A Perfectly Cromulent Blog

Stiller-born

Seeing Ben Stiller's latest appearance on The Late Show, where he "hilariously" plummets to his death while throwing a dodgeball from a rooftop, I suddenly came to the startling conclusion (which many of you probably reached years ago) that the man just isn't that funny.

Further, I've come to realize that he never has been.

He fooled me for a while, I admit. I've still got some old episodes of The Ben Stiller Show taped, and while I always knew Bob Odenkirk was the funniest one on the show ("Maaaaanson!"), I must not have paid that much attention to the great writers the show had: Odenkirk, Judd Apatow, David Cross, Robert Cohen. Cohen and Apatow have worked on some great shows you may have heard of (the former on The Simpsons, Apatow on Freaks and Geeks and Undeclared). Stiller's only other current writing credit, on the other hand, is for the sporadically amusing Zoolander. And aside from a few decent celebrity impersonations on his show, he never really pulled off any big laughs.

Before taking a look at his entire career, I attributed his lack of funny to the natural tendency of formerly "indie" stars to abandon their quality acting pursuits to take an increasing number of mainstream roles as they get older (paging Steve Buscemi). Then again, I'm pretty sure Stiller's old stuff like Empire of the Sun and Next of Kin (Stiller and Swayze together for the first time!) don't exactly count as indie films. In other words, it's not the material, it's the performer. I don't even think he's a bad actor, just not a particularly funny one.

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These last few years, he's made some pretty questionable casting choices. Increasingly, every time I'd see Stiller in one of these bad roles, I'd try to recall the times he actually made me laugh in the hopes of reminding me that I used to find the guy amusing. Trouble is, I realized I'd been cobbling together bits recalled from across his career - not just one or two juicy parts - and several that he had little to do with: the "It's just a bunch of guys" comment from Zero Effect, for example, or his exchange with Harlan Williams in There's Something About Mary. Perhaps the funniest thing I can actually attribute to him is when Mr. Furious tells Casanova Frankenstein not to correct him because it "sickens" him (in Mystery Men), and even that is merely a dig at the genius that is Shatner.

Stiller's comedy movie parts (going back to 1994, anyway, when he started toplining) can be broken down into three basic templates: the stammering nebbish (SN), put upon by individuals and forces outside his control; the manic/angry freak-job (MF). who channels his emotions into comically positive results; and the sadistic asshole (SA), pretty self-explanatory. There's some overlap here and there, but you get the idea.

As I went through his filmography, I started to get progressively more annoyed with myself, because I could have sworn I found the guy funny at some point. Here's what I came up with, judge for yourself.

Reality Bites (SN) - I remember being occasionally amused by this when I first saw it, thanks to my current (at the time) crappy employment situation and tempered by my unbridled loathing for Ethan Hawkes' grungy Nazi character. Later viewings, however, have shown me the error of my ways. Advertising jingles are used as a subsititute for actual dialogue, and Stiller's bad guy (who's one of the few somewhat sympathetic characters in the movie) is neurotic yuppie so annoying his name is actually "Grates." Delicious. I sometimes wonder if Stiller didn't direct this movie just so he could make out with Winona Ryder.

Heavyweights (SA) - Stiller's fat camp owner who drives his hefty charges to mutiny (Tony Perkis sounds suspiciously similar to Dodgeball's White Goodman) might be his best role. Of course, this was written by Apatow, so Stiller had it easy.

Happy Gilmore (SA) - Stiller's retirement home orderly was his second sadistic asshole character in as many movies. It wouldn't be his last.

If Lucy Fell (MF) - Showcased our hero as a borderline psychotic, but in an allegedly humorous way.

Flirting with Disaster (SN) - A low-key role, but not bad. Also not that funny, however. Watching it all the way through is tough to do, unless you buy the premise that someone who looks like Patricia Arquette would ever be married to the vaguely simian Stiller.

Though she did date Nicolas Cage, didn't she?

