Michael McDonald Recalls Having Track in Flop Film: ‘Buzzing Genitals Was Drowning Out the Song’ (Exclusive)

Michael McDonald remembers when his song was featured in a movie by the late director Mike Nichols — and it wasn’t exactly music to his ears. “It was one of those things where I just thought, ‘Any Mike Nichols movie, how could it be bad? It’s going to be great,” McDonald, 71, tells PEOPLE. “It turned out to be a comedy about aliens coming to earth and trying to breed with humans.” The film, according to IMBd, What planet are you from?which Nichols, the late classic director loves Bachelor, Working girl and Birdcage, released in 2000. The film stars Garry Shandling, Annette Bening and John Goodman, and is about an alien (Shandling) who comes to Earth from an all-male planet to procreate and have a child. The sci-fi comedy featured McDonald’s song “The Meaning of Love” and is widely considered one of Nichols’ worst films, according to media outlets such as Flickchart, collider and GoldDerby. It currently has a 42% rating and 29% ratings on Rotten Tomatoes.

Garry Shandling and Ben Kingsley in a scene from ‘What Planet Are You From?’.

The Everett Collection

“Of course, they needed a mechanical genital device,” says McDonald, who co-authored his forthcoming memoir What a fool believes with crazy about you actor Paul Reiser “So the hum of genitalia drowned out the song and the scene.” “It’s what every songwriter dreams of, having their song played behind a mechanical sex act,” adds Reiser, 67.

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McDonald and Reiser recalled this story while working on a memoir to be published next year by Dey Street Books. In the book, McDonald looks back on his time in bands such as Steely Dan and the Doobie Brothers, as well as his solo career and beginnings. (What a fool believes (it’s named after the Doobie Brothers’ 1979 hit of the same name) McDonald will also touch on his friendships with famous musicians, such as Quincy Jones and Carly Simon, and his past drug and alcohol addiction.

‘What a Fool Believes’ by Michael McDonald with Paul Reiser.

Reiser, who has been friends with McDonald for years, tells PEOPLE that the idea for the memoir initially came as a joke. “I kind of made a joke,” Reiser recalls. “Because I would occasionally ask Mike questions that I didn’t understand about the Doobies, about him, and I’d say, jokingly, ‘You should write a book so I don’t have to bother you all the time.’ And he jokingly said: ‘I’ve been thinking about it, but I don’t know how to start it’. Given that we both had [an] With a huge amount of time on our hands with nowhere to go, we said, ‘Let’s see how this goes.'”

How Michael McDonald and Paul Reiser teamed up to co-write a new Doobie Brother memoir (Exclusive)

The two began writing a book together during the pandemic, with Reiser conducting interviews via Zoom. During the process they discovered many stories, except What planet are you from? soundtrack anecdotes, and McDonald says working with Reiser, who is also a writer, was a great experience.

Michael McDonald and Paul Reiser.

Timothy White; Dmitry Bocharov

“You can imagine how happy I am. Not too many people get to co-write a book like this, a memoir of their life, who is a top actor, producer, writer, author. I feel like, ‘How did that even happen?’ It’s incredible,” he says.

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE’s free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best PEOPLE has to offer, from juicy celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.Reiser and McDonald also discussed possibilities for future joint projects. One idea, Reiser jokes, is publication his a memoir follows. “Mike will write my story,” he says. “No,” says McDonald. “After all the work he’s put into this, I told him there’s not much chance of that ever happening.”What a fool believes will be published on May 21, 2024.

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Source: HIS Education