LEMMINGS (1973) NATIONAL LAMPOON’S PARODY OF WOODSTOCK AND MORE

LEMMINGS: DEAD IN CONCERT (1973) – This is not a review of the original, legendary National Lampoon stage version of Lemmings from January of 1973. Instead, it’s a review of the filmed special of a live performance of the slightly reworked version of the stage show.

Lemmings: Dead in Concert was originally intended to air on HBO in 1973, and yes, HBO really IS that old but was only available in New York and Pennsylvania at the time. This special wound up not being shown on HBO but instead was released on the college campus film circuit in ’73.

I long assumed that virtually EVERYBODY was familiar with this milestone work from National Lampoon but when I noticed there were only 7 user reviews of the special at the IMDb I decided it must have become so obscure over the decades that it qualified for a Balladeer’s Blog review.   

I’ll start with the basics for those who aren’t familiar with Lemmings in any form. It was a parody of the iconic 1969 Woodstock concert in the state of New York, a major event for the 1960s generation as many musical acts appeared, including many who were not originally scheduled to perform but got caught up in the phenomenon.   

The accompanying documentary about the multi-day event, filmed while it was happening, captured the experience for subsequent generations whether we wanted to see it or not. I’m KIDDING! If you had or have siblings, parents, grandparents, etc. from the 60s generation it’s possible that – like happened to me – they shared the documentary with you so many times you felt like you’d seen Woodstock more often than Charlton Heston’s character in Omega Man.

At any rate, this Lemmings special’s run on college campuses provided the first nationwide exposure for National Lampoon performers like JOHN BELUSHI, CHEVY CHASE, CHRISTOPHER GUEST, RHONDA COULLET and others. Yes, even before Saturday Night Live launched in 1975.

Still, I want to be clear that a familiarity with the Woodstock documentary and other coverage of the event is necessary to get almost all of the jokes in Lemmings, just like a familiarity with the films of Alfred Hitchcock is needed for a full appreciation of Mel Brooks’ movie High Anxiety.

I’m not trying to gatekeep here, obviously I’m not from the 60s generation myself, but I’ve seen too many disparaging comments about this 1973 comedy special on YT and other sites where it’s shown up. People who apparently know nothing about Woodstock (the concert and the documentary) blast Lemmings as “stupid” and “not funny” and worse.

So, I repeat, if a viewer lacks familiarity with the subject matter then most – maybe all – of the jokes will not register. It’s not a question of intelligence, of course, it’s more like the High Anxiety remark I made above.

With all that out of the way, let’s move on. The title of this comedy comes from the way that National Lampoon writer Harmon Leon compared the late 60s youth culture and its immersion in drugs to the way lemmings notoriously (but falsely) follow each other over a cliff to their doom.

The remark wasn’t entirely limited to drug use but was more of a poke at the perceived mindless conformity of the Woodstock Generation.

Lemmings was made at a time when much of that generation was still willing to laugh at itself, long before they became the uptight, self-appointed judges of what was permissible in comedy once their generation was well and truly in the cultural and political driver’s seat. Don’t worry, this review is not going to be about the Political Correctness Police, etc., but it’s necessary to mention this because of all the slaughtering of 60s generation sacred cows that is at the core of Lemmings.

No reasonable person would think that Belushi, Guest and company hate the singers and musicians parodied in this comedy piece. They’re just being irreverent and taking some well-deserved comical jabs at those musical giants and a milestone cultural moment. 

The title’s reference to the false perception that lemmings figuratively commit mass suicide is also reflected in the way John Belushi, as the Emcee of the parodic “Woodshuck” concert, periodically directs such mass self-deletion among the audience members. 

NOTE: Ignore online sources which claim there is no mass suicide in Lemmings. There is no climactic moment in which Belushi orchestrates a Jonestown-sized atrocity, but if you’ve seen this comedy you know full well that his character suggests karmically fitting ways for attendees to off themselves. For just one example, environmentally minded audience members are referred to a field where they can kill themselves so that their rotting bodies can serve as fertilizer for new greenery and crops. 

For newbies, I’ll emphasize that yes, some of the humor in Lemmings is very dark so be prepared. In addition, since the stage show originated in 1973 it featured anachronistic jokes about events that took place after the 1969 Woodstock event. For instance, jokes about the deadly Altamont concert, and the now-legendary Mad Dogs and Englishmen tour with Leon Russell, Rita Coolidge and Joe Cocker. 

