Friday I'm in Love: What's Your Damage?

Heathers came out soon before I graduated from high school. It was so dark, especially when compared with my other beloved high school movies of the '80's  - 16 Candles, The Breakfast Club, Lucas and Say Anything. It was sicker, and funnier, than all of them.

There was a female protagonist, too. And the guy she liked turned out to be a jerk. Despite the violence, murder and strip croquet, I related more to Veronica Sawyer's dating life than I ever did to any of the other heroines of the time.

As far as I'm aware, no one I dated or liked in high school turned out to be a murderer like J.D. But no one turned out to be Jake Ryan or Lloyd Dobbler, either. At least not to me.  Plus, Veronica was flawed and bitchy and bitter, which was how I saw myself. 

Besides, how can you not love a movie that includes lines like, "Fuck me gently with a chainsaw, " and:

I found this image on Pinterest and can't find a source. But it's so awesome I'm sharing it anyway. 

I even got my Dad hooked on the movie, which led to us seeing the Off-Broadway musical version in 2014. I enjoyed the musical but didn't really think about it again. . .

until Ironflower brought it up. Apparently, one of her friends had discovered the musical on YouTube. She enjoyed the songs and asked if she could see it. I had to explain that tragically, Heathers the Musical had not made it to Broadway - nor had it even remained Off-Broadway. I searched for a local production but couldn't find one at the time.

So I let her watch the movie with me.

It was darker than I remembered. But I still loved it and Ironflower actually liked it. Except for J.D. She couldn't understand why Veronica liked him in the first place, "He's obviously a stalker, Mom."

I really hope she retains this ability to assess boys accurately throughout her teen years. 

The movie didn't grab her attention the way the musical had, though. So, last month when I accidentally found a local theater company  performing Heathers the Musical,  I had to take her.
Then I discovered that they were doing a high school version, so I invited a few of her friends as well. Even Lovebug came.

The high school version, which I've learned is really called Heathers 101, removes the sex, drinking and most of the swear words, but keeps the violence. The writers of the original musical did the revisions for this version, including putting in a new song that they like better than the (extremely inappropriate, terrible and hilarious) Blue. 

I was really impressed with the production.

But not the theater, which was at a junior high several towns away and a good lesson for the kids in how lucky they are to have such a great theater at their school. 

I would recommend the musical even if you didn't like the movie that much. Lovebug was disappointed there weren't more deaths, but he enjoyed it without having seen the movie or being a musical theater nerd. I think Ironflower had him convinced there would be some kind of bloodbath.

He's going to like Hamlet, I think. 


One of my favorite songs: (from the Off-Broadway production.) Skip ahead to :57 in the video to actually see it.