut hit theaters.
1999 - Wild Wild West hit theaters.
1999 - Elton Brand was the top pick in the NBA Draft, by the Chicago Bulls.
July 1st
1979 - The Sony Walkman debuted.
1980 - O Canada became the Canadian national anthem.
1985 - A&E separated from Nickelodeon as Nick at Nite began.
Shows from only three classic TV series aired on the first night of Nick at Nite programming.
Those series were Dennis the Menace (1959-1963), The Donna Reed Show (1958-1966), and Route 66 (1960-1964).
1987 - Kid Icarus was released for the NES.
1988 - The first issue of Nintendo Power magazine was released.
1989 - Baseball Stars was released for the NES.
1989 - Milli Vanilli’s single Baby Don’t Forget My Number hit number one.
1991 - Heavy D’s single Now That We Found Love was released.
1991 - Clarence Thomas was nominated for the U.S. Supreme Court and has been cashing in ever since.
1991 - Court TV (now TruTV) premiered on cable.
1991 - Michael Landon passed away.
1992 - A League of Their Own hit theaters.
1992 - Boomerang hit theaters.
1994 - Little Big League hit theaters.
1994 - Martin Page’s single In the House of Stone and Light was released.
1995 - The State aired its series finale.
1997 - Radiohead’s album OK Computer was released in the U.S.
1998 - Armageddon hit theaters.
1998 - Puff Daddy’s single Come with Me was released.
1998 - The NBA lockout began.
July 2nd
1979 - The Susan B. Anthony dollar was released.
1980 - Airplane! hit theaters.
David Letterman auditioned for the role of Ted Striker in Airplane!
The producers say they believe his agent pushed him to audition because “he didn’t want to be an actor… he doesn’t take himself seriously enough to be an actor.”
The role ended up going to Robert Hays, who was a star of the sitcom Angie at the time.
1982 - A guy strapped balloons to his lawn chair and flew for an hour.
1988 - Steffi Graf won at Wimbledon, breaking Martina Navratilova’s six-year streak.
1988 - Michael Jackson became the first artist with five number one singles from the same album when Dirty Diana hit number one.
1991 - Boyz n the Hood hit theaters.
1991 - Axl Rose started a riot when he jumped off stage at a concert in St. Louis to attack a fan.
1993 - Pauly Shore's Son-in-Law hit theaters.
1995 - Bill Gates was named the richest person in the world for the first time.
1997 - Men in Black hit theaters.
1998 - OpenTable was founded.
1998 - Harry Potter & the Chamber of Secrets was released in the U.K.
2001 - The original version of Napster officially shut down.
July 3rd
1982 - Don’t You Want Me by the Human League hit number one.
The Human League’s lead singer and songwriter, Philip Oakey, begged the label not to release Don’t You Want Me as a single because he thought it was the worst song on their album.
Virgin Records released three singles off Dare (The Sound of the Crowd, Love Action (I Believe in Love), and Open Your Heart). All were hits in the U.K. but none made it big in the U.S.
The label wanted one more single and picked Don’t You Want Me. Even though Oakey objected, they released it anyway… and it became the band’s first U.S. hit, a number one hit in both the U.S. and U.K., and the band’s most commercially successful song ever.
1985 - Back to the Future hit theaters.
1987 - Adventures in Babysitting hit theaters.
1989 - The New Kids on the Block single Hangin’ Tough was released.
1991 - Terminator 2: Judgment Day hit theaters.
1996 - Independence Day hit theaters.
1999 - Whitney Houston's single My Love Is Your Love was released.
1999 - Infamous video game star Billy Mitchell achieved the first perfect score ever on Pac-Man.
2001 - Real World: Back to New York premiered.
2001 - The '90s NBA expansion team the Vancouver Grizzlies moved to Memphis.
July 4th
1982 - Ozzy Osbourne married his manager, Sharon Arden.
1984 - Big Trouble in Little China hit theaters.
1984 - The Great Mouse Detective hit theaters.
The Great Mouse Detective was the first Disney movie to make use of computer-generated animation.
The computer assistance allowed for more complex animation and scenes — like the movie’s climatic scene inside Big Ben. Disney even promoted their use of computer-generated animation in the film’s marketing.
1985 - Mr. T played the drums for the Beach Boys in concert.
1992 - Sir Mix-a-Lot's Baby Got Back hit number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
1993 - Pete Sampras won Wimbledon for the first time.
1995 - Deep Blue Something's single Breakfast at Tiffany's was released.
1996 - Hotmail debuted.
2000 - Destiny Child’s single Jumpin’ Jumpin’ was released.
2001 - Takeru Kobayashi won his first hot dog eating contest.
What’s the Frequency, Kenneth?
A look at the reboots, revivals, throwbacks, retro insights, and nostalgia in the news
Michael Jordan won the NBA’s Defensive Player of the Year award in 1998 — but a new investigation sure makes it seem like the Chicago Bulls’ scorekeeper cooked the books to make it happen.
According to Noah Wyle, an ER reboot was in the works in 2020 but he and show’s executive producer decided to work on a different medical show instead. It’s called The Pitt and it’s in production now.
Bette Midler says “they’re talking about a third” Hocus Pocus movie.
Lisa Kudrow says she’s rewatching Friends to keep her memories of Matthew Perry alive.
Jason Biggs’s wife, Jenny Mollen, says she didn’t watch American Pie until after they got married. She says she “felt like [she] was too highbrow theater major” to watch it back when it was in theaters.
Shifty Shellshock, lead singer of Crazy Town, passed away this week at age 49.
Get Your Book-It Stickers Here
Recommended articles about ‘80s and ‘90s pop culture you loved, forgot, and never knew existed
Den of Geek ranked every video game console generation from worst to best. The video game consoles of the ‘80s and ‘90s did ok.
What are the 25 essential ‘80s rock and metal albums to pass down to your kids? Raffi got screwed.
In 1995, a group of technologists and librarians got together in Ohio and created a system for indexing and organizing World Wide Web content — a system that is still largely in use today. This is the story.
Have a great week!
-Sam