Daisies Ways Not To Die #5

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Yes indeed it's another glorious installment of MNPP's Daisies Ways Not To Die series! Wherein we celebrate the gorgeous technicolor slaughters of the much beloved television program Pushing Daisies, with some assistance from the show's creator Bryan Fuller.

Previous Installments of Daisies Ways Not To Die:


#1 - Deep Fat Fried In My Own Unique Blend of 500 Herbs & Spices
#2 - Aggravated Cementia #3 - Scratch & Snuffed
#4 - Window Dressed To Killed!

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And stay tuned on thru the bottom because yes, we've got another super duper special something for you. But for now, tis time to die...

Pushing Daisies
Episode #18 - "The Legend of Merle McQuoddy"

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MNPP: So whose sick idea was this grisliness anyway, and what not-so-buried layer of depravity begat it?

Bryan Fuller: This episode started to coalesce when handsome Doug Petrie spun the yarn about a lighthouse that disappeared from the East coast and reappeared on the West coast (or vice versa – I forget which) completely in tact, brick by brick. Evidently a true story.

MNPP: Y’all always made gratuitous violence so whimsical! What were the priorities with this specific corpse’s decoration? (so close to desecration…)

Bryan Fuller: Fried egg. The number one priority was that this corpse look like a giant harpooned, fried egg. Crafting a corpse to look like a fried egg of course required all sorts of discussion. “What’s the yolk?” “What’s the whites?” “Should there be a rogue vein?” All the things you think about when you think about eggs, we discussed them.

MNPP: Besides just the occasional notes from the higher-ups, what sort of difficulties – special-effects or budget or time limitations - did y’all face getting your vision for this episode out, and what do you wish in retrospect you could’ve done here that you didn’t?

Bryan Fuller: To be honest, and I know this is boring, but I couldn’t be prouder of “The Legend of Merle McQuoddy.” As a consolation for the lack of good dirt, I give you my favorite Standards and Practices note of this episode concerning Kristen Chenoweth’s breasts:

Page 10, sc. 17 Strong caution on Elliot’s face inadvertently ending up on Olive’s bosom, avoiding his face touching Olive’s breasts or Chuck’s breasts when he is pushed her way.

MNPP: Every episode’s stuffed with homage to previous pop touchstones – what ones stick out to you in this specific episode?

Bryan Fuller: Well, mention the word lighthouse to me and my brain goes two places: Antonio Bay and Passamaquoddy. And my brain goes to those places with Adrienne Barbeau and Helen Reddy.


So as pop culture DJ’s, we at PUSHING DAISIES mashed up the ghost story of THE FOG with the musical whimsy of PETE’S DRAGON and sent Chad and Dara Creasey off to craft a ghost story of a man lost at sea and presumed dead that emotionally paralleled Chuck’s personal ghost story with her father returning from the grave. I will forever love them for naming a character McQuoddy ala Passamaquoddy.


Also, we did the bat signal.

MNPP: If you had to choose one single thing from this episode to frame and hang on your wall – a scene or a costume or a reaction-shot or a line of dialogue - what’d make the cut?

Bryan Fuller: I’m torn between Lee Pace’s pitch-perfect performance of Ned on his first man-to-man with Chuck’s dad; and Chi McBride and Kristen Chenoweth’s “Boo-yah!” chest bump...

... and last but not least Kristen Chenoweth doing Helen Reddy proud. One of those things is on the wall.

MNPP: Two other things that happened behind the scenes while shooting this episode… go!

Bryan Fuller: Watching our second season premiere live on a lunch break with all of the cast and crew, taking up an entire sound stage on the Warner Brothers lot. That was neat.


Listening to all the varied and glorious ways Ellen Greene said “I don’t get pissed. A gypsy once told me it brings on hemorrhoids.” to the delight of everyone on set. I think it is a crime that no one has set them to music.

MNPP: And finally, if you gotta go, and we all gotta go, would you wanna gotta go like this?

Bryan Fuller: She was taken violently from behind and fried like an egg. What are you suggesting?

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Thanks to Bryan Fuller once again for his spectacular generosity, extending to the following bit of magic: Yes, we've got another mp3 to share! There's only a brief portion of Chenoweth's rendition of the Pete's Dragon song "Candle in the Water" in this episode proper, where she's joined by a yellow slicker'd quartet of fellows giving her some sweet sweet harmonies. And a soundtrack of Jim Dooley's music for the second season lingers cruelly unreleased - "Shut the A capella up," as Emerson would say. So what I'm saying is, you won't find this anywhere else! Enjoy!

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Download "Candle on the Water" here; or here;
or you can listen to it right on here now ya see...

