Friday, October 8, 2010

Chevy Chase rates his own movies! A look back.

Once again we are celebrating the birth of the finest American Actor, Chevy Chase!  In celebration I thought it would be fun to take a look at the career of the genius with the man himself.  Kinda.

This is a famous interview with Chevy from 1989.  This interview has become infamous over the years as Chevy comes off as somewhat arrogant in the interview but that is Chevy and that is why we love him.  These are simply some of the highlights and for more check out the full interview at Movieline.com.

In this excerpt Chevy rate some of his own films:
Since the critics usually attack your films, how would you like a chance to rank what you’ve done on a scale of 1-10?
I’d give Deal of the Century a five.
**Glad you’re playing. What about your first film, Foul Play?**
Everybody seems to like Foul Play, so I’m beginning to think it’s a good movie, but at the time I didn’t think so. I was very much against them making me fall off the pier into the water for the good old days. I never got over that. I was so pissed about it. I suppose the highest I could go on that is a seven.
Weren’t you involved with Goldie Hawn at that time?
Most people who knew us back then knew that we were romantically involved. Particularly during the making of Foul Play. But obviously that changed. Nothing went sour, we just went our separate ways. But yeah, we were very much in love at the time. Very infatuated.
Have you considered working together again in a similar kind of film?
People talk to me and Goldie over the years about doing another similar picture, but I think she would prefer to work with Kurt [Russell]. I mean, I love her and I think we work great together but there haven’t been any scripts that have come to both of us. Now that she’s at Disney and I’m at Warners I don’t see how that’s going to happen.
**Back to your rating your films. What about Seems Like Old Times?**
Six. It was kind of the last of those Neil Simon-type pictures that worked and it was great to work with Neil and his lines. I don’t think people have the patience for that kind of thing.
Oh, Heavenly Dog!
CHASEBenji was hot. It was an opportunity to work with a dog. I never saw the picture. I’d give it a two.
Modern Problems.
CHASE: I’d give that a one. There were too many drugs in Modern Problems.
Weren’t you almost electrocuted in that?
Yeah. It was awful. I had a scene in which I was to be wired as a landing airplane in a dream sequence and the special effects people had devised it so that these lights would go over my shirt. The director felt that wasn’t right, and that it should go under the shirt and attach to my skin. We were all a little nervous about that. They turned on the juice and I just was getting electrocuted and they thought I was kidding, screaming and yelling, “Turn it off!” In fact it was real and I fainted. The paramedics came. I was almost killed, according to the doctor. The burns were to the muscles in my shoulders, arms and back. I was weak for a long time.
**How do you feel about Caddyshack?**
There were too many drugs in that too, but that wasn’t a problem. The more I’ve seen it over the years, the less I thought it was a good picture. I really liked Billy’s [Murray] performance, and Ted Knight’s. Rodney’s just Rodney, not a good actor obviously. It’s up there at six or seven.
**Under the Rainbow?**
I met my wife then. She was working as production coordinator. First picture I made $2 million on. It was just a fiasco. Awfully funny script, but it changed.
**The first Vacation?**
I’d give that an eight. I always thought that was one of my best. It had a wonderful spirit and charm and it was so much fun to make.

**The first Fletch?**

CHASE: A six. It made use of me in a way films hadn’t — it showed a more serious side, an ability to behave and act like a detective.

**The second Fletch?**

CHASE: A four.
European Vacation?
I rate it low. It opened bigger than any of my other films because of the expectation after the first one.

**Spies Like Us?**

CHASE: I forgot about that. That was all right, a five or six. I had to work with [John] Landis.

