He Said, She Said (1991)
Trivia
Jump to:
Cameo (2)
The genesis of this film was generated from a night out in Paris, France where the film's two directors, Marisa Silver and Ken Kwapis, were both telling the story of how the pair had gotten together. They noticed that their stories were different in perspective, so they decided to make a movie based on this high concept, and shortly afterwards, contacted the film's Screenwriter Brian Hohlfeld to develop the movie, then pitched the picture to Paramount, who gave them the go-ahead.
Ken Kwapis and Marisa Silver are married, but weren't at the time the movie was made. They were then, like the film's two lead characters, boyfriend and girlfriend. According to Variety, the two got engaged during the film's production.
This was not the first movie about relationships to split the film into two main segments, titling them with gender-specific terms, each telling a story from each gender's perspective. The Richard Burton-Elizabeth Taylor television movie Divorce His - Divorce Hers (1973) had done this.
Ken Kwapis and Marisa Silver, who filmed "He Said", and "She Said", respectively, each watched each other's segments being filmed, so they would be cogniscent of how to vary each's own segments from the other. However, each when watching the other's segment being shot, were not allowed to talk to the actors during it.
The framing story which has Lorie (Elizabeth Perkins) throw a coffee cup at Dan (Kevin Bacon) functions to differentiate the "present" time-frame of the picture from the "past" time-frame as it results in him having a sore requiring a bandage, thereby acting as a visual signifier to the audience that whenever he appears with this, that it is the present and not the past.
Kevin Bacon top-billed this movie for Paramount Pictures, having previously headlined an earlier 1980s box-office hit for the studio, Footloose (1984). Bacon had also appeared in other 80s Paramount films, such as She's Having a Baby (1988) and Planes, Trains and Automobiles (1987).
The movie is actually three short films or segments collated as one feature film. The first two segments are called "He Said" which plays first, then "She Said" which plays second. There is then a third segment, which, according to the audio-commentary, can be kind of called "They Said".
This movie was one of five Sharon Stone films released in 1991, they all being released before her big breakthrough role in Basic Instinct (1992). The other four were Scissors (1991), Year of the Gun (1991), Diary of a Hitman (1991), and Where Sleeping Dogs Lie (1991).
According to the film's audio-commentary, in the "He Said" segment, Elizabeth Perkins plays her part from his (Bacon's) point of view, while in "She Said", Kevin Bacon plays his part from her (Perkins') point of view.
Kevin Spacey and Jason Alexander were considered for the role of Wally Thurman, which in the end, went to Nathan Lane.
Some DVD covers for this film feature a preamble that reads: "He says sex, she says romance. He says relationship, she says marriage. He says he won't but she hopes he will. Luckily they both agree they've fallen in love!" whilst some movie posters had a preamble that read: "He said, Women are illogical, fussy, manipulative, hormonally deranged creatures who play hard to get, then hard to take...but then he met Lorie. She said, Men are insensitive, messy, uncommitted, sexually obsessed clods who just want hot sex followed by a cold beer...but then she fell in love with Dan. HE said, SHE said. The story of true love. Both versions".
The first drafts of the screenplay set the picture in Minneapolis-Saint Paul, Minnesota, the twin cities, so as to reflect the two male and female perspectives. The setting though for the film, was changed to Baltimore, Maryland.
Since this movie's release, the phrase "He Said, She Said" has gone into the vernacular of popular culture.
Kevin Bacon mocked the film when he appeared on The Howard Stern Show.
The name of the restaurant that is featured repeatedly as Lori and Dan's hangout is called "Punta di Vista" - Point of View, a reference to the jobs of the two main characters, who make their living expressing their (conflicting) points of view.
The "She Said" segment of this film, is the final theatrical film (to date, March 2017) directed by Marisa Silver.
In 2006, a television movie was made with a similar title, which also looked at the male and female perspectives of a relationship. It's title was the reverse of this film's, She Said/He Said (2006).
Marisa Silver has said that this movie "Is a story told from two points of view. Ken directed the man's POV, I directed the woman's. It was a very formalistic project, and we had a good time. But when I was finished with that, and thinking about what to do next, I had a very strong feeling that the next thing I needed to do, was to no longer make movies."
The cup that Lorie (Elizabeth Perkins) threw at Dan (Kevin Bacon), which hit him on the head, causing a wound, was made of hard rubber.
The name of the slogan on the bus promoting Dan (Kevin Bacon) and Lorie's (Elizabeth Perkins's) media work read: "People just love a good fight."
A scene featuring Sharon Stone getting out of a limousine with a bottle of champagne was inspired by Stone's debut cameo performance on the train in Woody Allen's Stardust Memories (1980).
The film had two directors, Ken Kwapis and Marisa Silver, one male and one female.
According to a January 30, 2009 edition of The New York Times, "It was at a party in 1986 that Mr. Kwapis met Ms. Silver, a daughter of the filmmaker Joan Micklin Silver. Their conflicting versions of the ensuing courtship, Mr. Kwapis's reluctance to tie the knot, and their eventual marriage, became fodder for the 1991 romantic comedy the couple directed together, He Said, She Said (1991)."
Another film with a similar title was made for video in 2011, He Said, She Said: A Romantic Comedy (2011), but it's not a remake of this picture, though it does have the same battle of the sexes/gender relationship themes.
This title was the first part of Paramount Home Video's "3 to See" rental program, along with True Colors (1991) and The Perfect Weapon (1991). It was the first of the two titles in the program to release in August 1991.
Debut produced screenplay of Brian Hohlfeld.
Both the female leads of He Said, She Said (1991) (Elizabeth Perkins) and Divorce His - Divorce Hers (1973) (Elizabeth Taylor) were both first named "Elizabeth".
Apparently, according to the movie's audio-commentary, "He Said, She Said" was also the title of an American 1960s Psychology text-book.
According to Halliwells, "the story is told first from the man's point of view, and then from the woman's".
The name of the newspaper was "The Baltimore Sun", while the name of the television station was "WBAL-TV Baltimore", while the name of its television show, that Dan (Kevin Bacon) and Lorie (Elizabeth Perkins) hosted was "He Said. She Said". In real-life, there had been a television game-show called He Said, She Said (1969).
Appearing in this movie five years before his role in The Birdcage (1996), was Nathan Lane. Ironically, a birdcage is featured in one scene in this film.
The movie was released not long after Deborah Tannen's book "You Just Don't Understand: Women and Men in Conversation" (1990), a work also associated with relationships with both male and female perspectives. A later educational video of Tannen's is titled "He Said, She Said: Gender, Language and Communication" (2009).
The cast featured two actors who were both last-named "Stone" - Sharon Stone and Danton Stone, the two apparently being unrelated.
