Sister Act

Em: 00:02:50

Hi, everyone. I'm Em and welcome to Verbal Diorama, episode 295. Sister Act.

This is the podcast that's all about the history and legacy of movies you know, and movies you don't. That blends in like nuns in a casino. Welcome to Verbal Diorama.

Whether you're a brand new listener to this podcast and welcome back regular returning listeners, thank you for being here. Thank you for choosing to listen to this podcast. I am, as always, so happy to have you here for the history and legacy of Sister Act.

And if you are a regular returning listener, thank you so much for continuing to listen to and support this podcast. This podcast has been going for over six years now and over 290 episodes. And that would not have happened without your continued support.

So thank you so much. It genuinely means so much. And I cannot believe the 300th episode of verbal Diorama is right around the corner.

The last episode that I did was on Sonic the Hedgehog. And really the only similarity between that movie and this is that they're both kind of fish out of water comedies and they both start with an S.

And that's really the only way to link Sonic the Hedgehog with Sister Act. Now, when I was a kid, I saw Sister act for the first time and I fell in love. Genuinely. I'm not joking with the idea of becoming a nun.

Now, obviously, I didn't really understand the whole murder subplot. Because to me, this was a story about a fabulous singer who becomes a nun and has a great time singing. I love the soundtrack.

And I listened to it constantly when I was a child. Bear in mind as well, my family weren't Catholic. I'd never met a nun. And the only nuns in my town taught at the local Catholic school.

But I decided I really wanted to be a nun because it looked fun. And obviously that idea was quashed pretty quickly when my parents explained that nun life isn't all fun trips to Reno and singing gospel music.

But this movie is fun trips to Reno and singing gospel music with a little bit of mild peril on the side. So here's the trailer for Sister Act.

Em: 00:07:00

Reno lounge singer Deloris Van Cartier is embroiled in an affair with married mobster Vince LaRocca. After witnessing Vince murder an informant, Dolores runs to the police. Lt.

Eddie Souther decides that Deloris needs to go into witness protection and places her at St. Catherine's Convent in California, where she will live as a nun until her safety is guaranteed.

Deloris, now Sister Mary Clarence, butts heads with the traditional Reverend Mother who assigns her to direct the church's seemingly hopeless choir. After several rehearsals, where she brings the best out of several nuns, the choir debuts both a traditional hymn and a gospel influenced version.

While the Reverend Mother is irate, the Monsignor is delighted. Over time, the church's congregation grows and the nuns begin to involve themselves in the community more frequently.

But with Vince's trial approaching, he becomes more desperate to find Deloris and puts a bounty on her head, leading to a corrupt officer in Souther's department telling Vince where she is. Let's run through the cast.

We have Whoopi Goldberg as Deloris Van Cartier, aka Sister Mary Clarence, Maggie Smith as Reverend Mother Kathina, Jimmy as Sister Mary Patrick, Wendy McKenna as Sister Mary Robert, Mary Wicks as Sister Mary Lazarus, Harvey keitel as Vince LaRocca, Bill Nunn as Lt. Eddie Souther and Joseph Marr as Monsignor O'Hara. Sister act was written by Joseph Howard and was directed by Emil Ardellino.

The humble Catholic nun is more prolific on screen than you might think. Sister act is the obvious choice, along with obviously the Sound of Music. But let's just run through a couple of nun based movies.

e's also Nuns on the run from: 1990

some, what about the Nun from: 2018

Cinema likes More than nuns. I am just waiting for the MCU to introduce a nun superhero. The sisters who looked after Matt Murdock as a child don't count.

So the idea for Sister act started, like all good ideas do, with drag writer Paul Rudnick. And yes, I realize that's not the name at the top, but I'm going to be coming to that.

He was trying to come up with an idea for a screenplay in the late 80s and kept thinking about drag. Specifically why men dressing up as women was funnier than women dressing up as men.

