Why Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World filmed in India:
Some of the Arab press, Mr. Brooks said, questioned his decision to set the film in India and Pakistan rather than an Arab country. “I said, ‘Well, if you can get me permission to shoot in Saudi Arabia, let me know,’ ” he said. “Because it was not happening when I was making calls. That was shut down within five minutes, with ‘What, are you insane?’ They’re not going to let a Jewish man, much less a filmmaker, in there. That’s just not going to happen. But I wanted the conflict between the two countries. I knew in writing this that I wanted to take two existing powers that are always suspicious of each other, and that was the one place you could do that. The idea was always that I go to do a peace mission, and I almost start World War III.”
Dude, Johnny Lever is still very much around, on film and on stage:
Comedy in the Muslim world (Arab or otherwise) can indeed be hard to find. “Today, stand-up comedians just don’t really exist,” Mr. Usman said. “But they did once. I have albums from the 70’s. The big, towering guy from Pakistan is called Moin Akhtar, and another guy, who was his contemporary, was Umar Sharif. And there was a guy in India who was really famous, who used the name Johnny Lever. They basically did one-man shows, with a lot of improv and sketch comedy, but with a small portion of what we would call stand-up.”
I dunno, the previews seemed similarly lame to me:
Once Mr. Brooks chose India as his setting, he visited the minister of information. “He told me that Steven Spielberg had wanted to shoot ‘Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom’ there, and they wouldn’t allow it, because they didn’t like the scene where they ate monkey brains,” Mr. Brooks said. “I said, ‘I don’t do that,’ and I think they were really appreciative that I didn’t have the whole scene where the cow stops traffic. They’ve seen that so much, and they hate it…” “I get nervous when I hear people are doing something about India, because usually it’s done with so little intelligence,” Ms. Sheth said.
India is indeed a weird choice for this movie. I can understand why he could not go to Saudi Arabia but I would imagine that he would have no problems in a country like Morocco, Turkey or Malaysia.
India is indeed a strange choice,
but I must applaud the fact that Brooks is so consciously non-Orientalist. I bet we won’t see colours, hullaballo in orchards or squabbling in spice-markets in this movie.
As are Moin Akhtar and (sadly!) Umar Sharif.
Yeah, that reminds me, What the hell was that scene all about?! I don’t ever recall from Indian history in any part of India where Indians eat or ever ate monkey brains, bugs, or snakes. That was a gross ummm… what’s the word I’m looking for here. Anyway, you know what I mean. Speilberg and Lucas should compensate us all Indians for that gross [insert word here].
India has the second largest muslim population in the world so i can understand why he would choose india or indonesia. Looking at Greater India(better than SA) including neighbors like bangladesh, pakistan you get the largest group of muslims in the world. PS standup comedy has allways been alive in india. All the funny comedians forgot comedy when they ‘moved up the ladder’ from stage/Tv and onto movies. Thats what happened to Johnny Lever. Now on indian cable there are shows called Great Indian Laughter Challange/champion which showcases several comedians. With radio being privatized that will also increase regional language comics.
Johnny Lever’s given name is John Rao. Mr.Rao belongs to a Telugu family from Bombay. The senior Mr.Rao is believed to have moved into Bombay from his native Andhra Pradesh to work at Hindustan Lever’s Sewri works in the ’50s. Johnny Lever made his debut at a staff/workmen’s mela and became so popular that movie roles followed within no time at all.
Guru Gulab Khatri said:
Agreed, but India is hardly an Islamic country and Indian Muslims have hardly any hostility towards Americans as compared to those from other muslim/arabic countries, and if I am not mistaken the plot is that the US govt wants to improve its relations with hostile muslim countries/sources of terrorists. All this makes the inclusion of India as part or representative of the “Muslim World” all the more ridiculous and ignorant especially when the film makers claim to have been authentic.
I havent seen this movie yet, but I guess it is not going to be very funny.
And yes, The Great Indian Laughter Challenge/Champions was an immensely successful program in India and some of the comedians were really funny and original.
According to wikipedia, India has the third largest muslim poulation after Indonesia and Pakistan. So, technically, filming the movie in the second and third largest Muslim countries makes sense. However, the IMDB synopsis for this movie says “To improve their relations with Muslim countries, The U.S. Government assigns comedian Albert Brooks to find out what makes the Muslim people laugh”. From my limited knowledge of world politics, this plot would require a Middle East setting (or faking it at the least). IMDB incidentally does not have any flattering reviews of the movie either… and I hope it is not just another attempt at pretentious holier than thou humor showcasing subcontinental cliches from a western standpoint.
It seems almost impossible for it not to be, but I guess I’ll try to withold judgment until I see it.
That “third largest” muslim population argument doesn’t hold water at all, because it is a very small percentage of the total. You’d have to ignore 900 Million Hindus to get an all muslim audience to test comedy on.
Well go to old delhi, Bhopal(city), Aligarh and you see 90% + muslims. So you’d get enough to test the comedy.
I was in India this past December and early January. While in Karwar, I was watching TV for an hour, and spent a good amount of time laughing from the great standup by Johnny Lever. While maybe he doesn’t perform as often, he still does stand-up.
Note: A few months ago one of my friends asked me the same question regarding the film. All I could muster up was that I think that India has more Muslims than the whole of the “middle east” combined (please don’t ask me to define the middle east). While Muslims are a minority, their slim percentage becomes a huge amount of people, considering India’s high population. But still..why India/Pakistan? I guess we’ll leave up to the film to tell us why. I think I remember reading somewhere that the director answered this by saying it was part of the humor to showcase the US’s ignorance by sending someone on a “Muslim” mission to a muslim-minority country. Anybody have that link?
The article clearly says that a critical element to the plot was that he goes there on goodwill and “accidently” almost starts World War III. I am assuming that plot twist is not really possible if he chose Malaysia and Indonesia.
By some accounts there are more Muslims in India than the total population of Pakistan (depends on which sets of numbers you use), but it is definitly close.
Well go to old delhi, Bhopal(city), Aligarh and you see 90% + muslims. So you’d get enough to test the comedy.
Aligarh has less than 20% Muslims. Old Delhi has around 25-30% Muslims.
The western perspective has always been an outsiders view and doesnt try to know the real inside. Indiana Jones depicts Indians eating monkeys head and snakes (whatever happened to Hanuman and Nagdevta), Mars attacks depicts Indians as aborginals like the kalahari bushmen of Africa. Havent watched “looking for humour….” but India does seem to be an odd choice. Just because everything Indian is making waves, doesnt mean you can fabricate things to market your product better. India has around 15% as compared to 95- 100% of Saudi Arabia, Pak, Bangladesh etc.
India is the second largest English-speaking muslim population. To shoot in Pakistan is not that realistic given that Mr Brooks would’ve been stabbed upon his arrival and Indonesians (esp. its muslims population which are still rural) do not speak english and surely have never heard about stand-up comedy. That’s why India is the best and most realistic location for the movie.