The Cable Guy (SN) - Less memorable for Stiller's small role than the fact that this was his second big screen directorial effort. TCG got a lot of flack when it came out because it wasn't what people had come to expect from a Jim Carrey movie. I suspect that means they didn't find it funny, and they'd be right. No, no, hear me out. There are some amusing bits (the Medieval Times/Star Trek fight scene), but continuous pop culture references - also overused in Stiller's first director's gig, Reality Bites - do not comedy make (just read this blog for any length of time). and watching Jim Carrey portray a psychotic with a speech impediment for two hours isn't nearly as knee-slapping as it sounds.

Zero Effect (SN) - More straight man shenanigans for Stiller, this time to abet Bill Pullman's take on Sherlock Holmes. I liked this movie, but more for Pullman's performance and the gradual way the story unfolds. Stiller's not bad in it, but I think just about anyone could've handled the role of Arlo.

There's Something About Mary (SN) - Widely considered the high point of Stiller comedies, despite the fact he's the foil to Matt Dillon and Chris Elliott. The "franks and beans" scene is funny because of everyone's reactions, not really in how Stiller sells it, but the rest of the movie generally finds him befuddled by the goings-on around him. TSAM also marks one of the first appearances of Stiller's trademark mispronunciation gag, where he draws out the vocalization of an allegedly comical sounding word for alleged comical effect (see also Mystery Men and Meet the Parents). In this case, "Favre."

Your Friends and Neighbors - Uh, not a comedy.

Permanent Midnight - Also not a comedy, but damn I never get tired of films about successful people who piss their lives away for drugs. For my money, Hollywood can't make enough of these. Really.

Mystery Men (MF) - I actually enjoyed this movie quite a bit. Stiller, however, couldn't match the performances of William H. Macy (The Shoveller) and Paul Reubens (The Spleen). And Geoffrey Rush was excellent as well. Stiller got to misquote common phrases ("I'm a Pantera's box you do not want to open") and mispronounce words ("cadre") though, so I'm sure somebody found that amusing.

Keeping the Faith - Arf. Next.

Meet the Parents (SN) - The hype factor really fooled me on this one, as did all the "best comedy of the year" accolades. All we really get is Stiller settling into the twitchy Everyman groove that will define many his later comedy roles. I did find the idea of a septic tank leaking at an outdoor wedding to be amusing, however.

Zoolander (MF) - Stiller's third directorial effort is a scattershot collection of mild satire and dumb humor. An inspired Will Ferrell brings Mugatu to life, and also has the best lines, leaving Stiller to bludgeon us over and over with the fact that his character is really, really stupid. I appreciated the male model theory of political assassinations, but could've done with less of Stiller and Owen Wilson mugging on screen.

The Royal Tennenbaums (SN+MF) - It's probably my fault that I expected something as slyly hilarious as Rushmore from Wes Anderson, but TRT - while visually stunning - didn't do a lot for me. I can't really blame Stiller for this one, since most of the cast (with the exception of Bill Murray and Kumar Pallana) is mired in the same "is this a comedy or not?" conundrum.

Along Came Polly (SN) - Stiller plays an amped up version of Greg Focker from Meet the Parents. "Plays" might be an overstatement, as I'm convinced Stiller is now capable of flicking an internal switch in his hyopthalamus and knocking out a neurotic romantic comedy performance on autopilot.

Starsky and Hutch - Not seen at blog time.

Envy (SN) - Thank the box office performance of School of Rock for resurrecting this almost straight-to-video piece of crap, which is in the running for many "Worst of 2004" lists. Not even Christopher Walken as a deranged homeless man can take the pain of Stiller and Jack Black's phoned-in performances away.

Dodgeball (SA) - In a surprise twist, this movie produces a few laughs in spite of one of its lead actors. That actor being - who else - Stiller. "White Goodman" is possibly one of the most obnoxiously unfunny characters in cinematic history (he gets a good last line, I'll admit). Luckily they got Vince Vaughn, Rip Torn, and Steven Root to make up for it.

In retrospect, it does indeed appear that I was mistaken in finding much jocularity in Stiller's past performances. Fortunately, it doesn't look like I'll have that problem anytime soon: next up for Stiller is Meet the Fockers and the next Dreamworks SKG animation project, Madagascar. He stars in the latter with Chris Rock, who actually has a worse record in comedies than Stiller does, so you know I'm looking forward to this one.