Think of Some Like It Hot, the smart, socially aware, gender swapping comedy of the 50s, starring Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon. And Barbara Stanwyck's Oscar nominated role in Ball of Fire. So he started to think of the funniest disguise for a woman.

And then, blessed with some holy divine imagination, his thoughts turned to nuns and how nuns are represented in media. Usually quiet and heavily committed to their faith, but also as dictatorial, sexually repressed and scary. His words, not mine.

He called this script Sister Act. He took Sister act to producer Scott Rudin and together they agreed. There was one actor who they wanted for the main part.

She was one of the biggest comedy actors of the 80s, had signed a three picture deal with Disney to star in movies produced by its new Touchstone Pictures division. She set up her own production company with Bonnie Bruckheimer, the ex wife of Jerry Bruckheimer.

I'm not talking about Whoopi Goldberg, I'm talking about Bette Midler. She'd starred in Ruthless People and Outrageous Fortune and her production company was based at Disney.

So Scott Rudin set up a meeting in New York between him and Paul Rudnick and one of the studio executives. Rudnick pitched Sister act and a deal was struck incredibly quickly.

He wrote a two page treatment stating that Sister act was to be a satire of sugar family perennials like the Sound of Music, the Singing Nun, the Flying Nun, the Trouble With Angels and its sequel, Where Angels Go Trouble follows basically any mainstream nun movies with older nuns offering their wisdom to younger, guitar strumming rebel nuns. Sister Act's heroine, Perry Van Cartier would be a pop singer.

She would be sexy, she would wear sequins and she would take refuge in a prissy Catholic convent, converting the nuns to her way of thinking.

And in a meeting with Disney executives at Disney hq, everyone was praising Sister act, eager to get it made as soon as possible, agreeing that Bette Midler would be perfect and that they all love nuns because who doesn't love nuns. After his return to New York, Rudnick finished the first draft. There were questions, though, once he turned it in.

Now that Bette Midler was thinking about playing the part, the film could turn into a full fledged musical, which was great because singing nuns are better than mutant nuns. But what should she sing? Original songs or go with the classics? Terry was a showgirl and feels trapped in the convent.

Could she sneak some of the nuns out to a drive in movie? Somewhere a bit less nun, like. Like a bar or a brothel? Could they get some product placement in there for McDonald's?

Could the nuns drink or take drugs for comedy purposes? How about showing sex? It makes sense that Terry's imposed chastity would be a source of humour. But what about women who've taken a vow of celibacy?

And what if the nuns were so sexy that a male character might start to fancy one of them? But all these questions and the potential answers started to cause a concern for Bette Midler. She worried about her image.

Playing a nun was bad enough, but a naughty nun was something else.

Clearly, they needed intense research on convent life, and a year into the project, it was suggested that Rudnick do exactly that proper research at a convent.

lvis Presley in loving you in: 1957

nd her fiance don Robinson in: 1963

Mother Dolores Hart is currently 86 and the only nun who is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Rudnik was assigned private quarters in the rural old buildings of the Abbey of Regina Laudis, nestled in woods and pastures.

Regina Laudis was a cloistered order, and you couldn't just call up nuns for random conversation.

Since they received no funding from the Vatican, they supported themselves by running a farm, a dairy, a pottery studio and a small gift shop selling ceramics, organic skin creams, greetings cards and their own cd. Titled Virgin Martyrs, the Regian Laudice nuns would pray regularly and attend eight services a day.

Rudnick spent two days with the nuns, attending prayer services and briefly talking to the Mother Superior, who was told he was researching a novel about a woman seeking a more prayerful life within convent walls rather than the actual plot of Sisteract and all the sinful behaviour contained within life at Regina. Now this was a life that was slowly becoming extinct in America.

Convents and monasteries were closing and being sold off, and those that remained had an average age of a nun, well past retirement age. In the early 20th century, a young woman was expected to get married and her employment options were limited.

So becoming a nun could actually be a route to independence. Post the feminist age, the options open to women at home and the workplace were much greater.

