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Freaked
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Release:
Oct 1993
Producers:
Stephen Chiodo, Harry J. Ufland, and Mary Jane Ufland
Cast:
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| Plot Synopsis: Ricky Coogan (Winter), a former child actor, is hired by a South American company to advertise their fertilizer - Zygrot 24. His intial misgivings about the job (rumor has it the stuff is poisonous) are pushed aside by the dangling of a sweet $5 million salary, so off he goes to Santa Flan. There he meets up with protestors, a female activist (Ward), and an evil sideshow director, Elijah C. Skuggs (Quaid), who kidnaps him and uses the very chemical he's promoting to transform him into a hideous mutuant. Just a tad ticked about what being a pus-covered, spiny monster will do to his acting career, Coogan decides to join forces with Skugg's other victims - including Ortiz, the Dog-faced boy (Reeves), the Bearded Lady (Mr. T), and Sockhead (Goldthwait) - leading a rebellion against the sideshow director. | ||
| Director's Comments: "He felt that moving from a Coppola movie to ours was a needed step up for him. He just begged me. I had problems with the studio, but I twisted their arms. I know he's done Dracula, but this may come out before that, so his reputation will be intact ... But seriously, we're just friends. Tom and I worked with [Keanu] before on a short film, and we had a really good time. He's been around so many years and we've been talking about this project all that time: he's always wanted to be in it. It's the kind of comedy Keanu does really well, but doesn't get a chance to do very much. It's one of his strengths as an actor."--Alex Winter | Keanu's Comments: Well, I worked in it for eight days with Alex, Tom Stern, and Tim; I don't know Tim's last name - sorry, Tim! (cupping a hand over his mouth, the other over his heart) ...[Alex's] comedy is physical, dark, usually social commentary; I guess the base of it is bitterness at original sin, at the spit and shit of man. It's Alex's first film and he plays a successful actor who's full of himself and gets hired by this company to push all these different products. The company suits are going, 'We want you to represent all these things,' so then they say, 'We want you to represent this chemical, Zygrot 24', and he goes, 'No way, I heard that stuff was poisonous.' But when they work up to, 'Five million' he goes: 'Okay!' So, he goes to this make-believe Central American place called Santa Flan and there's protesters, then him and this biased American girl hook up. He buys a crutch, clothing and bandages so that he can disguise himself as a cripple, and they stop at this freak show where Randy Quaid, the freakmaster, captures them and rubs on him this poisonous Zygrot stuff that he was going to represent. It turns him into a half-beast, half-normal guy, Beast Boy. And I play Ortiz the Dogboy, the leader of the freaks in this house of freaks. I had canine teeth and makeup and got to play him. (bounding from his seat, opening his mouth wide, flinging out his arms, and bellowing a resounding "Aaaahhhhhhh!")that makes [the interviewer] wonder if Ortiz the Dogboy is related somehow to Tarzan, the Ape Man) Muy macho, man. I based my character upon Che Guevara, Fidel Castro and Tom Jones." | |
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Running time:
86 minutes
"I don't find dogs sexy, but he was the funniest freak in the movie! Loved the squirrel chase!"
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