Adaptation Sequence: Newspaper Comic —> TV show —> Cartoon —> Video Game —> Movie —> Cartoon show loosely based on movie —> Video Games —> Sequel to movie —> Direct to Video Movie —> Reboot TV Show —> Video Game —> Broadway Musical —> 2 Animated Movies —> Video Games —> Netflix show
Beam Me Up, Scotty!: Morticia is often quoted saying, "Normal is an illusion. What's normal for the spider is chaos for the fly." However, no one is sure when exactly she said that.
She does say the line in The Musical, but it seems to be a reference to the presumed earlier quote.
Keep Circulating the Tapes: To this day, there has never been a DVD release for the following Addams Family films and shows: The Addams Family Fun-House, Halloween with the New Addams Family, the 1992 animated series, Addams Family Reunion, and — at least in America — The New Addams Family (the latter being caught between Saban and Disney- what else would you expect from a Fox Kids/Fox Family show?). Also, the crossover episode on The New Scooby-Doo Movies, "Wednesday is Missing," is unavailable on DVD or Blu-ray due to licensing issues.
What Could Have Been: After Illumination Entertainment obtained the rights to Charles Addams' original cartoons, there was a planned stop-motion animated film with Tim Burton calling the shots. It wound up replaced by a CG cartoon instead.
Actor-Inspired Element: John Astin and Carolyn Jones were the ones to develop Gomez and Morticia's sultry relationship. They wanted to show a proper, adult romance on television rather than the rather chaste ones typically depicted at the time.
Corpsing: During Morticia's close-up in the intro, Carolyn Jones just barely fails to not crack a smile.
Disowned Adaptation: Though he visited the set a few times, Charles Addams considered the original series a travesty.
Dueling Shows: With The Munsters. The Addams family were humans that acted like monsters, but the Munsters were monsters that acted like normal humans. It was an interesting contrast.
Fake American: The entire cast of The New Addams Family (apart from Glenn Taranto and Nicole Fugere, who played Gomez and Wednesday, respectively) were Canadian.
The Production Curse: Tragically, almost all the lead actors died relatively young: Ted Cassidy at 46 from surgical complications, Carolyn Jones at 53 from cancer, Ken Weatherwax at 59 from a heart attack, and Lisa Loring at 64 from a stroke. The only exception is nonagenarian John Astin, who is the only surviving lead cast member as of 2024. (Blossom Rock, who played Grandmama, managed to make it to age 82 but was already older than every other cast member would live to be excepting Astin and Jackie Coogan, who died at 70, when she was cast).
A sort-of example from the series: while playing Thing Ted Cassidy would occasionally use his left hand just to see if anybody would notice.
Jane Rose replaced the ailing Blossom Rock as Grandmama for Halloween with the New Addams Family.
The Other Marty: In the original series, Thing was usually performed by Ted Cassidy; whenever a scene required both Thing and Lurch to appear together, a stagehand (usually associate producer Jack Voglin) would take Cassidy's place while he performed instead as Lurch.
Recycled Script: Most of the episodes of The New Addams Family were recycled from the original series. In fact, the episode "Thing is Missing" is a twofer. Not only is it a remake of an episode from the original show, but it also borrows two plot elements from the 1992 animated series episode "Itt's Over" (though this time, Uncle Fester starts growing hair because he's stressed over the mistaken belief that Thing is dead rather than Cousin Itt).
The 1973 animated series had new actors for most of the family, but had Jackie Coogan and Ted Cassidy once again reprise their roles as Uncle Fester and Lurch. John Astin returned to his role as Gomez in the 1992 cartoon.
Nicole Fugere (Wednesday) was the only cast member from Addams Family Reunion to reprise her role for The New Addams Family.
Self-Backing Vocalist: Composer Vic Mizzy, who couldn't afford singers, triple-overdubbed his voice for the theme song to simulate a trio.
Throw It In!: Ted Cassidy ad-libbed "You rang?" in the pilot, and the producers kept it — and changed Lurch from a mute to allow for it.