Many Catholic orders attempted to modernize their missions, including the traditional habitat. The point of a habit wasn't to stand out, it was to stay humble.

econd Vatican Council between: 1962

This included allowing Mass to be spoken in local languages instead of Latin, promoting peace and justice through addressing social and political issues and promoting dialogue and understanding between all faiths.

Following this, many religious orders re evaluated their missions and dress, leading to some abandoning traditional habits and allowing nuns to wear modest everyday clothing. However, some religious orders do still insist on traditional habits.

return to New York, reading a: 1985

The book is called Lesbian Nuns Breaking Silence by Rosemary Curb and Nancy manahan and contains 51 accounts of lesbian nuns and ex nuns. It's apparently a very good book.

Rudnick shared his experiences with the Sisters of Regina Laudis at his next meeting with Disney and wrote a few more drafts until his contract expired and Disney chose not to renew it, instead hiring Jim Cash and Jack Epps Jr. The writing team behind Top Gun, to change the locales and put the heroine in more jeopardy.

Bette Midler's fears of her public image being tarnished by playing a nun, as well as not getting her choice of director, she wanted Pedro Almodovar led to her choosing to back out the project and Disney put it on hold while they looked for a new lead. Cher, Tracey Ullman and Madonna were all considered.

Meanwhile, Whoopi Goldberg won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her role in Ghost and her profile in Hollywood received a boost. Producer Scott Rudin had worked with her before and suggested her for the lead role, offering her $2 million to play the lead.

Scott Rudin had also worked with Emile Ardellino before on his Oscar winning documentary about Jacques d'amboise. He Makes me Feel Like Dancing.

His most famous movie at that point was Dirty Dancing, and he'd worked for Disney previously on Three Men and a Little Lady.

Once Goldberg was on board, Disney asked Rudnick to return to the project, mostly because Cash and Epps script wasn't great and Goldberg requested the character's name be changed from Terry Van Cartier to Deloris Van Cartier. Sadly not after the inspirational nun who Rudnick had tried to find in that convent just because she liked the name Deloris.

The script called for a cast of supporting nuns of all ages and sizes and all the women who auditioned were asked to prepare a song.

The film's musical director was Marc Shayna, who had not only worked with Bette Midler for years, he was admired for his many film schools from Beaches to When Harry Met Sally through to Misery and City Slickers. Later he wrote the score for Hairspray to audition for the many singing nun roles.

Shaiman brought with him dozens of veteran Broadway cabaret and recording artists, including Mary Wicks, who had starred opposite Bing Crosby in White Christmas as Sister Mary Lazarus. Wicks would pass three years after Sister Act's release.

Shaman also brought in award winning Broadway performer Susan Johnson, who'd end up as choir nun number six.

The supporting cast would be rounded out by Kathina Jimmy as Sister Mary Patrick, newcomer Wendy McKenna as novitiate sister Mary Robert and double Academy Award winner Maggie Smith as the Reverend Mother. The script was under near constant rewrites with Rudnick's original idea becoming more watered down with more emphasis on comedy.

Because Whoopi Goldberg was a comedian first and foremost and the fish out of water comedy suited her. They wanted less sex, more friendship montages, less drugs, more Dolores teaching the nuns about life and the nuns teaching her in return.

Even the police liaison officer love interest was watered down and it would be completely removed by the finished film released.

from Disney again until late: 1991

But it resembled very little of his original idea, and he asked for his name to be removed from the credits. When Disney refused to do that, he suggested a pseudonym. Firstly R.

Shasable, after Reverend Shazable, the priest in Oscar Wilde's the Importance of Being Earnest. Then simply Goofy, which Disney also didn't like.

He chose the name Joseph Howard from a character from a story he'd written, plus his brother's middle name. And that's why Paul Rudnick is not credited as Paul Rudnick and instead is credited as Joseph Howard.

