The Onion: The Movie?
August 27, 2001 10:09 AM   Subscribe

The Onion: The Movie? In an internal memo posted to Fucked Company this morning, The Onion's Publisher/President Peter Haise (allegedly) says they're working on a sketch comedy movie with David Zucker. Considering Zucker's filmography, this could be really, really great, or really, really terrible.
posted by waxpancake (20 comments total)
 
Perhaps the Onion folk'll bring a fresh angle to Zucker's tired premise... Also, check out this thread about the onion deal with miramax...
posted by tallman at 10:17 AM on August 27, 2001


Just watched Airplane! the other day. Very good. I was thinking it was about time to have another re-hash with some updated effects ;-).

Oh, and Nice Adds, Onion!
posted by daver at 10:25 AM on August 27, 2001


By the way, the note about the movie deal is at the tail end of the memo.
posted by waxpancake at 10:26 AM on August 27, 2001


They mention Zucker as producer, so hopefully he won't direct, or have too much power over the script, but I imagine that's all up in the air.

Ouch... he's also producing a film with Larry Cohen (The Stuff, Q: The Winged Serpent) as writer, and Joel Shumacher (the last two Batman disasters) as director. Wow, that could be a disaster. (Sorry ... a bit OT but I can't help myself)
posted by D at 10:51 AM on August 27, 2001


Is this a joke?
posted by geir at 11:02 AM on August 27, 2001


You forgot one in your list of really great Zucker movies.
posted by Brilliantcrank at 11:02 AM on August 27, 2001


No, he forgot two.

He didn't direct it, but that's ok.
posted by winterdrm at 11:06 AM on August 27, 2001


Rat Race is a Jerry Zucker movie, not David.
posted by briank at 11:09 AM on August 27, 2001


Baseketball is one of my favourite movies.
posted by annathea at 11:09 AM on August 27, 2001


This thread reminds me of an Onion article.
posted by kindall at 11:11 AM on August 27, 2001


We already knew they had included a movie development deal as part of the sell-out. Except for the talks with Zucker, this is old news.

From my point of view, I'm not sure how this will work. The hallmark Onion style is deadpan, and deadpan barely exists as a comedy style these days. Bonnie Hunt's sitcoms flopped. There's still hope -- maybe the Onion comedy squad can adapt to fart and masturbation jokes, after all.
posted by dhartung at 11:28 AM on August 27, 2001


The e-mail was first posted at dotcomscoop and was next seen on the FC message board. No one has yet confirmed whether it is a hoax or the real thing. It seems authentic to me.
posted by Atom Heart Mother at 11:45 AM on August 27, 2001


It's too boring to be a hoax, isn't it?
posted by D at 12:19 PM on August 27, 2001


Why does anything even remotely funny have to be turned into a not-very-funny movie? I'm surprised the Onion is going for this obvious car-wreck in training.
posted by UncleFes at 1:16 PM on August 27, 2001


It does have enough of the indulgent marketing speak and lack of self-parody in it to be a hoax. But in fact I suspect it's real - as dhartung rightly says, the film deal has been common knowledge for a while now.

The Onion and Zucker have both made me laugh, and in the best possible sense. So I hope that good things come out of the deal.
posted by skylar at 1:17 PM on August 27, 2001


I thought it was too boring too, until I read the parts about onion needing to really sell to the alcohol and tobacco advertisers. I can imagine that this is a parody just a bit too subtle...
posted by daver at 1:19 PM on August 27, 2001


One sketch humour series that was turned into a movie that I thought was hilarious (but nearly everyone else didn't) was Kids In The Hall: Brain Candy. It's goddamn hilarious and needs to come out on DVD. I can see The Onion staff pulling off a movie like this, which is loved by small groups (aka cult), but turns off the masses.
posted by almostcool at 2:13 PM on August 27, 2001


Yeah, daver, it's subtle. I liked this: "we had three plans: a, b and c... but these didn't work, so we now have plan d, which is a combination of the best bits from plans a to c"
posted by skylar at 2:31 PM on August 27, 2001


I just watched Brain Candy yesterday. I love that movie more each time I see it. Why ISN'T it out on DVD?!
posted by kevspace at 3:24 PM on August 27, 2001


One thing I loved about Brain Candy is that it used a bunch of their existing characters and incorporated them into an entirely new plot, rather than picking one character or sketch idea and making a feature out of that (the traditional SNL route).

And I love the "there's something in my eye" part – it catches me off guard each time. That's some good surprise-violence comedy.
posted by D at 4:42 PM on August 27, 2001


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