Jason Friedberg (born October 13, 1971) and Aaron Seltzer (born January 12, 1974) are American and Canadian filmmakers. They have primarily worked on parody films, which they began writing and directing during the mid-2000s. Friedberg and Seltzer's first five films between 2006 and 2010 received wide theatrical releases to mostly commercial success, but universally negative reviews; their films '' Epic Movie'' (2007), ''
Meet the Spartans
''Meet the Spartans'' is a 2008 American parody film written and directed by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer. The film is mainly a parody of the 2006 film ''300'', although it also references many other films, TV shows, people and pop cultural ...
'' and '' Disaster Movie'' (both 2008) are considered among the worst ever made. Except for '' Vampires Suck'' (2010), their next films during the 2010s drew less attention due to receiving limited theatrical releases.
Biography
Interviews with the duo are rare, but in an exclusive 2014 interview with the publication '' Grantland'', their background was discussed: Seltzer is part of a Canadian shoe salesmen family from
Mississauga, Ontario
Mississauga ( ), historically known as Toronto Township, is a city in the Canadian province of Ontario. It is situated on the shores of Lake Ontario in the Regional Municipality of Peel, adjoining the western border of Toronto. With a popul ...
, and Friedberg, who was born in
Newark, New Jersey
Newark ( , ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey and the seat of Essex County and the second largest city within the New York metropolitan area.Paterson, New Jersey
Paterson ( ) is the largest City (New Jersey), city in and the county seat of Passaic County, New Jersey, Passaic County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey.Rick Friedberg. Seltzer and Friedberg met at the
University of California, Santa Barbara
The University of California, Santa Barbara (UC Santa Barbara or UCSB) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Santa Barbara County, California, Santa Barbara, California with 23,196 undergraduate ...
and bonded over their love of film, especially comedy. Both are Jewish. They did not attend film school, with Seltzer majoring in art history and Friedberg in history, but decided to try a career in the film industry after attending a class about
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese ( , ; born November 17, 1942) is an American film director, producer, screenwriter and actor. Scorsese emerged as one of the major figures of the New Hollywood era. He is the recipient of List of awards and nominatio ...
in their last semester.
''Spy Hard'', ''Scary Movie'' and screenwriting
While writing screenplays at night, both spent the day attending jobs to pay their
tuition
Tuition payments, usually known as tuition in American English and as tuition fees in Commonwealth English, are fees charged by education institutions for instruction or other services. Besides public spending (by governments and other public bo ...
, selling homemade T-shirts, starting their own food delivery service, and opening shoe shops in Los Angeles. When Rick Friedberg made the comic instruction video ''
Bad Golf Made Easier
''Bad Golf Made Easier'' is a 1993 33-minute video by actor Leslie Nielsen. It is a parody of golf and other golf videos and books. It demonstrates many humorous bad golf swings, and a slogan found in it is: "I don't play golf to feel bad; I pl ...
'' with Leslie Nielsen, he showed his son's script for a spy film spoof to him. Nielsen approved, and this led to 1996's ''
Spy Hard
''Spy Hard'' is a 1996 American spy parody film starring Leslie Nielsen (who also executive produced) and Nicollette Sheridan, parodying James Bond and other action films. The introduction to the film is sung by comedy artist "Weird Al" Yanko ...
''.
Friedberg and Seltzer then spent some years as screenwriters for hire, with Seltzer estimating the duo sold "upward of 40 scripts". The only finished project was an uncredited rewrite to the Jean-Claude Van Damme film ''
Maximum Risk
''Maximum Risk'' is a 1996 American action thriller film directed by Hong Kong director Ringo Lam in his American directorial debut, and starring Jean-Claude Van Damme and Natasha Henstridge. The film was released in the United States on Septembe ...
