Even if you haven’t seen Practical Magic — the 1998 fantasy film starring Nicole Kidman and Sandra Bullock as cursed sister-witches — you know the “midnight margaritas” scene. It happens shortly after Gillian and Sally Owens (Kidman and Bullock, respectively) accidentally murder Gillian’s abusive boyfriend Jimmy Angelov (Goran Višnjić). They revive an even worse version of Angelov from the dead, kill him again with a frying pan, and frantically cover up their crime. You know, normal witch stuff.
But then things start looking up — at least briefly. The Owens’ aunts, played by Stockard Channing and Dianne Wiest, decide to whip up some margaritas at midnight. (They have absolutely no clue about Angelov’s death, which won’t bode well for the sisters later.) The two elders stand together over a blender and cast a spell:
Eye of newt, toe of frog, wing of bat, tongue of dog.
Adder’s fork and blind worm’s sting,
Barbados lime is just the thing.
Fragias salt, like a sailors stubble,
Flip the switch, and let the cauldron bubble!
Sally and Gillian run down the winding staircase and join in on the fun, grooving to Harry Nilsson’s “Coconut.” But the dance party morphs into an intensely heated argument — complete with drunken insults and shattered glass — as the Owens sisters realize Angelov isn’t really gone.
In honor of Halloween, and the Practical Magic sequel that is underway, we reached out to Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman, as well as director Griffin Dunne, producer Denise Di Novi, and writer Akiva Goldsman, for an oral history of “midnight margaritas.” As Sally Owens says, “Always throw spilled salt over your left shoulder, keep rosemary by your garden gate, plant lavender for luck, and fall in love whenever you can.”
I. Origins
Denise Di Novi, who had produced 1988’s Heathers and several films with Tim Burton — including Edward Scissorhands and Batman Returns — optioned the Hoffman book at Warner Brothers.
Denise Di Novi (Producer): When I left my partnership with Tim Burton, my goal was, if I have the opportunity to be one of the few women producers at the time, I want to focus on trying to make female-driven content.
The script was written by Robin Swicord, Adam Brooks, and Akiva Goldsman, who had previously worked on Batman Forever and Lost in Space.
Akiva Goldsman (Writer): I got involved through Denise. I had been doing a lot of work at Warner Bros. at the time. Denise sat me down and talked to me about the movie, and it was pretty exciting. There are three writers on this, and, God knows, we’re all intertwined in terms of the page.
Robin Swicord had already done a pretty spectacular script, and they had some ideas for how to move certain pieces in different directions. I didn’t know Griffin Dunne, but we quickly met, and Denise and I put our heads together and worked on it for a while.
Dunne had just directed the 1997 rom-com Addicted to Love with Meg Ryan and Matthew Broderick.
Griffin Dunne (Director): When you make a movie and Warner Bros. is feeling hopeful about either the box office or about your abilities as a director, they let you into what they call “the vault.” That is all their projects that they have in development. You sort of get to pick and choose. I was working my way through it, and I get a call from a Warner Bros. executive about Practical Magic. I believe the suggestion came from Sandy [Bullock]. We had met years earlier at Sundance, when Hope Floats was being shown there. I loved Sandy, I was dying to work with her. I think Nicole was, if not attached, very interested, which was also a nice bait for me. So this script came my way, and I really loved it. It was beautifully written.
Dunne’s only hesitation was that he wasn’t particularly interested in fantasy.
Dunne: I had to deal with my lack of real passion or even interest with magic and witches. It just wasn’t an interest in my wheelhouse of things. So I almost turned it down. I grappled with it for quite a while.
[But] then I thought about the women in my family. I thought about my grandmother, who was from Mexico. A very tough, shrewd woman who had been through a lot. And her daughter, my mother, who was also a terribly strong woman, who had sickness. She had multiple sclerosis, but she had such inner strength. And then I thought of my daughter. I thought of the three generations of women in my life and their strengths and their humor, and then I understood the script.
I understood it to be about family, and I certainly understood — metaphorically — passing a curse from one generation to the next. That was all I needed. I saw the possibilities of the magic, and that became a very illuminating word to me. I got a concept of a witch being a strong, assured woman who can use her strength for good and for bad. Once I got a handle on it, I was off and running.
Dunne’s lack of interest in fantasy ended up benefitting the film, bringing less cheese while incorporating real-life evil like domestic violence, with which he had personal experience: Dunne’s sister, actress Dominique Dunne, had been murdered by an ex-boyfriend in 1982.
