MovieChat Forums > Daydream Believers: The Monkees' Story (2000) Discussion > Fictional versions of the two creators

Fictional versions of the two creators

posted 14 years ago by VladdyTrout
2 replies | jump to latest

Great movie. Granted, there isn't much dramatic action, but as a Monkees fan I give this film two thumbs up.

This film is in the same vein as the TV movies about Three's Company and Charlies Angels (those films also featured Wallace Langham as super agent Jay Bernstein - well at least in the Charlie's Angels movie. Wallace Langham is a great actor.)

What struck me as odd and funny was how the film-makers used fictitious versions of the two creators, Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider. Colin Ferguson's character is dressed sorta like Bert Schneider back in the day, but the other actor looks nothing like Bob Rafelson - he's too "Mad-Men" squares-ville to be a hep-cat like Bob Rafelson.

The Monkees names were used, as were the Beatles (albeit with reeeaallly bad accents - which I dig), and others, but not the two guys who created the show.

But it’s all good, this is just a TV movie, after all. An enjoyable TV movie.

"My, my, the clock in the sky is pounding away...there's so much to say..."

[–] planetdust1 13 years ago

Um, didn't you know? The character of "Van" is a composite of Bert and Bob. The "Mad Men squaresville" guy is Don Kirshner.

Oh, do you mean "Harris"? I think he was supposed to represent the network. It's probably explained in the commentary.

[–] hka-3 9 years ago

The Monkees names were used, as were the Beatles (albeit with reeeaallly bad accents - which I dig), and others, but not the two guys who created the show.

Yeah, I wonder what was up with that. It almost seemed like a legal thing to not use Bert and Bob's names (Colin Ferguson was excellent as "Van," though), or to use songs written by any of the four Monkees.

Surprisingly I didn't notice that about the songs; someone on this board pointed it out. The songs they used fit the story well enough, so that's probably why I didn't notice.

As for dramatic action, it affected me deeply to see Peter so hurt that Mike didn't invite him (or the others) to work on his new music projects. It seemed like Peter thought the two of them were friends -- or at least music compadres -- until that happened (and I remembered what Peter said to Micky about not having many friends growing up because of his family moving a lot). Peter had to face the hard reality that it was part of the business. That said I can understand if Mike felt he needed an outlet that wasn't part of the manufactured Monkee machine.

Mag, Darling, you're being a bore.