Airplane!: 20 Behind the Scenes Stories of a Perfect Comic Takeoff

ZAZ Had No Idea How to Write a Script, at First

When ZAZ started out on their Zero Hour parody in the 1970s, they weren’t sure how to start. Then they saw John Landis on The Tonight Show in 1973, talking about his low-budget monster movie tribute Schlock, of which Johnny Carson was a fan. Landis had made the film at 21.

Zucker called him up and invited them to a performance of their comedy show at the Kentucky Fried Theater, where ZAZ told Landis about their movie idea. But they didn’t know anything about writing a screenplay, so he gave them a copy of his own An American Werewolf in London, which he would finally get to make into a movie in 1981.

ZAZ used it as a template as they wrote Airplane. But when they couldn’t find backing for Airplane, they decided to make a film based on their live comedy sketches — which became Kentucky Fried Movie.

Here’s the story of Kentucky Fried Movie.

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