But the leap from the small to big screen was significant. Having worked previously in television for years (both acting and directing), she was accustomed to the entertainment business. Jumpin’ Jack Flash was her feature film directorial debut. I said, ‘OK, I’ll just jump right in here.’ I have the Lone Ranger Syndrome. In an interview at the time, Marshall stated that with Flash, “I didn’t have time to think, ‘Should I or shouldn’t I?’…They wanted me. At the time, Marshall had been considering directing Peggy Sue Got Married (which then went to Francis Ford Coppola). I just know it was awful.” While several articles mention a rift between Goldberg and Zieff or “creative differences on set,” Zieff’s departure was a career-changer for one woman: Penny Marshall. The producer just called me one day and said, ‘We’re changing directors.’ I don’t know what happened. Whoopi Goldberg was asked about the directorial change by the Reno Gazette in 1986.“I don’t know what happened,” she said, “I had nothing to do with it, though they made it seem that I did. While Zieff had directed work like Private Benjamin (1980) and My Girl (1991) he was most famous for his commercial work, including the groundbreaking “You Don’t Have To Be Jewish” Levy’s rye bread campaign and the “Spicy Meatball” ad for Alka-Seltzer.īut the Jumpin’ Jack Flash campaign was handed to someone else. Clearly, neither of those things occurred. Howard Zieff was originally slated to direct the film and it was planned as a Shelley Long vehicle. Melville, respectively) while respected novelist and screenplay writer Richard Price’s credit can be found only in 1980s writers’ columns and collector sites. Writers Nancy Myers and Charles Shyer went by pseudonyms (Patricia Irving and J.W. de Souza was one of several people who contributed his skills to a film that many did not think would see the light of day based on its rocky beginnings. Lester, 1985) was one of the uncredited authors of Jumpin’ Jack Flash (Penny Marshall, 1986)? Steven E. Would it surprise you to learn that the writer of Die Hard (John McTiernan, 1988), 48 Hours (Walter Hill, 1982) and Commando (Mark L.