A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum Lovely Piano
| A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Richard Lester |
| Screenplay by |
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| Based on | A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum by Burt Shevelove Larry Gelbart |
| Produced past | Melvin Frank |
| Starring |
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| Cinematography | Nicolas Roeg |
| Edited by | John Victor-Smith |
| Music past | Ken Thorne Songs: Stephen Sondheim |
| Distributed past | United Artists |
| Release date |
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| Running time | 99 minutes |
| Countries | United States Britain |
| Linguistic communication | English |
| Budget | $2 million |
| Box office | $3.iv million (U.s.a./Canada) [1] |
A Funny Matter Happened on the Way to the Forum is a 1966 period musical one-act picture show, directed by Richard Lester, with Zero Mostel and Jack Gilford reprising their stage roles, it also features Buster Keaton in his final screen role; Phil Silvers, for whom the phase musical was originally intended; and regular Lester collaborators Michael Crawford, Michael Hordern and Roy Kinnear.
The motion-picture show was adjusted for the screen past Melvin Frank and Michael Pertwee from the phase musical of the same name with music and lyrics past Stephen Sondheim, and volume by Burt Shevelove and Larry Gelbart, which was inspired by the farces of the ancient Roman playwright Plautus (251–183 BC) – specifically Pseudolus, Miles Gloriosus and Mostellaria – and tells the earthy story of a slave named Pseudolus and his attempts to win his freedom by helping his immature principal woo the girl next door.
Plot [edit]
In the city of Rome during the reign of Emperor Nero, Pseudolus is "the lyingest, cheatingest, sloppiest slave in all of Rome", whose merely wish is to purchase his freedom from his primary's parents, the henpecked Senex and his overbearing wife, Domina. When he finds out that his primary, Senex's handsome just dim son Hero, has fallen in love with the beautiful Philia (destined to be a courtesan) from the house of Marcus Lycus, side by side door, Pseudolus makes a deal: he will get the daughter for Hero in render for his liberty.
Unfortunately, the virgin has been sold to the great Roman soldier Miles Gloriosus, who even now is on his manner from conquering Crete to merits her as his helpmate. In an attempt to fake out the bang-up Gloriosus and purchase enough fourth dimension to come up with a program that volition requite Philia to Hero, Pseudolus and his overseer, Hysterium, phase a sit-downwardly orgy for 14. Pseudolus informs the captain that his bride is expressionless and blackmails Hysterium into masquerading as the corpse of Philia to fool the captain and send him heartbroken away; only things go wrong at every turn.
When the supposedly dead "Philia" suddenly comes back to life after the smashing Gloriosus announces his intention of cutting "her" heart out every bit a memorial, a chase beyond Rome and on into the countryside ensues. Eventually, Miles Gloriosus collars Hero, the real Philia, Hysterium, Marcus Lycus, Pseudolus, and Gymnasia, the silent courtesan fancied past Pseudolus, and brings them back to Rome to untangle the skein of deception and see that justice is washed.
In the end Hero gets Philia; Senex's adjacent-door neighbor Erronius learns that Philia and Miles Gloriosus are in fact his long-lost children; Marcus Lycus is spared from execution for breaking a marriage contract; Miles Gloriosus takes the gorgeous Gemini twins as his consorts; and Pseudolus gets his freedom, the beautiful and Amazonian Gymnasia to be his wife, and a dowry of 10,000 minae, compliments of Marcus Lycus.
Cast [edit]
- Zero Mostel as Pseudolus
- Phil Silvers as Marcus Lycus
- Buster Keaton as Erronius
- Jack Gilford every bit Hysterium
- Michael Crawford as Hero
- Michael Hordern as Senex
- Annette Andre as Philia
- Patricia Jessel as Domina
- Leon Greene as Captain Miles Gloriosus
- Pamela Chocolate-brown equally High Priestess
- Inga Nielsen as Gymnasia
- Beatrix Lehmann as Domina's mother
- Alfie Bass equally Gatekeeper
- Roy Kinnear as Gladiator instructor
- Pecker Kerr as Gladiator-in-Preparation
- Lucienne Bridou as Panacea
- Helen Funai as Tintinabula
- Jon Pertwee as Crassus
- Janet Webb as Fertilla
- Peter Butterworth as Sentry
- Frank Thornton as Slave commuter
- Ingrid Pitt as Courtesan
Cast notes:
- Veteran comedian Keaton was terminally ill with cancer at the time of filming. Even so, the 70-twelvemonth-sometime was able to perform many of his ain stunts, to the amazement of the bandage and coiffure.[2] Forum would be his final film appearance.
- Futurity Third Doctor Jon Pertwee, brother of screenwriter Michael Pertwee, appears briefly equally Crassus, who reports that there is no plague in Crete. He had originally played Lycus in the 1963 W End stage production.
