SATURDAY NIGHT FEEBLE

SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER (1977)
dir: John Badham

MAD #201, September 1978
w: Arnie Kogen
a: Mort Drucker

Tony Manero (John Travolta) sees himself as a big wheel in his neighborhood of Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. The movie starts with him delivering a can of paint back to the hardware store where he works. The movie was just as successful in selling songs by The Bee Gees that were used in the soundtrack.

The can of paint says “Stigwood”, who was producer of the movie. It just now occurred to me seeing the sign that says “Andy Gibb Pizza” that Bee Gees stands for 'Brothers Gibb'. Duh.

Tony wants an advance on his salary so he can buy a shirt for his night at the disco, but his boss Mr. Fusco (Sam Coppola) is reluctant. Tony's family is a typical Brooklyn Italian Catholic family that wants him to sit down and eat instead of galavanting, and they're proud of their other son Frank (Martin Shakar) who's a priest. Tony wears a cape to dinner so he won't get food on his new shirt.

Tony and his friends enter the disco, 2001 Space Odyssey, and are treated like royalty. Annette (Donna Pescow), desperate to land a man, wants to dance with Tony, but he can't respect someone who sleeps around. A local girl (Denny Dillon) worships Tony. There are numerous gags in this parody and the next about John Travolta being the breakout star of Welcome Back, Kotter.

Huntz Hall and Leo Gorcey of the Dead End Kids are pictured in the third panel.

He spots Stephanie Mangano (Karen Lynn Gorney), a woman older and more sophisticated than him, and asks around about her, like if his friend Double-J (Paul Pape) knows who she is.One of the big musical numbers involves everyone there dancing on the floor.

More family life with the Maneros. Tony goes to the dance rehearsal space and comes on strong to Stephanie, who's practicing there, she rejects his advances initially but accepts him but only for dancing. He takes her out, learning more about her. She commutes to Manhattan working at a PR firm and he's just a local without manners. She's always dropping names to show how cultured she is. Meanwhile at home, the family's in shock finding out Frank has left the priesthood.

Tony takes Frank out to the disco. Frank just wants to be a regular guy, but Tony's friends keep asking for religious advice, particularly Bobby (Barry Miller), who got a girl pregnant and wants to know if he should marry her. Tony dumps Annette as a potential dance partner for the big dance contest coming up, so now he can disrespect her again and tries to “make it” with her, but can't bring himself to. He and his friends go prowling around the Verrezano Bridge except for Bobby, who's too depressed. Tony introduced Stephanie to his friends, and neither are impressed with each other.

After Tony helps Stephanie move to Manhattan, he finds out she's seeing someone. He forgives her, but she's upset he had to find out. He says it's all right and they rest at the Verrezano Bridge. Tony and his friends go to avenge their friend Gus (Bruce Ornstein) who was supposedly beaten by a gang called The Barracudas, crashing their local hangout. Bobby, who was supposed to be waiting for them in their getaway car, drives away, then has a change of heart and comes back.

Tony and Stephanie win the dance contest, but the couple that came in second place was better and he knows it. He knows he and Stephanie only won because they're Italian and the other couple was Puerto Rican. The gang goes back to their usual prowling. Bobby's depressed about what his future holds and ends up falling off the bridge. Tony's sick of it all and leaves the neighborhood.

In this, as he's riding the subway, he runs into Olivia Newton-John of Grease, which also came out around then. At this time, it was believed John Travolta would leave TV to be become a movie star, which he did. Then didn't. Until he did again.

Letter from one of the stars of the movie.

SATURDAY NIGHT FERVOR
Crazy #39, July 1978
w & a: Murad Gumen

Bobby didn't kill himself, but fell, though you could argue the former since he had a death wish.

DISCO MAGAZINE
Crazy #51, June 1979
w: Virgil Diamond (Paul Laikin)
a: Alan Kupperberg

A few issues later, they published this as a result of the disco craze inspired by Saturday Night Fever.

Punk and disco were the two prevailing musical trends, with anti-disco fervor using the motto “disco sucks” on everything.

MAD put out a special issue of all-new articles devoted solely to disco, which included a record insert.