[Ads-l] Origins of "Greed Is Good"

[Dan Goncharoff]

Trailers are often made while the movie is still being made. It is not
surprising (to me, at least) that footage shows up in the trailer that does
not appear in the final film. It is a different decision process, and the
preview trailer is usually finished long before the movie.

Here is the extended quote from the script:

"The point is, ladies and gentlemen, greed is good. Greed works, greed is
right. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the
evolutionary spirit. Greed in all its forms, greed for life, money, love,
knowledge, has marked
the upward surge of mankind -- and greed, mark my words -- will save not
only Teldar Paper but that other malfunctioning corporation called the
USA...Thank you."

DanG

On Fri, Jan 19, 2018 at 3:15 PM, ADSGarson O'Toole <
adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> wrote:

> Video clips available on YouTube suggest that the trailer for "Wall
> Street" was spliced together from footage (and audio) of the movie.
>
> Here is a link to a video clip of the speech from the movie. (This
> should be independently verified with a DVD.)
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVxYOQS6ggk
>
> [Begin excerpt; spoken text begins at 40 seconds; double check for errors]
> . . .  the point is ladies and gentlemen that greed, for lack of a
> better word, is good; greed is right; greed works; greed clarifies
> cuts through and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit.
> [End excerpt]
>
> Here is a link to a video clip of a trailer. The YouTube title says
> "Wall Street 30th Anniversary | "Greed Is Good" Trailer | 20th Century
> FOX". I cannot be certain that this is the original trailer. Maybe
> there is a trailer on an old DVD that can be used for verification.
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q21U6TxveU0
>
> [Begin excerpt; spoken text begins at 35 seconds; double check for errors]
> . . . the point is ladies and gentlemen, greed is good; greed works . . .
> [End excerpt]
>
> The footage appears to come from the film; however, there are a
> multiple quick transitions in the trailer that hide the fact that
> sections have been excised from the full speech of Gordon Gekko
> (played by Michael Douglas). The word "that" is omitted. The phrase
> "for lack of a better word" is omitted. The phrase "greed is right" is
> omitted.
>
> On the other hand, an enormous amount of footage is shot that does not
> appear in the final cut of a movie. Sometimes a scene is shown in a
> trailer that never appears in the final cut shown in theaters. I have
> not performed a forensic analysis of the scenes in "Wall Street". The
> pertinent part of the trailer just looks like a reassembly of the
> scenes and the audiotrack from the movie.
>
> Garson
>
> On Fri, Jan 19, 2018 at 1:42 PM, Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu>
> wrote:
> > It seems that in the film "Wall Street," the Gordon Gekko character says
> "Greed, for lack of a better word, is good," but in the trailer Gekko says
> "Greed is good," which is the way the saying is usually remembered.  Does
> anyone have any idea of how the pithier version made its way into the
> trailer?  Was the trailer scene taken from an earlier cut of the film?  Was
> "for lack of a better word" spliced out, a kind of concision that I think
> often happens in trailers where every second counts?
> >
> >
> > Fred Shapiro
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org