Lone Ranger---$250 million

"The Lone Ranger should be big.
What kid isn't dying to see
their grandpa's favorite radio
character in action?"
--J Elvis Weinstein

I was in a Subway late last night. They had some sort of cardboard Lone Ranger display.

"Can you believe they spent $250 million on that thing?" I was going to say to the guy, but I didn't.

I wonder what happened to Klinton Spilsbury, the guy who starred in the last Lone Ranger movie in 1981. The poor guy suffered terribly. His wife was seriously ill during the filming, it was his first (and last) movie. And people were mad at him because the producers of the movie sued Clayton Moore who played the Lone Ranger on TV in the '50s. Moore was still making appearances in costume as The Lone Ranger. The producers didn't think an elderly man conveyed the image they wanted, so they sued to force him to stop wearing a mask in public. He began making appearances wearing large black sunglasses.

On top of that,it was reported that he was drinking, smoking and fighting off the set during the filming, and he was ridiculed when it was reported that all his dialog was being dubbed. I don't know if his acting was bad or if they just wanted him to sound different.

The poor guy won a couple of "Razzies", one for worst actor, one for worst new star.

The movie was a hit in China. Unfortunately, China had very few movie theaters. I don't know how many they had in 1981, but they only had about 100 at one point.

But now----why? Why a Lone Ranger movie? There was a Green Hornet movie----the Green Hornet was supposed to be the great grand nephew of the Lone Ranger.

But nobody goes to Westerns anymore, especially a children's western from the early '50s.

It reminds me of The Three Amigos, the '86 comedy with Steve Martin, Martin Short and Chevy Chase. It was a spoof of a 1930s B movie series. What sense does it make to spoof a series that hadn't been seen in 50 years?

Well, the thing will have to gross well over half a billion dollars just to break even. About $625 million.

I remember when they made fun of Heaven's Gate  because they spent $38 million on a western.