'' (1996), while an unproduced
Liberace
Władziu Valentino Liberace (May 16, 1919 – February 4, 1987) was an American pianist, singer, and actor. A child prodigy born in Wisconsin to parents of Italian and Polish origin, he enjoyed a career spanning four decades of concerts, recordi ...
biopic (unrelated to ''Behind The Candelabra'') introduced them to future collaborator and producer Peter Safran. In 1998, Safran managed to sell to
Miramax
Miramax, LLC, also known as Miramax Films, is an American film and television production and distribution company founded on December 19, 1979, by brothers Harvey and Bob Weinstein, and based in Los Angeles, California.
It was initially a leadi ...
's
Dimension Films
Dimension Films is an American film production company owned by Lantern Entertainment. It was formerly used as Harvey and Bob Weinstein's label within Miramax, which was acquired by The Walt Disney Company on June 30, 1993, to produce and relea ...
division a
horror film
Horror is a film genre that seeks to elicit fear or disgust in its audience for entertainment purposes.
Horror films often explore dark subject matter and may deal with transgressive topics or themes. Broad elements include monsters, apoca ...
spoof spec script of Friedberg and Seltzer's named ''Scream If You Know What I Did Last Halloween''.
Shawn Wayans
Shawn Mathis Wayans (born January 19, 1971) is an American actor, comedian, writer, and producer. Along with his brother Marlon Wayans, he wrote and starred in The WB's sitcom ''The Wayans Bros.''(1995–1999) and in the comedy films ''Don't Be a ...
and
Marlon Wayans
Marlon Lamont Wayans (born July 23, 1972) is an American actor, comedian, writer, and producer. Wayans began his career portraying a pedestrian in ''I'm Gonna Git You Sucka'' (1988). He went on to regularly collaborate with his brother Shawn Wa ...
, with Buddy Johnson and Phil Beauman, developed a similar project and, thanks to a WGA decision, all six writers were credited on what became ''
Scary Movie
''Scary Movie'' is a 2000 American slasher parody film directed by Keenen Ivory Wayans and written by Marlon and Shawn Wayans (who both also star), alongside Buddy Johnson, Phil Beauman, Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer. Starring Anna Far ...
'', despite Friedberg and Seltzer not actually working on the final script. The film was a
sleeper hit
In the entertainment industry, a sleeper hit is a film, television series, music release, video game, or some other entertainment product that was initially unsuccessful on release but became a success later on. A sleeper hit may have little promo ...
in 2000, bringing much attention to Friedberg and Seltzer.
Directing
Tired of unmade projects as screenwriters, and with Regency Enterprises unable to find a director for their
romantic comedy
Romantic comedy (also known as romcom or rom-com) is a subgenre of comedy and slice of life fiction, focusing on lighthearted, humorous plot lines centered on romantic ideas, such as how true love is able to surmount most obstacles. In a typica ...
spoof, Seltzer and Friedberg opted to direct ''
Date Movie
''Date Movie'' is a 2006 American romantic comedy parody film written by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, directed by Seltzer, and produced by Paul Schiff and Friedberg. It was released on February 17, 2006 by 20th Century Fox and stars Alys ...
'' (2006) themselves. ''Date Movie'' opened with $12.1 million and earned $48.9 million overall. Moving forward, they would direct their own scripts, leading to a long tract of parody films, spoofing major blockbusters. ''Disaster Movie'' opened with $5.8 million and earned $14.2 million total in the United States. ''Vampires Suck'', which opened on a Wednesday, earned an estimated $19.7 million in its first five days.
Announced projects
Friedberg and Seltzer announced their intention to release ''Who the F#@K Took My Daughter?'', a parody of '' Taken''. On February 8, 2017, it was reported they were developing a parody of ''
Star Wars
''Star Wars'' is an American epic film, epic space opera multimedia franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the Star Wars (film), eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide popular culture, pop-culture Cultural impact of S ...
'' titled ''Star Worlds Episode XXXIVE=MC2: The Force Awakens The Last Jedi Who Went Rogue'', whose filming was scheduled for late 2017.
