Alcoholism was never so funny!

I just heard on Howard Stern that UK comic/actor Russell Brand will be starring in a remake of ARTHUR (or "Arfa" as Brand says in his accent).

Here's a toast to the one and only Arthur Bach -- Mr. Dudley Moore !!
His charm and wit and acting chops (at age 46) helped make the $7 mil dollar budgeted 1981 "small picture" into a boffo $95 million dollar Oscar-winning hit & classic.

Plus - Moore's supporting cast was superb: Liza as Linda Marolla, the likeable poor waitress with her loveable slob live-in Dad, fabulous John Gielguld as Arthur's tart-tongued fatherly butler Hobson, and screen vet Geraldine Fitzgerald as Arthur's concerned Aunt Martha.

The lines delivered by Moore are so witty and fun that the film plays like a giggly drunk's private jokes delivered to a buddy, ie: they're not hammered home to the audience which gives the film an adult vibe. This element was sort of lost on me as a 14-year- old at the film's 1981 opening weekend. I remember being more into Bill Murray's Stripes that summer.

But now (in middle-age) if I had to choose between watching Arthur and Stripes on cable today ...Arthur would win out.

Thanks Dudley for the laughs -- and for the great movie lines:
"Don't you hate Perry's wife?!"
"You're a hooker? Jesus, I forgot! I just thought I was doing GREAT with you!"
"You must've hated this moose."