She didn’t give permission for her image to be used. This aired not long after A Very Brady Christmas, when Susan was replaced due to budgetary reasons. The official reason at the time was that Susan was on her honeymoon, but in reality she was willing to cut it short, but not for the relative pittance she was offered compared to her TV siblings Maureen McCormack and Eve Plumb. So my guess is she wasn’t feeling charitable toward Paramount at the time and wasn’t willing to give them permission to use her image.
It was common knowledge in the community that Mike Brady had an insatiable sexual appetite but was a selfish lover. Carol generally took an entire day just to recover after a long night of passionate yet ultimately unsatisfying love making, which was almost every night. At least her daughters had a roof over their heads. Just saying that Carol did the best she could under the circumstances.
I noticed A Very Brady Christmas is on Hulu so I watched it for the first time in ages. Still good to see the gang back together. I remember watching the tv series when it was revived shortly after and enjoyed those as well but haven't seen them since they originally aired.
As notes previously, that final season episode, “Getting Greg’s Goat” is one of my favorites of the entire series. Some of the misinterpreted dialogue, listening to Greg talk to the goat, explaining to his dad….it pretty hilarious for a Brady episode. Too bad the series couldn’t have evolved and grown with the kids.
Loved the original series, don't like the movies at all. Like everything else in life, you can't recapture the magic of the original moment.
I loved the TV show, grew up on it, was the right age to have been a fan, and, have seen every episode in their original run and in reruns repeatedly. I even own the entire TV show collection on DVD. The movies stunk. What's worse is that not all of the original actors are in them.
That was the plan, but Sherwood Schwartz claimed in his book that he killed the show because the kids wanted music in every episode. Most of them had musical aspirations after "The Silver Platter" episode.
You know, that may have been a good thing. It seems like when they have cameos by stars of the original, it almost seems like they do it to make it seem as though the originals are "giving the new project their blessings" and/or "passing the torch". Or just to gets rears into the seats, knowing a lot of folks will be/would be curious to see the past cast members in their cameos, whether they like the new project(s) or not... In short, a cheap attention grab.
as a 70s kid, I grew up with the series and it has a place in my heart... so at least the first movie in the '90s and it was ok... can't remember if I saw the second or not... they tried to camp the first movie up but it wasn't particularly successful in that regards because the series was campy to begin with without meaning to be, which makes it camp... trying to be camp is never camp...
I thought they were totally great send-ups of the original show. Gary Cole and Christine Taylor were both spectacular in their roles.
Be sure and check out The Real Brady Bros podcast. It’s excellent as Barry and Chris break down episodes of the show.
I thought the movies were very uneven and sometimes unnecessarily mean spirited; but I agree that the two actors above were excellent. And Gary Cole’s “Mike speeches” to the family are the highlights of the movies for me.
I actually like father knows best , but I like the radio show a lot better. except for the mom, the family was less "perfect". robert young, the only cast member from the tv show, was much less patient. princess could be rather snarky. kitten was saucy and impish and seen as an occasional source of irritation. finally, bud was a bit more dopey and deadpan. he also said holy cow in a drawn out monotone to voice his displeasure. my three son was kind of like that. it was a bit more wild and woolly when it was in black and white and ran on ABC.
the scene on the brady bunch that cracked me up is when peter's crush falls for greg, and marcia and greg put on this ruse, portraying greg as a cad and heartless lothario, that plays like a hokey soap opera.
i'm of the Brady gen but did watch both My Three Sons and Father Knows Best in re-runs... never heard the radio show, though... sounds interesting!
There are three movies not two. Third was a TV movie and has a new Alice and six new kids. It’s absolute trash. Brady Bunch in the White House. First two movies were great.
I like the first movie a lot. It’s definitely uneven and I agree with the poster above that some of it is more mean-spirited than necessary. I also wish they had used more incidental music from the original series. Some of those musical cues were inspired, like when the repaired vase is leaking or when Myron the Mouse is chewing his way out of the girls’ hamper. The Marcia/Jan dynamic in the movie was very funny. I love how they twisted things a bit, so that Jan is pissed when Marcia wakes up and the swelling in her nose has gone down. Jan screams and Marcia says, “Is my nose worse?” And Jan says despairingly, “No! It’s better!” And then Marcia blows herself a kiss in the mirror. The other thing that makes me laugh is that in the original, Marcia daydreams about repeatedly being hit in the nose with a football. In the movie, it’s Jan, and she comments on what a great dream it was.
There seems to be some confusion in this thread, with some people posting about the made-for-TV movies or miniseries featuring some of the original cast. These are all pretty awful. If I'm not mistaken, the OP was referring to the two spoofs that were made that starred other people (but had a few cameos by some of the original cast). Those two movies were called The Brady Bunch Movie and A Very Brady Sequel. I thought both of those were pretty funny, though I preferred the first one. The second one did make me laugh repeatedly, though, when they amped up the supposed sexual chemistry between Greg and Marcia.
It's fans of the show who will best appreciate the movies because most of the humor comes from referencing and parodying the show.
