FLOP CULTURE

POPEYE

The salty sailor’s spinach did not slip down smoothly with viewers in 1980. Was Robert Altman’s stoned musical too offbeat for mass digestion?

Why it was a good idea (on paper)

Maverick filmmakers, a fast-rising star, beloved IP. Between producer Robert Evans (Chinatown), director Robert Altman (Nashville), live-wire lead Robin Williams (Mork & Mindy) and cartoonist E.C. Segar’s cock-eyed creation, Paramount/Disney’s musical comedy promised to be the spinach-enhanced family splash of Christmas 1980.

What went wrong?

If pre-production was choppy, the production was choppier. Dustin Hoffman was courted for the lead, until he chafed with writer Jules Feiffer and jumped ship. Enter Robin Williams, the wild-mannered stand-up eager to graduate from TV. ‘This is my Superman,’ he recalled thinking, ‘and it’s gonna go through the fuckin’ roof.’ The budget did, blasting beyond $20m while the shoot ran overschedule. Evans’ pick of several directors was Altman, a bold but risky choice to steer a studio project. Partly to avoid LA’s input, Altman shot in Malta, where distressed village Sweethaven was built from scratch with crew bases incorporated. Feiffer and songwriter Harry Nilsson were on set, reworking the dialogue/lyrics that were shot – Altman’s preference – live. This proto-Nolan strategy made the already mangled words tough to understand on screen. And Williams’ improvisatory energies were tougher still to direct. Meanwhile, drugs were rife, with Evans giving the studios hernias when he mislaid bags full of them. Oops.

Redeeming feature

Shelley Duvall, as Olive Oyl, and Williams are fun, and Nilsson’s music is a sea-legged pleasure, as superfan Paul Thomas Anderson might agree. Messiness and crap octopus aside, Popeye yis what it yis – an Altman-esque auteur portrait of a bustling community…

What happened next?

…but it isn’t Superman, which was what the studios supposedly wanted. Duly, Altman’s already wobbly studio reputation was destroyed in the 80s.

Should it be remade?

Sony canned Genndy Tartakovsky’s proposed 2010s animation. But Altman’s Sweethaven still stands as a tourist site. Could it be reused for a daring director’s – paraphrasing Olive Oyl – ‘good-gotten’ reboot gains?