Extra! Extra! - The Making Of Planet Of The Apes
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The Ape Of Things To Come
The A to (chimpan)Z of Apes sequels and spin-offs
Beneath The Planet Of The Apes (1969)
In which astronaut Brent crashes, bumps into Nova and travels to Ape City to meet Cornelius and Zira who tell him the gorilla army is preparing to wage war on on the mutants of the Forbidden Zone. Ends with the rediscovered Taylor nuking the world.
Escape From The Planet Of The Apes (1971)
In which Cornelius and Zira crash-land in 1971 where they become media celebrities. Zira falls pregnant (with Caesar), making the pre-Watergate politicians paranoid,
and so the apes go on the lamb with the help of Khan from Star Trek II.
Conquest Of The Planet Of The Apes (1972)
In which Caesar spends his days hanging out with Khan in a fascist world, before leading his brother apes on a society-shattering, Watts Riots-style rampage. (When the film played in black districts, the finale received a standing ovation.)
Battle For The Planet Of The Apes (1973)
In which Caesar teaches apes and humans the value of peaceful coexistence while embarking on another war with the mutants. Ends with a sermon from scholarly orang-utan John Huston.
The Planet Of The Apes (TV series, 1975)
In which astronauts Virdon and Burke (Ron Harper and James Naughton, who now hang about the old TV actors home with Wayne Rogers and the guys out of CHiPs) crash-land and meet Galen (Roddy McDowall) who helps them evade the gorilla army. Ended mid-season but episodes were later glued together to make five more ‘films’.
Return To The Planet Of The Apes (TV series, 1979)
In which Bill, Jeff and Judy travel to 3979 where they crash-land and discover a society ruled by apes who’ve invented aircraft, cars and cinemas. Bill is captured and meets Cornelius and Zira. He speaks, they’re amazed, we’ve been here before. Animated (poorly), it ended after a year due to not shifting enough Spangles. Probably.
Homer Sapiens
Five superb Simpsons simian sketches
‘Rosebud’ (Season Five)
Eight thousand years after losing his teddy bear Bobo (“a symbol of your lost youth and innocence”), Monty Burns rediscovers him in a world where apes are the dominant species and all their human slaves look like Homer.
‘Deep Space Homer’ (Season Five)
”The only danger is if they send us to that terrible Planet Of The Apes,” Homer tells a press conference as he prepares to become America’s first civilian astronaut, before remembering… “Statue Of Liberty?! That was our planet! You maniacs! You blew it up! Damn you! Damn you all to hell!”
‘Bart’s Girlfriend (Season Six)
How do Springfield’s parents round up their children for church? Why, by pursuing them through a cornfield on horseback and snaring them with a variety of nets, lassos and lariats, accompanied by Jerry Goldsmith’s celebrated Apes score.
‘Bart Of Darkness’ (Season Six)
A homage-rich episode (Joseph Conrad, Rear Window, Witness) features Itchy And Scratchy in ‘Planet Of The Aches’, in which the world’s most put-upon cat is discovered by a band of mutants like the ones in Beneath… who use their awesome psychic powers to hack him apart with axes and scalpels.
‘A Fish Called Selma’ (Season Seven)
Washed-up actor Troy McClure completes his comeback with the lead in the musical ‘Stop The Planet Of The Apes, I Want To Get Off!’ Show stoppers include ‘Dr Zaius, Dr Zaius’ to the tune of Falco’s ‘Amadeus’ and ‘You’ll Never Make A Monkey Out Of Me’ (“I hate every ape I see/From chinpan-A to chimpan-Z…”)
Back To The Planet
Anatomy of a remake
1993
Oliver Stone takes up the challenge of reshaping Franklin Schaffner’s groundbreaking feature for a new generation of filmgoers. He quits while the script is in its early stages, which is probably just as well since the conspiracy-keen director would probably have attributed the apes’ rise to a bizarre plot engineered by Charles Darwin, Desmond Morris and David Attenborough. And Castro.
March 1995
Terry Hayes’ ambitious reworking pricks the interest of Philip Noyce (Dead Calm, The Saint) but the Aussie director suffers a creative block and has to quit. Home Alone helmer Chris Columbus takes up the reigns but is unable to get his head around a script that, like the original novel, portrays the apes as a civilised race who have developed aircraft and who populate a liana-strewn Manhattan.
December 1997
Austrian Oak Arnold Schwarzenegger buys the right to the Apes storyline from 20th Century Fox, hires the directing services of best but James Cameron, takes a look at the Hayes script, adds some new stuff and scouts Australia for locations. Terminator special effects wizard Stan Winston is tasked with trying to outdo John Chambers’ make-up work.
January 1999
With the Schwarzenegger/Cameron project abandoned because Fox hated the director’s dark reinterpretation., it’s rather surprising that the studio was absolutely chuffed with a story treatment submitted by Seven’s Andrew Kevin Walker. The Rock’s Michael Bay is pencilled in to direct, event king Jerry Bruckheimer takes on producing duties and Kevin Costner is considered for the lead.
May 2000
When Bay and Bruckheimer fail to agree a budget, it falls to affable Goth Tim Burton to bring Pierre Boulle’s novel back to the big screen. He secures a $100 million budget plus the services of Tim Roth, Helena Bonham Carter, Michael Clarke Duncan and the artist formerly know as ‘Marky’, Mark Wahlberg.