News: National Lampoon partners with VidShadow

National Lampoon and online video network VidShadow have made an agreement where VidShadow will syndicate National Lampoon content across their network.

“In order to maximize the millions of eyeballs which our affiliate sites receive, we need to better engage viewers at the point of contact,” said Hudgens. “Working with National Lampoon and tapping into their tremendous content creation abilities and extraordinarily valuable brand, we expect to dramatically increase affiliate site stickiness and attract major advertisers looking to reach consumers through broadband video.”

Personally, I don't get why the Lampoon is investing so much time and energy into online videos. I've never understood the whole trend; I hardly ever watch any videos. But, I guess if they're able to make money off of it well then more power to them!

Source: Press Release

News: National Lampoon Announces "Joke of the Day"

National Lampoon announced today that they are starting a "Joke of the Day" email program. I know I saw a link for it on their website a few weeks ago but I can't find it now. Apparently, it's on some of their other websites, but I don't feel like clicking around trying to find it. Have you seen how many other sites they're affiliated with now? It's a lot!

“This program is something our base of users and fans have been requesting for years. It’s exciting to finally be able to offer the ‘Joke of the Day’ along with the other platforms over which our content is available on a consistent basis,” said Daniel Laikin, National Lampoon’s Chief Executive Officer. “We are also exploring additional email programs where users can have complete flexibility over the content and frequency of emails.”

I'm just wondering how long this will last...last time they tried this, with their newsletter in the early 2000's, it started weekly, then turned to about monthly, then randomly throughout the year, and then it just disappeared. It was pretty funny though!

Source: Press Release

National Lampoon's Repeat Offenders: Tim Matheson

Welcome to National Lampoon's Repeat Offenders, a quick look at some of the people who have been involved in multiple Lampoon projects!

To start off, I figured who better than the man who almost destroyed the Lampoon? Tim Matheson!

Ooooo, dreamy!!!

Tim Matheson is probably best known for his role as Otter in the first Lampoon movie, Animal House, although a quick look at his page on the IMDb and you can see just how many things he's been in! Matheson's character is one of the most memorable in the movie, a guy who can charm the pants off of anyone (literally!) He returned to NatLamp movies nearly 25 years later when he costarred in Van Wilder as Van Wilder, Sr. The role is smaller, but it's hilarious seeing him mad at his party boy son when everyone knows he played the same type of character! Tim also has one other claim to Lampoon fame: when, along with partner Dan Grodnik, he took over the National Lampoon.

You know, for some one who's been in so many movies, it sure as hell is hard to find pictures of him.

In 1989, when the Lampoon magazine was falling in numbers, Matheson and Grodnik were able to buy up the majority of the shares and Matty Simmons decided to just give them control of the company instead of fighting them. I'm sure Tim is a nice guy and all, but whatever made him think he could run a magazine, I'll never know. They made themselves co-chairmen and co-presidents, and almost immediately, began cancelling lucrative deals that had been lined up for months. Instead of making more money as they had promised, they ended up losing more! For whatever reason, Matheson decided that the magazine should have a more PG-13 approach, so gone were the racy jokes, most swearing, and (gasp!) nudity that had been there since the beginning. Gilbert Gottfried did a hilarious piece on this but I can't remember what issue it was in. Well, eventually Matheson and Grodnik must have realized that they had screwed the company and were going to be screwed themselves, so they sold the Lampoon in 1991 to Jim Jimmiro, an even worse owner who managed to screw the company even worse (but that's another story for another day).

Now what lesson did we learn today kids? Actors shouldn't run companies! Leave that to people who know what they're doing! Join us next time when we take a look at another one of National Lampoon's Repeat Offenders!

Source: If You Don't By This Book, We'll Kill This Dog: Life, Laughs, Love and Death at National Lampoon by Matty Simmons

News: National Lampoon releases 2008 second quarter revenue

The National Lampoon sent out a press release today announcing their financial results for the second quarter of 2008. As usual, they lost a hell of a lot more money than they made, although this year they lost over $1 million less than last year. I honestly don't understand how they can still be in business though when they consistently lose money every year.

Daniel Laikin, Chief Executive Officer, commented, “We are now at the point that we are delivering the film projects that we have been so focused on, and look forward to recognizing revenue from these areas going forward. Now that we have gotten our first original National Lampoon production, 'National Lampoon’s Bag Boy' out to market, we will start to see the associated revenue. We are also now completing post-production of our second feature film 'National Lampoon’s Ratko, the Dictator’s Son', and moving towards production of our third. I’m excited as we look forward to seeing the financial results as we expand our film library and brand.”

Hopefully they will actually turn a profit this year; I'm hoping that the quality of their product will improve now, but only time will tell.