Charles Addams, who provided names for the characters when his creation went to series (they were unnamed in his cartoons, even lacking the "Addams" surname), initially submitted the name "Pubert" for the family son. Producers rejected it on the basis that it was too vulgar, leading him to come up with "Pugsley" instead. The name Pubert would, of course, go on to appear elsewhere in the franchise (see Development Gag below).
Chaz came up with two different names for the family patriarch, and left the final choice up to the character's actor, John Astin. Imagine how different the show could've been had Gomez instead been named "Repelli".
Halloween with the New Addams Family was intended as a quasi-pilot for a TV series revival, but for one reason or another the idea never got off the ground.
Written-In Infirmity: In the 1964 series episode "Wednesday Leaves Home" Wednesday is missing one of her front teeth because Lisa Loring lost a baby tooth before filming. Morticia mentions Wednesday losing one of her teeth in the opening scene.
For the films:
Acclaimed Flop: Addams Family Values has higher critical reception than the first film, but made far less money at the box office.
Channel Hop: Orion Pictures originally produced the first film, but the studio's bankruptcy led to them selling the US rights and copyrights to Paramount. Orion retained the international rights, which were licensed to Columbia Pictures for distribution. The sequel was produced and released by Paramount outright.
Creator's Favourite: Raúl Juliá has said that Gomez Addams was his favorite role and appreciated the feedback from fans. After he died in 1994, his family said that his role as Gomez Addams kept his spirits up while suffering from illness.
Cut Song: Michael Jackson's "Is It Scary" was originally written for Addams Family Values and had most of a corresponding video shot that featured clips from the film and a closing cameo by Wednesday and Pugsley. However, contractual disputes between Paramount Pictures and Epic Records led to the song being dropped in favor of Tag Team's "Addams Family (Whoomp!)". "Is It Scary" was released four years later on Jackson's album Blood on the Dance Floor: History in the Mix and served as a basis for the song "Ghosts" on the same album; the video was reshot and reedited into Michael Jackson's Ghosts. The joke in the film where Joel sees a Jackson "Heal the World" poster and screams was meant to be a reference to Jackson having written a song for the film, but the context was removed with Jackson's departure.
Deleted Role: Ophelia was originally going to have a brief scene in the first movie. She's still in the finished product, only now in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment (she's the lady dancing with a candle at Fester's party).
Development Gag: Baby Pubert was named for Charles Addams' original intended name for Pugsley, which the producers felt was too vulgar.
Dyeing for Your Art: Anjelica Huston wore a corset, plus make-up that made her closer to the comic strip's Morticia.note This included some painful straps she had to wear on her temples to make her eyes more slanted. They were so stressful that she couldn't bear to wear them all day lest she succumb to headaches, which proved to be a hassle when it came to applying and removing them. She described it as exhausting.
Enforced Method Acting: For the scene where Morticia reads Hansel and Gretel to some children, Scott Rudin wanted the child actors to cry on command. So Barry Sonnenfeld told them they would all have to get measles shots. It worked.
Executive Meddling: In a 2016 Yahoo! interview, Addams Family Reunion director Dave Payne claims that this was the catalyst that ended up causing the movie's downfall, as he had intended to make a darker kids movie version of the familiar universe and characters, but executive producer Haim Saban shot down every single one of his original ideas and instead told the crew to basically imitate as much of the original series and movies as possible, but excise any darker elements and satire present in the latter and aim the production squarely at children.
Originally, Amanda was going to be killed off during the pageant in Addams Family Values, but according to Mercedes McNab, the developers didn't want the Addams kids "to be killing off children, no matter how awful the child is", so they showed a scene of Amanda surviving being burned on a stake and making it back home on a plane with her parents.
Hostility on the Set: The first film was made during the Persian Gulf War. Judith Malina, a committed anarchist and pacifist, encouraged Anjelica Huston and Raul Julia to sign an anti-war ad but both refused. When a teamster passed her a paper American flag, she said, "Don’t give me that without a match to burn it.” She claimed that no one on set spoke to her for three weeks after that. This incident may explain why she was not invited back for the sequel.
