“I Like Big Butts, and I Cannot Lie.” Original Lyrics to ‘You Must Remember This’ Discovered

An emotionally harried Rick marches over to the piano and instructs Sam to “play it.”

Sam, who knows is boss well, pleads with him to be allowed to play something else but Rick is insistent – “play it.”

Sam, resigned, plays a gentle piano refrain and then, he begins to sing.

“I like big butts and I cannot lie, you other brothers can’t deny…”

“I’m not sure anyone in the rap community knew that Sir Mix-A-Lot had written Baby Got Back as a moving ballad and that he’d written it for movie. Perhaps the most famous movie of all. Casablanca,” explained rap historian Stewart James.

A recently discovered stash of papers connected to the film contained the lyrics to Sir Mix-A-Lot’s classic to the tune of You Must Remember This. There is also a fragment of the original script in which Rick laughingly explains to Ilsa that he really does like big butts.

“As the script developed, Curtiz moved away from the Sir Mix-A-Lot version of You Must Remember This to the softer, more romantic version that we’re all familiar with,” continued James.

Happily, even though suffering disappointment in the 1930s, Sir Mix-A-Lot added a huge beat to his lyrics, renamed the song Baby Got Back and, some sixty years later, had a huge hit.

Interestingly, the notes also reveal that other songs considered ‘for Sam to play’ include Vienna by Ultravox, Black Hole Sun by Soundgarden, and Wonderful Christmastime by Paul McCartney.