Filmography
Other
Recurring cast members
Crista Flanagan
Crista Flanagan (born February 24, 1976) is an American actress and comedian, best known for her work as a cast member on the Fox sketch comedy series ''MADtv'' from 2005 to 2009, various roles in films made by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, ...
The critical reception of Friedberg and Seltzer's films have been overwhelmingly negative. Common criticisms of their work include being heavily reliant on pop culture references, passing trends, product placement, scatological gags, gratuitous nudity, casual violence and offensive stereotypes for their humor, as well as mistaking plagiarism for parody. They hold the lowest average
IMDb
IMDb (an abbreviation of Internet Movie Database) is an online database of information related to films, television series, home videos, video games, and streaming content online – including cast, production crew and personal biographies, ...
rating of all directors with 10 or more titles to their name, with an average of 3.1/10. ''Disaster Movie'' and ''Meet the Spartans'' were rated the two worst films of 2008 by ''
The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...
''. Additionally, every film they have directed has made it into
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
' "Worst of the Worst" for the 2000s, only one scoring a spot outside of the bottom 25. The pair appears more often than any other person on the fan-voted list of "The 50 Worst Movies Ever" in noted British film magazine ''
Empire
An empire is a "political unit" made up of several territories and peoples, "usually created by conquest, and divided between a dominant center and subordinate peripheries". The center of the empire (sometimes referred to as the metropole) ex ...
''; almost all of their films appear with a rank, and all are mentioned in the full review text.
Flavorwire
''Flavorwire'' is a New York City-based online culture magazine. The site includes original feature articles, interviews, reviews, as well as content recycled from other sources. ''Flavorwire'' describes themselves as "a network of culturally con ...
collectively lists the duo's entire filmography at #9 in its list of the 50 worst films of all time, saying:
"You may as well lump them all together, because they all bleed together in cinematic hell: the 'parody' efforts of Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, which include ''
Date Movie
''Date Movie'' is a 2006 American romantic comedy parody film written by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, directed by Seltzer, and produced by Paul Schiff and Friedberg. It was released on February 17, 2006 by 20th Century Fox and stars Alys ...
Meet the Spartans
''Meet the Spartans'' is a 2008 American parody film written and directed by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer. The film is mainly a parody of the 2006 film ''300'', although it also references many other films, TV shows, people and pop cultural ...
'', '' Vampires Suck''. They're sad, limp affairs that have all but single-handedly reduced the 'spoof movie' from parody to mere quotation: From '' Napoleon Dynamite'' to '' Borat'' to the 'Leave Britney alone!' guy, no payoff delights these comic geniuses more than cutting away to the flavor of the month, presumably causing the audience to roar with laughter, smack themselves on the forehead, and exclaim, 'Hot damn, how the hell'd the
Kardashians
The Kardashian family, also referred to as the Kardashian–Jenner family, is an American family prominent in the fields of entertainment, reality television, fashion design, and business. Founded by Robert Kardashian and Kris Jenner (née Hough ...
end up in thar? Hyuck, hyuck!' Their most recent efforts, the ''Hunger Games'' parody ''
The Starving Games
''The Starving Games'' is a 2013 American parody film written and directed by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer and produced by Peter Safran. The film parodies ''The Hunger Games'' and it stars Maiara Walsh, Cody Christian, Brant Daugherty, Lau ...
Best Night Ever
''Best Night Ever'' is a 2013 American found footage comedy film written and directed by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer and produced by Jason Blum, Friedberg and Seltzer. The film took place in Boston, Massachusetts and Las Vegas, Nevada.
...
'', both sunk without a trace, meaning the jig might finally be up for these two rip-off artists."
