“Caddyshack: The Making of a Hollywood Cinderella Story”

I’ll just come right out and say it - Entertainment Weekly film critic Chris Nashawaty’s fascinating, funny and sometimes frustrating new book about the making of “Caddyshack” may possibly be more entertaining than the film itself. “Caddyshack: The Making of a Hollywood Cinderella Story” is in of itself a Cinderella Story.

We all know the film — Harold Ramis’ indomitable big screen epic of snobs, slobs, downtrodden golf caddies and Kenny Loggins-dancing rodents has and forever will be a part of our cultural lexicon. “Caddyshack” truly is a work of cinematic art concocted and acted in by a team of creatives more interested in snorting lines than writing and remembering them.

Yes, I really just went there.

And despite its iconic popularity today, what surprises most is how poorly the film was received upon its release and just how long it took Orion’s little $6 million amiable “out house” mess of a comedy to invade the nucleus of contemporary pop culture after critics and filmgoers besmirched its existence upon release. The story of what became the “Caddyshack” we know and love, this minor entry in the era of “Animal House,” “The Blues Brothers” and other “Saturday Night Live”/”National Lampoon”-inspired fare, is indeed fascinating. 

As we all know, every legend — just like every chlorine-soaked Baby Ruth candy bar — has a story behind it.

Nashawaty’s book is not only a fascinating study about the making of a classic, but an exploration of a pivotal era in American comedy and everything in between. Clocking in at a casually anemic 309 pages, the first substantive reference to “Caddyshack” doesn’t appear until about a third of the way into the book; the heart of the film inspired by stories both Bill and Brian Doyle-Murray told Harold Ramis about their summers working at snooty country clubs along Chicago’s North Shore. 

Thanks to National Lampoon and its foray into cinematic pay dirt with “Animal House,” dick and fart jokes had stifled the seriousness of earlier 1970s fare by Martin Scorsese (“Mean Streets”), Francis Ford Coppola (“The Godfather”) and Dennis Hopper (“Easy Rider”). And we really have no one else to thank for this than “Animal House” co-writer and National Lampoon co-founder Doug Kenney, who under intense pressure to duplicate the success of “Animal House,” with Harold Ramis, pitched the idea to Orion Pictures for a comedy about Illinois Nazis. Not received well at all (shocking, I know!), an increasingly frustrated and paranoid Kenney worked with Ramis and the Murrays on their golf course premise, much to Orion’s better interests. Script drafts were cranked out and, to the surprise of many, first-time filmmaker Harold Ramis was handed the directing reigns.

And then production began…

From there, Nashawaty’s stories just get funnier. After seeing so many documentaries about the making of “Caddyshack” and its behind-the-scenes debaucheries over the years, reading this book offered little in the way of fresh substance-induced anecdotes. I'd heard most of them before, including familiar descriptions of rampant drug and alcohol abuse running full gamut day and night throughout the film’s nine-week shooting schedule. Then there was Bill Murray’s incessant ad-libbing to the point of distracting the finely-tuned acting chops of Ted Knight and others. They may be rehashed, but they're still funny.

Seriously, hearing tawdry tales of Ramis, Kenney and half the cast and crew sneaking onto the Rolling Hills Golf Club near Ft. Lauderdale, Florida each night to recreate World War II desert tank battles on the 18th green and Chevy Chase constantly breaking into Ted Knight’s trailer to drop a deuce without flushing never gets old.

Shrouded within the heart of Nashawaty’s very funny book exists the tragedy of Doug Kenney, who, having suffered serious depression, anxiety and drug addiction for many years, never saw the enduring legacy of his final contribution to American comedy. Kenney, greatly disappointed with the final cut of “Caddyshack,” died under mysterious circumstances in Kauai, Hawaii on August 29, 1980, just one month after the film’s release. He was just 33-years-old.

One never tires of “Caddyshack,” its quotes or its references. It’s $40 million box office success ranked it the 17th largest grossing film of 1980, respectable numbers for its day, especially with the level of critical enmity it received. But one wonders if those critics who clobbered it had any idea of its lasting potential, even forty years after its release. I guess one could categorize it as a cult film, but is it really? I don’t think so. The film’s prominence within pop culture delves far deeper than that. It’s more of a colossus than anything. Always has been, always will be.

And as a fan, I can only thank Chris Nashawaty’s efforts to bring his extraordinary account of this iconic comedy to life. It makes us remember, it makes us laugh, it makes us appreciate the “slobbier” things in life.

And, most important, it makes us be the ball.