So, the other day, while listening to a bunch of songs I snagged for The Wife's™ iPod, I happened upon one that I'd long-forgotten: Get Out of My Dreams, by 80s icon Billy Ocean. This little rediscovery led me down a rabbit hole from which I've emerged more jaded, freaked-out, and grateful for my own mundane existence than I thought myself capable of being.

This seemingly innocent little song was, as you may recall, attached to a film called License to Drive, notable as Heather Graham's first starring vehicle, and the last instance in which The Coreys - that two-headed devil-beast that, for a period in the mid- to late-80s, anyway, threatened to seize control of the entire world - would spend their time together engaged in activities other than the snorting and smoking of Colombia's most popular exports.


The Coreys - Feldman and Haim - were, at one point, so popular with the 12-16 year-old female demographic that several large cosmetic firms developed secret plans to kidnap the teen stars, murder them, and sell their ground-up essence in a line of teen-targeted perfumes and lotions.

I may have made that part up.

At any rate, most boys in the same age bracket experienced one of two reactions when confronted with The Coreys; more confident young guys were able to experience nothing more than oozing disdain for the two, while those of a more, shall we say, "husky", or "geeky" nature were driven to complex combinations of utter hatred, and blinding envy when confronted with the Coreylust of our female classmates, oftentimes culminating in daydreams wherein one or both of The Coreys would find himself/themselves devoured by rodents, leading to the coining of such little ditties as:

How much Haim could a woodchuck maim, if a woodchuck could maim Haim?

License to Drive, of course, marked the high point of the Coreyllaborations (though Lost Boys, where the two try to kill Jack Bauer, is a close second). Sadly, future joint efforts typically involved arson, at least 73 pounds of black tar heroin, and long stays in one of several penal institutions. Oh, and they were always released direct-to-video.

The film featured Haim and Feldman in the lead roles (with Haim as its central protagonist, and Feldman as his goofball buddy), and involved such diverse plot points as drunk girls in the trunks of 1974 Cadillacs, Communist demonstrations, and a pregnant Carol Kane. It also served to mark - once and for all - the status of the Volkswagen Cabriolet as the penultimate chick car; a vehicle so thoroughly feminized as to completely suck the testosterone out of any male who dared grasp its dainty steering wheel.

The life-draining power of The Coreys - even through only incidental exposure - was so thorough as to transform the once-lively and ubiquitous Billy Ocean...


Into this:


Now, granted...life hasn't been kind to either of The Coreys since the halcyon days of the late-80s, either, so in many respects, they've paid their pennance. Feldman has been through rehab approximately 304 times, and has appeared on reality shows, from time to time. Haim, on the other hand, went through rehab in a similar fashion (and with similar results, it would seem), gained somewhere on the order of 80 pounds, and tried to sell a molar and several clumps of hair on eBay to get enough cash to move out of his mom's condo (really!).


Both guys appear, from all indications, to finally have been successful in becoming clean and sober, and are ready to work. Are we ready for another serving of Coreymania? We may not have a choice. According to reports surfacing across the web, they're wrangling for a Lost Boys sequel as we speak. Can a License to Drive reunion be far behind?

Prepare yourselves.

¶ 10:06 AM // |