Now, obviously, when Whoopi Goldberg joined the production, the script said that she would lead the choir of nuns, as well as perform as Dolores, the lead singer of the Ronelles, in a show in Reno. Goldberg, however, didn't know how to sing.

Rather than dub her vocals like for some of the characters, Goldberg and Mark Shaman got together, and Shaman taught her how to sing, and she dedicated herself to her singing lessons.

Shaman also hired Jennifer Lewis and Charlotte Crossley to play Dolores Ronelles, and they supported Goldberg's vocals and re recorded some Motown classics that would form the basis of the soundtrack. That doesn't mean Goldberg had an easy time on the movie, though.

completed script in September: 1991

And over the course of filming, no less than half a dozen screenwriters would take turns polishing the script, including Carrie Fisher, Robert Harling and Nancy Myers. It was a constant battle against time and budget, with screenwriters sometimes writing scenes only a day ahead of production.

Sister act was filmed on location in San Francisco, Reno and Los Angeles, with the Moonlight Lounge exteriors shot at Nevada Club, North Virginia Street, Reno. The interiors at Fitzgerald's Casino, just down the road. The Reno police station in the movie was actually Reno's main post office. St.

Catherine's Convent was actually St. Paul's Catholic Church in no Valley, San Francisco. The production had to dress the surroundings to make it appear run down.

The majority of interiors of the church were filmed at the First United Methodist Church in Hollywood. But the main body of the church, in which the choir ends up performing for Pope John Paul II, is the real St. Paul's Catholic Church.

Whoopi Goldberg and script doctor Carrie Fisher were friends, and Fisher was also friends with Disney Studios chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg. And there was no love lost between Goldberg and Katzenberg. It was Katzenberg who wanted a black love interest.

Goldberg wanted to audition white actors, and Goldberg would regularly call up Fisher to complain about Katzenberg. Fisher suggested she avoid fighting with Katzenberg and suggested she send him a hatchet for him to bury on both of their behalves.

So Whoopi Goldberg did in fact send Jeffrey Katzenberg a hatchet, and in return, he sent her a pair of brass balls. As many of the cast were older ladies, Goldberg noticed that as the star, she was treated slightly differently.

She noticed some of the women were struggling financially and clearly they hadn't been compensated for their time in a way they deserved. Goldberg would say in an interview with Vulture that, quote, the ladies hadn't gotten everything I thought they should have gotten.

The nuns, they were older women. They were women who I felt should be able to go and have dinner and not be worried about paying hotels or whatever it was.

This group of women was indeed a sisterhood.

And Whoopi Goldberg would take matters into her own hands by getting sick, which shut production down for a couple of days until the matter was sorted and the older women were compensated accordingly, by which time Goldberg got better. Goldberg denied going on strike for her castmates, instead saying to Vulture, I got sick.

I would never go on strike, but if my coughing and sneezing coincided with our brief problem, but they fixed it and it was great. More issues would arise after the movie's release, too.

In: 1993

reenplay based on the book in: 1985

million settlement offer in: 1994

lt Disney Company in November: 2011

She claimed that after writing a three page synopsis, a movie executive showed interest in the film rights. She sued for breach of contract, misappropriation of likeness, and unjust enrichment.

he initial lawsuit in January: 2012

h prejudice in early February: 2013

Now, Keanu did attend a Catholic boys school for a year to play hockey, but he also famously played John Constantine, who is damned to hell for attempting suicide. And the moody Constantine is full of Catholic imagery, possibly some nuns, but honestly, it's been a few years since I watched it.

, all the way back in: 2019

Now, I cannot talk about Sister act without talking about the incredible soundtrack to Sister act when I rewatched this movie for this episode, because I rewatch all of the movies for all of the episodes, I just sat there with a huge smile on my face clapping and singing along to the music. Genuinely, I adore this soundtrack so much.

r, Mary Wells, originated the: 1964

Peggy March's: 1963

If My Sister's in Trouble by Lady Soul was the only song uniquely created for the Sister act soundtrack. The black and white music video also features the film's actors, including Whoopi Goldberg.

