Spy Hard

Spy Hard (1996)

All the action. All the women. Half the intelligence.

The evil Gen. Rancor has his sights set on world domination, and only one man can stop him: Dick Steele, also known as Agent WD-40. Rancor needs to obtain a computer circuit for the missile that he is planning to fire, so Steele teams up with Veronique Ukrinsky, a KGB agent whose father designed the chip. Together they try to locate the evil mastermind's headquarters, where Veronique's father and several other hostages are being held.

Date of release
1996-05-24
TMDB
5.4 / 10 (804)
Runtime
1h 21m
Genres
Comedy, Action
Director
Rick Friedberg

Casting

Interesting facts

Spy Hard is a 1996 American spy parody film starring Leslie Nielsen and Nicollette Sheridan, Charles Durning, Marcia Gay Harden, Barry Bostwick, and Andy Griffith, parodying James Bond and other action films. The introduction to the film is sung by comedy artist "Weird Al" Yankovic, and it was the first film to be written by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, who went on to write and direct parody films such as Date Movie, Disaster Movie, and Meet the Spartans. The film's title is a parody of Die Hard. The film was directed by Rick Friedberg who produced with Doug Draizin and Jeffrey Konvitz.

Production

"Weird Al" Yankovic sings the title song and directs the title sequence. It is a parody of title sequences from the James Bond films designed by Maurice Binder, specifically 1965's Thunderball, complete with multiple coloured backgrounds, silhouetted figures, women dancing with guns, and "wavy" text.

In the decades since its initial release, director Rick Friedberg has spoken at length about his unhappy experience with the film, alleging rampant interference on the part of Disney that led to an "eviscerated" final product.

Disagreements between the filmmaker and the studio started during the casting process. Friedberg envisioned the villain as "international" a la those typical of the James Bond films. With this description in mind, he suggested Patrick Stewart and Nigel Hawthorne. Disney executives were unreceptive, firing back sarcastically "What is this, the British Royal Theatre Club? Cast a TV star!'".

A major point of contention during production was Spy Hard's intended target audience. While Disney insisted that Spy Hard appeal to as wide a demographic as possible (with a particular emphasis on children), Friedberg maintained that their core demographic was males in their early to late teens. Friedberg was forced to cut or rewrite entire set-pieces if Disney deemed them "too sophisticated" for young audiences.

Late in production, with the film one day behind schedule, Friedberg claims Disney removed him as director and hired a replacement to conduct reshoots. Now unofficially working in a consultant capacity, Friedberg was sent the dailies from the reshoots, which he said were "all terrible". Final editing on Spy Hard occurred without Friedberg's involvement.

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