THE COMEDY SPECIAL – Obviously, some reworking of the original stage version of Lemmings was done, like in all adaptations of a stage work. The most significant change comes in the way that the stage show’s opening half was a series of comedy sketches about drugs, sex, etc. and the Woodstock parody wasn’t presented until the second half.

Wisely, Lemmings: Dead in Concert incorporates the non-Woodstock sketches into the concert parody as it goes along rather than segregate the material. Other changes compared to the stage show include the brilliant Rhonda Coullet replacing both female cast members from that show, and the change to the ending, which I’ll cover below.     

And if you’re already wondering about Jimi Hendrix, he gets a shoutout along with the rest of the All-Star Dead Band. Hendrix is lead guitar, Duane Allman is on slide guitar, Bryan Jones on rhythm guitar, Ginger Baker on drums, with Jim Morrison and Janis Joplin splitting lead vocals.

A joke member is former President Harry S. Truman on keyboards. (Hey, he was indeed dead and could play the piano.) The other joke member is Paul McCartney on bass as a nod to the “Paul is dead” business.

*** Going in order, then, Belushi as the Emcee welcomes the audience to the mass suicide Woodshuck event, calling it three days of peace, love and death as a joke about Woodstock’s tagline “Three days of peace, love and music.” John then does sendups of several Emcee moments from the Woodstock documentary, like “helping a buddy” kill themselves if they’re too stoned to manage it, “not enough food to go around” and more.

Belushi’s vocal inflections perfectly match the real-life Emcee, so I’ll reiterate that a familiarity with the source material is necessary to fully appreciate how funny all this is. Think of how meaningless a Christopher Walken impression would be to people who have no idea who Walken is.

*** He introduces the first “act” – Freud, Pavlov, Adler and Jung (in the original stage show they were Freud, Marx, Engels and Jung). They’re partially satirizing Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young at Woodstock, right down to their “scared shitless” remark and reference to this being the first time they’re performing together. Again, jokes that won’t register without knowledge of the documentary.

Portraying the musicians are Christopher Guest, Chevy Chase, Paul Jacobs as a David Crosby pastiche and Rhonda Coullet (at left) as a Judy Collins/ Joni Mitchell composite performing with them. Their song is LEMMINGS’ LAMENT which intentionally captures elements of Collins’ song Woodstock, plus Judy Blue Eyes, Long Time Gone, etc. Think of the way the songs in The Rutles (1978) are clearly sendups, but not quite copies, of various Beatles songs.   

This comical song lays out the origins and nature of the generation’s disillusionment now bordering on nihilism (for the comedy’s purposes) and includes the lyrics “We are Lemmings/ We are CRAAAZZYY”.  Musically, Chase is an adequate drummer and Guest shows guitar skills long before he played Nigel Tufnel.

*** Belushi moves on to jokes referencing the “don’t touch the brown acid” and other drug segments from Woodstock. They’re tied into the theme of mass suicide as he provides helpful suggestions about the blue belladonna poison going around the crowd as well as the brown strychnine.

Belushi and Chase do a bit about Bob Dylan’s infamous failure to show up at Woodstock even though he lived comparatively nearby. Dylan supposedly wanted more money than the concert organizers could afford and since this money-grubbing attitude by Dylan was so at odds with the non-materialistic public image he cultivated that this capitalistic motive served as the crux of Christopher Guest impersonating Bob Dylan. He sang POSITIVELY WALL STREET, a parody of the real Bob Dylan song Positively 4th Street.

The stage version of Lemmings took the liberty of varying the Bob Dylan jokes, sometimes going straight into Guest’s Dylan impersonation, sometimes having Belushi and company bidding on Bob’s fee as if at an auction, and sometimes with nobody playing Dylan at all. Belushi would be imploring “Bob” in the audience to come onstage and perform only to ultimately grow disgusted at Dylan’s unwillingness. “Bob, come on up here … c’mon, Bob, come onstage” and on and on until he finally just says “Fuck you, Bob” and moves on.

*** The Lemmings: Dead in Concert special omits a few of the stage show’s songs at this point. We don’t get to see Goldie Oldie (a nod to Sha Na Na as well as female 50s singers) do Pizza Man and no Chevy Chase as John Denver singing Colorado, a pastiche of Rocky Mountain High.

