Drew Barrymore and Jimmy Fallon Reunite 20 Years After Fever Pitch
Drew Barrymore and Jimmy Fallon are sharing more about how their movie Fever Pitch was originally supposed to end.
In a preview clip for the Oct. 10 episode of The Drew Barrymore Show, the actress, 49, and The Tonight Show host, 50, reminisce about the movie’s original ending and their experiences filming during the World Series.
In the rom-com, Fallon plays Ben Wrightman, a young teacher obsessed with the Boston Red Sox, who falls in love with Lindsey Meeks, portrayed by Barrymore. The film culminates with (spoiler alert!) the Red Sox making a historic comeback from a 3-0 deficit to defeat the Yankees in the ALCS, followed by a sweep of the Cardinals in the World Series.
However, in the original ending, Barrymore reveals that the Red Sox were supposed to lose since they hadn’t won in real life in 86 years. The film was initially meant to conclude with the stars’ characters dressing as old people in the future when the Sox finally win.
“As we’re filming, this is baseball history; as we’re filming this film, they make it into the wild card, then they make it into the playoffs. It’s the most magical year,” Fallon says of the sports magic unfolding alongside filming.
“And we happen to have cameras at every single one of these games,” Barrymore continues. “So we were flying down to the final game of the World Series, and Fox Sports said, ‘We’ll let you use our cameras. You cannot bring movie cameras to the finale.’ By the way, my boyfriend at the time, Fabrizio Moretti, is watching the series finale of the Red Sox, and there we are on the field kissing.”
Fallon adds that at the time, no one knew they were filming the movie, and they had asked Fox not to air any footage of them at the game together because they planned to use it in the film. “And they go, ‘Yeah, sure.’ ”
He goes on to explain that the broadcast network ultimately got nervous and cut to him and Barrymore on the mound after winning the game, where their characters shared a kiss.
“I still have the sand from the mound,” Barrymore says.
Of his memento, Fallon says, “My baseball hat that I had made filthy because any real baseball fan has a dirty hat that they’ve had since high school. It’s disgusting and has salt stains. That hat is in the Baseball Hall of Fame.”
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During their catch-up, the hosts also talked about Fallon’s recent 50th birthday. Fallon shared how, instead of having a big party, he just wanted to be with his family. He described waking up to a Pee-wee Herman breakfast his wife Nancy Juvonen made him, which he hadn’t had since he was 12 years old. It consisted of pancakes with fried eggs for eyeballs, along with a fake Mr. T cereal that doesn’t exist anymore.
Then, Fallon recounted how how is family gave him a gift, which he later realized had a special nod to Fever Pitch.
“When I grew up, my dad had a jukebox and he got it for free from the VFW because it was broken,” he recalled. “My dad fixed it. And so we had a jukebox in our house and then eventually it just broke again and then we just gave it away or threw it out or something.”
“Two years ago, my friend calls Nancy and goes, ‘If you want a good gift for Jimmy, I think I saw his dad’s jukebox at an electronics store.’ And, and she’s like, what? And so she buys the jukebox and makes it working again,” he added.
“My dad’s handwriting is on all the 45s. Is that wild for real?” he continued. “And, and one of the, one of the songs on there is, ‘Oh Babe What Would You Say’ by Hurricane Smith, what we used in the movie Fever Pitch. And it turned out to be my wife and I’s, one of our wedding songs.”
Fallon’s episode of The Drew Barrymore Show will air on Thursday, Oct. 10.