They’re making a movie based on the TV show Get Smart, and they’ve cast Steve Carrell to play the lead. The message board thread titles also mention Sascha Baron Cohen as Siegfried, but I can’t see whether that’s true or just a rumor.
This could be good. Get Smart was one of my favorite TV shows when I was a kid, and I think Carrell can do the character easily. I’m just worried that they’re going to make the movie hip, modern, edgy and dumb.
While I can certainly see him pulling this off, I’m still officially opposed to anything that gets in the way of more episodes of The Office.
I like Steve Carrell a lot, and I do think he could do it. But it’s a movie based on an old TV series, and those never seem to turn out well.
Alan Arkin is going to play Chief. This has a chance to be good.
Sometimes they do. Maybe I’m revealing my terribly bad taste, but I thought the Brady Bunch movies — both of them — were friggin’ hillarious! Great parody. With the right director (and they already have the right actor), this movie could be just as good or better. I have high hopes for it. (While acknowledging that hope springs eternal.)
I dunno; I find it hard to imagine anyone but Don Adams as Max. And listening to 90 minutes’ worth of somebody doing a Don Adams impression is on my short list of ‘things that would make me set my own head on fire.’
But if we must have a **Get Smart ** movie, then where’s the big-budget, live-action adaptation of Tennessee Tuxedo I’ve been waiting for?
Wait a minute, wait a minute. I don’t want Carrell doing a Don Adams impression. I want it to be an adaptation, not a recreation. […fingers crossed…]
Is there any word on who’ll be playing Agent 99?
(checks IMDB)
Anne Hathaway! That’s a very good choice.
But what about Larabee? And Hymie?
I don’t much care for Carrell one way or the other, but I happen to think he seems good for this part. I’ve just got to echo that I hope they don’t modernize it. I would almost bet my left leg that they will, though.
Of course, the ONLY important question is who will play Hymie?!
An important consideration: will he still have a shoe-phone?
Obviously, cell-phones make a portable shoe-phone somewhat useless. So clearly the answer is that he will have a shoe-top computer.
Well, technically, it would be Steve Carell doing an impression of Don Adams doing an impression of William Powell. Missed it by that much.
Don Adams was doing a William Powell impression? I don’t get it.
Count me in with those who think this is a horrible idea. Get Smart was already a spoof, and I can’t think of a spoof that has ever lead to a successful spoof.
And everything that made the show what it was doesn’t have a good analog today. We don’t have the “Other Side” as we did with Russia. We don’t really have a spy culture or spy books and movies to spoof. The technology that they spoofed in the show is so advanced today that reality sounds more like a spoof than shoe-phones did. And even though Steve Carrell was a “40-Year-Old Virgin” you can’t have the sexual innocence of Smart ignoring the come-ons of Agent 99.
You can’t play it straight and you can’t play it as satire. I don’t see any way for it to succeed.
Don Adams used an exaggerated version of Powell’s speaking style for his Hotel Detective on The Bill Dana Show. He used the same voice as Maxwell Smart. (Yeah, I’ve been watching the boxed set.)
I don’t have high hopes for the Get Smart! movie. The Brady movies were successful because they were making fun of the original show, which while a sitcom wasn’t known for its zany wackiness. The original Get Smart was a spoof, and its tough to spoof a spoof.
Not to mention that, since the original series aired, we’ve had plenty of other spy spoof movies (the Austin Powers movies, Spy Hard, and that Rowan Atkinson one, just off the top of my head). It’s been done to death.
The Naked Gun was based on the tv show Police Squad, and those movies were great. The problem I foresee is that Get Smart was essentially an all ages/leaning towards adult tv show, while the movie will almost certainly be rated PG (I can’t see Maxwell Smart swearing or engaging in the type of violence that would earn PG-13), meaning they will have to camp it up bigtime to appeal to kids. It’s all about marketing and this just doesn’t fit in today’s market.
The Addams Family movie, the first one anyway, was terrific. So it can be done well.
And, loving it.
Yeah! Or the big-budget, live-action adaptation of Inspector Gad— Huh? What’s that?
Crap. 