Peggy Sue Got Married - Time Travel

Peggy Sue Got Married is another time-travel gem. There was no book associated with this film. It does, however, contains one heck of a cast, although some were barely known when they appeared here. Like Somewhere in Time, this is another time-travel movie, beautifully scored by John Barry.

It was released on my birthday, October 10th, in the year 1986.

It was directed by: Francis Ford Coppola and starred:

Kathleen Turner
Nicolas Cage
Don Murray
Barbara Harris
Joan Allen
Jim Carrey
Maureen O'Sullivan
Catherine Hicks
Sofia Coppola

Produced by
Paul R. Gurian

Written by
Jerry Leichtling
 Arlene Sarner

 Music by
John Barry

Kathleen Turner as Peggy Sue was wonderful in this film, with her raspy Jessica Rabbit voice and talent. She was smart, witty, emotional and sexy.

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Here’s the premise of Peggy Sue Got Married: Soon to be divorced, Peggy Sue Bodell (Kathleen Turner) goes with her daughter, Beth (Helen Hunt) to her 1960 high-school reunion. She becomes visibly upset when her separated husband, Crazy Charlie Bodell (Nicolas Cage) expectantly shows up. This, coupled with the fact that they surprisingly name her class reunion queen and everybody starts singing Buddy Holly’s Peggy Sue. While on stage, she becomes overwhelmed and passes out, falling to the stage floor. When she wakes up, she finds herself in 1960, recovering from a faint at a school blood drive.

Here she is, a thirty something woman with the chance to relive her last year of high school. Turner is actually a thirty two year old woman playing this part, and the viewer is aware of this. But somehow it works. You are in on the joke when she tells her math teacher how she knows from experience that she will never need algebra or how she laughs at her dad buying an Edsel. She even makes the statement that she wants to go to Liverpool and discover the Beatles.

Much like Somewhere in Time, this movie is highly sentimental and makes my wife cry every time. Imagine being back in your childhood home with all the people you knew and loved. One day after school, Peggy is taken off-guard when her long departed grandmother calls her on the phone. The emotion she experiences while hearing her voice is overwhelming due to how much she misses and loves her. This scene can topple, even the strongest of men.

Her grandmother is played by a true Hollywood golden age actress, Maureen O'Sullivan. O'Sullivan was most famous for playing Jane in the 1930s and 1940s Tarzan movies, but was also in such great films such as Pride and Prejudice and David Copperfield. She died in 1998.

Maureen O'Sullivan with Johnny Weissmuller. NOTE: My grandfather was once in a swimming competition with Weissmuller. My grandfather lost to Tarzan.

This was an early film for the non-buff Nicolas Cage, who acted a little strange in the role as Peggy Sue’s boyfriend and husband. To me, he seemed immature and whiny. Back in ‘86, I had no idea this strange little actor would become the star he is today.

It also stars a young Helen Hunt as Peggy’s daughter, a virtually unknown Jim Carrey as a friend and Coppola’s young daughter, Sofia Carmina Coppola as Peggy’s little sister. Sofia Coppola would later become an academy award winning screenwriter, director, producer and actress. In this film, she was a scrawny, snotty little sister.

Long before she became well known in the TV series 7th Heaven, and even prior to going off to space with Captain Kirk to take care of whales in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (Although that movie came out later that same year), Catherine Hick starred in Peggy Sue Got Married as one of her two best friends.

Another great item in this movie is the appearance of the Marshall Crenshaw Band who plays great fifties tunes at the reunion, along with a secondary score of original fifties rock and roll.

One of my favorite scenes in this film is when Peggy Sue makes a visit to her grandparents. Peggy doesn’t know what she’s going to do about Charlie. She is remembering what it was about him she fell in love with, but he hurt her deeply in the future. She also misses her kids and longs to return to her own time. On a rainy night, with the haunting melody of John Barry’s music playing in the background, she sits with her aging grandparents by the fireplace and tells them everything. After hearing the story, her grandmother (Maureen O'Sullivan) says the following to her:

“If you believe it, darling, then I believe. Being young is just as confusing as being old. The things that happened to me fifty years ago are more on my mind than things that happened today.”

Peggy replies. “But I’m remembering the future.”

Her grandmother responds. “Right now you’re just browsing through time. Choose the things you’ll be proud of…things that last.”

How many of us would love to have a scene like this with a beloved person who had died?

Peggy Sue Got Married is an emotionally charged time-travel movie, worth a couple hours of your time. 

-Gone but not forgotten, Dennis Higgins

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