Dunne: That was really important to me. The way it dealt with domestic violence and having Goran’s character be truly, truly threatening, and seeing Nicole’s character trapped in this incredibly destructive relationship that she was unable to get out of. That was a through line that meant a great deal to me. I wanted to make it as realistic as possible and not have it just be a “bad guy.” In the script, he was written as a country-western shit-kicker, a redneck kind of guy. It felt a little stereotypical, and I didn’t think it would be dangerous enough, because we’d seen characters like that.
I saw Goran Višnjić in a movie called Welcome to Sarajevo, and I thought of Eastern Europe and the home of Dracula and all sorts of Serbian potions. The Kosovo War was going on at the time, and I saw a certain malevolence in a character that would be from that area. So he came in and read for the role, and it was very clear English was quite new to him at the time. He learned the lines phonetically, and even saying it like that, he had such menace, such great danger in his delivery. That made it feel much more real and much more threatening.
II. Putting the Lime in the Coconut
With three writers, the screenplay went through many changes. A dancing sequence was in the script, but it was Dunne who chose Harry Nilsson’s 1971 hit “Coconut,” off his iconic album Nilsson Schmilsson.
Di Novi: I have always been a fan of [Nilsson’s]. That song is unusual for him, it’s not your typical song of his. I think he’s so unique, and it was a brilliant idea on Griffin’s part to use that.
Dunne: My addition was “Coconut.” We had a music supervisor named Danny Branson, who had done Cameron Crowe’s movies, and he was very connected in the music business. When [Danny] approached [Harry], I told him to remind Harry — which I knew he would never remember — that we were on a flight together [once]. He was really drunk and would start to yell facetiously, “The plane’s going down! We’re going down!” I was next to him, so I thought it was funny, but the stewardess and the crew and the passengers did not find it that amusing.
I remember vividly the first time I heard [the song] was in a discotheque in the Hamptons, when I was an apprentice [one] summer for a stock company. I must’ve been around 16 years old, because I just got my driver’s license. I was too young to actually be allowed to go in the thing, but whatever. And that song came on and I became possessed. I came up with this dance that was so insane. I looked up and there was this circle of people around me, and I was all by myself in the circle doing this crazy fucking dance. The people then cheered uproariously when I finished. And that flashed to my mind for “midnight margaritas,” that song and how you can dance to it and how it does have a spell about it. I certainly was under a spell in that discotheque, and it came to mind.
Dunne shot on a Steadicam, and they played “Coconut” in real time. The result was hours and hours of hearing the song.
Di Novi: I was worried about it. It was taking so long, we did a ton of takes. But it was fun, so nobody really complained. We spent a lot more time on it than I thought we were going to, but it was clearly worth it as it was evolving.
Dunne: We shot one direction on the set at Warner Bros., and then the other direction was the last shot of the night shooting through the window. I did much more than we needed, just because it felt so good doing it. I also act, and I’ve been in that situation many times on many different films, where they play about five seconds to get a feel of it, and then you’re either continuing dancing or you’re continuing having to talk really, really loud as if the music’s really playing. It always feels funny.
Di Novi: People don’t realize that Sandy could be a professional dancer. She’s an absolutely incredible dancer. Nicole is good. Nicole can do anything. But Sandy is just an amazing dancer.
Sandra Bullock (Sally Owens): Nothing was choreographed. We knew how much room we had and where the camera was. Denise is kind, but what I was doing wasn’t dancing — it was more like avoiding the camera. But there was a night that I forced Nic to go to a salsa club with me. She was a good girl and sat in the corner, and I left no stone unturned.
While some of the scene was shot with mock margaritas, at some point, real tequila was brought in.
Dunne: I’ll tell you, what motivated the dance was something called tequila. I can’t say it was me, but somebody said, “Why don’t we really drink tequila and margaritas?” Yeah, I think it was [Nicole]. She was a troublemaker. So we all had shots of tequila and off they went. It really made it sing.
Bullock: I can neither confirm nor deny that it was Nic who brought the tequila. But if she did, then it would have been supported by the ladies.
Nicole Kidman (Gillian Owens): I’m with Sandy… that stays within the coven!
Bullock: Given that we are all Method actors, we naturally would have felt it was important to be truthful in this imaginary circumstance and partake. I don‘t remember how much we partook — details are sketchy. But I do recall Griffin throwing back.
At one point, Dunne also joined in on the dancing.
Dunne: I was so carried away, I joined them in one of the takes.
Di Novi: Griffin will do anything for a laugh.
