FILM 1517: MYSTERY MEN
TRIVIA: According to Ben Stiller in an
interview on Late Show
with David Letterman (1993), he and Greg Kinnear got into a
heated argument on the set. Afterwards, Stiller tried to be released from the
film.
Tom Waits' odd hand
gestures when explaining the psychofrakulator were the result of him writing
his dialogue on his fingers and reading the words as he went along.
A number of the sets used in the
film are the same sets used in Batman
Forever (1995).
The Mystery Men were the supporting
cast of an underground superhero comic book called the Flaming Carrot. Mr.
Furious and the Shoveler were the only ones from the comic to make it into the
movie. Captain Amazing was created as a replacement for the Flaming Carrot, who
was felt to be too bizarre to bring to the silver screen.
The Bowler's
stream-of-consciousness monologue in support of independent filmmaking at the
conclusion of the film was originally not intended to be included in the
finished print. Janeane
Garofalo was instructed by director Kinka Usher to say
whatever came to her mind at the time (Usher simply wanted to use up some
excess film.) Usher liked her performance so much he edited it into the final
print.
CAMEOS: Michael Bay (noted action
director) and Riki Rachtman,
(former host of MTV's Headbangers
Ball (1987)) as two of the Frat Boys. Bay asks "can we bring
the brewskies?".
According to Hank Azaria, the cast
argued constantly with each other over the comedic tone of the film.
As the team enters Dr. Heller's
amusement park workshop, creepy music is heard. This is not just incidental
music, but turns out to be Dr. Heller practicing on a 'waterphone', the strange
cylindrical device with steel wires he can briefly be seen holding. The
waterphone is primarily used in the motion picture industry in the composition
of creepy incidental music.
In an odd parallel, Tom Waits actually creates
curious machines from junk and hardware store purchases, in the same way that
his character (Dr. Heller) does. Waits' machines are musical, and one is
6-stringed steel dumpster.
A subtle reference to William Shatner: once,
while recording lines for the video game Star Trek: Judgment Rites
(1993), Shatner pronounced "sabotage" strangely and was asked twice
to repeat the line. He finally blurted, "Don't tell me how to act - it
sickens me!" In Mystery Men
(1999), this line is repeated by Ben Stiller.
Later, Janeane Garofalo says to
Stiller, "You say 'sabotage', I say 'saboTAGE'," another Shatner
quote from the Star Trek recording session.
Ricky Jay's character
tells Captain Amazing, "I'm a publicist, not a magician." Jay is in
fact a well-known magician.
In a 2011 interview with A.V. Club,
Hank Azaria claimed that
during production Kinka Usher
declared "I'm going back to commercials when this is done. I've had
enough. I'd much rather do my cool little one-minute shorts that I make than
deal with all this nonsense."
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