Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo

Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Mike Mitchell
Written by	Harris Goldberg Rob Schneider
Produced by	Sid Ganis Barry Bernandi
Starring	Rob Schneider William Forsythe Eddie Griffin Arija Bareikis Adam Sandler
Cinematography	Peter Lyons Collister
Edited by	George Bowers Lawrence Jordan
Music by	Teddy Castellucci
Production company	Happy Madison
Distributed by	Touchstone Pictures
Release date	December 10, 1999 (1999-12-10)
Running time	88 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$17 million
Box office	$92,938,755

Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo is a 1999 comedy film starring Rob Schneider. Other cast members include Eddie Griffin, Amy Poehler, Oded Fehr, Arija Bareikis, and William Forsythe. Adam Sandler makes a cameo appearance as Robert Justin in a voice only role. He's accredited.

The story is about a hapless fishtank cleaner who goes into business as a male prostitute in an attempt to earn enough money to repair damage he caused while house-sitting.

Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo was the first film released by Happy Madison Productions. The film spawned a sequel titled Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo. Unlike Male Gigolo, distributed by Disney's Touchstone Pictures brand, European Gigolo was released by Sony's Columbia Pictures brand.

Plot

Deuce Bigalow (Rob Schneider), a diminutive fishtank cleaner (aquarist), is fired for cleaning the tank at a public aquarium in the nude. Deuce has no success in attracting women, so he tries to stay busy with work. On a house call, he meets a Russian male prostitute Antoine Laconte (Oded Fehr). Antoine is going on a business trip, and he asks Deuce to care for his lionfish and his home while he is away. Deuce accidentally sets Antoine's kitchen on fire when trying to make a grilled cheese sandwich in the toaster, and smashes an expensive fish tank.

Fearing Antoine will kill him, Deuce is forced to find a way to pay for the damage. Low-rent pimp T.J. Hicks (Eddie Griffin) offers to help Deuce make enough money to buy a new fish tank, and convinces Deuce to take over the absent Antoine's role as a gigolo. Deuce decides to make the clients feel better about themselves, since he only desires to have sex with beautiful, sexy women.

Deuce meets unusual clients but he still manages to get along with them, despite there being no sex involved, by doing something that has never happened with them before. These clients include:

• a woman who is severely narcoleptic. Rather than having sex, Deuce just literally sleeps in bed with her.
• one woman who has Tourettes Syndrome with coprolalia, and therefore is afraid of socializing. Deuce decides to take her to a baseball game, where her sporadic outbursts of profanity are likely to fit in with the crowd's yelling. After a few outbursts, the crowd starts cheering with her.
• an obese woman weighing close to 750 pounds. Deuce averts the woman's advances, leaving her somewhat emotionally disarmed to the point of revealing her insecurities with her appearance. Deuce quickly comes up with an alternative form of "play", and the scene changes to Deuce and the woman sitting on her sofa playing a food-themed trivia game.
• another woman has a pituitary gland disorder and is extremely tall, so tall in fact that her face is always out of frame (her face is never revealed throughout the film). As Deuce walks down a sidewalk with the woman, various unseen bystanders yell insults at her, such as "Freak!" and, "That's a huge bitch!" the latter insult becoming one of the most memorable lines from the movie (later appearing in other films).

Deuce's list of clients gradually increases, with each client being satisfied by much more fulfilling measures (such as the aforementioned tall woman heard groaning with pleasure while Deuce is giving her a foot massage, exclaiming that no one had ever touched her feet before) due to Deuce's evasion of sex with them. However, Deuce falls in love with one of his clients, Kate (Arija Bareikis), who has a prosthetic leg. She later breaks up with Deuce when she finds out that he was a prostitute hired by her friends.

Meanwhile, Deuce is pursued by Detective Chuck Fowler (William Forsythe), who demands Antoine's "black book" of clients and threatens to take Deuce to jail if he does not comply. Deuce eventually helps Detective Fowler please his wife by stripping and erotically dancing for her, and the two make peace. Deuce is still taken into custody on prostitution charges, as Fowler needs someone to bring in. At the hearing, it is revealed that Deuce never slept with any of the clients except for Kate. Since Deuce gave back the money to Kate and was not paid for sex with her, he is cleared of all charges.

Using the money he made, Deuce restores Antoine's fish tank, albeit with lower-quality glass. Unfortunately, one of Deuce's friends accidentally kills the prize fish in Antoine's aquarium. Deuce buys a replacement fish and returns to Antoine's house just in time. Antoine is suspicious, but cannot figure out why. He taps the new aquarium and the glass shatters. Deuce then reveals his man-whoring escapades to the confused and angry Antoine. Outraged, Antoine tries to kill Deuce, and at one point shoots an arrow at him. However, the aforementioned overweight client shows up, comes between the two men, and saves Deuce's life (she is not killed because the arrow hits her breasts, between which she has hidden a roast chicken). Antoine is then arrested by Detective Fowler, and Deuce marries Kate.

Cast

• Rob Schneider as Deuce Bigalow
• William Forsythe as Det. Chuck Fowler
• Eddie Griffin as Tiberius Jefferson "T.J." Hicks
• Arija Bareikis as Kate
• Oded Fehr as Antoine Laconte
• Gail O'Grady as Claire
• Richard Riehle as Bob Bigalow
• Jacqueline Obradors as Elaine Fowler
• Big Boy as Fluisa aka Jabba
• Amy Poehler as Ruth
• Bree Turner as Allison, fish tank girl
• Andrew Shaifer as Neil
• Allen Covert as Vic
• Elle Schneider, Rob's Daughter, as Cookie Girl
• Pilar Schneider, Rob's Mother, as Old Lady in Japanese Restaurant
• Norm Macdonald as Bartender (uncredited)
• Marlo Thomas as Client with Vicious Dog (uncredited)
• Adam Sandler as Robert Justin (uncredited, voice role)

Production

Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo is the first film released by the Happy Madison Productions film production company. Adam Sandler served as the film's executive producer. Sandler also shouted the insults "Freak!" and other lines spoken off-screen at Tina, the tall lady. Harris Goldberg, who wrote the screenplay with Rob Schneider was also a co-producer. Harris originally came up with the concept after an appearance on Late Night with Conan O'Brien where he and Schneider performed "The Blue Man Ass Group," a parody of "The Blue Man Group." That night Harris watched "American Gigolo" in his hotel room. The next morning he began making jokes about Schneider as a gigolo.

Soundtrack

Untitled

1. "Call Me" - Blondie
2. "Spill the Wine" - War/Eric Burdon
3. "You Sexy Thing" - Hot Chocolate
4. "Get Down Tonight" - KC & The Sunshine Band
5. "Let's Get It On" - Marvin Gaye
6. "I'm Not in Love" - 10cc
7. "Magnet and Steel" - Walter Egan
8. "No Worries" - Hepcat
9. "Can't Smile Without You" - Sean Beal
10. "Lift Me Up" - Jeff Lynne
11. "Call Me" - Emilia Maiello

Critical reception

Deuce Bigalow received generally negative reviews. It currently holds a 23% "rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Sequel

A sequel, Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo, was released on August 12, 2005. It was distributed by Columbia Pictures instead of Touchstone Pictures.

External links

• Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo at IMDb
• Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo at Box Office Mojo