Bullock: All I remember that day is, once we blocked where the cameras would be, it was all about forgetting everyone was watching — and be[ing] careful of the massive camera that weighed several hundred pounds, and its operator that was going counterclockwise to us. But after a few times, all four of us just let go and had fun. We all really adored each other. I guess Griffin could tell we were loving our time together at that moment, so he just let us go.
Kidman: It was like capturing reality. It was so fun!
Warner Bros/Everett Collection
III. The Vibe Shift
Part of what makes “midnight margaritas” so remarkable is the change in tone — the seamless shift from joyful dancing to spicy insults to utter paranoia, as Gillian realizes the tequila they’re bingeing belongs to Angelov.
Dunne: Nothing like an angry drunk getting going. That was among several tone changes in the movie that I was quite attached to: It’s all fun and games and then something switches. I’ve always been drawn to the light and the dark, and I like them in the same [scene], because that’s what life feels like. Happy, happy, then unexpected things going south and anger erupting out of nowhere, and then there’s impending violence.
It really frustrated Terry Semel, who was the head of Warner Bros. at the time. I remember him saying, “Stick to one tone.” And he was quite cross about it. So certain things were actually softened to sort of address that almost-order. Putting the needles in Goran’s eyes, I had a much more brutal scene.
Goldsman: You have different people working different pieces of the movie, so what’s interesting is it’s a collaboration over time. But Griffin and I were probably edging things a little darker. I can’t tell you who made that scene dark or not, but I do remember the importance of it taking that turn. I think we all ended up feeling that part of what made the movie work was that there was real emotion underneath frivolity at all times — often, familial emotion that was complex, and not easy, and not lighthearted. And that let the lighthearted parts shine.
There’s something very real about the idea of a conversation — be it accelerated by alcohol or magic — going from one thing to another, swinging that pendulum of familial connection, from light and joyous to dark and feverish. I think we all recognize a version of that from many dinner tables in our lives.
At first, Channing and Wiest weren’t satisfied with the insults in the script.
Dunne: They were very disenchanted with the insults. In fact, the scene quite honestly played really badly. They weren’t into it, and then it affected everyone else. It’s just a process, and that’s why you have rehearsal. The part I don’t remember is if it was rewritten with brand-new insults. I suspect that they brought their own insults, and in the spirit of the tone-change, they just glided right into it.
Bullock: I honestly don‘t remember. As I said in my earlier answer, the details of that night are very hazy… But I can‘t imagine it wasn’t written in the script. Such a dramatic shift from complete freedom and safety to darkness makes perfect sense. When things are really good, at some point you always ask yourself, “When will the other shoe drop?” Doing it in this way allowed the audience to relax just enough to forget that Jimmy was just outside — waiting.
IV. The Legacy
More than 25 years later, “midnight margaritas” is arguably the most memorable scene in Practical Magic. It’s not difficult to figure out why.
Di Novi: It’s the combination of sisterhood extending to the older aunts and the little girls, and that kind of female community of women being together. Not in servitude and not in a defensiveness — just experiencing freedom and joy together. Historically, women feel safest when women are with other women. That’s what is so beloved about the movie.
Dunne: It’s a movie that once people have seen it once, they watch it several times afterwards. There are “midnight margarita” parties around. You can see them online. And of course around Halloween, it becomes a real event in people’s homes to watch the movie again. I think people relate to it. If it’s not their family, they wish that it was their family that they would be dancing around the kitchen with. For a lot of people, it’s a wishful memory about a joyous family dance of abandon.
Wiest, left, and Channing casting a spell.
Warner Bros./Everett Collection
Everyone felt the scene — and the film — worked particularly well because of the chemistry between Bullock and Kidman.
Goldsman: The chemistry between Sandy and Nicole was magical. When there are two people who seem to be relating at both a character and a human level onscreen, you can’t take your eyes off it. It feels like it’s occurring in real time. That’s the thing that you always want. When you’re watching a movie, you want to believe it’s just happening right then. And that scene feels like that — like you’re just looking through a window.
Di Novi: It’s like two thoroughbred horses in a race right next to each other, making each other go faster or better. I mean, they really are both thoroughbreds. They really wanted to work together. At that time, women didn’t have that many opportunities to work with another [female] star. It was a very unusual movie in that it had two big stars. So at that time, Nicole had kind of been out of circulation because she had spent so long on [Stanley Kubrick’s 1999 film] Eyes Wide Shut. So she hadn’t done a movie for a long time, and Sandy was a superstar. Nicole was kind of a new star, but clearly an amazing actress. I think they just really enjoyed having that kind of a relationship where they had an equal that was a woman.