*** Rhonda Coullet as Joni Mitchell sings I Do for You, a biting, darkly comedic song about the horrible way Mitchell was treated by some of the men in her life. 

*** After one of the drug sketches from the original opening half of the Lemmings stage show came the Motown Manifestos – a group sending up the Temptations. Despite the alleged racial awareness of the 60s generation and of the National Lampoon writers, the Motown Manifestos are played by the very white Paul Jacobs, Chevy Chase, Rhonda Coullet and Christopher Guest.

The song they perform is a parody of Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone and is titled PAPA WAS A RUNNING DOG LACKEY OF THE BOURGEOISIE, spoofing the Communist Manifesto by making lines from it into the lyrics of the song. 

*** After a comedic bit with Chevy Chase as Mick Jagger, Christopher Guest does his uncanny impression of James Taylor singing a song about heroin addiction – HIGHWAY TOES, a parody of Taylor’s Highway Song.

*** Belushi as the Emcee does a funny, prop-free reenactment of the frisbee throwing scene in Woodstock. I repeat, no prop being used, just John pantomiming the action. It always reminds me of his original samurai bit in which he portrayed the Japanese warrior playing pool with an imaginary pool cue on an imaginary pool table.

*** Other bits of business now with Chase and Belushi playing two stoners reuniting after a long separation. We also get John as Country Joe MacDonald, whose group was called the Fish. In the documentary, Joe leads the Woodstock audience in the call and response Fish Cheer – “Gimme an f; gimme a u; gimme a c; gimme a k. What’s that spell? (“Fuck”) What’s that spell? (“Fuck”) over and over.

In this joking version, Belushi leads the attendees through the “Gimme an f” through Gimme a k” but when he asks what that spells he follows up the audience’s shout of “Fuck” with a quiet, subdued “Right.”

*** More suicide humor as Belushi’s Emcee instructs the attendees climbing the towers erected at the concert site to speed up leaping to their death down below. He critiques the form shown by the leapers and goes to the judges, who award points like in a diving competition.   

*** PULL THE TRIGGERS, NIGGERS – Rhonda Coullet does a flawless impersonation of Joan Baez at Woodstock, from virtue signaling about her husband’s prison hunger strike to her perceived pretentiousness and self-importance. This number is a parody of protest songs about Black Panthers vs the authorities in general and the song George Jackson in particular. 

As the title should make clear, it’s a savage poke at 60s generation leftists and their reputation for encouraging black violence against cops. It’s the kind of daring, Theatre of Dionysus irreverence and iconoclasm that satire is historically known for. Some of the lyrics – “Pull the triggers, niggers/ We’re with you all the way” and a poke at Baez in a line about thinking she’s needed from Hanoi to Bangladesh “righting wrongs with my tedious songs.”

*** We then get a parody of Farmer Yasgur (Christopher Guest), on whose land the Woodstock concert took place. This segment, too, would be meaningless to anyone who hasn’t seen the Woodstock documentary.

*** Next comes LONELY AT THE BOTTOM, sung by Belushi as Cocker, with Coullet as Coolidge and Jacobs as Russell. It’s disappointing that John doesn’t do Cocker singing With a Little Help from my Friends like he later did on SNL, but what can ya do?

*** At last, to finish off those audience members who haven’t already killed themselves through poison, suicidal leaps from great heights or Joan Baez’s instructions to eloctrocute themselves, comes MEGADEATH. It’s the name of a fake Heavy Metal band AND the song it performs. Yes, long before the real band called Megadeth and long before This is Spinal Tap, Christopher Guest got to do his rendition of a Metal Head as he, Chase and Jacobs turn their amplifiers up to (no, not “eleven”) 750 decibels.

In addition to parodying Heavy Metal bands of the time, this song closes the show as everybody is killed by the magnitude of Megadeath’s sonic assault – not just the on-stage performers but for the HBO Special the audience members obligingly pretended to be dead for the final shot of the production.

Lemmings: Dead in Concert is enjoyable, but its deadpan, play-it-straight approach seems to confuse people who aren’t familiar with such humor or with Woodstock itself. Personally, I regard this work as the granddaddy of the aforementioned Rutles, Spinal Tap and maybe even The Last Polka.