So two decades on and a legion of fans later one must ask, "Where are they now.?"Īdam Sandler was fired from SNL the same year as ‘Billy Madison’s’ release, but the success of the film and his recording career gave him independence and a leg to stand on, resulting in a mutual parting. 'Billy Madison' has gone on to inherit cult-like status and become a defining film of a generation. ‘Billy Madison’ really does have something for everyone. oh yeah, a grown man attending primary school. Nor are there double-takes at giant hallucinogenic penguins, Mexican wrestling gay principals, a kindergarden teacher with a deep-seeded love of glue, a homicidal lipstick wearing man, a dead clown, a short-fused school bus driver, a maid with boundary issues, or a teacher being set on fire or one more thing. Laugh factor aside, ‘Billy Madison’ still makes a point of dealing with bullies, friendship, a father/son relationship, the harsh reality of growing up, the politics of dodgeball, and there’s even a musical number, but oddly dating the teacher never gets so much as an eyebrow raise. Debates are still raged today as to which one is the more superior film, along with whether shampoo or conditioner is better. Okay, so the humour was immature and idiotic, but does that mean it wasn’t funny? 'Billy Madison' has gone on to inherit cult-like status and become a defining film of a generation, along side Sandler’s follow up ‘Happy Gilmore’. Even the great Roger Ebert relegating Sandler to the pits of “he might have a career as a villain, a fall guy or the butt of a joke.” Well, it turns out that Mr Ebert was so right and so wrong at the same time, but only time would tell on that one. Described by one reviewer as finding moments of “inspired lunacy”, and another as "a kid-friendly version of 'Dumb and Dumber'", most wrote Sandler off. While the film may have debuted in the #1 spot at the box office, it received mixed - but never glowing - reviews and a 46% rating on Rotten Tomatoes - not the lowest scoring Sandler film (in fact one of the highest), but by no means receiving high praise. When it looks like Eric might actually lose the bet to a nudie magazine-loving, beer guzzling half-wit, sabotage becomes the order of the day, resulting in the academic decathlon to end all academic decathlons. After a rough start, Billy eventually gets the hang of things, even making friends and falling for one of his teachers, Veronica Vaughn (Bridgette Wilson). Upon hearing of his father’s less than stellar opinion of him and learning that his entire scholastic career was a lie Billy imposes a bet, of sorts - to go back to school (“to prove to dad that I’m not a fool”), two weeks a grade, Kindergarten to year 12, re-test, re-graduate and the company is his. ‘Billy Madison’ is the tale of an heir to a Fortune 500 hotel empire being pipped at the post for takeover by conniving employee Eric (Bradley Whitford). Collaborating with SNL writer Tim Herlihy, the pair wrote what was the first of many successful film projects together including ‘Happy Gilmore’, ‘The Water Boy’, ‘Big Daddy’ and the future ‘Pixels - and thus the beginning of a beautiful friendship. We saw what he was really made of, and it was damn funny. But it wasn’t until the over-privileged, layabout, dumbass Billy Madison decided to go back to school that Sandler broke out from the shadows of his more talented colleagues such as Mike Meyers, David Spade and Chris Farley. And let's not forget his “token white guy” status as Smitty in a handful of late 80s ‘The Cosby Show’ episodes. Appearing on both big and small, Sandler had been an SNL cast member for the past five years and showed off his big league chops next to Brendan Fraser and Steve Buscemi in ‘Airheads’ and Steve Martin in ‘Mixed Nuts’ the previous year. By the time ‘Billy Madison’ came around in 1995, Adam Sandler was no stranger to our screens.
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