- Kinnear appeared in eight other films directed by Richard Lester: Aid! (1965), How I Won the War (1967), The Bed Sitting Room (1969), The Three Musketeers (1973), The Four Musketeers (1974), Juggernaut (1974), Royal Flash (1975) and The Return of the Musketeers (1989).
Songs [edit]
- "Comedy This evening" — Pseudolus and Company
- "Lovely" — Philia and Hero
- "Everybody Ought to Have a Maid" — Pseudolus, Senex, Lycus, and Hysterium
- "Bring Me My Bride" — Miles Gloriosus and Company
- "Lovely" (reprise) — Pseudolus and Hysterium
- "Funeral Sequence" — Pseudolus, Miles Gloriosus and Company
- "Finale" — Company
Songs from the original Broadway score which were cutting for the film: "Honey I Hear" (Hero), "Free" (Pseudolus and Hero), "Pretty Niggling Picture" (Pseudolus, Hero, Philia), "I'grand At-home" (Hysterium), "Impossible" (Senex and Hero), "That Muddied Old Human being" (Domina) and "That'll Show Him" (Philia).[iii]
Sondheim'south music was adapted for the film version of Forum past Ken Thorne, who previously worked with The Beatles on Help! (1965).[iv]
Production [edit]
Although the musical had originally been written with Phil Silvers in mind, Zip Mostel starred on Broadway as Pseudolus,[5] and Richard Lester was his selection to direct the motion picture version. Other directors who were considered included Charlie Chaplin, Orson Welles and Mike Nichols.[4] Information technology was filmed at the Samuel Bronston Studios in Madrid, Spain, and on location around that city, on an estimated budget of $ii million. Filming took identify from September to Nov 1965.[ citation needed ]
Jack Gilford was likewise re-creating his stage function, as Hysterium,[5] and at that place are other connections to the Broadway product. Tony Walton, who designed the production, including the costumes, was also the designer of the Broadway show. For Walton, who was married to Julie Andrews from 1959 to 1967, Forum came at the beginning of both his motion-picture show and stage careers: it was his second Broadway product, and his third film - he had designed costumes for Mary Poppins in 1964, and did the overall production pattern of Fahrenheit 451 in 1966. Bob Simmons, a renowned stunt coordinator, designed and performed many of the activity scenes in the flick.[ citation needed ]
Forum is remarkable as one of the few films in which Buster Keaton appeared where he employed a double. Keaton was suffering from terminal cancer at the time – a fact of which he was not aware – and Mick Dillon stood-in for him for the running sequences. Withal, Buster performed the pratfall afterwards running into a tree in the chase sequence near the end of the picture himself, as no one could properly imitate his pratfalls.[6]
The blithe end credits created by Richard Williams feature many houseflies, a reminder of the fly problem the production suffered through when the fruits and vegetables which festooned the fix were left out to rot overnight after the cease of the shooting day.[4]
George Martin, who with Ethel Martin is credited with the choreography of the pic,[seven] was the banana to choreographer Jack Cole on Broadway.[viii] (Jerome Robbins too did some uncredited piece of work on the phase show.[5]) Other members of the Forum squad are notable equally well. Cinematographer Nicholas Roeg moved up to the director's chair to brand films such as Operation (1970), with Mick Jagger, Walkabout (1971), Don't Expect Now (1973), and The Human Who Brutal to Earth (1976) with David Bowie.
