Chirs Rock plays Lance, a Harlem bike messenger who is returned in the body
of an elderly white millionaire - which is what Sontee (Regina King) sees
when she talks to him. |
Garry Shandling was in his usual, irreverent form. “Chris Rock told me he wanted to do a remake of a Warren Beatty movie,” chuckled the TV comedian, “and he couldn’t decide if it would be funnier to do Heaven Can Wait or Reds.” On the other hand, maybe Shandling was just passing on a joke to his audience: the Beatty gag sounds pretty much like the kind of thing that Rock - one of America’s edgiest comics - would say.
The occasion was the post-premiere party for Down to Earth, an updated version of Heaven Can Wait, starring, co-written and co-produced by Rock, which was held on a very wet night last month in LA. And the venue - the Ruby Club, just down Hollywood Boulevard from the Chinese Theatre - was overflowing with comedians. Rock’s idol, Eddie Murphy, was there. So were fellow Saturday Night Live alumni Adam Sandler, Ben Stiller and David Spade.
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Down to Earth is anything but a mundane choice of movie for stand-up comedian Chris Rock: it’s a romantic comedy which takes his talents in a whole new direction. Eleanor Singer profiles Hollywood’s newest star.
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All were on hand to pay tribute to a fellow comedian who had taken a risk with his career by starring in a romantic comedy (the US public would vote next day, boosting the film into second place, just behind monster hit Hannibal). The assembled comics may also have felt a twinge of identification with an early scene in the movie, in which Rock’s character, Lance, is so bad during an amateur stand-up night at the Apollo that he gets booed off stage. After all, what comedian is confident enough of his own stardom to be sure that his days of dying in front of a live audience are over? Even Rock had to keep reassuring himself it was only a movie.
“You know how a lot of baseball players just can’t hit in Yankee Stadium?” he says. “Well, Lance really sucks every time he plays the Apollo. He just freezes right up. Which is not a good thing because the crowd at the Apollo is the toughest anywhere. When they like you, they’re with you all the way. But when they don’t, they can be vicious. It’s like a gust of wind hits you from all those boos and knocks you off the stage. I had to keep telling myself it was just part of the movie!”
In Down to Earth - which Rock co-wrote with Lance Crouther, Ali Le Roi and Louis CK, all of whom work on his TV show - the comedian plays a Harlem bicycle messenger who gets hit by a truck. Before long, he is waiting in line behind velvet ropes to get into the Pearly Gates. It ain’t quick: even in heaven, pretty girls get special treatment and move to the front of the line.
When Lance finally gets there, however, he discovers there has been a mistake: Mr Keyes (Eugene Levy) has got his divine lines crossed and Lance’s time has yet to come. So the Head Guy, Mr King (Chazz Palminteri), offers to send him back to earth. This suits Lance, who reckons he has some unfinished business at the Apollo.
Only problem is, Lance’s body is no longer, er, serviceable, so they send him back in the body of one Charles Wellington, an elderly millionaire businessman who has just been bumped off by his scheming personal assistant (Greg Germann) and his loving wife (Jennifer Coolidge). This is not entirely a safe place to be, but it’s better than being dead, thinks Lance. Oh, and did I mention that Wellington, in addition to being elderly and rich, is white?
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