jeff goldblum...paul schrader...The Day The Clown Cried...wtf

Message Bookmarked

Bookmark Removed

http://www.aintitcoolnews.com/display.cgi?id=23833
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr/film/brief_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002803338

― latebloomer (latebloomer), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:00 (nineteen years ago)

Not exactly.

― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:05 (nineteen years ago)

Anyway is The Day The Clown Cried really that bad?

― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:09 (nineteen years ago)

well, it was never released!

― latebloomer (latebloomer), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:10 (nineteen years ago)

x-post -- I'd say so.

SPY: What was it like seeing The Day the Clown Cried?
JOAN O'BRIEN: It was a disaster. Just talking about it makes me very emotional ...
(Her voice trails off.)
HARRY SHEARER: With most of these kinds of things, you find that the anticipation,
or the concept, is better than the thing itself. But seeing this film was really awe-inspiring,
in that you are rarely in the presense of a perfect object. This was a perfect object.
This movie is so drastically wrong, its pathos and its comedy are so wildly misplaced,
that you could not, in your fantasy of what it might be like, improve on what it really is.
Oh My God! - thats all you can say.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:12 (nineteen years ago)

Haha poor Jerry.

― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:16 (nineteen years ago)

The movie Lewis did before The Day The Clown Cried, a straight comedy called Which Way To The Front? was so awful that I can imagine the incorporation of earnest drama would lead to the worst movie ever.

― Zwan (miccio), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:19 (nineteen years ago)

The Day the Clown Cried just begs for a Criterion release, doesn't it? Special bonus atrocity features including excerpts from The Total Film-Maker and the works of Adorno!

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:35 (nineteen years ago)

didn't roberto benigni basically make this film anyway?

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:38 (nineteen years ago)

I'd love to have seen Jerry Lewis crawling across Oscar audience members.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:43 (nineteen years ago)

has anyone seen "hardly working"?

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:46 (nineteen years ago)

i looooove hardly working. one of the best stoner movies ever made.

― scott seward (scott seward), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:51 (nineteen years ago)

i hope you have all read the screenplay:

http://www.subcin.com/clowncried.html

very, um, interesting.

― scott seward (scott seward), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:53 (nineteen years ago)

Very very interesting.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:54 (nineteen years ago)

(Here's an older thread on same, though it was brief:

The Day the Clown Cried

Rah.)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 13 July 2006 15:55 (nineteen years ago)

Hardly Working is really very good. I haven't seen Cracking Up yet, though.

― Eric H. (Eric H.), Thursday, 13 July 2006 16:00 (nineteen years ago)

ANNA
Darling, what's tormenting your
soul? Please let me help you!

Helmut looks at her, then looks away again and begins rambling, which is really the whiskey taking control --

HELMUT
(more or less acting)
I AM A CLOWN ... PEOPLE LAUGH AT
ME ... I like being a clown ... I DON'T
LIKE people laughing at me ... But,
Oh, How I HATE when they DON'T !!!

― milton parker (Jon L), Thursday, 13 July 2006 18:04 (nineteen years ago)

actually, hard to laugh at much of the script itself, which is pretty effectively horrifying, even the final revised draft

though the mind boggles to imagine what the acting must be like

― milton parker (Jon L), Thursday, 13 July 2006 18:35 (nineteen years ago)

I would love to see any other fucking Lewis movie discussed here. Just once.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Thursday, 13 July 2006 18:43 (nineteen years ago)

Um, ok: I liked The Bellboy.

― Marmot 4-Tay: based on my memories of the one listen I gave it 19 years ago (mar, Thursday, 13 July 2006 19:12 (nineteen years ago)

"The Caddy! It'll make ya SHIT!"

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 13 July 2006 19:12 (nineteen years ago)

Artists and Models is terrible!

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, 13 July 2006 19:14 (nineteen years ago)

(that was for you Morbs)

other Jerry Lewis movies I have seen:
The Nutty Professor (eh)
King of Comedy (awesome!)
some clips of the Martin and Lewis show (they were okay)

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, 13 July 2006 19:15 (nineteen years ago)

yeah "king of comedy" is better than any of the "real" jerry lewis movies. i mean, jerry's ok, pretty fascinating guy.

