Posted on 10/06/2004 7:42:22 AM PDT by escapefromboston
In a Q&A with Playbill magazine, Mel Brooks says that he's currently working on a Spaceballs sequel. Here's the clip from the interview which starts off by talking about the big screen adaptation of The Producers.
Playbill: Will you have a role in it?
MB: It's doubtful, but I'm writing myself back into the Spaceballs sequel that I'm now writing, so you haven't seen the last of my face. Why another Spaceballs? It wouldn't feel right have anyone else play Yoghurt and the first one was the best experience I've had making a movie since Blazing Saddles.
Playbill: When can we expect that?
MB: Best case scenario: a week before the new Star Wars opens. Worst Case Scenario: a year after the new star wars opens.
Stay tuned for more news on this as it comes. Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith will be released in theaters on May 19.
Harvey Korman & Mel Brooks ..."Oh piss boy"
ping-a-ling-a-ling
"Hey, It's Heddie Lamar."
"That's HED-ley!"
LOL
It's good to be The King.
-Mel Brooks
I thought Spaceballs was funny and the kids think it's hilarious.
Maybe he'll die before he finishes it...
The only funny movie he ever made was The Twelve Chairs.
And the only funny one Woody Allen ever made was What's Up, Tiger Lilly?.
--Boris
My vote: The Gods Must be Crazy.
--Boris
Mel completely misunderstood Star Wars (the original). He thought he could parody something that was already a finely tuned parody.
You didn't like "Sleeper?"
Or one of the best movies ever written, "Crimes and Misdemeanors?"
Star Wars (the original) can be 'read' as a retelling of the Morte d' Artur, with Luke as the young Arthur, Obi-Wan as Merlin the Magician, etc. The light sabre is Excalibur...
A year or two later, the producers of the (bad) movie Excalibur went to pains to point this out; knights' helmets looked like Storm Troopers or Darth Vader; the young Arthur makes precisely the same moves with his sword as does Luke...etc.
--Boris
Yes. That would have been a better choice. Spaceballs seemed to be more of a "Naked Gun" style parody of science fiction films (Star Wars in particular).
The shorter sketches of a History of the World Part II would have been better.
Also several of the cast members from the first film are unavailable (John Candy is dead and Rick Morannis hasn't been working since his wife died).
I prefer Blake Edwards' The Party although I don't know if it is my favorite comedy of all time. I'll have to think on that one (I like the Marx Brothers and the films have their moments to be sure but there is also some downtime that keeps them from being "the funniest" film of all time).
Olsen & Johnson's Hellzapoppin' is almost non-stop gags (even in the musical numbers) but it is virtually unavailable. It WAS released to DVD in Australia but that disc is now out of print (I bought 2 copies when I saw it was on clearance for under $5 online).
The first naked gun movie is still one of my favorite comedies. No matter how many times I see it, I'll still laugh at the "baseball bloppers" part
Caddyshack would be up there also.
According to Lucas, on the commentary track for the latest DVD, the death of Obi Wan was not in the script, but was added in fairly late in production. It was not part of some grand design, but rather to accomodate the fact that he had nothing left to do in the movie.
Lucas does not strike me as a great intellectual (in the French tradition) so this sounds believable to me. Any time someone says they backed into a good idea by accident, I am inclined to believe them.
Actually though there is humor in a lot of Chinese films (even when the tone is very serious or horrific there can be an odd turn to humor briefly). The Chinese films that I saw in the 1990s are about the only modern films that had me laughing out loud in the theater.
Until 1997 when the Communists got Hong Kong and Disney, Turner, et al bought up the US distribution rights to films (only to sit on them or butcher them), I would go regularly to a Chinese theater in my town and see some double features. They were all subtitled in English (as well as Chinese) because of Hong Kong's ties to the UK. All of Jackie Chan's HK films are superior to the films he has made in Canada, Australia, and the US.
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