Favorite Fish
Remembering THE FISH THAT SAVED PITTSBURGH
“The name’s Tucker. Not Sucker,” a line from one of my favorite movies of all time, The Fish that Saved Pittsburgh (1979), or ‘The Fish’ for short. TFTSP is not exactly high achievement in cinema, but it has been and continues to be hugely fun and entertaining going all the way back to when I was a little black boy growing up in the 70s and 80s. It was the perfect mixture of two things I loved, sports and comedy.
The premise was simple, a struggling pro basketball team got rid of all its players except for the star, played by Julius Erving (aka Doctor J) and they brought in a squad of new players, all of whom had the zodiac sign of Pisces, the same sun sign of Dr. J’s Moses character in the film. The illogical, screwball strategy for success was dreamt up by a kid (the team ball boy) played by a young James Bond III (not that James Bond). He theorized that if all the players had the same zodiac sign (Pisces), then the team would be in sync and able to accomplish more than their actual talents (or lack thereof) would allow. The team of all Pisces should theoretically be able to punch way above their weight-class. And naturally, being a comedy, the collection of players is a group of oddball knuckleheads but by working ‘together’, and with guidance from the team astrologer, they somehow become a winning pro basketball team.
Given the times and the culture back when the movie came out, it’s not surprising that a young black boy would have a love of basketball, but the zodiac? As a somewhat nerdy kid, I can remember the first book I ever read cover to cover was about Stonehenge. For some reason, strange, weird and/or mystical stuff caught my interest. Once I learned about the zodiac, I was hooked. And then there was this quirky movie, TFTSP that combined two things that seemingly had nothing to do with each other, basketball, and astrology. And it was a comedy. And as with most black films in the 70s and 80s, the soundtrack was fire too. It was like they made The Fish that Saved Pittsburgh just for me, a young black kid not even 10 years old.
And now that I’m slightly older, and having recently seen reference made of TFTSP in the Lakers story, Winning Time, I recently rewatched ‘The Fish’ to see if my adult eyes might see things a bit differently? Nope, still dope. Still one of my favorite movies of all time. Still has a great cast featuring heavyweights like Flip Wilson, Johnathan Winters, Stockard Channing of Grease fame and of course, the incomparable Dr. J doing it better than everyone else on the basketball court because No One Does It Better, a song on the soundtrack performed by The Spinners. Surprisingly I really enjoyed the music which took me back to 70s/80s disco era. It all worked together so well providing silly, campy fun back in 1979 and it still provides silly campy fun here in 2023.
Looking back, I can’t help but notice how TFTSP lifted my spirits as a kid in the same way I feel inspired today when I’m writing screenplays and the characters, dialogue, etc. all seem to be falling into place on its own. How could this fun, yet silly movie have made such a strong impression on me? Perhaps it has something to do with The Fish being my most watched movie during my early years, but more than likely it has more to do with The Fish being my most listened to movie of my entire life.
When I was a kid there was no streaming and my family didn’t have a VCR, which was new cutting-edge technology. And to make matters worse, we only had ONE television hooked up to cable-tv service. As the youngest, my TV watching preferences carried the least amount of weight. I could only catch glimpses of screentime when my two older bullies—I mean sisters were busy in Barbie land and my mother and father were busy with work. So, the chances of me getting to watch what I wanted to watch were slim to none…until later when I devised a scheme where I would get up in the middle of the night, use my carefully honed ninja-walking skills and silently sneak downstairs to watch late night TV when they actually showed…da’boobies. (a story for another day)
The only times I got to watch what I wanted is when me and my older sisters all wanted to watch the same thing. Enter The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh. Luckily, my sisters had crushes on Paul Mooney’s twin sons, who played twin brothers in the movie. My sisters and I watched The Fish nearly every time it came on. I idolized Dr. J and dug astrology, and they got to look at the Mooney twins. This worked out fine until my father always seemed to pop up every time our movie came on and he’d take over the TV telling us we’d ‘already seen the movie a million times’. As I mentioned, there was no streaming, and we had no VCR. The only way to watch The Fish was to catch it when it was broadcast, which was increasingly more difficult. Until I came up with a plan so that I could see The Fish anytime I wanted.
Back then we had cassette tape recorders. We didn’t download songs, we recorded our music from the radio, which took a certain amount of skill and timing. I decided I would record the entire TFTSP movie onto an audio cassette so I could listen anytime I wanted. My older sister helped me prep the tapes and set up the recorder close to the TV speaker. I ended up with a near perfect recording of the entire movie. I listened to TFTSP all the time over and over. I’d even fall asleep listening to it. I knew every line of dialogue, every sound effect, every song. Somewhere along the way something happened. I was no longer listening to The Fish; I was seeing the movie in my head every time I played the tapes. It’s like my young brain was imprinted with a mechanism for turning audio (words, sounds, music) into visuals and it’s been that way ever since. To this day, whenever I hear ‘good’ music, I see images and sometimes even an entire story. I emphasize ‘good’ music because that’s how I instantly evaluate songs. If I don’t ‘see’ anything when I listen, then the song is trash.
It's strange how some things from childhood stick with you your whole life. Although I did forget a few lines of dialogue over the years, I still remember most of it and especially my favorite lines, “like white on rice…like cold on ice…like stank on sh—”. Another thing that surprised me is how far ahead of its time The Fish was when it comes to the diverse cast. I see TV shows and movies today struggling to include representation in an organic way. They try to include ‘everyone’ but it often feels forced, like the narrative suddenly stops in order to take a ‘diversity detour’. Not so with The Fish. Anyone who wants to see diversity done right, where diverse characters all have their chance to shine as they contribute to the (singular) narrative, check out TFTSP, but keep in mind the movie was released in 1979, way before the me-too era.
After all my years of studying story, drama, writing and filmmaking, I’m impressed at how structurally sound TFTSP actually is, even by today’s standards. The story has a clean, clear-cut SINGULAR goal, which makes it fit well within The StoryRay Way (more on that in future posts). This movie did something that few current films are able to do. It makes me feel something. Even though I know the story and have seen it a gazillion times, I still find myself rooting for the Pittsburgh Pythons to win in the end. It’s an underdog triumph story through and through.
Is it time for a remake? I, for one, am tired of the endless remakes these days, but if they wasted all that money remaking Space Jam, somebody’s got to remake the far superior basketball movie, The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh. If it were up to me, I’d set the remake in a more vibrant city like Atlanta. And in keeping with the alliteration theme, I’d change the name of the team from the Pittsburgh Pythons to something like the Atlanta Aquarians. Yes, we need to change the focus from Pisces to Aquarius because it only makes sense to upgrade the remake. Nothing against Pisces, my moon is in Pisces, which is probably why many of my good friends have been Fishes over the years. Pisces is a creative sun sign that does deserve respect. After all, they only missed perfection (Aquarius) by one notch on the zodiac.
By,
Marlon G.
If you’re lucky, you’ll treat yourself and watch or re-watch The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh here: Click here or click photo to watch movie.
And if you’re really lucky, you’ll check out the soundtrack too:
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