The score for Sister act, as I mentioned, was composed by Marc Shaiman, and the singing voice for Sister Mary Robert was provided by Andrea Robinson. The soundtrack album was certified platinum in Australia and gold in Canada, Germany and the us. I have to add that I didn't buy the soundtrack.

May: 1992

It would stay at number two for four weeks in total and would stay in the top 10 for 16 weeks.

st grossing film worldwide of: 1992

And obviously if you're looking for a sweet musical comedy about a witness to a crime hiding out from killers in a convent, there's none better than Sister Act. Or at least that's the summary on Rotten Tomatoes, which has Sister act at a 73% rating.

Sister act would also receive two Golden Globe nominations for Best Picture, Musical or Comedy and Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy. For Whoopi Goldberg, it would lose the former to the Player and the latter to Miranda Richardson for her role in Enchanted.

e performances in movies from: 1992

Yes, that Lauryn Hill as well as James Coburn and Broadway icon Sheryl Lee Ralph, among others.

and Harry Styles. In December: 2020

In January: 2023

rg confirmed as much in March: 2025

al had a regional premiere in: 2006

olores in the Broadway run in: 2011

Some orders of nuns are becoming extinct, but for now they live on in our popular culture.

sic or Sister Birchill in the: 1960

But horror and the Catholic Church go hand in hand.

In real life, a lot has happened under the supposed safety and sanctuary of the Catholic Church, with many people reporting decades of sexual abuse in monasteries and convents.

like the Magdalene sisters in: 2002

I'll admit I love this one more than the sequel. It's just so wholesome.

I thought Whoopi Goldberg was the epitome of cool, and when Maggie Smith passed last year, in a career spanning seven decades for me, she was the Reverend Mother and she was Granny Wendy in Hook, and they were what made me fall in love with her. RIP to a legend Religion can sometimes be an easy target for Hollywood, and Catholicism was only ever something I learned from movies.

From people confessing their sins in church to Holy Communion to thinking convent life was just full of gospel music.

And this is your typical traditional values, such as from the Reverend Mother to the version of contemporary faith, being a nun for many is an honorable calling to devote yourself to your faith and to receive genuine joy in humble service to God. And this movie, while being a comedy, doesn't speak down to that.

These nuns can be in service to God and their community and also sing their praises in a modern way. Ultimately, Sister act is a movie about women caring for other women on the individual and collective kindness of women.

That even if your calling is to God, you still ultimately love and care for other women. That race and sexuality don't come into it. Nobody in this movie cares that Dolores is a black woman. There are no race jokes, no comments.

It's not nasty, cruel or diminishing. And when one of their own is in trouble, the nuns think nothing of putting their lives in danger to help their sister.

This movie is about nuns, but more than that, it's about the power of winning together. Dolores, on her own was in danger, but Dolores sequestered with a group of women is power.

And not only that, but put a black woman in charge of the music and amazing things can happen. Which just speaks to the decades and decades of white artists taking inspiration, slash stealing from black artists.

Dolores Van Cartier could have been Terry Van Cartier, a white woman played impeccably, I'm sure, by Bette Midler, but it wouldn't have had the same cultural impact. To see a black woman in this role made it iconic, not because it was written for a black woman, but because it wasn't written for a black woman.

This isn't a culture clash between white women and black women, but a culture clash of Dolores secular ways and the Sisters, more traditional religious ones. And honestly, many movies could learn a lesson from Sister act in how to depict women, especially women of a certain age.

I love this movie with all my heart, but I am really glad I didn't become a nun. It's just not my calling. Thank you for listening as always.

I would love to hear your thoughts on Sister act and thank you for your continued support of this podcast. If you want to get involved and help this podcast grow and reach more people, you could leave a rating or review wherever you found this podcast.

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In: 1934

operas like Star wars. But in: 1980

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