After her hilarious 'Girls' parody Mackenzie Watson has been busy writing and starring in a new video that sends up the new film everybody is talking about '50 Shades of Grey.'
Hello Funny Women! I’m back, thank you for having me again. This time I’m poking fun of a little film you may have heard of – '50 Shades of Grey' ring any bells? Of course poor old 50 Shades is an obvious target for parody, but when I decided it would be my next video project, I sought a different angle than just the formulaic spoof.
Here was my process of film selection: first, the trailer (if you haven’t seen it, watch it now, there’s no further elaboration necessary). Then the internet gossip about how the leads Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson were not particularly fond of each other – okay let’s not mince words, more sexual chemistry has been observed between inanimate objects than these two. For your reference check out this article and this one.
.
This struck me as hilarious given that the entire plot (or lack thereof) hinges on this incredibly visceral and all-encompassing attraction between Miss Steele and Mr. Grey. So one would assume they’d, ya know, do a screen test or two to see if there was chemistry between the actors, or at the very least… not revulsion?
The absurdity of this inspired me to re-cast the film in the most ridiculous way possible. Why Lena Dunham? Well, poor girl has been the target of my gentle lampooning before. Why Jonah Hill? I thought it would be funny to have a sort of deadpan 'chill dude' type to be responding to Dunham’s, let’s say intense, personality.
Though the parody is light-hearted in tone, I did want to subtly hint at the points of the contention that many people have with the film and the entire franchise’s treatment of BDSM practices and sexual violence, and the precarious tight rope it walks between them. There is a moment where Lena says, “I feel like this is for your enjoyment,” which is as on the nose as my critique goes. I’m not trying to make an emphatic statement or a moral judgment either way, but I merely wanted to suggest that the discussion exists and perhaps there is some validity to those decrying ’50 Shades’ for more than just its
Rotten Tomatoes score.
To finish on a lighter note, how cheesy was that trailer though? It was basically begging to be parodied. And I obliged.
