Go Back to School With Adam Sandler & New Animated Film ‘Leo’ Plus His Classic Hits!
Adam Sandler sure has been busy! In addition to the forthcoming August 25 film, You Are So Not Invited To My Bat Mitzvah, a family affair that costars his daughters and his wife, Sandler is also the cowriter of the new animated musical comedy, Leo, which comes out November 21. Sandler voices a 74-year-old lizard who decides to escape from the Florida classroom he’s lived in for decades, along with his terrarium roommate, a turtle voiced by popular comedian Bill Burr (I’d watch just for that reason alone!). Both projects are being released on Netflix.
Sandler has been a very prolific actor and writer over the last few decades since his debut on SNL in the 1990s. Let’s take a look at some of his best films!
The Wedding Singer (1998)
© New Line/courtesy Everett Collection
I’m not normally a fan of romcoms, but this one was pretty cute. Sandler plays a wedding singer who falls for a waitress (’90s queen Drew Barrymore) while they’re both engaged to other people. Who can forget that epic scene on the plane when he serenades her? Barrymore and Sandler also played love interests to each other a few years later in 2004, as costars on the romcom 50 First Dates.
Billy Madison (1995)
(c) Universal/courtesy Everett Collection
Sandler cowrote this comedy and stars in it as an immature man-child in this comedy about a lazy rich guy who must repeat grade school all over again in order to inherit his father’s hotel empire. Though the premise is extremely unbelievable, it gets the point across and delivers some laughs.
The Waterboy (1995)
(c) Buena Vista/courtesy Everett Collection
Another comedy cowritten by Sandler and starring him in the main role is this film about a water boy who joins a football team after the coach discovers his talent for tackling people. Also stars the lovable Henry Winkler and Kathy Bates.
Big Daddy (1999)
© Columbia/courtesy Everett Collection
Sandler plays another lazy man-child in this comedy about a law school grad who adopts a five-year-old boy to impress a girlfriend who dumped him. Sandler’s wife, Jackie Sandler, played a waitress in a bar scene, which began a tradition of her appearing in a cameo in most of Sandler’s films.
Happy Gilmore (1996)
Who can forget this Sandler comedy about a rejected hockey player who joins the PGA tour in order to save his grandmother’s house? Bob Barker, who recently passed away at the age of 99, has a brief cameo. Sandler said of his friend “Loved laughing with him. Loved him kicking the crap out of me.”
Punch-Drunk Love (2002)
(c) Columbia/courtesy Everett Collection
Playing a more serious role for the first time, Adam Sandler really got to stretch his acting chops in this Paul Thomas Anderson drama about a guy and a girl and an addiction to a phone sex line (I guess this would be called “historical” now?). Plus, it costars the late, great Philip Seymour Hoffman.
Murder Mystery (2019)
ph: Scott Yamano / © Netflix / courtesy Everett Collection
A more recent success for Sandler was this Netflix movie about a cop and his wife (played by Jennifer Aniston) who go on vacation to reignite the spark in their marriage and end up framed for the death of a billionaire, a crime which they must then solve together. The sequel, Murder Mystery 2, just came out this year.
Classic Comedy Duos
March 2021
Chuckle at television & films funniest comic duos.
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