I believe that Nielsen played two difference characters with the same name, because the portrayals of Frank Dreben are quite different. On "Police Squad," Nielsen played Dreben totally straight, with the absurdities blowing right past him (he's at a bar where his seat is extremely low; the bartender asks "what'll it be?"; Dreben asks for a screwdriver and is handed the tool, which he uses to raise the height of the seat). In the Naked Gun movies, Dreben becomes far more slapstick (witness the entire Enrico Pallazzo scene), and that frustrates me. The moment the characters becomes aware of the farce they're in, I feel like the movie drops it's edge.
Indeed, I think people generally like one more than the other (either "Police Squad" or "Naked Gun"), and the one you like more tells a lot of how you like your comedy. I like "Naked Gun," have the movie on DVD, but it collects dust. The six episodes of "Police Squad" are in heavy rotation on my laptop, and I can devour them any time. The few jokes from "Police Squad" that are used in "Naked Gun" don't work nearly as well the others: even the "Nice Beaver" joke that people think is hysterical is more because of the word than then delivery. This is why Airplane was so groundbreaking: the comedy was not necessarily in the jokes, but in the absurdity of the environment. Take, for instance, one of the great lines from the movie delivered by Nielsen: "The life of everyone on board depends upon just one thing: finding someone back there who can not only fly this plane, but who didn't have fish for dinner." He delivers it with such honest and sincere intensity that it becomes absurd. But Zucker, Abrahams, and Zucker didn't write that line. It came directly from "Zero Hour," where it was delivered just as straight, and undoubtedly with the idea of ratcheting up the tension. Joe Hass Warren, MI On Sun, Nov 28, 2010 at 8:16 PM, Wesley McGee <[email protected]> wrote: > This stings like a punch to the gut. Dramatic turned comic actor Leslie > Nielsen died of pneumonia today (I believe). He's been in the hospital for > two weeks. > > http://www.deadline.com/2010/11/r-i-p-leslie-nielsen/ > > -- > Wesley McGee > http://www.ambivi.com > http://drawing-a-blank.tumblr.com > > -- > TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google > Groups "TV or Not TV" group. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected] > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected] > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en
