Singles is a 1992 romantic comedy film written and directed by Cameron Crowe. The film stars Bridget Fonda, Campbell Scott, Kyra Sedgwick, and Matt Dillon.
Plot
Singles centers on the lives of a group of young people, mostly in their 20s, living in an apartment block in Seattle, Washington, and is divided into chapters. It focuses on the course of two couples' rocky romances, as well as the love lives of their friends and associates. The film stars Bridget Fonda as a coffee-bar waitress fawning over an aspiring musician (Matt Dillon) and Kyra Sedgwick and Campbell Scott as a couple wavering on whether to commit to each other. The events of the film are set against the backdrop of the early 1990s grunge movement in Seattle.
Cast
Cameron Crowe wrote the part of Janet Livermore specifically for Bridget Fonda to play. Jennifer Jason Leigh was Crowe's first choice for the role of Linda Powell. When she turned it down, after Jodie Foster, Mary Stuart Masterson and Robin Wright Penn were all under consideration, Kyra Sedgwick won the part.
There are brief and early appearances from actors Victor Garber, Paul Giamatti, Jeremy Piven and Eric Stoltz (whom Crowe has said is in all of his films, and who in this film plays the loudmouthed mime), and a rare onscreen appearance from director Tim Burton. Cameron Crowe himself has a cameo as a rock journalist at a club.
The film includes cameos from key bands from the Seattle music scene of the time, such as Pearl Jam, Alice in Chains, Soundgarden, and grunge favorite Tad Doyle (lead vocalist of the Seattle bands Tad and Hog Molly). Stone Gossard, Jeff Ament, and Eddie Vedder, all members of Pearl Jam, have small parts as members of Matt Dillon's character Cliff Poncier's fictional band Citizen Dick. Their parts were filmed when Pearl Jam was known as Mookie Blaylock. Soundgarden frontman Chris Cornell has a cameo as the guy who comes out to listen to a car radio. He also appears in a later scene with his band Soundgarden performing the song "Birth Ritual". The members of Alice in Chains also appear in the film as a bar band, playing the songs "It Ain't Like That" and "Would?".
Production
The film was shot at a number of locations around Seattle and includes scenes at Gas Works Park, Capitol Hill, Jimi Hendrix's grave at Greenwood Memorial Park in Renton and Pike Place Market. The central coffee shop featured in the film is the now-demolished OK Hotel. The apartment building is located on the northwest corner of the intersection of E Thomas St & 19th Ave E. Additional concert footage was shot in the now-defunct RKCNDY bar.
The apartment building that was used as the main set for
Singles.
Most of Matt Dillon's wardrobe in the movie actually belonged to Pearl Jam bassist Jeff Ament.[1] During the making of the film Ament produced a list of song titles for the fictional band, Citizen Dick. Chris Cornell took it as a challenge to write songs for the film using those titles, and "Spoonman" was one of them. An early acoustic version of the song was created and can be heard in the background during a scene of the film. Citizen Dick's song name "Touch Me, I'm Dick" is a word play on the song "Touch Me, I'm Sick" by the Seattle band Mudhoney. Also, in the inside cover photo of the soundtrack, there is a Citizen Dick CD with the track listing on the CD itself. One of the songs is called "Louder Than Larry (Steiner)", a wordplay on the Soundgarden album, Louder Than Love. The band name Citizen Dick is a play on the Seattle band Citizen Sane, which itself is a play on the 1941 film, Citizen Kane.
Release
While completed in early 1991, the film was not released until September 1992. The film's release went through repeated delays while studio executives debated how to market it. Warner Bros. did not know what to do with the film, but after the grunge scene exploded, the movie was finally released.
Reception
Singles rode on the heels of Seattle's grunge music boom. The success of and buzz around the film's soundtrack largely eclipsed the film itself, which was neither as commercially nor as critically successful as either Crowe's previous film, 1989's Say Anything..., or his next film, 1996's Jerry Maguire. Nevertheless, Singles has been credited with inspiring a wave of films marketed towards a Generation X audience, spawning numerous imitators (most notably Reality Bites and Threesome). Tim Appelo wrote in Entertainment Weekly, "With ... an ambling, naturalistic style, Crowe captures the eccentric appeal of a town where espresso carts sprout on every corner and kids in ratty flannel shirts can cut records that make them millionaires."[2] As of June 24, 2008, Singles currently holds a 78% critical approval rating on the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes with 21 out of 27 positive reviews.[3]
Interestingly, Warner Bros. Television tried immediately to turn Singles into a television series. When Crowe balked at the notion, the company proceeded with the idea, engaged a new writing and directing team, changing elements and the name to Friends,[4] which ran successfully on NBC from 1994-2004.[5]
One of the few Seattle bands of this era not to have a cameo was Nirvana, and according to Everett True's 2006 book, Nirvana: The Biography, Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain hated this film.[6]
Soundtrack
The Singles soundtrack was released on June 30, 1992 through Epic Records and became a best seller three months before the release of the film. The soundtrack included music from key bands from the Seattle music scene of the time, such as Alice in Chains, Pearl Jam, and Soundgarden. Pearl Jam released two songs on the soundtrack: "Breath" and "State of Love and Trust". The Soundgarden song "Birth Ritual" and Chris Cornell's solo song "Seasons" appear on the soundtrack. Paul Westerberg of The Replacements contributed two songs to the soundtrack and provided the score for the film. The Smashing Pumpkins also contributed to the soundtrack with the song "Drown".
Nirvana (who had gained major success a year earlier with the multiplatinum record Nevermind) was the only major grunge band of the time to not appear on the soundtrack. During production, Nirvana were not yet national stars, but by the time the soundtrack was released, the band's song "Smells Like Teen Spirit" had to be cut because it was too costly to buy the rights.
References
External links
