Meet Wally Sparks

views updated

Meet Wally Sparks ★★ 1997 (R)

No-brow “Man Who Came to Dinner.” Smutty TV shock-talk host Sparks (Dangerfield) is given one week to save his failing show when producer Reynolds (with a noticeably bad rug) puts him on notice. Opportunity knocks when he is invited to a party at the governor's mansion to interview the conservative head honcho (Stiers). Once there, a freak accident with a drunken horse prevents Sparks from leaving, and the new guest makes himself right at home by turning the fancy digs into a broadcast studio. Dangerfield's machine gun spray of one liners occasionally hits, as do his sometimes lengthy and elaborately set up jokes that do little to propel the plot along but are pure Dangerfield. Not much beyond Rodney makes lackluster “Sparks” fly. 107m/C VHS, DVD . Rodney Dangerfield, David Ogden Stiers, Burt Reynolds, Debi Mazar, Cindy Williams, Alan Rachins; D: Peter Baldwin; W: Rodney Dangerfield, Harry Basil; C: Richard H. Kline; M: Michel Colombier.