Thank God It's Friday

Thank God It's Friday ~ This movie is a long forgotten entry from the disco age, barely a footnote today, but when I was a teenager and it premiered, it was huge. For a week or so, before vanishing into the vortex of 'the next big thing.'

Thank God It's Friday was being touted as the next Saturday Night Fever, and it featured Donna Summer singing "Last Dance." The ads made it out to be funny, cool, and it had so much great new music. In other words, the flick had the same hype machine as other masterpieces like Corvette Summer and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.

I was at an age where I couldn't see movies. My friends didn't drive yet, I didn't have my own money, and there was no way my parents would take me. All of the above mentioned films I never saw until they made their way, edited for content, to network television. As badly as I wanted to see this, I had to live vicariously through the music, and the friends whose parents did let them see it. Notably, those friends weren't impressed.

What might have been risqué then with a PG rating is a bit lame now, and rewatching this seems more like an extended episode of "The Love Boat" on land. The movie chronicles several vignettes at a night at an exclusive Los Angeles disco, then called Zoo. It is very reminiscent of Cannonball Run meets It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World, set to disco music with less laughs, and stars.

While not really the stars at the time, look for Jeff Goldblum, Debra Winger, as well as Paul Jabara, and of course, Donna Summer, Lionel Ritchie and the Commodores. Valerie Landsburg, Doris from "Fame," figures prominently, and don't miss Otis Day, and the pre-Berlin Terri Nunn. The cast, both major and minor is filled out by character actors and others who have faded into obscurity.


The movie is pretty predictable, and has been called the worst movie to ever win an Academy Award, for best original song (for Summer's "Last Dance"). Worth watching, but don't expect much, even if you have nostalgia for this one.

Donna Summer 1948-2012

We've lost far too many folks this year already, and this morning, we lost the Queen of Disco, Donna Summer, this morning after a private battle with cancer. She was 63.

The multi-award-winning singer, also known for her stage, television and film work, came to prominence in the disco era, becoming the so-called queen of the genre. Her songs were the anthem of a generation. Songs like "Last Dance," "I Feel Love," "Hot Stuff," "Bad Girls," and "Love to Love You Baby" are the stuff of musical legend.

In my early teens at the height of her rein I remember listening to my brother's 8-track of her greatest hits "On the Radio," and still have favorites from that album. I also remember Dick Clark, another recent loss, letting her host an episode of "American Bandstand. I remember hearing about her character and subplot in Thank God It's Friday even though I wasn't allowed to see that flick in the theater. I also remember her comeback in the music video age with "She Works Hard for the Money."

Summer continued to perform until recently, despite being out of the public eye in America, she always charted in Europe over the years and toured frequently. The last time I saw her was when she performed with Prince Poppycock on "America's Got Talent" a couple years ago. She was just as fabulous as she had been in the seventies.

We have lost another legend. Donna Summer will be missed.