A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum

Starring: Phil Silvers, Zero Mostel Director: Richard Lester Original UK Premiere: 1966 Dvd Release: 12th January, 2004 Number Of Discs: 1 Format: PAL, Region 2 Encoding

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A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum is a musical with music & lyrics by Stephen Sondheim & a book by Burt Shevelove & Larry Gelbart. Based on the comedies of the ancient Roman playwright Plautus, it tells the story of a slave named Pseudolus & his attempts to win his freedom by encouraging the romance between his masters son Hero & a young virgin named Philia who is owned by Marcus Lycus, a dealer in courtesans & promised to a swaggering soldier named Miles Gloriosus. The humor is broad & bawdy & fast-paced. Sondheims score was coolly received when Forum opened on Broadway on May 8, 1962 at the Alvin Theatre & was not even nominated for a Tony Award even though the show won the award for Best Musical. Starring Zero Mostel, Jack Gilford, David Burns, Ruth Kobart & John Carradine, the original production was directed by Broadway legend George Abbott. A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum was made into a film in 1966 with Mostel, Gilford, Buster Keaton, a very young Michael Crawford & Phil Silvers. Posters Of A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum

The words of the opening song pretty much describe the menu in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Something familiar, something peculiar, something for everyone: a comedy tonight!, a frantic adaptation of the stage musical by Larry Gelbart & Burt Shevelove. The wild story, based on the Latin comedies of Plautus & set in ancient Rome, follows a slave named Pseudolus as he tries to extricate himself from an increasingly farcical situation; Mostel & a bevy of inspired clowns, including Phil Silvers, Jack Gilford & Buster Keaton, keep the slapstick & the patter perking. The cast also includes the young Michael Crawford as a love-struck innocent.

This project landed in the lap of Richard Lester, then one of the hottest directors in the world after his success with the Beatles films. Lester telescoped the material through his own joke-a-second sensibility, & also ripped out some of the songs from Stephen Sondheims Broadway score. The result is very close to the vaudeville spirit suggested by the title, though anyone with a low tolerance for Zero Mostels overbearing buffoonery may be in trouble. Oddly enough, amid all the frenzy, Lester creates a grungy, earthy Rome that seems closer to the real thing than countless respectable historical films on the subject. Frankie Howerd, who played Pseudolus on the London stage, kept the tradition going with his Up Pompeii TV series.

Phil Silvers was an American entertainer & comedy actor. His best-known work is The Phil Silvers Show, a 1950s sitcom set on a US Army post in which he played Sergeant Bilko; the show was also often referred to by this name. He won a Tony Award for Best Banana in 1952. Born Philip Silversmith in Brooklyn, New York, Silvers was the youngest of eight children. His father, a Russian Jewish immigrant, was one of the workers on the early New York skyscrapers. Silvers started entertaining at age 11, when he would sing in cinemas when the projector broke down. Two years later, he left school to sing professionally, before appearing in vaudeville as a stooge. He famously starred as a guest in one of the Carry On films, Follow That Camel, as a Segeant Bilko character in a spoof of the Foreign Legion films. Peter Rogers employed him to ensure the Carry On films success in America. His salary was £30,000, the largest Carry On salary ever, only later met by the appearance of Elke Sommer in Carry On Behind. Posters Of Phil Silvers

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Zero Mostel was a Tony Award -winning stage actor. He was born Samuel Joel Mostel. In the 1950s, he was blacklisted on account of his leftist political beliefs. In 1963 his career recovered with his Tony Award winning performance in the musical A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. In 1964, he joined the original cast of the Broadway musical Fiddler on the Roof, for which he won a Tony in 1965. Mostel won an Obie Award for his 1958 role as Leopold Bloom in Ulysses in Nighttown, a stage adaptation by Marjorie Barkentin of James Joyce s novel Ulysses. He reprised his role in 1974. His most famous film role was probably as Max Bialystock in Mel Brooks The Producers. He recorded an appearance on The Muppet Show & has the macabre distinction of being the only guest to die before their episode aired. His last film appearence was as the voice of Kehaar in the animated adaptation of Watership Down. Posters Of Rhinoceros

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Richard Lester is a UK based film director famous for his work with The Beatles. Lester was something of a child prodigy & at 15 began studies at the University of Pennsylvania, where he first developed an interest in British film, particularly Ealing comedies. In 1953, Lester moved to London & began work as a director in independent television. A shambolic variety show he produced caught the eye of Peter Sellers, who enlisted Lesters help in translating The Goon Show to television as Idiot Weekly. It was a hit, as were two follow-up shows A Show Called Fred & Son of Fred. A short film Lester made with Spike Milligan & Peter Sellers - The Running, Jumping & Standing Still Film - was a favourite of The Beatles & in particular John Lennon. When the band were contracted to make a film in 1964, they chose Lester from a list of possible directors. A Hard Days Night showed an exaggerated & simplified version of The Beatles characters & proved to be an incredibly effective marketing tool. Posters Of The Three Musketeers

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