EDITORIAL
ROUTTNG 1-18-94
TO:
Heads up!
Jane Curtin recalls the Coneheads
By Fratrk Loyece
You can't accuse Jane Curtin of
having a big head in conversation,
she's polite, witty, -suburban-genteel,
the very soul of Connecticut eli-
quette. Yet she's perhaps best known
as that ultimate big- head, PrJrmaat
Conehead, now on video with the re-
lease of "Coneheads" (1993), the film
adaptation of the Curl in/Dan
Ayhoyd/Laraine Newman sketches
from the golden age of "Saturday
Night Live."
"They've been a small part of my
life," Curtin says gamely, chuckling.
"But constant!"
The movie followed a trend of TV-
based film that included "The
Addams Family" (1991) and "Waj.ne's
World" (1992) the latter, a con-
- sketch. While
temporary "SNL"
"Coneheads" didn't scoop up at the
box ofrice in that summer of "Juras-
sic Park," it plays humorously
enough on video.
So does Curtin, who after leaving
"SNL" with most of the rest of the
original cast in 1980 went on to an
Emmy-winning run as Allie Lowell in
"Kate & Allie" (CBS, 1984-89), and a
lesser one alongside Stephen Collins
as star of Lhe ill-fated "Working It
Out" (NBC, 1990). Yet she concedes
. a continuing soft spot for the bald,
grotesquely pated immigrant house,
wife from the planet Remulak.
Doing the movie, says Curtin,46,
"was more of a lark than alything
else. I would've been hurt had they
not asked me! There was," she
admits, "nostalgia mixed with yuck-
I-don't-wanna-do-that, because when
it's something that involves any sort
of prosthetic Inakeup, it's really
hard."
Indeed, the giant coneheads worn
by Curtin, Aykroyd (husband Beldar),
Michelle Burke (daughter Connie)
and Laraine Newman (the original
Connie, now Beldar's sister) took
some two hours daily to apply to each
to the reported min:
-utesas oropposed
so on "SNL."
20
"Actually," Curtin reflects on those
halcyon days, "all told it took about
an hour when we were doing it on the
. show but a lot of thaf time was
spent -tilking. We really didn't have
to worry about seams showing you
could,see the lines where the -cones
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stopped and faces began, but you the original cast. Curtin went on to F:
didn't care because it was only three her sitcoms, plus a handful of TV t.
minutes and you didn't go to close- movies
ups. But when you're doing a film, with
- one
"Suspicion"
of which, a remake of
for PBS"'American Play- t
speciftc lighting and different camera house ' anlholog/, she produced with
angles. you have to make it look seam- her husband of l8 years. Patrick v' .
F
less and that was a tedious process. Lynch. The two have a young daugh-
-
We had to use a new prosthesis every ter, Tess.
day, and it'd be thicker on some days Curtin, a Massachusetts insurance t.
v.
and thinner on others, and if there executiye's daughter, dropped out of c
were any problems," she shudders, Nodheastern Universitv in 1968 to c
"then it was three hours." help found The Proposiiion comedy
troupe. She came to New York City z
E
h
with it two years later, eventually E
c
leaving to support herself with com-
No one realty knew mercials ("Mostly cleaning products.
what ('Saturday Night I was the germ killer.") and with
plays artd off-Broadway rewes. ccN
Live') was going to be. Her audition for "Saturday Night 6'
tr
(at the time officially titled
I liked that and the Live"
"Saturday Night") came at about the
0)
fact it had a chance to same time as one for anolher show 6'
X
evolve. -Withamazingly, "Saturday Night Live
Howard Cosell" (ABC, 19?s-?6).
lntended to be an Ed Sullivan-style
.,'
revue hosted by sportscaster Cosell, I
The Coneheads sketches debuted in the show, says Curtin, "was looking o
the second season of "SNL" and even- for a rep company, and they were in-
tually numbered 11. In the excellent terested in John Belushi, Billy o
behihd-the-scenes book, "Saturday Murray, Chris Guest and me." ji
Night," authors Doug Hill and Jeff We- Offered both shows, Curtin says, F
ingrad reported that Aykoyd's origi-
nal concept was "pinhead lawyers
she went with thle not-ready-for- 2
prime-time gig. "It wasn't really well
from France," but executive produc- defined
er Lorne Michaels vetoed it on - notoone
it was going
really knew what
be. I liked that and c
grounds of not wanting to be insensi- the fact it had a chance to evolve o
o
tive to the disabled. Sometime later, it was probably going to start out -in
Aykroyd and Tom Davis wrote a
sketch called 'B lind Dates'Frbm
one direction and become whatever
it became, which is indeed what hap-
ac
C
Outer Space," which was never used. pened."
All thse elements supposedly came Curtin has done likewise vith- N
out losing her improv-sharp -wit. She
to a head N
- so to
Aykroyd returned
speak
- when
from a South Seas doesn't miss a beat when told that
vacation marveling about the giant research for this column uncovered c(
carved heads on Easter lsland. And. a lot of Curtins. o
from there... "Well," she says effortlessly, a
"Hmmm," says Curtin doubtfully. trained professional, "hang them up."
"What -l heard was that Danny and O, T994 NEWSPAPER ENTORPRISE ASSN.
Tom Davis were staring at l,he moni
tor one day, trying to figure out what
STAR VIEW
. they could do to fill the screen. They
came up with these lines; and that
became a cone shape, and so tbey
came up with 'ionehead lawyers from
France.' Then Lorne wanted to make
it a domestic situation rather than a
courtroom."
After Curtin and companv left
"SNL," the Coneheads had a brief
breath of lifd as an animated-series
pilot on NBC in 1983, with voices by