Stay Tuned is one of those movies that tries too hard to a movie for everyone that it never really pushes the boundaries of what it could’ve been capable of. This, I’m sure, is because the production company, Morgan Creek, was in need of a huge hit.
That would come later in 1992 with their graphically violent adaptation of The Last of the Mohicans. But Stay Tuned might have worked if Tim Burton had remained on the project and they spent more money to have Dan Aykroyd in the lead role as Roy Knable (John Ritter.) Nothing against the late Ritter but aside from a 30-second Three’s Company joke, it’s the type of role any actor who’s been successful on TV and the movies could do.
Roy is a middle-aged suburban husband/father whose life is so uneventful he spends his spare time watching TV. He’s neglected his wife, Helen (Pam Dawber) who has actually become more successful in her career and wants a partner who at least looks at her. Their kids are the basic stable of Gen X stereotypes. Their son, Daryl (David Tom), is a computer/mechanical geek because he wears glasses. (David Koresh and Jeremy Dahmer wore glasses too.) And their daughter, Diane (Heather McComb), is going through the typical junior high transition where she’s wanting to be an older woman and be with her family less. She basically looks like she’s imitating Blossom, which I’m sure was intentional.
But there’s trouble brewing as Helen gets fed up with Roy as he takes on a free trial for a huge satellite in the backyard and a new TV set. Looking at it now, over 30 years later, it might be hard for some people to imagine but there were people who would put these satellite dishes the were over 10 feet tall in their backyards. Now everyone streams. I don’t think anyone who still have with Dish Network or DirectTV.
But this is not an ordinary satellite. It’s actually a device that sucks its users into Hell as Johnny Spike (Jeffrey Jones) is always searching for fresh souls. The thing is Spike is the head of a major department in Hell where people who sign up for have 24 hours to stay alive as they bounce around channels. Just like A Nightmare on Elm Street, if they die on a TV show/movie, they die in real life. One of their neighbors, Murray Sidelbaum (Bob Dishy) and his wife have also been sucked into Hell.
The movie works somewhat as a demented parody of popular TV shows and movies. The writers described it as “Monty Python meets Evil Dead.” But since the movie is rated PG, it never does really go extreme as it could. There is some dark humor here but it plays it too safe. In Hell, movies have a twisted version of entertainment such as Three Men and Rosemary’s Baby and Driving Over Miss Daisy where an elderly woman is run over by a car driven by Spike.
At one moment, Roy finds himself on a show called Duane’s Underworld, a parody of Wayne’s World where everyone are ghouls including the audience. One of the movie’s highlights is when Roy and Helen find themself in an animated cartoon as house mice who are chased by a robot cat monster. This was made through Chuck Jones Productions and has its charm. But like I said, it plays it too soft.
Eugene Levy plays Crowley, an underling of Spike’s who is sent out in the field when he gets on Spike’s bad side. At one point, his fingers begin to fall off when he meets Roy and Helen on Northern Overexposure. But there’s not much violence and the humor works on word play such as The Fresh Prince of Darkness, The Golden Ghouls and a Leave It to Beaver style show focusing on Charles Manson as child.
Yet, it never really does much with the concepts except present a title card or 30-second spot. And that’s probably why audiences stayed away as the movie doesn’t go for the jugular the way it should. I’m almost certain it was rewritten a lot. The Duane’s Underworld scene feels like it was added late in production or even in post to become more relevant. Wayne’s World had been released six months earlier.
And maybe because the movie was released on Aug. 14, 1992, people were getting ready to go back to school and a lot of people didn’t want to spend their last few days in a movie theater. Still 30 years later, it avoids the problems of many parody movies, most notably the ones by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer (who thankfully haven’t made a movie in 10 years). Something that might be popular in 1992 may not be popular in 1995 and definitely 2015.
I’m not sure the younger audiences expecting a silly comedy knew about Northern Exposure or ThirtySomething of who Charles Manson was. But it doesn’t wear a joke down the way other parody movies have done. Still the movie kinda falls apart at the end. Ritter does handle the role well while he never was a big movie star, he had the right charm. It’s just sad that he still died with a lot more left to offer.
it might be hard seeing Jones (a convicted child sexual predator) as Spike even though he has fun in the role. There’s always been something a little off about Jones and the movie was filmed a whole decade before he was convicted. But you’re wondering if there were other cases were authorities weren’t contact or even an investigation wasn’t conducted. At least Spike gets what’s coming to him while Jones continues to work in movies and on TV.
So maybe Hell may not be that bad.
What do you think? Please comment.
Zane Says 