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Previous Ways Not To Die: Acid Dip -- On a Wing and a Prey -- For Standing in the Way of Sappho -- Busting Rule Number Three (For The Purpose of Number Two) -- Daisies #4 - Window Dressed To Killed -- Hands Off the Haas Orb -- Bullet Ballet -- A Single Vacancy at the Roach Motel -- A School Bus Slipped Thru The Ice -- Trache-AAHHHH!!!-tomy'd - For Mel Gibson's Sins -- A Wide Stanced Slashing --- Daisies Ways #3 - Scratch n' Snuffed -- The Victim of a Viscous Hit & Run -- Curled -- Kabobbed -- Daisies Ways #2 - Aggravated Cementia -- Boo! Nun! -- 2009's Ways Not To Die -- Bug Scratch Fever -- Daisies Ways #1 - Deep Fat Fried in My Own Unique Blend of 500 Herbs & Spices -- By the Yard End of the Stick -- Screwed From A Very Great Distance -- A Righteous Bear-Jew Beatdown -- Fisted By Hugo Sitglitz -- Xeno Morphed -- Fuck-Stuck -- A Vengeful Elevator God: Part 4 -- Lava Bombed -- The Cradle Will Rock... Your Face Off!!! -- The Food of the Nilbog Goblins -- The Slugs Is Gonna Gitcha -- Phone Shark -- Hide The Carrot -- Sarlacc Snacked -- Avada Kedavra!!! -- Hooked, Lined and Sinkered -- "The Libyans!" -- Axe Me No Questions -- Pin the Chainsaw on the Prostitute -- The Wrath of the Crystal Unicorn -- The Ultimate Extreme Make-Over -- Drown In A Sink Before The Opening Credits Even Roll -- The Dog Who Knew Too Much -- Don't Die Over Spilled Milk -- Inviting the Wrath of Aguirre -- An Inconceivable Outwitting -- The Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique -- Nipple Injected Blue Junk -- Your Pick Of The Deadly Six -- Thing Hungry -- Don't Fuck With The Serial Killer's Daughter -- DO Forget To Add The Fabric Softener -- Any Of The Ways Depicted In This Masterpiece Of Lost Cinema -- Rode Down In The Friscalating Dusklight -- Good Morning, Sunshine! -- Mornin' Cuppa Drano -- The Cylon-Engineered Apocalypse -- Tender-Eye-zed -- Martian Atmospheric Asphyxiation -- Maimed By A Mystical Person-Cat -- The Sheets Are Not To Be Trusted -- Handicapable Face-Hacked -- I Did It For You, Faramir -- Summertime In The Park... Of A Pedophile's Mind -- A Vengeful Elevator God: Part 3 -- Strung Up With Festive Holiday Bulbs By Santa Claus Himself -- A Vengeful Elevator God: Part 2 -- A Vengeful Elevator God: Part 1 -- Decapitated Plucked Broiled & Sliced -- Head On A Stick! -- A Trip To The Ol' Wood-Chipper -- Pointed By The T-1000 -- Sucking Face With Freddy Krueger -- A Pen-Full Of Home-Brewed Speed to The Eye -- Motivational Speech, Interrupted -- A Freak Ephemera Storm -- When Ya Gotta Go... Ya Gotta Go -- Hoisted By Your Own Hand Grenade -- Having The Years Suction-Cupped Away -- Criss-Cross -- Turned Into A Person-Cocoon By The Touch Of A Little Girl's Mirror Doppleganger -- Satisfying Society's "Pop Princess" Blood-Lust -- Done In By The Doggie Door -- Tuned Out -- Taking the 107th Step -- Rescuing Gretchen -- Incinerated By Lousy Dialogue -- Starred & Striped Forever -- Vivisection Via Vaginally-Minded Barbed-Wire -- Chompers (Down There) -- Run Down By M. Night Shyamalan -- Everything Up To And Including The Kitchen Toaster -- Sacrificed To Kali -- Via The Gargantuan Venom Of The Black Mamba Snake -- Turned Into An Evil Robot -- The Out-Of-Nowhere Careening Vehicle Splat -- "Oh My God... It's Dip!!!" -- Critter Balled -- Stuff'd -- A Hot-Air Balloon Ride... Straight To Hell!!! -- Puppy Betrayal -- High-Heeled By A Girlfriend Impersonator -- Flip-Top Beheaded -- Because I'm Too Goddamned Beautiful To Live -- By Choosing... Poorly... -- Fried Alive Due To Baby Ingenuity -- A Good Old-Fashioned Tentacle Smothering -- Eepa! Eepa! -- Gremlins Ate My Stairlift -- An Icicle Thru The Eye -- Face Carved Off By Ghost Doctor After Lesbian Tryst With Zombie Women -- Electrocuted By Fallen Power-Lines -- A Mouthful Of Flare -- Taken By The TV Lady -- Bitten By A Zombie -- Eaten By Your Mattress -- Stuffed To Splitting -- Face Stuck In Liquid Nitrogen -- Crushed By Crumbling Church Debris -- Bitten By The Jaws Of Life -- A Machete To The Crotch -- Showering With A Chain-Saw -- In A Room Filled With Razor Wire -- Pod People'd With Your Dog -- Force-Fed Art -- Skinned By A Witch -- Beaten With An Oar -- Curbed -- Cape Malfunction -- In The Corner -- Cooked In A Tanning Bed -- Diced -- Punched Through The Head -- Bugs Sucking On Your Head.