The two are frequent nominees of the Golden Raspberry Awards. The first was a Worst Screenplay nomination for ''Epic Movie'' at the 2007 Razzies and the following year the pair were nominated for Worst Picture, Worst Director, and Worst Screenplay for both ''Meet the Spartans'' and ''Disaster Movie''. At the 2011 Razzies, ''Vampires Suck'' was nominated for Worst Picture, Worst Director, Worst Screenplay, and Worst Prequel, Remake, Rip-Off or Sequel.
Critic Josh Levin of ''
Slate
Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...
'' stated: Josh Rosenblatt of ''
The Austin Chronicle
''The Austin Chronicle'' is an alternative weekly newspaper published every Thursday in Austin, Texas, United States. The paper is distributed through free news-stands, often at local eateries or coffee houses frequented by its targeted demogr ...
'' said that "There's no nice way to say this, so I'll just say it: Writer/directors Friedberg and Seltzer are a scourge. They're a plague on our cinematic landscape, a national shame, a danger to our culture, a typhoon-sized natural disaster disguised as a filmmaking team, a Hollywood monster wreaking havoc on the minds of America's youth and setting civilization back thousands of years." Austin critic and animator
Korey Coleman
Korey Coleman (born September 9, 1971) is an American film critic, animator, filmmaker, voice actor, and comedian. He is best known for his now defunct film review site, Spill.com and its current spiritual successor Double Toasted.
Biography
...
, of
Spill.com
Spill.com was a movie and video game review, discussion and news website. It was the continuation of the 9-year-old Austin, Texas-based public-access television cable TV show called '' The Reel Deal''. There were four main film critic contributo ...
and
Double Toasted
Double Toasted is an entertainment website based in Austin, Texas. The site hosts weekly podcasts covering current events, pop culture, movie reviews and video games.
History
After the closure of Spill.com in 2013, Korey Coleman was encoura ...
, has claimed that he is "bothered" by the duo's films, as he believes they are dumbing down the film industry and popular culture in general, and saying: "Yes, we all know that a lot of movies put aside the more artistic aspects of film making to solely make a profit; we're not naive. But, the films that these two directors make are so blatant at being nothing more than a juvenile finger pointing at an image or mention of a popular trend that, to me, they seem exploitive of a young culture raised to have an ever-decreasing attention span, thanks to the internet and channel surfing and, this may sound a little crazy, but, I think it shows a slight de-evolution in what people will accept as entertainment".Vampires Suck Audio Review , Spill.com
Critic
Nathan Rabin
Nathan Rabin (; born April 24, 1976) is an American film and music critic. Rabin was the first head writer for ''The A.V. Club'', a position he held until he left the ''Onion'' organization in 2013.
also gave their work an indignant condemnation, calling them "comedy antichrists" and saying about their films:
"Spoof movies, as practiced by the cultural blight that is Seltzer-Friedberg, aren't just troubling from an aesthetic viewpoint. They're horrifying from a moral standpoint as well. The parody of the
Zucker brothers
Zucker is a German word meaning "sugar" and may refer to:
* Zucker (surname)
* Zücker, an album by the Fastbacks
* Zucker (Rosenstolz album), ''Zucker'' (Rosenstolz album), an album by Rosenstolz
* Laboratory rat#Zucker rat, ''Zucker'' laborator ...
and
Mel Brooks
Mel Brooks (born Melvin James Kaminsky; June 28, 1926) is an American actor, comedian and filmmaker. With a career spanning over seven decades, he is known as a writer and director of a variety of successful broad farces and parodies. He began h ...
is defined by love, knowledge, and appreciation: The Zucker brothers and Mel Brooks love, know, and appreciate the source material they're spoofing enough to get all the details perfect. The comedy of Seltzer-Friedberg, in sharp contrast, is defined by contempt: contempt for the attention span, intelligence, maturity, and frame of reference for the audience, and an even more raging contempt for the source material they're spoofing. Friedberg and Seltzer aren't writers; they're comic terrorists who cavalierly destroy what others create for their own ugly self-interest. Their success is entirely dependent on making comedy a dumber, crasser, less dignified place."