Girls just want to have fun—and sometimes that means having sex with a man in a purple elephant costume.
Before movies like Bridesmaids and Girls Trip proved that women breaking bad could lead to box office gold, Cameron Diaz, Christina Applegate and Selma Blair came together for 2002's The Sweetest Thing. Though it starred Hollywood's golden girl, this wasn't your grandparents' rom-com, rather it was a raunchy romp featuring a glory hole and a musical number about penises written by South Park veteran Nancy Pimental. Think Nancy Meyers gone wild.
Diaz and Applegate starred as best friends who embark on a wild road trip after Christina (Diaz) meets her potential soul mate at a club. Hijinks, including movie montage-inspired makeovers, a penis piercing-induced medical emergency and the aforementioned purple elephant costume, ensue.
The response to The Sweetest Thing after its April 12 debut was anything but, with critics panning the crass and campy movie and audiences failing to show up at the box office. But in the past 20 years, it has amassed a cult following, with Diaz telling Entertainment Weekly in 2018 that people still approach her about The Sweetest Thing.
"You know what's really funny about this movie is I get people who come up to me often and they'll be like, 'Oh my God, The Sweetest Thing is my favorite movie,'" she said. "It's not like anybody comes up to me and says, 'Oh yeah, I love that movie.' It's like, when they reference it or say something to me about it, it's always, 'No, but it's my favorite movie.' I'm always like, 'Wow. All right, I know you now. I know you.' I love it."
In honor of the movie's 20th anniversary, check out these behind-the-scenes facts you might not know about The Sweetest Thing. Warning, some are a little NSFW:
1. South Park writer Nancy Pimental wrote the script, which was far raunchier than what ultimately made the final cut of The Sweetest Thing.
"We were going to push way more boundaries and [the studio] got scared," star Christina Applegate told Entertainment Weekly in 2018. "Don't you remember, you guys, that they got really freaked out about it and they were like, 'Oh, women shouldn't be talking like this,' and they toned it down? We couldn't say c--k and things like that."
2. A hot commodity, there was a bidding war for the screenplay with Sony ultimately landing it, "But there was an executive over at Universal who was really bummed out she didn't get it," Pimental told EW. "She sent me this congratulatory basket of cookies that were in the shape of penises and boobs."
3. One of the most sought-after actresses at the time, Cameron Diaz earned $15 million for the movie, which was almost one-third of the budget.
4. Production was delayed on The Sweetest Thing so that Diaz could finish filming Gangs of New York and Vanilla Sky.
5. Selma Blair reunited with her Cruel Intentions director Roger Kumble for the project, though she joked to EW that there wasn't a ton of competition for her role.
"I think I got my part by default because nobody wanted to go in and have a penis [stuck in their mouth]," Blair said. "All their agents were like, 'No, you will not be cast with a penis caught in your mouth.' I was like, 'It's Cameron Diaz and Christina Applegate, are you f--king kidding me? Yes, I will have a penis in my mouth!' I really do think I was cast by default."
6. The scene in question, wherein Blair's character Jane requires emergency media attention after her boyfriend's penis piercing gets caught in her throat, ended up being a physically taxing experience for the actress.
"I had a banana in my mouth. I have really, really bad TMJ and that was so painful to stay like that all day," Blair explained. "I remember Cameron so soothingly stroking my hair. It was really a dramatic scene for me. I didn't view it as a comedy. It was a really low point, but also I knew somewhere, this was going to help people get through something one day. It was so pathetic, and I still have pain from it."
7. The iconic moment where Jane has sex with a man wearing a purple elephant costume in a dressing room was not in the original script, with Kumble coming up with the idea on the day of filming.
"That was one of Roger's glorious brain farts," Blair said. "He was like, 'This scene needs something. Those girls are having such a great time. What's a great time for you?' Animal sex! It was really absurd. I remember being really comfortable. It was so cozy."
8. While it has been reported for years that Pimental's friendship with Grey's Anatomy star Kate Walsh was the inspiration for the movie, the writer clarified the rumor in 2018. Pimental explained that she and the actress met while waitressing together, forming a group of friends that "were running around town and partying at these different clubs and just owning our womanhood," she said. "I just thought, 'God, there's not an example of this sort of girl posse where we're more like guys.' Yeah, we decide if we want to give you a fake number or not kind of thing. There wasn't this empowerment, I guess, or this example of it. Anyway, that's really how it started."
9. One of the film's most infamous scenes—"The Penis Song" musical number—did not make the final cut of the movie, only appearing on the unrated DVD release, much to its stars' chagrin.
"It was in the original and it was probably what made me want to do the movie," Diaz said of the song-and-dance scene. Applegate added, "I thought, 'Oh my God, we're going to do Greased Lightnin', but singing about a penis.' I was so excited, I had so many visions in my head of the production number we were going to do."
10. Pimental revealed that the song was initially going to be about gonorrhea when she set out to write a spec script to get noticed, telling EW, "I don't know, it just was inspired because I wanted this celebratory female, here we are and here's how we deal with the penis song."
11. The woman who comes into the laundromat with schoolchildren as Blair's character is trying to drop off an, um, soiled item of clothing was Applegate's mom, Nancy Priddy. "That was so ridiculous. I turned beet red," Blair admitted to EW. "I cringed a lot. I can't watch that."
12. Pimental made a small appearance, playing the "vomit girl" in the club where Christina (Diaz) first meets Peter (Thomas Jane).
13. Applegate's then-husband Johnathon Schaech also had a cameo, playing a man in a leather coat who hits on her character at a bar.
14. Applegate credits the scene in which her character Courtney pretends to go down on Christina in the car as a surprisingly pivotal moment in her career.
"It was one of those things that I had never done something quite that far," Applegate said. "I realized in that moment that I am as crass as anyone, and I did the thing with my tongue, miming eating someone out, and I was like, 'Oh my God, who am I? I'm discovering so much about myself right now. I am severely disgusting and loving every second of it!' I don't think, up until that point, I had said the word p--sy in my whole life, and I think after that I haven't stopped saying it. It was a true awakening for me."
15. Pimental told EW in 2018 that she would be interested in writing a sequel, with the main trio also saying they would be game to reprise their roles. "They should do The Sweetest Thing: The Geriatric Years," Applegate joked. "I'd come out of a retirement for it, too." A since-retired Diaz added, "I'd do it."
The Sweetest Thing is streaming on Netflix.