Source: Press Release

New release: National Lampoon's Bagboy

Opening today in a theater probably nowhere near you is National Lampoon's Bagboy. Why they waited until the day before it opens to send out a press release is behind me, but that's the Lampoon for ya. Bagboy is the story of Phil (Paul Campbell), a grocery store bagger who travels to Las Vegas to compete in the International Bagging Campionship. The movie stars Campbell, Dennis Farina, Marika Domincyzk, Robert Hoffman, Nick Lashway, Brooke Shields, Larry Miller, and Richard Kind, and was co-written and directed by Mort Nathan (Kingpin, Boat Trip, National Lampoon's Van Wilder 2: The Rise of Taj). It's also the first movie National Lampoon has produced in-house, in association with the Farrelly Brothers' Conundrum Entertainment. Even though the Farrelly Brothers' aren't directly involved, I'm still holding out hope that this is going to be better than the average Lampoon movie.

Source: Press Release

Review: Jake's Booty Call

National Lampoon Presents Jake's Booty Call (2003)
77 mins., R
Starring Julian Max Metter, Jay Lerner, Tony D., Billy Thames, Jake Smith, Tommy Chunn, Eric D. Eisner
Written and Directed by Julian Max Metter and Eric D. Eisner
Produced by Romp Films in association with National Lampoon
DVD released by National Lampoon and distributed by Arts Alliance America

To kick off my reviews of NatLamp stuff, I'm starting with their newest DVD release, also the first one they're releasing themselves.

National Lampoon Presents Jake's Booty Call is based on an internet game, Jake's Booty Call from the website The Romp, which was apparantly very succesful back in the early 2000's (I'd never heard of it until the movie). In the game, the player would help Jake, the ultimate pimp, hit on girls and get laid. The movie expands upon this idea by giving it an actual plot!

Hitting on ladies in a bar, Jake (Metter) needs a wing-man and chooses Siton Manoba (Lerner), a prince from the country of Bangasloid. Siton is here on a mission to loose his virginity before his father, King Slobon (Tony D.), makes him the new king. Jake takes Siton under his wing, and together, the two set off around the world in a quest to get Siton laid. But Siton's brother, Likapon (Lerner again) is determined to become king by killing his brother.

Jake's Booty Call was made in 2003, and for awhile, National Lampoon was touring with the movie, showing it at different colleges. Why did it take so long to arrive on DVD? Probably because it suffers from the same problem a lot of NatLamp movies do: it kinda sucks. The whole movie plays like a rejected Adult Swim cartoon, and even at 77 minutes, it feels too long and slow moving. The animation isn't that bad, especially the backgrounds, but the characters were obviously done on a computer. This is the first full-length movie made with Flash, and it shows.

Another problem is the character of Jake isn't really all that likable. I think it would have been a lot funnier if Jake was actually a loser who never got any women, instead of kind of a sleazeball who gets with most of the women he hits on. I think a lot of the humor is supposed to come from the fact that cartoon characters are saying and doing these things, but it's just not funny enough to rely on only that. When the funniest part of your movie is the characters names, you're in trouble.

The DVD is the first to be released by National Lampoon, and it's being distributed by Arts Alliance America. For special features, it has the widescreen version (I'm guessing 1.78:1); four deleted scenes (deleted for good reason); an animatics/final film comparison; a gallery of the girls in the movie, which looks like it was taken right off a computer and has text so tiny you can't read any of it; and an Easter Egg, which is just a song called "Jake's Back" played over a static screen. Hopefully, future releases have better features, although I'm not holding my breath.

Athough I did laugh out loud a few times, I can't really recommend this movie unless you're a die-hard fan of everything NatLamp, like me, or drunk/high/both. I'm guessing most of the people at those college screenings were, and that's why they found it so funny. Other than that, the best audience for this movie is 13-year-old boys, who'll think they're watching something really dirty!

News: NatLamp in danger of being delisted

Acording to the Los Angeles Business Journal, the National Lampoon is in danger of being delisted from the American Stock Exchange for not meeting the listing standards. The reason is they've had losses of $23.8 million over the last 3 years, according to the article. They have until March 27 to present a compliance plan and until August 27 to achieve compliance.

“We have come a long way building our businesses and growing our revenues, and we are finally seeing the results of this,” Daniel Laikin, National Lampoon’s chief executive, said in a statement. “We are already in the process of strengthening our balance sheet through exercise of warrants and conversion of preferred dividends and stock, along with the revenue growth from our film and online media divisions, which will all be part of the plan we submit.”

This isn't anything new; the Lampoon has had financial problems for years, constantly losing money, and pretty much every year, they say they're on the way to turning their fortunes around. I'm also pretty sure this isn't the first time that they've been in danger of being delisted. Personally, I think they should never have even brought the company public. Nobody's going to want to buy stock in a company that's constantly losing money!

Source: Los Angeles Business Journal

Hello and Welcome!

...to the National Lampoon News Blog! This blog is all about the latest National Lampoon happenings. For years, I've been frustrated by how hard it is to find information on new National Lampoon projects. So, I decided to start this blog to post the latest news that I find, all in one spot! I'm also going to be posting reviews of movies, starting with the latest to be released on DVD, Jake's Booty Call, profiles of actors, writers and other people involved in multiple NatLamp projects, and a list of currently available NatLamp stuff. I hope you enjoy!