Release [edit]
Forum premiered in New York Urban center on October 16, 1966[ix] and in London on December 14 of that year. It went into general release in January 1967.[ citation needed ]
Reception [edit]
Box office [edit]
The movie obtained $8.5 million in actual box role domestic gross receipts during 1966–67. When adjusted for current (2019) movie costs, its box office revenue would be equivalent to $69.3 million. It was the 26th-near-pop picture shown in U.S. theaters that year.[x]
The picture show received about $iii million in rentals in the U.S.[ commendation needed ]
Disquisitional reception [edit]
The motion-picture show received generally positive notices, with a current 86% score on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 22 reviews, with an boilerplate of vii.00/10.[11] Variety wrote, "Flip, glib and sophisticated, however rump-slappingly bawdy and fast-paced, 'Forum' is a capricious look at the seamy underside of classical Rome through a 20th-Century hipster's shades [...] Generally assayed with satirical thrust and on-target accuracy, nearly all of the performances are top-rung and thoroughly expert."[12] In a generally favorable review for The New York Times, Vincent Canby praised the "handsomely realistic settings" and determined that "Stephen Sondheim's music and lyrics concord up well," but also found information technology "hard to decide whether Mr. Lester has gone too far, or not far enough, in translating into film terms the carefully calculated nonsense originally conceived for the theater. He's done a lot of catchy things — with his penchant for quick cutting and juxtaposition of absurd images — just there are times when this mode seems oddly at variance with the bones textile, which is roughly 2,000 years older than the motion-picture camera."[13]
Philip 1000. Scheuer of the Los Angeles Times wrote that the moving-picture show moved so fast that "I simply couldn't ingest information technology all in ane viewing," but "I was able to annals plenty to realize I was enjoying myself hugely. 'Forum' is a bawdy, ribald romp that rips Rome's Peachy Society right up the middle, an out-and-out caricatural show that may even—underneath all the frenetic foolery, the flourishing of floozies and the pratfalls—have something satirical and cynical to tell us about nations and why they fall."[fourteen] Richard L. Coe of The Washington Post raved, ""Bawdy, gaudy and lawry, how funny! 'A Funny Thing Happened on the Manner to the Forum' has arrived at the Cinema, where laughter should be exploding for months."[15]
Brendan Gill of The New Yorker wrote "I laughed my style mindlessly through ninety percentage of the motion picture," calling the jokes "both awful and exactly right for Mostel, Silvers and company."[16] A review in the Uk's Monthly Film Message thought that Lester's fast-moving direction style made for a "curious effect of dislocation," writing that Mostel and Silvers "constantly notice the editor snapping at their tails while Lester dashes down some attractive byway and the laugh they probably would take got is stopped brusk." The review concluded, "Apart from the long chase at the finish, which is boring and irrelevant, this is an odd, adept-humoured mess of a picture show, in spite of everything decidedly likeable."[17]
A negative review came from Rex Reed who opined in his review of the tape version of the movie's soundtrack album that "the existent wit in Stephen Sondheim'south score for the very funny Broadway burlesque A Funny Thing Happened on the Fashion to the Forum was all just totally demolished in Richard Lester's vulgar, witless, and over-stylized film version. All but a scattering of the marvelous Sondheim songs were ditched, the few remaining musical numbers were and then integrated into the activity that they took a back seat to Lester's self-conscious visual gimmicks, and the riotous Zippo Mostel was almost crowded out of the plot completely."[ commendation needed ]
Awards and honors [edit]
Music director Ken Thorne received an Academy Award for Best Music, Scoring of Music, Accommodation or Treatment in 1966. In addition, the film was nominated that year for the Gilded Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy".[18] [xix]
Encounter also [edit]
- List of American films of 1966
- Upwardly Pompeii!
References [edit]
- ^ "Large Rental Films of 1967", Diversity, 3 January 1968 p 25. Please notation these figures refer to rentals accruing to the distributors.
- ^ Buster Keaton: A Hard Act to Follow, Thames Television documentary (aired in the U.S. on Turner Archetype Movies)
- ^ "Songs" on the Net Broadway Database
- ^ a b c Jessica Handler "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum" (TCM article)
- ^ a b c IBDB "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum"
- ^ Freese, Cistron Scott (2014) Hollywood Stunt Performers, 1910s-1970s (Second Edition). Jefferson, Northward Carolina: McFarland & Visitor ISBN 978-1-4766-1470-0
- ^ TCM Full credits
- ^ IBDB George Martin
- ^ "Overview". Turner Archetype Movies.
- ^ "1966 Top Box Office Movies | Ultimate Pic Rankings". 2018-04-18.
- ^ A Funny Thing Happened on the Style to the Forum at Rotten Tomatoes
- ^ "Picture show Reviews: A Funny Matter Happened On The Mode To The Forum". Diverseness: half-dozen. 1966-09-28.
- ^ Canby, Vincent (1966-10-17). "Screen: 'Funny Thing' Happens Here". The New York Times: 48.
- ^ Scheuer, Philip K. (December 4, 1966). "'Fahrenheit' Freezes Claret, 'Forum' a Funny Matter". Los Angeles Times. Agenda, p. 11.
- ^ Coe, Richard Fifty. (1966-12-24). "'Funny Thing' A Funny Matter". The Washington Post. p. D7.
- ^ Gill, Brendan (1966-x-22). "The Current Cinema". The New Yorker. p. 165.
- ^ "A Funny Matter Happened on the Fashion to the Forum". The Monthly Moving picture Bulletin. 34 (398): 41. March 1967.
- ^ "Winners & Nominees 1967". www.goldenglobes.com . Retrieved 2021-11-11 .
- ^ "Oscars Awards Database". awardsdatabase.oscars.org . Retrieved 2022-05-26 .
External links [edit]
- A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum at the American Film Found Catalog
- A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum at IMDb
- A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum at AllMovie
- A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum at the TCM Movie Database
- A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum at Rotten Tomatoes
trepanierteres1972.blogspot.com
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Funny_Thing_Happened_on_the_Way_to_the_Forum_(film)
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