An early teaser trailer for the first movie begins with footage of another film being played in a theater. The character in the film turns and screams at something in the audience. As everyone turns back to look, it is revealed that the entire family is occupying the back row, and they snap their fingers in time to the theme music before the teaser ends. This sequence was shot specifically for the teaser, and features Christopher Lloyd in early makeup for Uncle Fester. This is a wonderful example of Shown Their Work: This is based off a New Yorker cartoon by Charles Addams, completely unrelated to the family at that!
A shot of Grandmama emerging from the attic trap door stating “You kids are gonna have to kill your own breakfast this morning!” was featured in several trailers for the first film. This comes from a deleted subplot of her battling with a malfunctioning fog machine on the roof. This deleted subplot is referenced by the mechanical clock in the opening of the film.
Addams Family Values' teaser trailer has a nurse examining babies in a maternity ward, all while adoring parents look on behind glass. She comes to a crib that's covered in a massive black overhang and opens it up to examine, then turns around and screams once she sees what's inside. Like the original, this clip was shot specifically for marketing purposes, and never appears in the final film.
No Export for You: Legal issues between Paramount and MGM (successor to Orion) explains why it took until 2013 for the first film from being reissued on video outside North America following its initial VHS release. A year before Orion sold the film to Paramount, they sold a package of 50 films, including The Addams Family, to Columbia Pictures for foreign distribution, which is why Paramount only distributed the film in North America. After Columbia's license to the film expired, neither Paramount nor MGM could determine where the foreign rights reverted to. Ultimately, it was learned that the foreign rights ended up at MGM, and the film was finally released on DVD and Blu-Ray worldwide in 2013.
Carol Kane replaced Judith Malina as Grandmama for Addams Family Values, likely due to the reasons listed in Hostility on the Set above.
The third movie did this to most of the actors playing the family. Justified, as it's intended as a separate continuity, and the only reason it exists is to have served as the Pilot Movie for The New Addams Family.
The Production Curse: The film duology is connected to the sudden decline of several careers attached to it:
MC Hammer tanked his career with a failed shift to Gangsta Rap, went bankrupt due to severe overspending, and retired from music to become a pastor.
Tag Team quickly descended into One-Hit Wonder status and survives mostly off of media appearances and corporate events.
Michael Jackson's song "Is It Scary" got shelved due to contractual disputes before Jackson himself became embroiled in a child molestation scandal, becoming mostly known for the latter and ultimately dying of a drug overdose in 2009 at the age of 50.
Director Barry Sonnenfeld saw his star drop considerably a few years after the second film's release with the widely-panned Wild Wild West, being relegated mostly to TV work in the aftermath.
Writer Paul Rudnick saw his own reputation tank with the poor reception of Marci X and the remake of The Stepford Wives, with later film scriptwriting being done anonymously as a result.
Gomez's actor Raúl Juliá saw his career die in the most literal sense possible: he died of cancer shortly after the second film's release. In return, his death torpedoed the possibility of a third movie in the film continuity - Addams Family Reunion was almost completely recast and instead was meant to kick-start a new live-action series.
Promoted Fanboy: When asked who his favorite character was that he's portrayed, Christopher Lloyd answered with Uncle Fester because he was a fan of the original Addams Family comic strip as a kid.
Reality Subtext: Barry Sonnenfeld revealed in his memoir that aspects of his childhood influenced parts of the films. Notably, Fester's line, "You were a terrible mother!" was something he had wanted to say to his own mother. Joel Glicker's parents were also based on his own parents.
Role Reprise: Carel Struycken and Christopher Hart reprised their roles as Lurch and Thing, respectively, for the otherwise non-canon Addams Family Reunion.
Star-Making Role: Christina Ricci's beloved performance as Wednesday in the first two movies not only made her a star, but also a 90's goth icon.