Practical Magic flew into theaters on Oct. 16, grossing $13.1 million in the box office but with less-than-favorable reviews. “In a scene that’s too embarrassing to be dull, the four get drunk on margaritas and parade through the house, dancing ‘funky’ to that tropical ’70s novelty hit ‘Coconut,’” one critic wrote. “Scenes like this one have become the postfeminist equivalent of corporate nerds doing the white man’s overbite. The witch sisters get empowered, all right — into wild and crazy girls.”
Di Novi: Believe it or not, we actually got criticism for having too many women in the movie. There was one review I always quote: “How many women can you fit in one movie? In Practical Magic, too many.”
Dunne: The vast majority of critics were men. I think that’s why the movie has been a slow burn in terms of mass popularity. A movie starring two women, no matter their star status, I think it had a lot to do with the lackluster sort of reception at the time. It was Number One for like a week, but it was very tough to bring in huge audiences at that time with two women above the headline, as sad as that sounds.
Di Novi: It was a really unusual movie and still would be an unusual movie in that we had three generations of women and the guys were the supporting-actor love interests, which is the flip side of what every movie at that time had been. We didn’t get great reviews at the time, because 98 percent of critics were men, and it’s not that much different now. We’ve made some strides.
Bullock: Well, “Hollywood” made the movie and fully leaned into it. They may have regretted it once we got eviscerated, but they were brave enough to make it back then, so for that I am so grateful.
Kidman: I just remember loving the film. I won’t be pulled off it if I love it. And I love it! As people say, “sticks and stones may break [my] bones, but words will never hurt me.” I stick to what I like, it doesn’t sway me. I’ve probably made a lot of films like that. I remember Moulin Rouge was the same way, and the movie finds its audience.
But in the years since, it’s transitioned from a cult favorite to a classic Halloween film.
Dunne: I framed pages from the spell book. I’m looking at it right now.
Bullock: All the credit for the clothes goes to our divine costume designer Judianna Makovsky, and the brilliant kitchen and home can be squarely blamed on our genius production designer Robin Standefer of Roman and Williams. But I honestly had no idea how much of a following Practical Magic had until a few Halloweens ago. I had carried so much embarrassment about the response to the movie for so long, that it striking such a beautiful chord for others hit me out of left field. It was a total surprise.
The embarrassment wasn’t because we made the movie — because it was a movie about us and for us — but because of the things that were said about it, and us, afterwards. But thanks to social [media], I get to enjoy the original film in a way I never could before. My sister and the women in my life are my foundation. Some of the best memories I have made are with them. I feel happiest, funniest, bravest, and safest when I am with them. Turns out I am not the only one, and boy does that feel good.
Kidman: I think sisterhood is powerful! I am so proud that we made a film that has not only stood the test of time but has also been a piece that can be passed down from generation to generation.
Goldsman would go on to win an Oscar for writing 2001’s A Beautiful Mind and co-create Star Trek series — including Picard. But Practical Magic remains a highlight.
Goldsman: It was the first thing, maybe still the only thing, that I’ve ever been involved with that my daughter’s really paid attention to.
V. The Sequel
A Practical Magic sequel is currently in the works, with Bullock and Kidman slated to return. Many details are under wraps, but it is based on Hoffman’s fourth book in the series, 2021’s The Book of Magic.
Goldsman: I wish I could tell you all the things, but I can tell you none of them, except that we’re really excited to be doing it. There’s this whole thing that if I say a word about it, I burst into flames. It’s actually that.
Dunne: This should be directed by a woman. We haven’t decided on anyone, but I’m really curious to see what they do and what their take will be, and what they bring of themselves to directing the movie.
Di Novi: The joy that came from the [sequel] announcement on TikTok, I was crying for three days. There are so many TikToks of women sobbing and saying, “Oh my God, I can keep going. This gives me something to live for.”
Do they feel any pressure to follow-up the beloved film?
Bullock: YES! [Fans can expect] a lot of devotion to the subject, and a lot of hard work to execute it!
Kidman: It’s amazing! I’m sure you could analyze why that is, but for now I just love that we made something that was embraced this way — it’s so rare — and that we get to do it again, hopefully with an audience that embraces us a second time. But c’mon, we are witches! We will work our magic.
Bullock: I can‘t wait to do a repeat. Next time, [Nicole] is getting on the dance floor.
