Hey, do you remember it?

Hello and welcome to Hey Do You Remember, show where we reminisce about a movie or TV series we grew up with, then take off the rose-tinted glasses to see how it holds up.

I'm Chris.

I'm Donna.

And I'm Carlos.

And today we're revisiting it.

Yeah. And I'm Carlos. And today we're revisiting it. The fear of clowns is so widespread that there's an actual scientific term for it.

Coolrophobia. And if you were a child in the 90s, Stephen King's It probably had a lot to do with your aversion to them.

It didn't matter that this adaptation was a made-for-TV miniseries that operated well within the guidelines laid down

by standards and practices. Because while the filmmakers may not have been able to honor the more

grotesque elements of King's expansive novel, they still had an ace in the hole, Tim Curry's

performance as Pennywise, the Dancing Clown. A character so terrifyingly realized that it completely transcended the limitations

of network television and became one of our generation's most iconic horror villains. That's why

so many of us loved this at the time. That's what we remember when someone brings it up. Not the

cheesy dialogue or melodramatic acting, not the somewhat awkward pacing that's inevitable

when trying to cram so much

story into so little time. No, it's the stark white face popping up in contrast to a pitch-black

sewer drain. The unnerving laugh that precedes a quick glimpse at unspeakable evil. A monster that

torments you before it kills you because you taste so much better when you're afraid.

The rest of it was almost inconsequential, because back in 1990, Pennywise was pure,

unfiltered nightmare fuel. But before Curry brought life to the titular character, ABC was trying to determine exactly how to translate the massive tome for the small screen.

It was the first made-for-television film based on one of King's novels since the 1979 miniseries, Salem's Lot, and the network's initial plans for it were a lot more ambitious.

...