Published on Nov 12, 1999
Adam Sandler is either the next Lenny Bruce comic genius, or an
amazing bullshit artist.
His first comedy album,
They’re All Gonna Laugh At You!, had some moments of
brilliance on it, but the sketch work of Sandler and a group of his
“Saturday Night Live”-era friends often dipped too far into the
scatalogical side of humor.
For about 30 minutes into his sophomore release
What The Hell Happened To Me?, I thought that things were
looking up for Sandler and his style of humor. True, the material
still wasn’t for the kiddies, but it was an improvement over what I
had heard on the first album.
And then, I hit the second part of the album… and all my good
feelings went right down the toilet with the new level of humor (if
that’s indeed what I heard oozing from my speakers). Please,
someone tell this guy that a skit about a mother wanting her
teenage kids to play with themselves – and
her offering to play with their privates – is about as funny
as a fistfight. This shit isn’t funny. It’s sick.
Let’s go back to the few pluses on
What The Hell Happened To Me? that made me hold out some
promise. The one song that made me want to pick up this album, “Ode
To My Car,” sounds like it could have been written about my wife’s
1988 Plymouth Horizon. The only problem is that the joke on this
one gets old real quick, and the song doesn’t hold up to repeat
listens.
Some of the early sketches, like “Respect,” “Joining The Cult”
and “The Chanukah Song,” are truly funny, and while the fart jokes
on “The Hypnotist” get old quickly, it’s still a pretty good
sketch. Same goes for “The Goat,” a bit which has now become a
trademark of Sandler’s. It’s hysterical to think of a bunch of
slackers standing around joking with a talking goat – and it’s
executed well by Sandler and his buddies.
The trouble starts with the series of sketches featuring “The
Excited Southerner”. Granted, this character is nowhere as
repulsive as “The Buffoon” from
They’re All Gonna Laugh At You!, but these sketches just
aren’t funny. It’s almost as if they were short snippets to break
up main sketches.
But compared to “The Adventures Of The Cow,” these vignettes
seem like brilliance. “The Adventures Of The Cow” are a series of
shorts all laced together that put a cow in certain positions, like
getting a prank call or driving around town. This is just boring,
and should have been cut.
And then, there’s Sandler’s fascination with sex and all its
weird forms. Do yourself a favor, and skip “Do It For Your Mama,”
the previously ranted-about sketch. Christ, if anyone else had said
these lines on a street corner, they’d be put on the pervert list
in that town. Likewise, “Crazy Love” and “Memory Lane” touch on
this, but they thankfully don’t take it to the extreme that “Do It
For Your Mama” does. Be this as it may, these bits just aren’t
funny.
Even some of the songs can’t save this album this time. “Mr.
Bake-O” and the title track all can’t deliver on expectations,
while “Dip Doodle” again goes into a bit of scatalogical humor in
an attempt to remind people to “respect the grandma”. Give me a
fuckin’ break.
What The Hell Happened To Me? is yet another attempt by
Sandler to aim at the pre-teen market who get off on this
weak-kneed kind of humor. I’d rather have my kid watching “Beavis
And Butt-Head” than listen to this shit. Sandler really needs to
wake up and realize that comedy is a helluva lot more than talking
about playing with one’s genitals… ’cause right now, he’s jerking
himself off if he thinks this stuff is the pinnacle of comedy.