The Rutles 2: Can’t Buy Me Lunch
(2002)
The lunch you make is equal to the lunch you take.
Tom Hanks
This is a chapter about a sequel to a Beatles mockumentary in a book about the work of Robin Williams?
Yes, because Robin makes a short appearance in The Rutles 2: Can’t Buy Me Lunch as German rockologist and sexologist Hans Hänkie.
At around fifteen minutes into Can’t Buy Me Lunch, Robin Williams appears as Hänkie, speaking fake German to someone off-screen. Then he launches into this obviously improvised monologue:
That was Hitler’s original design for a plane called the Shtupa, which was designed to drop large penises on the enemy. Screaming penises. The Shtupa would fall from the skies dropping penises. But they changed it to the Shtuka because they are afraid. Because Hitler only had one ball. And Göring had no balls.
Melvin the interviewer (Eric Idle) then asks, “What about the Rutles?”:
Oh, the Frauleins. Crazy for them. Yelling at them “[fake German].” Sounds like, “I want dick.” But no, it means, “I love you. I love you.” And they loved them. More than just love. They wanted them.
Melvin thanks him and Hänkie replies, “Oh, it’s great to talk with you. And will the check clear?” Melvin replies, “It’ll be a small one from the BBC.” Hänkie responds:
Oh, BBC. I remember listening to them as a child. “The chicken has no lips.” We would hear your broadcasting. “The fox is in a nightgown. I repeat. The fox is in a nightgown.” You are crazy people. I wonder how you won the war with these strange riddles you’re broadcasting. But yet the French blew up a train afterwards. I remember my uncle said, “The fox is in a nightgown,” and the train blew up. Yeah, I have bad memories.
Robin appears later on in the film, at around the fifty-one-minute mark. This is his second monologue:
Could you think of any Communist rock bands? No, I don’t think so. There was nothing called the Village People’s Republic, you know. There was no bands of two million gay Chinese.
Robin was a lifelong Beatles fan, but was just starting out in his career when the first mockumentary The Rutles: All You Need is Cash was produced in 1978, so he wasn’t in that film. But twenty-four years later, he was able to pay tribute to the Pre-Fab Four and make a (somewhat bizarre) appearance in Can’t Buy Me Lunch.
What the Critics Had to Say
Nathan Rabin: “The Rutles: All You Need Is Cash was a Beatles satire by people who clearly loved and understood their source material and bothered to get the details right. Rutles 2 qualifies as little more than an overly reverent tribute to the 1978 original, and it barely bothers with the details at all. (Robin Williams’s footage, in particular, looks as if it belongs in a different film, though nagging aesthetic concerns are always a secondary irritation when dealing with Williams.)” (from film.avclub.com, March 29, 2005)
©2020 Stephen Spignesi. All rights reserved.
(2002)
The lunch you make is equal to the lunch you take.
Tom Hanks
This is a chapter about a sequel to a Beatles mockumentary in a book about the work of Robin Williams?
Yes, because Robin makes a short appearance in The Rutles 2: Can’t Buy Me Lunch as German rockologist and sexologist Hans Hänkie.
At around fifteen minutes into Can’t Buy Me Lunch, Robin Williams appears as Hänkie, speaking fake German to someone off-screen. Then he launches into this obviously improvised monologue:
That was Hitler’s original design for a plane called the Shtupa, which was designed to drop large penises on the enemy. Screaming penises. The Shtupa would fall from the skies dropping penises. But they changed it to the Shtuka because they are afraid. Because Hitler only had one ball. And Göring had no balls.
Melvin the interviewer (Eric Idle) then asks, “What about the Rutles?”:
Oh, the Frauleins. Crazy for them. Yelling at them “[fake German].” Sounds like, “I want dick.” But no, it means, “I love you. I love you.” And they loved them. More than just love. They wanted them.
Melvin thanks him and Hänkie replies, “Oh, it’s great to talk with you. And will the check clear?” Melvin replies, “It’ll be a small one from the BBC.” Hänkie responds:
Oh, BBC. I remember listening to them as a child. “The chicken has no lips.” We would hear your broadcasting. “The fox is in a nightgown. I repeat. The fox is in a nightgown.” You are crazy people. I wonder how you won the war with these strange riddles you’re broadcasting. But yet the French blew up a train afterwards. I remember my uncle said, “The fox is in a nightgown,” and the train blew up. Yeah, I have bad memories.
Robin appears later on in the film, at around the fifty-one-minute mark. This is his second monologue:
Could you think of any Communist rock bands? No, I don’t think so. There was nothing called the Village People’s Republic, you know. There was no bands of two million gay Chinese.
Robin was a lifelong Beatles fan, but was just starting out in his career when the first mockumentary The Rutles: All You Need is Cash was produced in 1978, so he wasn’t in that film. But twenty-four years later, he was able to pay tribute to the Pre-Fab Four and make a (somewhat bizarre) appearance in Can’t Buy Me Lunch.
What the Critics Had to Say
Nathan Rabin: “The Rutles: All You Need Is Cash was a Beatles satire by people who clearly loved and understood their source material and bothered to get the details right. Rutles 2 qualifies as little more than an overly reverent tribute to the 1978 original, and it barely bothers with the details at all. (Robin Williams’s footage, in particular, looks as if it belongs in a different film, though nagging aesthetic concerns are always a secondary irritation when dealing with Williams.)” (from film.avclub.com, March 29, 2005)
©2020 Stephen Spignesi. All rights reserved.