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Consequence Of Sound
The First Wives Club and the Unsung Joys of Middle Age
BY NICO LANGON
SEPTEMBER 17, 2016, 11:00PM

Dusting ‘Em Off is a rotating, free-form feature that revisits a classic album, film, or moment in pop-culture history. This week, Nico Lang revisits hit ’90s comedy The First Wives Club.

A movie can be important, even if it’s not very good. Such is the case with The First Wives Club, a frothy midlife crisis comedy currently celebrating its big 2-0. Starring Goldie Hawn, Diane Keaton, and Bette Midler, the film debuted in theaters in September 1996, sitting atop the box office for three weeks and topping out at a final gross of $105 million. Its success was sweet vindication following a troubled production. When the film’s original screenwriter, Robert Harling, bailed on the film to direct The Evening Star, a little-remembered sequel to Terms of Endearment, Paul Rudnick (In & Out) was tasked with finishing his script, which he claims “[made] no sense.”
For example, there’s a pivotal scene where Annie Paradis (Keaton) and her best friends from college (Midler and Hawn) visit a gay bar after Annie’s daughter comes out to her mother as a lesbian. Rudnick, who is openly gay, told the New York Times during a 1997 interview that he bristled at the logic of the scene. “OK, but why are they going there?’” Rudnick asked Scott Rudin, the ubiquitous producer behind such films as The Truman Show and No Country for Old Men. Rudin responded, “They’re going to talk to Diane Keaton’s daughter, who is gay.” Rudnick was still confused. “She’s gay, but she doesn’t have a phone?” he shot back. Rudin didn’t care if it adhered to common sense, just as long as it was funny. “Just write it,” he said. Read More