Suppressed Mammaries: Christina Ricci tied her breasts down when she played Wednesday. Puberty did not miss her. In what was almost assuredly a reference to this fact, her opening scene of Now and Then has her duct-taping her bra.
Throw It In!: In Addams Family Values, Joel can't get the arrow knocked into a target with a bow, so he throws the arrow onto the ground. According to David Krumholz, who played Joel, he actually screwed up during that scene in real life, so he had to throw the arrow down onto the ground in frustration and walk out, and the directors thought it was hilarious after the scene was filmed.
Troubled Production: Ooooh boy; the project took a while to start, forcing producer Scott Rudin to leave his job at 20th Century Fox to get with the franchise rights' owners Orion Pictures (by virtue of their merger with Filmways in 1982); first-time director Barry Sonnenfeld repeatedly panicked at the pressure of the job, had to step in to do his old job as a cinematographer in the final stretch (the one that is credited left for another project, while his replacement got hospitalized), and was forced to split time between the LA set and his sick wife in New York; and Orion's financial woes escalated to the point that they sold the film to Paramount.
Underage Casting: Carol Kane was only 41 when she played Grandmama (in heavy age makeup) in Addams Family Values, in contrast to 65-year-old Judith Malina who played the role in the previous film.
Wag the Director: According to director Barry Sonnenfeld, in the first film, Gordon Craven wasn't supposed to have been Fester all along, but still an imposter, though the family would've accepted him as Fester anyway, as, in Sonnenfeld's words, "...family wasn't about blood, it was about love." Sonnenfeld described Anjelica Huston as "passionately against" the idea and Raúl Juliá as "outraged" (though funnily enough Christopher Lloyd himself didn't care either way), and in the end, the cast chose ten-year-old Christina Ricci to convince Sonnenfeld to change the ending. Their reasoning was that Gordon not being the real Fester implies that the real Fester was still out there somewhere, and audiences would be wondering where he was, as well as why Gomez would simply give up on his actual brother.
Cher wanted to play Morticia. This would have provided a nice Casting Gag, as Cher and Christina Ricci had previously played mother and daughter in Mermaids. Huston herself has said that it would have been an apt casting, although she liked it herself.
Kim Basinger was initially cast, but dropped out to do another film.
The 'Mamushka' dance sequence was originally intended to be much longer, but was cut down significantly after test audiences complained that it 'ground the movie to a halt.'
Jimmy Workman's real life sister Shanelle auditioned for Wednesday. In fact, Workman being present at her audition by sheer happenstance led to him being discovered and cast as Pugsley.
As stated above, a third film was planned, but Raul Julia succumbed to his stomach cancer in 1994, and the film never came about since Julia was deemed irreplaceable. As far as we know there wasn't any specific plot planned, just the idea of a threequel.
You Look Familiar: Mercedes McNab, who plays the girl scout in the first film, plays Amanda Buckman in the second film. Though as noted on the main page, they could very well be the same character.
For the Bally pinball game:
Hey, It's That Sound!: The sound effects played after completing a Three- and Four-Way Combo sequence are the same ones used in FunHouse (1990).
Music from the game can also play in Twilight Zone's "Fast Lock" multi ball.
The "EMP Strike" mode in Dialed In! causes magnets underneath the playfield to flare up and disrupt the ball's trajectory, much like "The Power" in this game.
Digital Eclipse planned a digital release for the N64 and then Windows 95. However, development went to a halt, partly due to the fall of pinball in 1999. Both the original and the Gold versions of the game would be included.[1]
According to Larry DeMar, The Addams Family was originally designed with alphanumeric displays (instead of the then-new dot matrix displays), feeling that the dot matrix display's budget would be better spent on other parts of the game.
For the musical:
What Could Have Been: Alex Brightman auditioned to play Gomez, but did not get the part. At the 2018 Tony Awards, he referenced this during the Beetlejuice segment, saying, "I’ve lost roles to Nathan Lane!"
) in the first film and an extended tango sequence