To Be Your Lover Ain't No In Your Eyes

I read somewhere this week that in the original script of the movie Say Anything, Lloyd Dobler was supposed to be blasting Billy Idol's To Be Your Lover out of the boombox over his head trying to win back Diane in the final moments of the film and not Peter Gabriel's In Your Eyes. If you just said "WHAT!?" then this post is not for you. Stop reading. But yeah, how crazy is that? I know that Billy Idol song and believe me when I tell you, it would not have had nearly the same effect. On the way into shooting one day, frustrated with that scene in particular, Cameron Crowe 9the director of the film) was feeling whimsical and popped in his "Legendary 'I Do' Tape" and with those few opening lines, Crowe knew it was this or nothing. Only it wasn't that easy...

"I guess what I heard later was that Rosanna Arquette [for whom "In Your Eyes" is largely known to have been written for when she and Gabriel were an item in the '80s] put in a good word for us with Peter Gabriel, so he asked to see the movie to make the decision. And I was given a day to call him at his studio, I think it was in Germany, and so I got up super early to make this call, they put me on the phone with him after we’d sent him a tape, but I knew he’s seen the movie and stuff. And he got on and there was this kind of you know, ethereal voice, Peter Gabriel, really nice, and he said [accent], “I appreciate you asking for the song. It’s a very personal song to me and I just hope you don’t mind that have to turn you down.”

I just remember being in the kitchen and just going, “Oh man.” I said I understood and I appreciated it and was he sure and he said yes, he was sure, and I was saying goodbye to him and I remember the phone was like on its way to the cradle, I think we’d already even said goodbye. And I just, like, was seized with this thing and I pulled the phone back up and I go, “Why? I got to ask you why. Why can’t we have the song? Why was it wrong?”

And he said, “Well when he takes the overdose it just didn’t feel like the right kind of use of the song.” And I’m like, “When he takes the overdose?” He said, “Yeah, you’re making the John Belushi story, right?” I said, “No, no, no. It’s a movie about the guy in high school with the trench coat.” And he’s like, “Oh, the high school movie. We haven’t watched that yet.” Hallelujah! “Please watch the high school movie and let me know if it works in the high school movie.” And he said, “Oh yeah yeah yeah, okay, great.” And then we got the word back that he said yes."

Think people would've done this with To Be A Lover?



The answer is no.