Fridae

You will either love this or hate this. It is flamboyant, outrageous
and ostentatious. And it may even be too campy for some LGBT viewers.
When the film debuted in the US last year, a lot of critics slammed
it and many audiences called it crap. But not us though. We belong
to the fruity minority who enjoyed it. And we think you should give
it a chance too.

The Producers stars gay actor Nathan Lane as a down-and-out
Broadway producer whose shows keep losing money. Matthew Broderick,
an accountant, comes to do Nathan's books one day and casually tells
him that, by means of creative accounting, he could make a fortune
from producing a huge flop. Nathan believes it is a fantastic idea,
so the two men embark on a search for the worst script and worst
director in the world.

After reading thousands of script, they finally choose a pro-Nazi
musical written by a Hitler lover (played hilariously by Will Ferrell).
As for the director, they pick a flaming queen (Gary Beach) who
comes with his own Village People entourage. Needless to say, the
show they are about to stage will shock and upset everyone. Big,
broad and brassy, The Producers is actually a remake of
a 1968 film. When that original film came out, Hitler's atrocities
in World War II were still fresh on people's mind and many viewers
found the film vulgar and excessive. But over the years, the 1968
film slowly gained cult favor. And in 2001, it was turned into a
phenomenally successful stage show starring Nathan Lane and Matthew
Broderick.

Director Susan Stroman directed that terrific 2001 stage version,
and she also adapted it for this 2005 film version. But very little
has changed. The over-the-top acting, the cheap and showy musical
numbers, the spectacularly kitschy costumes are all there. And they
can add up to give a huge headache to the average movie-goer who
are not used to seeing things done this big.

We suggest that you quickly learn to swing with the broad jokes
and big slapstick acting. And you might actually start to enjoy
it. Think of it this way. New Yorkers paid hundreds of dollars just
to see the stage show on Broadway, while you need only pay $9.