Monday, January 11, 2010

There goes Mr. Humbug...There goes Mr. Sneer!

So Matt and I recently made it through the 12 episode BBC series of Oliver Twist. It was an authentic experience shot on video - the pure BBC experience. Once I was able to get over the expectation of the characters bursting out with tunes such as "Food Glorious Food", "Consider Yourself", "Who Will Buy" etc., I was able to enjoy it lots. Although, every once and a while I would make Matt stop the episode so that I could go to youtube.com and get my fix for the fitting song before we moved on in the plot.

Since it was the Christmas season at the time when we were watching it, we started thinking about some of the songs from the musical rendition of another Charles Dickins musical adaption, The Muppet Christmas Carol. Naturally, our thoughts turned to what muppets could play what characters from Oliver Twist. This is what we came up with thus far....

Oliver - Kermit
Artful Dodger - Gonzo or Animal (if we dare go that route)
Mr. Bumble- Statler and Waltdorf (suppose we could just duplicate this character)
Nancy- Miss Piggy
Fagin- Fozzie Bear (Wocka Wocka Wocka!)
Mr. Brownlow- Sam the Eagle

Since all muppet movies get at least one human character, Matt and I decided that would need to be saved for Bill Sykes. I am just not sure if the muppets could pull off the dark and the deep of this character. Don't get me wrong, those muppets are good at what they do. They just have a different appeal in what they do well. Also, we could throw in the Swedish Chef as himself during the "Please Sir, I want some more" scene. Beeker could be a beggar on the street somewhere in London. Scooter could be the Dodger's sidekick, etc.... Well you get the idea.

What are your thoughts? Any suggestions? Corrections? This is an open forum here.

4 comments:

LJ said...

I definitely agree that Bill Sikes should be a human. Maybe if they could exhume Oliver Reed...that guy was just so hairy and sinister and perfectly eeeeeeeville.

And I think your list of who should play who is perfect, except for these two:

Fagin: Dr. Teeth
Mr. Brownlow: Fozzie

And absolutely Gonzo should play Dodger. He'd be perfect.

cate said...

Good call on Mr. Teeth!

allyson elizabeth said...

This is jon, not allyson.
I hate to say it, but Robert Downey Jr. Destroying the entire character of Sherlock Holmes aside, he is a talented actor and surely could portray Sikes in a manner that balances the sinister with the bizarre and silly. It is a mupppet movie after all.

Lindsey Hicks said...

Fantastic job casting. I hope the muppets stumble on your blog, organize themselves and put this into action.