On this frantic day America dubs Black Friday, we’d just like to reunite you with a great little video from Moulin Rouge director Baz Luhrmann‘s album Something For Everybody.
Now 10 things you didn’t know about this video:
- Released in 1998, the video is not written by Luhrmann, it’s simply the director’s depiction of an essay titled “Advice, like youth, probably just wasted on the young” written by Mary Schmich and published in the Chicago Tribune as a column in 1997.
- In her introduction to the column, she described it as the commencement address she would give if she were asked to give one.
- The song features a spoken-word track set over a mellow backing track. The “Wear Sunscreen” speech is narrated by Australian voice actor Lee Perry.
- The backing is the choral version of “Everybody’s Free (To Feel Good)”, a 1991 song by Rozalla, used in the film William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet
Something for Everybody, the album this was taken from, was released by Baz Luhrmann in 1998. It contained new ambient versions (either newly recorded or remixed) of music from his films and plays.- The track was a part of the end credits in John Swanbeck’s film The Big Kahuna, starring Kevin Spacey, Danny DeVito and Peter Facinelli.
- There are four versions of the song: the original 7:09 minutes mix from the album Baz Luhrmann Presents: Something For Everybody; a 1999 single release which features an 5:05 minutes edit that lacks both choruses
- The video which uses the 1999 single edit of the song was directed and animated by Bill Barminski
- Hawaiian comedian and observational humorist Frank de Lima recorded Eat Rice which includes island-style advice such as, “Laugh at ethnic jokes; you’re ethnic, whether you like it or not.”
- Dennis Leary also parodied the song with “Ladies and gentlemen of the class of 99 – Drink beer.”
