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redantsunderneath · 7 years

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Does anybody remember the Twin Peaks Holiday Special

I wanted to know if anyone remembers the Twin Peaks Holiday Special with the little man from another place, because it was common knowledge on the newsgroup and boards in the early 90s, but no one seems to recall it when I mention it now. I had a VHS dupe of this show, with a badly printed jacket, that I had obtained at DragonCon 93' or so (I met Al Simmons, the real life namesake of Spawn and Jim Lee if that helps). While I was cleaning house, I had accidentally given it with the rest of my VHS tapes to a courier named Roland who worked for us (who was later fired for popping positive for THC and I didn't know his last name, so I couldn't get it back). It was so bad so I wasn't really upset. I just finished talking to my friend Gaines who I watched this with a bunch of times to just laugh and drink beer, so he managed to corroborate my memories and remind me of some other stuff. Note that all of this is just his and my memory and may be off, and the stuff about the actors and background info is pure hearsay from whatever groups and boards I was on in that era. Here is what I remember, if you guys can fill in the details or correct inaccuracies that would be fantastic.

ABC decided to exercise a clause in the Twin Peaks contract calling for their ability to produce up to 3 Twin Peaks related specials. In the rush of awards show wins and high profile media exposure, they decided to greenlight a Holiday Special in hopes that they could capitalize on the buzz and the small town spirit of the show to maybe wind up with a perennial favorite. It was to be shot on hiatus, but Lynch and Frost were not interested in working on it. The execs focused on getting a cast to lure another writer and director associated with the show.

The cast were mostly uninterested in the blind pitch, except for Kimmie Robertson, who thought it would be fun as long as she could “do hair” and Joshua Harris who had just been cast to play Nicky Needleman in the next season and happened to be around when they were looking. They felt they needed a bigger name to anchor the project and were surprised that Kyle MacLachlan said yes as long as he had final creative approval and a guarantee that the show would air. MacLachlan had a well known issue with excessive use of human pineal gland extract around this time and the executives simply thought he needed the money (the fad for “organic” drugs was in full swing and HPGE was the priciest drug on the market at that time – Kyle was said to have an 80 donor equivalents per week habit, the highest ever recorded).

They were able to get one of the incoming writing staff (not sure which one) to agree to write it but it was apparently a “Stan Lee” job where the instruction to the story editor (a pre TNG Ronald Moore) was “that dwarf guy goes home for some reason.” Moore, fresh off of a committed method writing exercise of 6 months living full emersion as a Klingon, decided on a “Pon Farr” scenario of the Little Man returning to his home planet to mate. Gains remembers that Alan Smithee, who IMDB tells me has had quite a career, was named as director and they were ready to go.

MacLachlan got heavily involved in the writing. He and Lara Flynn Boyle had been living in a small shanty in the Salton Sea, and communications with them had become erratic. Kyle said he had a “vision” as to how this might change the world, and fought Moore the entire time. When the executives saw some of the pages and, realizing they could not cancel, gave the minimal budget contractually allowed and planned to bury the project. Instead of at Christmas, it aired at 3 AM, Tuesday October 16th, 1991 with no promotion under a title that did not contain Twin Peaks (I thought it was something like “Trial of Bark,” but Gains swears it was “Our Emancipation.”). No one saw this thing, but somehow I had that tape in all its cable acess-level production glory.

The story was basically a Christmas Carol. There are no opening credits and the special starts with LMAP in the red room, when a large head (poorly superimposed with a blurring effect, weird computer imposed black hole for a mouth) tells him he must come back to “the planet Garmanbozia” (Lynch hated everything about this special and disavows it except for this name which he liked and kept for the movie) for the Tantaculus festival (MacLachlan’s suggestion, named after the “world system” he and Boyle were devising in the California desert) in order to mate. The little man with resignation walks into the mouth and emerges in his house. This is the only special effects and the only appearance of any of the normal settings of the actual show (all the summoned guests simply “walk on” from the side).

There are birds on the soundtrack constantly and no music outside of musical numbers. The house is like a modern Flintstones house (fake chrome everywhere, rust colored Formica table [no idea if this was an idea germ too], but uneven plaster painted ochre. He sees his wife Brigite (Priscilla Barnes, who acts in a 3 foot cutout in the stage, and just disappears when she is not in a scene – you never see her leave or come back). She is excited to mate, but he is clearly not and she disappears in a huff. He says hi to his kids (Bob and Mike, no relation – played by sock puppets worked by a guy dressed in black), who are arguing over what seems to be a beef jerky. He talks away from them about how he loves them but he doesn’t know if he can handle more. Behind him appears an unnamed thin giant (Meadowlark Lemon in a part presumably written for Carel Struycken) who says he will show him the value of “whoople” with “three gifts” as the show cuts to commercial.

The giant proceeds to bring in the three cameos, the first two of which have musical numbers. Lucy comes in and gives LMAP a makeover and reminds him several times that he is “still sexy” before breaking into that Sinead O’Conner song (Emperor’s New Clothes, I think). Locked camera shot, but the Lucy awkward dance stuff is fun. Commercial then Little Nicky comes in to remind him that his kids are still lovable and always a gift (more on this scene later) and he and the giant break into a Bossa nova-esque version of Blues from a Gun (the music is very dated and kind of inappropriate).

Finally, for the last act, Dale shows up. Most of his lines are gibberish (a lot about division and multiplication and, Zeno’s paradox perseverating), but he eventually gives LMAP a crushed velvet painting of a naked Log Lady (log held strategically). The little man becomes alert and approaches the painting, rubbing its surface and making a yelping noise. His wife appears and calls to him “Alf, come to me." He walks backwards to the rear of the house. The kids ask Coop if he wants some coffee and, in the one really interesting moment in the whole thing, Dale says “no thank you, if he makes coffee like he dances I’m likely to wind up with a mouth full of grounds.” Strange sounds emanate from the back of the house (the only good foley work) and we end on a freeze frame of Coop giving a thumbs up and really fast credits.

My main, seared-in memories are the song numbers, the bad blocking and lack of positional continuity (Barnes’ hole), and a few specific oddities. In the Nicky scene, Bob and Mike (who are always doing something competitive in the background) are bouncing a beach ball back and forth, playing the “don’t let it hit the ground” game (where someone tosses the ball so that other people will try to keep it in play by gently tapping it up – this is before I knew what meta was). Now remember, it is one guy in a black mask obviously playing with himself but you can see the ceiling fan. There is a tension that the ball is going to hit the fan, but it never does and they don’t do anything with this. Meadowlark is wearing a Star Trek-ish uniform that is made out of potholder material. MacLachlan speaks with an intensity like he needs to convince the audience that without math the world will cease to exist, or something. Lucy’s pre-Elaine funky dance is neat.

It is important to note that, in lieu of backward talking/shooting the scenes, everyone just inflects each syllable up with a tight jaw (they start to forget to do this pretty quickly except Barnes who is if anything a committed actress). There's no way this thing is canon in any way - Lynch doesn't even answer questions about it (he responds with non-denial stuff like "I don't think Id've done that" and "sounds made up"), and it is really bad. It is tonally nothing like the show and any mythology SHOULDN'T COUNT! It is a fiasco. I can't find references Googling, but I think there has been a lot of self editing Wiki pages and legal action trying to scrub this thing from existence.

Any information, corrections, or links to where I could get this would be appreciated.

#twin peaks #kyle maclachlan #lynch #mark frost #kimmie robertson #joshua harris #lmap

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