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Thursday, 13 July 2006 19:51 (nineteen years ago)

Living It Up is the best M&L film I've seen; on TV at least they were in the same sketch most of the time.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Thursday, 13 July 2006 19:54 (nineteen years ago)

Artists and Models is really great! Do you like any of the Lewis/Tashlin projects, Shakey?

― C0L1N B... (C0L1N B...), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:06 (nineteen years ago)

I only saw that one because Shirley MacLaine is in it (the wife is a huge Shirley fan, an affection I've come to share to some extent). Haven't seen any others, and I don't care to based on A&M which I really found unfathomable and not at all funny. Lewis' mincing-man-child routine is more of a head-scratcher to me than a source of entertainment (as discussed on some other Jerry Lewis thread)

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:10 (nineteen years ago)

I would love to see any other fucking Lewis movie discussed here. Just once.

I stopped being so mean about Adam Sandler movies once I saw Which Way To The Front? Sandler, Jim Carrey, all of those guys never had as much yelling in their movies as Lewis did.

― Zwan (miccio), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:17 (nineteen years ago)

And while the Buddy Love sequences are great in Nutty Professor, I dunno how anybody could stand the rest.

― Zwan (miccio), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:18 (nineteen years ago)

yeah the Buddy Love sequences were allright.

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:20 (nineteen years ago)

(Lewis doing Sinatra?)

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:20 (nineteen years ago)

Lewis doing Martin.

I'm not going to bother seeing any M&L movies if its true that none are better than The King Of Comedy.

― Zwan (miccio), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:21 (nineteen years ago)

no, Jerry doing Jerry, as he admits.

Which Way To The Front? is just astoundingly ghastly. It made me whimper.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:22 (nineteen years ago)

i don't know ANYTHING about the pictures jerry directed after the family jewels. are they just horrible?

i'm speaking of: three on a couch, the big mouth, one more time, which way to the front?

i also have never heard much about cracking up...

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:29 (nineteen years ago)

which one = smorgasboard cuz i remember seeing that as a kid, probably the only later later one i've seen. liked the martin and lewis ones from what i remember as a kid and tashlin's awesome obv. did anyone see that awful atom egoyan movie about martin and lewis last year? king of comedy is awesome too, i wonder what it would've been like if carson had said yes, either funnier or duller i'm guessing but not as effective - it helps that jerry langford's as scary as pupkin.

― j blount (papa la bas), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:39 (nineteen years ago)

am i the only one who thought it ... um, INTERESTING ... that this article ended with THIS?!?:

The script (for the day the clown cried) is said to be in the hands of Robin Williams.

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:48 (nineteen years ago)

you people are insane. jerry's movies are great.

― scott seward (scott seward), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:50 (nineteen years ago)

well, robin made his clown/holocaust weeper. so he must have been inspired by the master.

― scott seward (scott seward), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:51 (nineteen years ago)

mork goes to mauthausen

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Thursday, 13 July 2006 20:59 (nineteen years ago)

blount, i thought dean martin was asked to play the part that eventually went to jerry in KoC.

i saw a few minutes of that egoyan film on cable, it looked about as awful as i was expecting. i think pretty much NO critics got behind that one (or egoyan's last few films, come to think of it).

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Thursday, 13 July 2006 22:27 (nineteen years ago)

Such a shame that Lewis and his legal team put an end to Patton Oswalt's annual staged reading of the DTCC script.

― Tiki Theater Xymposium (Bent Over at the Arclight), Friday, 14 July 2006 00:01 (nineteen years ago)

http://www.lindenmanphoto.com/celebrites/images/Jerry%20Lewis.jpg

― Tiki Theater Xymposium (Bent Over at the Arclight), Friday, 14 July 2006 00:02 (nineteen years ago)

A Jerry Lewis picture thread coule be in order. A simple GIS turns up gold nugget after nugget.

― Tiki Theater Xymposium (Bent Over at the Arclight), Friday, 14 July 2006 00:03 (nineteen years ago)

Holy shit! It turns out that Egoyan/Bacon flick was based on a novel by Rupert "Escape (Pina Colada Song)" Holmes!

― Zwan (miccio), Friday, 14 July 2006 00:18 (nineteen years ago)

Dude does have a gift for narrative

― Zwan (miccio), Friday, 14 July 2006 00:18 (nineteen years ago)

there was actually a Rolling Stone reporter who was shown Clown in the early eighties, and couldn't contain her revulsion and answered imprudently about what she thought of it - I forget whether the Spy article discusses this, but there've been suggestions that if she'd have said "this is incredible," Jerry might have release this film, whose total destruction will almost surely be a condition of his will

― Thomas Tallis (Tommy), Friday, 14 July 2006 00:27 (nineteen years ago)

Such a shame that Lewis and his legal team put an end to Patton Oswalt's annual staged reading of the DTCC script.

