THE ECCHORCIST

THE EXORCIST (1973)
dir: William Friedkin

MAD #170, October 1974
w: Larry Siegel
a: Mort Drucker

Early on, the MAD logo had ghosts cavorting around it. This parodied that.

Father Merrin (Max Von Sydow) is leading an archaeological dig in Iraq and comes upon holy symbols there, a foreshadowing of what's to come.

In Washington, DC, we meet Chris McNeil (Ellen Burstyn) an actress and her assistants Sharon (Kitty Wynn) and Karl (Rudolf Schundler)...

...and daughter Regan (Linda Blair). The first sign something is wrong is thumping they hear upstairs, which Chris thinks must be rats in the attic. The next day she goes to work for the director Burke Demings (Jack McGowran) in a scene involving a campus protest. She takes the same route every day when she goes home, passing the local church, where she always sees a depressed Father Karras (Jason Miller).

Chris McNeil goes home to her daughter, who is playing with a Ouija board and says she talks to 'Captain Howdy' through it. Later that night, Chris throws a party for all her celebrity friends and Father Dyer (William O'Malley) entertaining on piano. In this, the celebrities are all caricatures of politicians of the time. Regan comes down to the party in her pajamas cursing and pees on the floor. When she's asleep later the bed starts shaking.

The man in drag is comedian Flip Wilson, whose character Geraldine, was known for the catchphrase "The devil made me do it", which is referenced in most of these parodies.

Chris has doctors examine Regan to find out what's wrong with her and they find nothing. A cat-scan reveals possible lesions on her frontal lobe.

Dr. Klein (Barton Heyman) examines Regan and also concluded little can be done. While Chris was gone, Sharon had Burke look after Regan for a few minutes and when Chris comes back she finds Regan is asleep but all the windows are open. Burke was found dead in the street as if he had jumped out, and his head has been found on backwards. Lt. Kinderman (Lee J. Cobb) is investigating the case and looks for Father Karras because he thinks Burke's death may have been from a demonic force.

Chris, concerned about Regan is asking for the doctors to do anything to help (They're drawn as various TV doctors here). Klein suggest one thing that as a last resort what might possibly work is an exorcism. She finds Karras, who is also a trained doctor, for help. He is not equipped to perform an exorcism, but is willing to examine Regan, believing that whatever problem it is can first be explained by science.

Karras is finally convinced an exorcism is the only solution, and gets permission from the church to perform one, with the assistance of Father Merrin.

Next is the blasphemy, profanity, and horror that caused a sensation when the movie came out before the devil is freed, but is not portrayed portrayed here.

Cracked didn't do a full parody but had a few short pieces. This is from an article called Pell-Mell with Mel in #125. I think the priest is supposed to be Mel Brooks.

This is from If Hit Movies Were Combined in #131, March 1976.

THE ECCHORCIST
Crazy #6, August 1974
w: Marv Wolfman
a: Vance Rodewalt

William Peter Blatty, writer of this, had been a screenwriter for years, mostly for comedies.

Regan did not have the sass-mouth this early on in the movie.

The storyline of Damien Karras' mother dying (and later portrayed by a possessed Regan) was left out of the MAD parody. An attendee at Chris' party is director William Friedkin.

Ozzie's Girls was an a short-lived attempt at Ozzie Nelson having his own sitcom without his children.

In that same issue, they had a fumetti parodying the movie. Bill Skurski was part of a group called Cloud Studio that were the first art directors of National Lampoon, fired for giving the magazine an underground/art deco look when the editors wanted to go in a different direction.

About a year later, in Crazy #17, an article called Combining Hollywood Movies for Fun and Profit, by Mark Steven and Bob Smith, did a mash-up of The Exorcist and The Sting.

Sick #99, August 1974
w: Fred Wolfe (Paul Laikin)
a: Tony Tallarico

The Sick parody doesn't have the prologue with the archaeological dig, which didn't need to be in the movie in the first place.

Many of the scenes and characters are conflated here.

A scene in the movie not used in the other parodies is that Karras records Regan's ramblings and tries to decipher and translate them, and finds out they are English backwards.

Also, Father Merrin is killed while performing the exorcism. Max Von Sydow, the actor who played him, was the most famous movie actor in Sweden.

There have been many parodies in television and film, such as this sketch during the first season of Saturday Night Live.

And this scene from Scary Movie 2.


There was a law passed in the early 90s stating every spoof movie must have Leslie Nielsen. Re-Possessed also starred Linda Blair, who has worked steadily since The Exorcist, but only in exploitation and low-budget movies.

A sequel to The Exorcist was made that was universally panned.