**That was after the tragedy with the deaths of the children and Vic Morrow on Twilight Zone—the Movie. Was Landis, who directed that segment, affected when you worked with him?**

He was affected, but not able to show it very well. If anything, it should have changed the way he dealt with people but it didn’t. He’s a bit of a bully, to say the least, with the wrong people, the easy shots. He’s got a crassness about him. Anybody who can pick on a set decorator or an extra in front of everybody else in a very mean way is lacking something. I would think that an experience like Twilight Zone—the Movie would put some humility into your life. But it didn’t.
Landis also directed you, Steve Martin, and Martin Short in Three Amigos!
That was great fun. I put that right up there with Vacation. Landis and his egoism cut out a lot of the funniest, best stuff of that picture. It could have been cut better. But Steve and Marty, we have Amigo dinners all the time. We became best friends in that.
**You had a small part in Caddyshack II.**
A bit part for less than a million bucks. I had nothing to do with it. I just went in for a week and shot my stuff. Had no idea how bad the movie was. That was just a horrible picture. That’s down at zero.
**Funny Farm?**
I rank it pretty high, though there’s not much to the picture. It’s a funny movie. My dad was very upset about the picture. He felt that it made no use of what is intrinsically indigenous and good about what I do. George Roy Hill just did not want me to mug in any way. He wanted pure, real acting and he felt it would be funnier because of that. I learned less is more in some cases, but I was also fighting him the whole way. Ultimately the picture came out dull because it lacked the things that I do give to a movie that people do expect.
**And your latest, Christmas Vacation?**
It has a different look and feel and I’m quite good in it, so I’d have to rank it high. I had a lot to do with it and I chose the director, who is a first-time director. But it’s not Moby Dick. It’s what I’ve been sort of forced into doing over the years. It’s only there to make you laugh, it’s not a particularly deep movie.

Happy Birthday Chev!

For the full interview Check out: http://www.movieline.com/1989/12/chevy-chase-cut-to-the-chase.php?page=1

Thursday, October 7, 2010

Community Soundtrack is Streets Ahead!

Just received my Community Soundtrack from Amazon.  Three Weeks late but okay at least I got it.

The CD is pretty good.  It only includes original music made for Community but thats Okay with me!

There is Plenty of Pierce, Abed, Troy, Vaughn with the nipples and Ludwig's amazing scores not to mention the full extended version of the 88's theme song! I think Chevy fans will really enjoy this as he really shines in more than one song including the Greendale School song "Greendale's the way it is!"

You can purchase the album from amazon or download it today from Itunes!




Itunes:
http://itunes.apple.com/album/community-music-from-original/id391832272?v0=9988&ign-mpt=uo%3D1

Chevy in Esquire

Our good friend over at the Chevy Chase Show blog brings us this great article of Chevy on... well everything,  from Esquire.  Here are some of the highlights!

My father was the funniest guy I ever met. I'm not sure if I stole his stuff or if I inherited it.
You could knock my teeth out and break my nose and there'd be something funny about it to me.
Billy Murray and I came to fisticuffs, but we never really ended up hitting each other. We tried, but Belushi got in the middle and we both ended up hitting John. And if anybody deserved to be slapped in the forehead it was John, for instigating it all.
The best advice I can give you about falling is to never land.
I never shot things up or freebased. I was pretty low-level when it came to drug abuse. I checked myself into the Betty Ford Clinic after my nose started to hurt.
Love is huge. But if you're talking about men and women, it's got to start with the most initial obvious attraction that warthogs go through. Look at that ass! That's what keeps the world spinning. There's your God.
I'm still in love with my wife the way I was when I fell in love with her thirty years ago. That's luck.
My favorite food is eggs. I like 'em over easy on a muffin with a little ham. I can have four of those every morning. I eat more eggs than anyone I know. How can you not love eggs? It's our birthright.
I'm about as bright on Community as I was in school.
I went to college with every intention of being a doctor. I was redirected by my grades. That, and a fake radio show that I improvised with some friends. Wasn't even on the air.
I don't think eggs are so filled with cholesterol as people think. The problem comes in with how they're made, the sauces and that kind of stuff. I could be wrong.
I remember the first "Update" I did on Saturday Night Live. They had big cameras back then, and you were looking into a huge lens. I wasn't nervous at all because I looked right through that lens and imagined the faces of the seven funniest people I knew. It never occurred to me that millions of people were watching. What I did was just for the eight of us.
It takes somebody smart to play somebody dumb.
It's all timing — Nixon leaving. Ford handed the presidency. Luckily for me, Ford kept on tripping over things. I didn't make any attempt to do an impression of him. I would simply take a nice fall or hit my head out of nowhere and get huge laughs for it. People used to joke that it really hurt Ford in the election he lost to Carter. It was close, and someone said I got a point in the New York primary.
I left Saturday Night Live after that first year. I never wanted to work for more than a year on anything.
I wish John were alive today. I'd love to see. Would he have kids? Would he be a grandfather? What would he look like? What you realize is, there aren't that many funny people in the world. You lose a guy like Belushi... ah, it's hideous.
It will eventually be discovered that the more you sleep, the healthier you are. Which means you'll really be at your healthiest when you pass away.
A good name for a mistress would be close to a man's name so that nobody would know. Like... Conane.
I always fly first class. To remind myself.
Live a life of grace. You'll be a better person for it, and so will your children.
Break as few bones as possible and make as much noise as you can.


