The Producers (2005)


Some things are perhaps left best on the stage.

I don't know if this has happened before. A film is adapted for the Broadway stage and then re-adapted for the big screen. In the case of the Producers, Mel Brooks turned his non-musical film about a producer hoping to make money on a flop, but bilking rich widows, into a Broadway musical. So of course it has boomeranged to the silver screen with original stagemates Nathan Lane as Max Bialystock and Matthew Broderick as Leo Bloom. Uma Thurman, however, is cast as Ulla, rather than Cady Huffman.

While I enjoyed the original 1960s film with Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder as Max and Leo, I was not as happy to see Nathan Lane in painful closeups as he turned beet red and sweated everywhere. And Matthew Broderick seems to be turning in a performance that is mostly gulping and eye bulging. The songs suffer a certain amount of "sameness," even though they can be quite catchy.

A personal pet peeve is the over-the-top characterization of the gay director and his partner as outrageous flaming queens. I realize it was set in the 1950s, but even then, not every gay man was waltzing around in a dress or mincing about.

"The Producers" seems typical of most of Brooks' work--catering to the lowest common denominator. On one hand, it's made him a fortune, but it doesn't show that much growth from his 1970s "Silent Movie," which thrived on slapstick and fag jokes. It's 2006 and I am quite tired of handing over money in exchange for fag jokes. This fag ain't laughing.

Posted: Sun - January 15, 2006 at 03:07 AM        

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