Anyone have this on tape? I’d absolutely love to see the ending. I’m positive I remember the scene, and am positive I could identify it as the ending I’m referring to.
This is one of those topics that has been on the back of my mind for nearly 20 years.
Assuming I can trust my memory, Kirk Douglas wrote in his autobio that he’d been offered the Col. Trautman role (which eventually went to Richard Crenna) and turned it down because the movie didn’t end the “right” way, virtually identical to the alternate listed on the page, and largely because Sylvester Stallone had far more creative control than the director.
If only I had remembered it’s name back at post #3!
In college I saw an alternate ending to Election that I’ve never seen anyone mention. My roommate downloaded the movie online while it was still in theaters, and he clearly got some in-house studio version.
SPOILERS
In the theatrical release, Mathew Broderick flees to New York and becomes a museum tour guide; he sees Tracy getting into a limo in Washington D.C. one time and throws a milkshake at the car. The End.
In the version my roommate downloaded, the story of the teacher who rigs a student council election hits the news wire and Mathew Broderick receives a small amount of unwanted notoriety. He doesn’t move to New York, instead staying local and becoming a car salesman. Tracy shows up at his job one day, they make up, and he signs her yearbook (I think, could be wrong about the yearbook). The End.
The released version is better, IMO.
The alternate ending to Big makes no sense.
Where is she going to live? In her apt in the city?
Who is going to be the ‘adult’ in her life, you know, to enroll her in school and stuff?
Who would willing repeat grade school and high school?
I’m sorry but that alternate ending sounds bad.
About the Young Frankenstein scene that Cal describes - I believe I’d seen it. Most recently about 10 years ago when the film was being shown at the Dryden Theatre at the Eastman Museum. I don’t recall the “Never with a TUX!” line, but I have a pretty clear memory of Gene Wilder goggling at the clean lines of Igor’s suit, and asking where his hump was.
That was a running gag. When Igor and Wilder’s character meet, we get this exchange:
Wilder: “You know, I’m a gifted surgeon, and I could do something about that hump.”
Igor: <deadpan> “What hump?”
There’s a part later where Wilder sees Igor and notices that his hump has switched sides.
Wilder: <gestures at Igor’s back> “Didn’t your…?”
Igor: “Yes?”
Wilder: <pause> “Never mind”
That’s not what OtakuLoki or I are talking about – he’s corroborating my statements about something missing from the existing Young Frankenstein movie – a scene where Igor has NO hump, not merely a moving one.
I recall “Never with tails” very clearly. That does not mean it happened on film, or in the novelization adaptation I read, but I can envision Feldman doing take to the camera immediately afterwards.
I was concurring that such a scene would fit in with the other “hump” gags.
squeegee, it’s precisely because it was part of the running gag that I remember it. First the hump moved, then it disappeared, and ISTR that at the end of the film it was back.
(What can I say? I really enjoy running gags.)
ETA: Oops, sorry - I thought you were suggesting it was a manufactured memory because of the other hump gags.
I would. Do it right this time.
If I were to do high school again, I’d like totally take all the drugs I was too scared to take last time around.
Right, that’s pretty much what I meant.
Heck, go back to being 11 with all my adult memories intact? If I had a month or so to make financial arrangements first, damn right I’d go for it.
In fact, that just highlights the problem with the alternate ending - previously he’d been a child in a man’s body, trying to improvise his way through life and his somewhat jaded adult girlfriend found him charming. Now he’s back to being a kid, and she’s now a kid, but if her adult memories are still intact, she’s presumably still jaded and intellectually 15 years beyond him. The original ending suggested that for him to finish his childhood, he had to sacrifice the adult trappings he’d accumulated. If she goes with him, what’s the point?
There was no alternate ending to Big. We established this already.
The ending of the Disney made-for-TV rip-off of Big made no sense, but the beginning and middle was pretty sucky too. The character didn’t become an adult overnight by some behind the scenes mysterious magic, he jumped into a device that made vegetables bigger.
I’m sure I remember the “Never with a tux” scene. The line could have been “Never with tails” or some other similar sentence, but I’m sure it happened. I last saw Young Frankenstein on cable, watching with my dad, probably about 10 years ago. I don’t remember which channel it was on, but it would most likely have been either A&E or Turner Classic Movies.
I don’t care what they say, my husband and I saw it and not once but several times. Then a few years later we were watching tv and there is a completely different ending. They said that in Australia and Canada they had the alternate ending but we live in the US. Wonder why they are lying about this? We went back to the theater and saw it over and over again and it wasn’t the ending that they have now. Its just weird that they deny this.
Here;s whatIMDB says on the subject:
And here is the ending scene from 14 going on 30. Start at about 2:40 to see the girlfriend walk in to the classroom.
The “missing” big scene is clearly from the Disney rip-off. All of the descriptions by people match 14 Going On 30, not Big. Besides, if an alternate ending to Big really existed, it’d be on YouTube by now! 
Forget it, Loc’. It’s BigTown.
If the alternate ending exists, and it ever shows up, boy, won’t we look stupid. “It doesn’t DO anything. That’s the beauty of it!”