Haha, I didn't know about that. I just sent for the Patton Oswalt DVD.

― Marmot 4-Tay: what those guyz make music 4. (marmotwolof), Friday, 14 July 2006 00:35 (nineteen years ago)

I went through a major Jerry Lewis obsession last year and half, watched and read everything I could. I'm pretty certain that DTCC will never be released though I know I'd probably pay more than I should if I found someone with a bootleg. Lewis is very self concious about his legacy at this point. When biographer Shawn Levy asked Lewis about the film, it basically lead to their falling out. In the last couple of years he has made a point of saying in interviews that Nutty Professor is "the only" worthwhile film he has ever made.

Levy's Lewis bio "King of Comedy" is an amazing read if this fucked up percodan and pot addicted holocaust clown directing psychological aspect of Lewis intrigues you. Actually, it's even better if his talent and art interests you as well.

But Paul Schrader is one of my favorites for consistantly making good good movies and good bad movies. So I find the news reported in this thread's first post extremely life affirming.

― theodore (herbert hebert), Friday, 14 July 2006 02:14 (nineteen years ago)

schader is really uneven though; Light Sleeper is one of the worst movies ever

― kyle (akmonday), Friday, 14 July 2006 03:24 (nineteen years ago)

That Lewis pic up above looks like a special effects sequence from The Thing.

A few years ago when UK newspaper The Guardian ran a story on the awful history of The Day the Clown Cried they got an indignant letter from some Euro director angry that they were saying it was bad when they had never seen it. I can't remember who it was, Maybe Bertolucci.

― Raw Patrick (Raw Patrick), Friday, 14 July 2006 07:31 (nineteen years ago)

The movie Lewis did before The Day The Clown Cried, a straight comedy called Which Way To The Front? was so awful

"Which Way to the Front" rocks!!!!!

― Dadaismus (Are we in love like I think we be?) (Dada), Friday, 14 July 2006 08:02 (nineteen years ago)

I remember one time, when I was young, my auntie came over and she and my mother were nattering away about boring stuff and family matters and I was watching "Which Way to the Front?" and thinking "I wish that pair would shut up so i could watch this film in peace" but as the movie progressed Jerry Lewis was making such a hideous racket that my mum and auntie were forced to stop their boring chat periodically and say, "Turn that down, that's awful" and to tut tut and generally disapprove - so for that reason alone it rocks...

― Dadaismus (Are we in love like I think we be?) (Dada), Friday, 14 July 2006 08:10 (nineteen years ago)

Which Way To The Front? is perversely fascinating, but certainly not funny. By comparison, both Hardly Working and Cracking Up have their moments -- I forget which one begins with a montage of Jerry's suicide attempts.

Anyway, TASHLIN retro at the Film Forum in Sept!

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Friday, 14 July 2006 12:36 (nineteen years ago)

I don't know how significant it is that Hitler appears as a character in "Which Way to the Front"... a loud, overacting and very Jewish Hitler too

― Dadaismus (Are we in love like I think we be?) (Dada), Friday, 14 July 2006 12:39 (nineteen years ago)

Artists and Models is terrible!

Shakey, it's likely been 15 years since I saw it at MoMA and I wasn't wild for it, but what about the "Bat Lady / Fat lady" shtick? Classic!

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 22 July 2006 15:19 (nineteen years ago)

six years pass...

Jerry answers the question straight-up and kinda beautifully.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=LEMSgRytNZ0

Evidently a French director claimed last year he owns a 35mm print of the rough cut??

― not feeling those lighters (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Monday, 18 March 2013 01:05 (thirteen years ago)

four months pass...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJai18eys0M

― i wanna be a gabbneb baby (Hungry4Ass), Sunday, 11 August 2013 20:20 (twelve years ago)

Ha, we DO have multiple threads on this, don't we. I'm still tripping at Jane Birkin and Serge Gainsbourg at 2:10 in out of nowhere.

― Ned Raggett, Sunday, 11 August 2013 20:22 (twelve years ago)

You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.