Recently, I learned that Queen Latifah and Dolly Parton will be in a movie together. Titled Joyful Noise, Latifah plays the mother of two kids who are in a church choir. The choir director dies and Latifah takes over as choir director. Parton plays the widow of choir director and she wanted to be the choir director, which sets up a rivalry between the two. The film is set to start production in 2011.
In case you didn’t know, Queen Latifah is a rapper and Dolly Parton is a county singer, so it will be interesting to see how well they work together in a movie. Why did the studios do it? There is the novelty factor and seeing what it looks like when opposites star in the same film that attract moviegoers. Of course, this is not the first time seemingly mismatched co-stars have been put together in a film. There have been others, such as:
Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988)
It’s Los Angeles 1947 and private eye Eddie Valiant is hired by Roger Rabbit to prove that his wife Jessica is cheating on him with Marvin Acme, gag factory mogul and the owner of Toontown. Soon Acme is found dead and signs point to Rabbit. So, Rabbit urges Valiant to help clear his name. What’s so odd about that? You ask? Just another private eye story or is it?
What makes Who Framed Roger Rabbit? unique is that this movie combines live action with animation. In fact, the title character is an animated character. Other animated characters are part of the film, such as, Mickey Mouse, Bugs Bunny, Betty Boop, Donald Duck, Daffy Duck, Woody Woodpecker, Droopy Dog and more. There is one memorable scene where Donald and Daffy are dueling pianists and Daffy says, “That’s the last time I share the stage with someone with a speech impediment.” So, the oddness comes from the genre/animated character mash up and it worked. Critics loved it and it did well at the box office.
Stop or My Mom Will Shoot (1992)
What happens when you bring together Sylvester Stallone and Estelle Getty? No, that is not a dream that is the byproduct of falling asleep during a Golden Girls marathon on Lifetime after you ran up the Philadelphia Art Museum steps. The answer is a movie about a cop (Stallone) and his mom (Getty). Stallone is a bigmouth Los Angeles cop whose methods of crimefighting don’t endear him to his fellow police officers. Then his overbearing mother (the kind that shows baby pictures to his colleagues at LAPD) and comes to visit and she happens to witness a crime. So, it is up to the two of them to catch the bad guys. Critics weren’t kind to this film and many said that Stallone should stick to action films, and not follow Arnold into comedy genre. Stallone agreed and didn’t make another comedy after this film.
Twins 1988
Speak of the devil, Arnold Schwarzenegger makes his first foray into comedy and his co-star is none other than Danny DeVito. They play fraternal twins who were separated at birth and find each other after 35 years. While this could have bombed like Stop or My Mom Will Shoot, it didn’t. It could be due to Schwarzenegger actually being better at comedy than Stallone (check out the one-liners Schwarzenegger delivers in Pumping Iron to see what I mean). Also having a co-star like DeVito, who has good comedic timing, helps.
Well, that’s all folks. What will the next unexpected pairing from Hollywood look like? Hey if I knew, then it wouldn’t be so unexpected.
Sources:
http://www.ivillage.com/dolly-parton-and-queen-latifah-co-star-new-movie/1-a-259452
Just Movie Posters Blog 