I was just thinking the other day about Pogo and the phrase “We have met the enemy and he is us”. This is of course a parody of Oliver Hazard Perry’s message, “We have met the enemy and they are ours.” But these days, Pogo’s version is widely quoted, while original is known mostly to history buffs.
Another set the come to mind are all of Lewis Carrol’s poem parodies, “You are old father William” is fairly well known while “The Old Man’s Comforts and How He Gained Them” is for the most part lost in obscurity.
Finally, the movie Airplane has a massive cult following, while the various Airport movies it parodies are not nearly so well known.
Are there any other examples that people can think of?
What about that international bestseller “National Lampoon’s Bored Of The Rings”, which I just found out was a parody of an obscure fantasy trilogy(which I can’t recall the name of) by some English professor.
Tina Fey’s Palin impersonation (“I can see Russia from my house”) caught on so well that most people think Paln actually said it.
Not exactly a parody, but Metallica have covered Diamond Head’s Am I Evil? throughout their career and only relatively recently started telling people it was a cover.
Speaking of Weird Al, Dare to Be Stupid (a “style parody” of Devo songs) actually outsold almost every Devo single because it appeared on the Transformers: The Movie soundtrack.
ETA: I’m always going on about Yes Minister/Yes Prime Minister here, but Sir Humphrey Appleby is certainly better known than any real permanent secretary or cabinet secretary who ever served in the British Government.
I don’t know how common this is, but I knew “On Top of Spaghetti” for years before I learned of the existence of “On Top of Old Smokey”. And even when I did learn of the other song, it was through yet another parody of it (“On top of old Smokey, all covered with grass and stuff, I lost my poor sweetheart, because I didn’t run fast enough”)
I’ve seen it once on TCM, and I was really amused at how close some of the dialog in “Airplane!” was to the original. Even the hero’s name, Ted Stryker, is the same except for the spelling.
The “crunchy frog” Monty Python sketch was in reaction to the 1968 British Trade Descriptions Act, which isn’t exactly on the forefront of people’s minds these days.
the Lewis Carroll parodies are the ones I thought of when I read the title. In most other cases I know of the the originals even if I’m not familiar with them. I haven’t seen Zero Hour, but I’ve known that Airplane! was a parody of it. I seriously doubt if people are more familiar with Bored of the Rings or Doon or Mad magazine parodies than the originals.
George MacDonald Fraser’s Flashman series is based on a character from Thomas Hughes’ book Tom Brown’s School Days. I know of Tom Brown, although I’ve never read the book. But I’ve never read the Flashman books, either. Saw the movie Royal Flash, though.
Young Frankenstein is based on four movies – Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein, Son of Frankenstein, and The Ghost of Frankenstein. The first and to some extent the second of those movies are fairly familiar, although I would guess that a lot more people know of them than have actually seen them. Son of Frankenstein, however, which Young Frankenstein is based most closely on, is pretty obscure. (You need to see it to really appreciate what a great job Gene Wilder does of imitating Basil Rathbone’s character.)
I would also guess that more people know “Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah” than The Dance of the Hours.
At this point Homer and Jethro’s “The Battle of Kookamonga” is probably as well know as the original, “The Battle of New Orleans” thanks to Dr. Demento.
Who would have watched even 10 minutes of “Manos: The Hands Of Fate” without Joel and the Bots? Who could watch it now without hearing Joel and the Bots in your head?
Parody being the original intention is debatable. But, yeah, Deadpool started life as a Deathstroke pastiche. Rob Liefeld comes up with a lot of pastiches.