Read more: http://www.esquire.com/features/what-ive-learned/chevy-chase-interview-1010#ixzz11ghAmeoc

And if you haven't already check out The Chevy Chase Show Blog: http://thechevychaseshow.blogspot.com/

Community News roundup!

First up the results of our Greendale Poll.
Will you still buy the Community: the complete first season" even if it is not on Blu ray?
Well... the results are in and 58% of you voted yes and it shows.  DVDEMPIRE.com has Community: The complete first season rated at number 78 in DVD sales this week.

Still bummed about not getting our show in HD?  Well then click here to sign up at amazon.com to be notified when it is coming to Blu Ray.
http://www.amazon.com/Community-Blu-ray-Joel-McHale/dp/B002N5N5LQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1286463470&sr=8-1
You have to admit it is strange that in 2010 a show is not comming out in Blu Ray.
Sony never has been been current with new technology I guess.

Next up, and no doubt you have already heard the news somewhere else as we have been slacking off...
Hilary Duff will be guest staring on Community.  If you are old like me you will not know much about this girl other than she is hot and co-stars with Chevy in the yet to be released film "Stay Cool!"
You can read more about Duffs appearance on Community here:
http://www.movieweb.com/news/NEweLKZURRcAAF

And check out Duff and Chevy in the Stay Cool trailer here at the films Official site:
http://www.staycoolthemovie.net/


Last up we have a ton of stuff coming in today about tonight's all new episode including this spoilerish summary from TVguide.com


Community's Season 1 paintball episode — a parody of action-flick clichés — wasn't just loved by fans. "It remains the favorite among everyone here," says Alison Brie (Annie). So it's inevitable that the show wants to top itself, and they'll try with the October 14 episode, a spoof of Apollo 13. Jeff (Joel McHale) and his study-group pals participate in a flight-simulation competition with another local college; the gang gets stranded on board when the shuttle is towed from the school parking lot.
This is no ordinary flight simulator: The Kentucky Fried Chicken SpaceBus — dubbed the "Herbs and Space Experience" — may be the oddest piece of product placement ever to appear on TV. "It's a tour de force of information about KFC, working to make the most delicious galaxy," McHale says.
More parodies are on the way: The Christmas episode will feature cheesy animation; the Halloween show sends up slasher films. "I hope no one dies, but I'm ready to bleed," says Danny Pudi (Abed). But all agree the show will always favor characters over pop-culture gags. Promises Brie, "We're never going to drift too far into outer space."

Read the full article here:
http://www.tvguide.com/News/Community-First-Look-1023992.aspx?rss=breakingnews&partnerid=imdb&profileid=01

NBC's Community