{"id":201,"date":"2006-06-24T11:23:38","date_gmt":"2006-06-24T16:23:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/index.php\/2006\/06\/18\/production-number\/"},"modified":"2006-07-17T01:31:30","modified_gmt":"2006-07-17T06:31:30","slug":"production-number","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2006\/06\/production-number\/","title":{"rendered":"Production Number"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brick<\/strong> heartily endorses renting the DVD version of The Producers<\/em> — the Lane-Broderick version. (Of course we vouch for the original. How else would you know that Matthew Broderick deliberately imitates Gene Wilder’s voice, inflections and timing when the dialogue is exactly as it was in the original — and that Nathan Lane does not ape Zero Mostel?)<\/p>\n

This is a Mel Brooks movie, although someone else directed it (Mel’s up in years and besides the flick needed a dance-staging expert). If you don’t like slapstick, overlapping one-liners, gleeful sexism, merry homophobia and knowing parody, all at once, don’t bother. This movie is for those of us who loved Mel’s almost Silent Movie<\/em> and will stop channel surfing for only three movies: Singing in the Rain, Casablanca<\/em> and Young Frankenstein.<\/em> (Neither Blazing Saddles<\/em> nor the original Producers<\/em> is on late-night that often or they’d be on that list.)<\/p>\n

Normally, a DVD’s extras are pleasant diversions after the show, background while you and the missus are feeding the cats, putting mugs in the dishwasher and otherwise preparing for bed. The Producers’<\/em> bonuses are so fun I went through them again the next night. While most of the outtakes actually are funny, the deleted scenes are what brought me back for another viewing. In them I recognized parodies of movie versions of Fiddler on the Roof, Sound of Music<\/em> and The Music Man,<\/em> done more with camera angles and flashes of choreography, nothing so much as even a chord or a rhythm. If I knew musicals better, surely I would have caught many more.<\/p>\n

When the price comes down, this might be the first DVD I will purchase. Why own a recording of something you’ll look at maybe once a year? Audio recordings sure, but to sit down and see a movie repeatedly?<\/p>\n

What can’t be done well, in writing, is to express the exuberant joy of this movie, to persuade folks to head to the video store for it. Did I mention Uma Thurman? Sure hers is a caricature of a part, but it’s fully the opposite of her one-dimensional Kill Bill<\/em> role. My baseline for classic drama is that somewhere within such a production it expresses a sense of play — yes, I mean real childlike play — even for just a couple of minutes. Shakespeare did it, August Wilson did it, and Mel does it. -30-<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Brick heartily endorses renting the DVD version of The Producers — the Lane-Broderick version. (Of course we vouch for the original. How else would you know that Matthew Broderick deliberately imitates Gene Wilder’s voice, inflections and timing when the dialogue is exactly as it was in the original — and that Nathan Lane does not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-american-culture"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":3502,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2012\/02\/whodve-thunks\/","url_meta":{"origin":201,"position":0},"title":"Who’d’ve-Thunks","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"February 13, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright 2012 Ben S. Pollock I knew what to expect of The Artist, a \"silent\" film, meaning no talking, though it did have sound effects and music (and beforehand, ironically, the loudest-volume trailers since those running with Avatar). Still, the teenage box office cashier warned My Beloved and me, while\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "American Culture"","block_context":{"text":"American Culture","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/american-culture\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":386,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/12\/dial-a-compass\/","url_meta":{"origin":201,"position":1},"title":"Dial a Compass","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"December 26, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Two years ago I read a profile of Philip Pullman in The New Yorker (I don't get this magazine for the articles but to look at the pictures, except sometimes) that inspired me to get the audio editions of the three volumes of the British children's author's His Dark Materials,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Mr. Boo Klist"","block_context":{"text":"Mr. Boo Klist","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/mr-boo-klist\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":394,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/12\/cotton-candy-club\/","url_meta":{"origin":201,"position":2},"title":"Cotton Candy Club","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"December 30, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Driving home from work early Sunday morning, the radio was playing \"It Ain't Necessarily So\" from Gershwin's Porgy and Bess. The tenor's voice was to-the-back-of-the-hall soaring, precise in enunciation and emoted with the sass the song demands but rarely gets. This was public radio's Jazz Profiles with Nancy Wilson, who\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "American Culture"","block_context":{"text":"American Culture","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/american-culture\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2908,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2011\/07\/im-your-vehicle-detroit\/","url_meta":{"origin":201,"position":3},"title":"I’m Your Vehicle, Detroit","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"July 2, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"DETROIT -- Six days after returning home, two of the June 23-26 columnist conference's field trips burn in me, tours of the Motown Historical Museum and the new heart-of-downtown home office of Quicken Loans. Hitsville U.S.A. The museum, informally called \"Hitsville,\" is in the two original houses in which Berry\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "I'm Your Vehicle, Detroit"","block_context":{"text":"I'm Your Vehicle, Detroit","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/detroit-2011\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Door off hallway at Quicken Loans headquarters, downtown Detroit -- Rick Horowitz photo","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/QuickenDoor-300x225.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":6144,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2018\/07\/indian-and-jew\/","url_meta":{"origin":201,"position":4},"title":"The Indian and the Jew","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"July 18, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"\"The Indian and the Jew.\" Kevin loved saying that about us. This is a man I've known since we were 6 or 7 years old, meeting and becoming fast friends in first grade at Ballman Elementary in Fort Smith. That's in the vicinity of five and a half decades. I\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Life Lessons"","block_context":{"text":"Life Lessons","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/life-lessons\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Kevin Dawes","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Kevin-Dawes-from-Carly-Hamilton-283x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":863,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2009\/01\/turn-rupees-to-scruples\/","url_meta":{"origin":201,"position":5},"title":"Turn Rupees to Scruples","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"January 26, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Report: Danny Boyle's Slumdog Millionaire. Why, everyone should see Slumdog Millionaire. It's a cross between Oliver Twist (book and any movie version) and WALL-E. Other lead characters: Fagin, Artful Dodger and Eve. The plot: fish-out-of-water-into-the-frying-pan-into-the-fire. (Shouldn't reviews now and then be as short as possible? Complete write-ups, not capsules) In\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "American Culture"","block_context":{"text":"American Culture","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/american-culture\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}