Okay, this is my first OP on this board, so please be gentle. Now that LotR has been out for well over half a year, it’s high time for the parodists to show their ugly heads. Mel Brooks must certainly be chomping at the bit even as we speak. So, my question to all of youse guys: Mel Brooks or otherwise, how would you cast the “Bored Of The Rings” movie?
(p.s. - If any of you have somehow failed to read the Harvard Lampoon classic, run (don’t walk) to your nearest Barnes and Noble and slurp up the genius that is BotR)…Timmy
My suggestions:
Frito: Rick Moranis (maybe Mike Myers)
Spam: Jack Black (maybe Dana Carvey)
Arrowroot: Don Knotts
Goodgulf: Mel Brooks, of course
Bromosel: John Candy (yeah, he’s dead, deal with it)
Gimlet: Marty Feldman (likewise)
Legolam: Richard Simmons
Serutan: Harvey Korman
I support the movie concept 100% (almost completely, that is, given ego-inflation).
I’m going for the “dream cast”, since I’ve been thinking about the book for some long years, now. I’d really like to enjoy the movie so I’m assuming that, as in Airplane, “regular” actors can handle comedy.
Frito: Same guy as in the LOR movie. He’d make a great straightman.
Spam: Steve Martin.
Arrowroot: Basel Rathbone.
Goodgulf: Carol Burnett. (You can do it, kid.) Second draft: Sigorney Weaver.
Bromosel: Some overweight actor way past their prime. William Shatner?
Gimlet: Robbie Coultrane.
Legolam: Robin Williams.
Serutan: George Bush.
Sorhed: George Bush.
Eorache: Jane Fonda or Diana Rigg. Both, maybe. (Rubs hands. Fun. Very, very fun.)
Moxie and Pepsi: The Doublemint twins.
Goddam: John Lennon, just as he once hoped.
“Bored of the Rings” is the only reason I slogged through LOTR. It made reading LOTR worthwhile (“Fellowship of the Ring” was the first book I ever deliberately did not finish; the trilogy does improve in “The Two Towers,” but never comes close to “The Hobbit” in quality.)
While reading the “Monty Python’s Lord of the Rings” thread. I was thinking about how great it would be if the Monty Python cast members did “Bored Of The Rings”. John Cleese would make a wonderful Arrowroot.
Point of order: just because they didn’t use Tom Bombadil in LotR doesn’t mean that Tim Benzedrino isn’t critical to BotR. I see Tommy Chong in this role.
Also, shouldn’t BotR be animated or CGI from Pixxar?
A more scathing and concise literary review I have never seen. My outlook on the text is profoundly changed by your insight.
Anyway…
The actor best suited to play Goodgulf is Sam Waterston from TV’s Law & Order. He is a marvelous straight-man and (if any of you have seen the “Robots attacking old people for their medicine” sketch from SNL) quite decent with comedy as well.
Excellent! And Courtney Love as his beloved Hashberry.
An entire Law and Order version of BotR could probably be assembled. The possibilities boggle the mind. Although I’d pick Jerry Orbach as the crotchety Goodgulf, and Steven Hill as Orlon. Benjamin Bratt would be a good naive Frito, with George Dzundza as his devoted Spam (replaced by Paul Sorvino in the second film, natch). Chris Noth would be the earnest Arrowroot, and Angie Harmon as Eorache. Help me, I just can’t stop!!!
I’m a big Robin Williman fan, and I wouldn’t mind seeing him in this, but I’m going to have to agree with that stiff who started this thread, on this one.
So I haven’t read “Bored” (or LOTR for that matter) so perhaps someone could enlighten me? How old are the “bored” characters? The hobbits in the movie all seemed quite young, and the actors who played them were. Just wondering about being consistant is all…
My worry is that the pop culture references (Goodgulf, “clean for Gene”, etc.) that were so funny thirty years ago would pass right over most of the audience today. (Is the term “Narc” even used anymore?)
Even so, maybe we could get Daniel Day Lewis as Arrowroot, son of Arrowshirt, son of Stuffed Shirt…
The character Frodo was 33 when the movie opens, but hobbits live a long time, so in a sense he was still a young adult. In the movie, they may have emphasized the youth of some of the characters to make it popular with the huge number of teens who were liable to pay to see it.
The Bored of the Rings characters appear to be the same age as those of the book.
You probably wouldn’t get a great deal out of “Bored of the Rings” unless you’d read at least the first book of LOTR. But it’s well worth reading. It’s not only genuinely funny on practically every page, but the writing style is…distinctive.