Posted on 07/03/2020 8:52:32 AM PDT by Stravinsky
Surely, we can be serious: Forty years ago in the summer of 1980, Airplane! flew into theaters and made the friendly skies safe... for laughter. The disaster movie spoof became an era-defining hit and launched the directorial careers of writing partners David Zucker, Jim Abrahams and Jerry Zucker — better known by their comedic call sign ZAZ. The trio went on to make such oft-quoted favorites as Top Secret!, The Naked Gun and Hot Shots!, but Airplane! remains their crowning achievement, even landing a spot on the Library of Congress’s National Film Registry.
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While Airplane! is filled with gags that are funny in every age, some jokes play very differently in 2020 versus 1980. That includes moments like the “I speak jive” sequence, which might strike contemporary audiences as being out of step at a time when the ongoing Black Lives Matter protests are shining a light on the way race is addressed in Hollywood comedies from the past and present.
Zucker, though, stands by it four decades later. “It’s evenly laughing at Black people and white people. Everything is so sensitive nowadays, but when we show the movie, it still gets a laugh. People get it. It cuts through all the sensitivity, because in humor, you can’t be that sensitive.” On the other hand, Zucker notes that ZAZ made a point of road-testing all of their movies in front of preview audiences in order to spot jokes that crossed the line into meanness. “Sometimes stuff just isn’t funny, and that’s our fault. If the audience doesn’t get it, we haven’t done our job and we cut it out.”
(Excerpt) Read more at yahoo.com ...
“Ward, you were a little rough on the Beaver last night.”
You were all over this thread in 2017.
-PJ
Zero Hour screenplay writer Arthur Hailey went on to write the popular 1968 novel, Airport, which revisited the air disaster genre and led to a film franchise that was also spoofed by Airplane! and its own sequel.
Side-by-side comparison: Zero Hour! (1957) Vs Airplane! (1980)
The brilliance was using actors, who primarily played serious roles, especially Leslie Nielsen.
Now you can’t watch him in his earlier serious roles without laughing out loud.
To the Marxists no lives matter.
They have proven that over and over again....
I so agree with Zucker......Mel Brooks said awhile back that political correctness has killed comedy. How right he was.....
Yes, Mrs. Cleaver. Wouldn’t have been as funny with anyone else.
Yeah they will demand that film pulled and last night I thought of “Silver Streak”, it has that Blackface scene with Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor and Pryor probably wrote the scene.
Different school system than mine. Two paths of jokes diverging into infinity.
Note to myself: What’s the matter with you for forgetting Caddyshack????
Apologies to all. The gags were real doozies.
Don’t forget the “Watch me, Faggots!” scene.
They may even wind up “cancelling” Richard Pryor because of his routine on Penitentiaries (”Thank God We Got Penitentiaries!”)
I dug her rap. Cut me some slack, Jack.
add Blazing Saddles and it might run 3:01
Robert Stack, Lloyd Bridges and Peter Graves also showed great comedic talent in Airplane!
Very true. I think back to my high school class in a small town with families from all over - French, Polish, German, Italian, Dutch, you name it. We told all the old ethnic jokes, we all laughed, and were all great friends. I miss the old days.
Funny.
But those TV double features cause people to go out for snack breaks with 7-10 minutes of medical and phone deal ads between features.
Leslie Nielsen was a once big name star who at the time Airplane was made was down to appearances on tv dramas and secondary movie roles. Airplane not only saved his career but in a sense made it.
Great post. Now you are encouraging all of us to watch that movie and the other comedy greats again.
Hint: buy dvds before the streaming and subscription content services later end up with 100% Muslim Sharia Law approved “women wearing modest clothing” and others with Marxist approved “showing worker collectives in favorable light”.
Taylor Swift and Katy Perry will come onscreen in videos with burkas, singing about Mecca.
Like the WKRP in Cincinnati episode where the religious leader wanted no more “man centered” content in songs on the station.
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