You Don’t Mess with the Zohanopens today, and it’s apparently a terrible waste. Boy, do I miss the days when Adam Sandler played stupid and immature rather than skilled and pretending to be gay. At least then it seemed okay that he was possibly making everyone in the room dumber just for having watched his movie. I guess it’s fair that with everyone else doing man-boy comedy these days Sandler is trying to do something with a hint of a political message, but personally I liked it better when he was the least mannish, most boyish man-boy to hit the screen since Jerry Lewis. Making shampoo and conditioner fight? Comedic genius, in my opinion. Making a modern day Shampoo? Not genius at all.
Looking back at Billy Madison, possibly his least mature but most consistently hilarious feature, it now seems as though Sandler has gone through a My Fair Ladysort of transition. And just as with that musical I prefer Eliza Doolittle with a Cockney accent, with Sandler I prefer the gibberish. I also like when he sings in his movies, as in this other favorite clip from Billy Madison. So here’s an idea: cast Sandler as Eliza’s father, Alfred, in the just-announced film adaptation of the musical. I’d love to hear him sing “Get Me to the Church on Time,” and Mr. Doolittle isn’t meant to be the brightest bulb, either. And yes, before you leave that comment, Sandler is actually old enough to be Keira Knightley’s dad.
While I’m on the subject of writing about comedy today, and since there aren’t any new trailers to comment on, I figured I’d go back and take another look at You Don’t Mess with the Zohan trailer. When the preview first hit, I decided not to write about it, because I know how difficult it is to write about comedy and I just know that people are apt to disagree with me over Adam Sandler’s career.
As a youngster, I was a huge fan of Sandler and a constant defender of the merits of his comedy. But I think as I’ve grown older, I’ve lost the appreciation for that random and absurdist stuff — I think this somehow coincides with my waning enjoyment of Bunuel. For awhile, I thought it was Sandler who was growing up, doing movies for kids and families and making more efforts to do dramatic roles, but Zohan seems as immature as anything he’s ever done. The problem is, it also seems as simple and formulaic (in a 1980s comedy, there’s always a bad guy to make the third act less funny, Crocodile Dundee/Twins/etc., sort of way) as anything he’s ever done. Say what you will about Billy Madison or Happy Gilmore, but there is some well-crafted, anarchic comedy in there beneath the stupid surface storylines.
