Last couple weeks, I talked about famous movie quotes that are non-existent, or misquoted.
Now let's jump into my third category: lines which may be correct,
but if they are, they're elusive.
These are the ones that aren't as definitive.
First is the line from movie trailers, you know, "In a world..."
It IS correct. They do say it. But most of the time, it's a parody.
I'm talking about the original sources.
How did the parodies get started?
"In a world..." is supposed to be this HUGE cliché that gets spoken all the time,
but I couldn't find one legit example, until I posted a blog on Cinemassacre, asking for help
The fans pointed out a decent amount of trailers, like Mad Max 2, Goodfellas, Alien 3, Death Wish 3 and Jakob the Liar,
So there ARE examples,
but whenever you hear it, it's always kind of disappointing.
It's usually somewhere in the middle of the trailer and it kind of sneaks in there, like,
"Here in a world where the sun burns cold..."
It's there, but it doesn't really seem to be as big of a cliché as it's supposed to be.
The trailers are mostly from the 80's and 90's.
Nowadays, no trailer says "In a world..." unless they're joking around.
It's kind of like when somebody does something stupid, and their friends joke about it for decades,
never letting that person live it down.
I think the parody of the cliché, is more cliché than the cliché.
Another one is Fonzie, from Happy Days
The famous catchphrase is "Ayyy," but whenever somebody does it, they give a double thumbs-up, that's important.
Or in some versions, they're kinda pointing at themselves, as if to say "Look at me, I'm the shit!"
And that accurately depicts what the character of Fonzie is like.
The only problem: When does the character ever do that?
You'd think a catchphrase that popular, that was the topic of an entire Family Guy episode, would be easy to find!
I spent a whole night, searching on Youtube, "Best Fonzie moments," "Fonzie Ayyy,"
Tons of great clips came up, but not what I was looking for
I typed in "A-Y-Y," "E-E-Y," every spelling I could think of, but I couldn't find it.
You'd think he would have said it so many times, that somebody would have edited together a compilation.
Nope. Nothing.
However, I DID find some instances where he says "Ayyy" WITHOUT the thumbs-up!
"Ayyy"
Recently, I found him saying it with ONE thumb up,
"Ayyy"
So we're getting REAL close!
But what about the double thumbs-up?
It's there, in the intro, but he isn't saying "Ayyy."
So, to my best knowledge, I believe the phrase, and the gesture, were two separate things,
but when people do impressions, they combine them.
But there is ONE clip I've seen, where Fonzie actually does the whole thing.
It's on Sesame Street, of all places.
He introduces the letter "A" by saying "Ayyy" and giving the thumbs-up.
"Ayyy"
It's EXACTLY what I was looking for. It's perfect!
But the problem is... It's a spoof.
It was obviously done AFTER it already became a cliché.
He's self-referencing his own catchphrase, so it doesn't count as a legit source.
Even HE knew it was a thing, but if it was such a thing, when did he first do it?
I can't rule out that it never happened, but until someone can help me find a real clip, I see no proof.
Next is two alleged quotes from Jerry Seinfeld.
First is, "What's the deal with - " fill in the blank.
This one doesn't bother me much, because it sums up what Seinfeld's comedy is all about.
He's always asking what's the deal with things, even if he doesn't say that exact line.
I know that he says it when he's joking about himself.
On the show, Seinfeld, other characters would say it to him,
Also he made fun of it on Saturday Night Live, in '92
on a sketch where he hosted a game show where comedians had to answer questions like
"what's the deal with this" and "what's the deal with that"
Later on, he starts saying it on the show, but it was always self-aware,
and it was AFTER lots of other people started saying it.
So, once again, I believe it began with the impressions, but, it's unresolved.
But the line that bothers me, is "Who are these people?"
Any time someone does a Seinfeld impression, they always say, "Who are these people?"
It's not out of line, it sounds like something Seinfeld WOULD have said,
But unlike "What's the deal," this one isn't a generalization.
This one's more specific, as if he said it during a particular occasion.
It could have been during a particular stand-up act, or an episode of the show,
or whatever, but I've never seen it ANYWHERE!
And I've looked. So if anyone can help find it, then... help me out.
What's the deal with, "Who are these people?"
If anyone can help find these clips, that would be really cool,
unfortunately, YouTube got rid of annotations, so I won't be able to add any updates or corrections
I'm not planning any follow-up video, not yet at least, but for curiosity's sake, it would be good to know, and to spread the knowledge to others.
It's trivial stuff, but, it's fun.
"Ayyy"