DIRECTOR
Danny DeVito

SCREENWRITER
Adam Resnick

PRODUCERS
Andrew Lazar
Peter MacGregor-Scott

CINEMATOGRAPHER
Anastas N. Michos

MUSIC
David Newman

EDITOR
Jon Poll

CAST

Robin Williams ("Rainbow" Randolph)
Edward Norton (Sheldon Mopes/Smoochy)
Danny DeVito (Burke)
Catherine Keener (Nora)
Jon Stewart (Stokes)
Harvey Fierstein (Mel Green)
Pam Ferris (Tommy Cotter)
Michael Rispoli (Spinner)
Vincent Schiavelli (Buggy)

MPAA rating: R
Running time: 108m
U.S. release: March 29, 2002
Video availability: VHS - DVD
Official website

Not even a week after the Oscars, here comes Death to Smoochy to pop Hollywood's balloon of self-satisfaction. If you groaned when Tom Cruise kicked off the Oscar show by declaring that we all now need Hollywood's brand of fantasy "more than ever," this dark, bitter, frequently outrageous little item is for you. Now more than ever, we need to be questioning what's fed to us -- as news, as official government policy, and as entertainment. Especially entertainment for kids, which often seems to be more about indoctrinating young minds into consumerism than about actual amusement or, perish the thought, education.

Popular kiddie-TV host "Rainbow" Randolph Smiley (Robin Williams) is in trouble: After he's caught taking parental bribes to ensure kids a slot on his show, he falls into disfavor and squalor. The network, casting about for an inarguably "squeaky-clean" replacement for Randolph, settles on the gentle idealist Sheldon Mopes (Edward Norton), who has developed a cheerfully didactic purple-rhino character named Smoochy. A good match for the network's newly prudish standards of ethics -- he has no skeletons in his closet, nor even probably a closet -- Sheldon creates headaches for the fatcats anyway: He can't get with the program -- he doesn't realize that his function is to look stupid, be harmless, and sell products. He actually wants to entertain and enlighten children. Which makes him maybe the biggest deviant among the many deviants recruited as kid's-show hosts by the network.

Directed by that cackling goblin of pop culture Danny DeVito, from an acrid script by Adam Resnick that never met an elaborate string of vituperation it didn't like, Death to Smoochy is only marginally about what its ads suggest -- the dethroned Randolph, crazed with jealousy and rage, brainstorming violent revenge on Sheldon. Even without Randolph, Sheldon has his share of enemies, including a shadowy big boss of the "Parade for Hope" charity (Harvey Fierstein), who wants in on the Smoochy money train. But Sheldon also makes some friends, including network exec Catherine Keener, who turns out to have a soft spot for men in rhino suits, and a punchy ex-boxer (the rambunctiously cartoonish Michael Rispoli) who finds a home on the show as Smoochy's "cousin Moochy." Death to Smoochy turns out to be about the struggle to maintain integrity in the face of success.

The movie is certainly funny enough, particularly when focusing on Edward Norton, who throws everything he's got into the naive, soy-dog-eating Sheldon, or Robin Williams, clearly enjoying this new grubby anti-Patch Adams stage of his career (he's got two other possible examples, Insomnia and One Hour Photo, coming up this year). Sheldon's heartfelt Smoochy songs (including a ditty called "My Stepdad's Not Mean, He's Adjusting") are dead-center whacks at touchy-feely kiddie tunes, and there's a Smoochy-on-Ice number, in tribute to a fallen friend, that manages to be moving and hilarious at the same time. The movie also redefines "dark comedy," literally -- often it appears to have been photographed at midnight during a power outage, the only apparent light source being the characters lit from within by hatred and fury.

Where it falls a little short, though, is in making Sheldon/Smoochy too likable -- we're set up to want a happy ending for him, when we should get an outcome closer to the promise of the title. Adam Resnick's script feels as though it possibly used to be a lot darker in its final act. Putting a happy face on the finale probably won't get many more people in to see the movie, but it won't satisfy those who like their black comedy poisonous to the last drop, either. I'm reminded of how Danny DeVito had the guts to end The War of the Roses with Kathleen Turner rejecting Michael Douglas's final gesture of reconciliation. Such touches are what make twisted comedies live on in memory -- what set them apart. Death to Smoochy is a more conventional affair, with some refreshing mean moments. I was happy enough with it through most of it, but are we living in such insecure times that even dark, violent comedies now have to end on an up note?