July 2, 2010

Happy 30th Airplane

The movie Airplane debuted on this date, thirty years ago. From the New York Times:
Surely It�s 30 (Don�t Call Me Shirley!)
When the creators of �Airplane!� were lining up actors for their rollicking parody three decades ago, some of the straight-arrow character actors that ended up in the cast worried about the harm it might do to their careers. One of the most skittish participants: Peter Graves, the taciturn �Mission: Impossible� star who played the movie�s pilot, a kindly veteran who welcomes a little boy named Billy into the cockpit and asks questions like �Ever seen a grown man naked?�

�His agent got him the script, and he was totally turned off by it,� Jerry Zucker, who wrote and directed the film with his brother, David Zucker, and their lifelong friend Jim Abrahams, said recently during a phone interview with his erstwhile partners. �He thought it was tasteless trash.�

Mr. Abrahams interjected, his voice perfectly deadpan: �I don�t understand. What did he think was tasteless about pedophilia?�

Graves (who died in March) needn�t have worried. Within months of its release in July 1980 �Airplane!� became the highest-grossing comedy in box office history, a distinction that held until �Ghostbusters� came along in 1984. And it remains one of the most influential. Its anything-goes slapstick and furious pop culture riffs can be seen in the 20-gags-a-minute relentlessness of �The Simpsons,� �South Park� and �Family Guy� and grab-bag big-screen parodies like �Epic Movie, �Date Movie� and the �Scary Movie� franchise (the third and fourth installments of which were directed by none other than David Zucker). It also inspired �Airplane II: The Sequel� in 1982.
Time flies... Posted by DaveH at July 2, 2010 8:29 PM
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