Bette Midler: Big Business Facts And Trivia
Seen about two-thirds of the way through the credits: “Don’t Go, It’s Almost Over.”
In the hotel scenes, Lily Tomlin is featured wearing a concert T-Shirt from rock star Tina Turner‘s 1985 “Private Disaster” tour.
The boy in the toy store who plays Bette Midler’s son is a very young Seth Green from “Can’t Buy Me Love“, “Austin Powers” & “Buffy The Vampire Slayer” fame.
In the scene where Bette Midler makes her first appearance in NYC, notice how the statue in the elevator lobby is positioned to look like it’s shielding itself from her.
Throughout the scenes inside the Plaza Hotel there is a lady with a dog whose wardrobe changes with each dog color. She is initially seen wearing a white dress with a white dog in the scene where Sadie and Rose Ratliff first enter the Plaza. Then she is seen wearing a brown dress with a brown dog and finally a black dress with a black dog.
Notice how Sadie’s jacket in New York is cut – now look at Sadie’s jacket from Jupiter Hollow – the red plaid one. It’s the same cut.
Also, in Jupiter Hollow, how could Sadie’s hair be pulled back and curled into all those ringlets when wearing it down it’s a short bob? It’s a beautiful Disney Films custom wig for Ms. Midler.
Notice subtle costume similarities in the characters. When New York Sadie goes to dinner with Fabio she is wearing a black bodiced bell-dress with red wrap and skirting. Then, when Jupiter Hollow Sadie walks up to the concierge desk, she has a red wrap around HER black bodiced dress. From the chest up they look the same to the concierge!
Did you see the Triplets trying to check into the hotel??
This movie was originally written for Barbra Streisand (Bette Midler’s role) and Goldie Hawn (Lily Tomlin’s role).
To prepare for her performance as Rose Ratliff, actress-comedian Lily Tomlin just before the cameras rolled before a take would whiz around in a circle several times until she got dizzy so as to exhibit the air-headed qualities of this character.
The production company couldn’t get the rights to film at the actual Plaza Hotel in New York, so it had it recreated on sound stages. To recoup construction costs, Disney built a sitcom around it, The Nutt House (1989). It was an expensive flop.
After the two sets of mis-matched twins meet for the first time, country Sadie comments about city Sadie, “Isn’t she divine?” An obvious reference to Bette Midler’s stage and screen title,”Divine Miss M”.
The structure of the film was based loosely on “The Comedy of Errors” by William Shakespeare.
Actress Lily Tomlin’s first big film role in a cinema movie for about four years. Tomlin’s last had been as Edwina Cutwater in All of Me (1984) in 1984.
The movie won in 1989 the American Comedy Award for Funniest Actress in a Motion Picture (Leading Role) awarded to actress-comedian Bette Midler.
Second of two consecutive movies with a connection to William Shakespeare for actress-comedian Bette Midler. The title of Midler’s previous film, Outrageous Fortune (1987), was derived from a passage in “Hamlet” whilst Midler’s next picture, Big Business (1988), had a plot loosely derived from “The Comedy of Errors”.
The stereophonic sound on the film does not kick in until the end of the prologue ready for the transition to modern day. The sound until that point is mono.
Second and final [to date, August 2013] of two films that director Jim Abrahams has made with actress-comedian Bette Midler. The first had been Ruthless People (1986) made and first released about a couple of years earlier.
One of a mid-late 1980s mini-cycle of movie comedies which starred Bette Midler that were all produced by the then new adult Walt Disney brand of Touchstone Pictures. The films include Big Business (1988), Ruthless People (1986), Outrageous Fortune (1987) and Down and Out in Beverly Hills (1986).
The name of the place in West Virginia where both sets of twins were born was “Jupiter Hollow”. “Jane Lew“, the town where the doctor provides direction to the closest hospital, is an actual town in West Virginia. “Jupiter Hollow” is a commune, less than eight miles from “Jane Lew”, in the town of Weston, WV.
Star Billing: Bette Midler received top first billing whilst Lily Tomlin received second billing.
Jim Abrahams said he staged one of the boardroom scenes based on an experience he had when a large agency used many employees to get him to sign with them.
Some movie posters for the film featured a long blurb that read: “Mixed up at birth, two sets of twins finally meet their match. BIG BUSINESS. Two’s company. Four’s a riot”.
Although Bette Midler and Lily Tomlin play two sets of twins, Tomlin is actually six years older than Midler.
One of two 1988 live-action movies starring actress-comedian Bette Midler. The other picture was Beaches (1988). Both were made by Touchstone Pictures. Midler also did some voice work for Touchstone’s parent brand Disney’s Oliver & Company (1988) released in the same 1988 year.
The two characters played by Lily Tomlin, Rose Ratliff and Rose Shelton, are both first named “Rose”. Co-star Bette Midler once starred in a movie called The Rose (1979) where her character was called Mary Rose Foster and nicknamed ‘The Rose’. Midler later played another Rose-named character, Mama Rose, in Gypsy (1993), the remake of the earlier classic Gypsy (1962). In one scene in Big Business (1988), Midler’s character is asked whether she wants roses or tulips in the hotel room.
The name of the dog that Lily Tomlin gave to the canine she befriended was “Duke”
THe DVD sleeve notes declare that the picture was a “critically acclaimed box-office hit”.
Principal photography on this picture commenced during August 1987.
Both lead actresses, Lily Tomlin and Bette Midler, both play dual roles in this movie.
Lily Tomlin is wearing Tina Turners Private Dancer Tour shirt, not Break Every Rule.
Thank you!
Who was the guy that got slapped by Bette Midler when she was going for a walk and caught the cab.
Louis Rukeyser
Thank you!