Barry Manilow's Copacabana

Have you ever been in a dentist's chair and heard the Barry Manilow song "Copacabana"? And as you sat there having inlays put on your cuspids you thought "Hey! They should make this into a movie."
Of course you would get Manilow himself to play the lead and Estelle Getty to play his mom.

After all, Estelle Getty is the greatest mom in the history of show business.

Let's take a look at some of the great actors and actresses who have played the offspring of Estelle Getty:

Cher (in the film Mask)
Sylvester Stallone (in Stop or My Mom Will Shoot)
and
Bea Arthur (on TV's Golden Girls)

Can you honestly tell me that you DON'T think Barry Manilow, Cher, Stallone and Bea Arthur look like siblings?

As Lola, the film's female lead we could cast the woman who played Lana Lang in Superman III (the one with Richard Pryor and a drunken Man of Steel) and Martha Kent in Smallville. She's handled Superman; perhaps she is woman enough for BARRY MANILOW.

With the cast set, all we would need is a writer.

How about the ever pompous host of "Inside the Actor's Studio", James Lipton.

As a bonus, let’s have Barry Manilow get shot in the chest at the end of the film.

Sounds like a dream, doesn't it.

Make sure you are sitting down before you read this next sentence:

THIS MOVIE ALREADY EXISTS!!!!

Yes, and I saw it last night. By the way, I won't be apologizing for the spoiler about Manilow's grisly demise in the picture. If you have ever heard the song, you knew that was coming.

The film opens in the year 1985 at a club by the name of, you guessed it, Copacabana. Everyone is on the dance floor decked out in parachute pants and neon T-Shirts. Everyone that is except Lola.

You remember the song, right? At the end Lola is a drunken, old, floozy who has been wearing the same dress for forty years. Lola either smells like a locker room floor or she has some amazing laundry secrets.

The film flashes back to forty years ago. Lola and Barry Manilow are appearing on some game show where they have to sing songs about monkeys and choo-choo trains. It's like American Idol only no one is sleeping with Paula Abdul.

Manilow wins, but decides to stalk Lola. He goes to her job where she dances with old men for 10 cents a song. Soon they are both working at the Copacabana. Barry works briefly as a bartender but is soon a lounge piano player.

Then Rico shows up. Rico is played by character actor Joseph Bologna. I wonder if we have the option of pronouncing his last name Bologna or Baloney. I would call him Joey Baloney. I take that back, I WILL call him Joey Baloney.

Joey Baloney is into Lola and hires her to go to his club in Havana. His club is the Tropicana, it's better than the Copacabana. It is popular with Tito Santana and Joe Montana. I like to wear a bandana. Anna bana fo fanna banana bana bo banna fee fie fo fanna Havana!

Manilow is sad to see her leave, but sadder when he finds out that Rico is going to give her a diamond ring called "The Kiss of Death" and kill her. He also is going to make her dress like a pirate. This was all pretty confusing in the film, so I don't expect it to make sense to you right now. I now know why the show isn't called "Inside the WRITER'S Studio".

The film draws to a super happy close until Manilow takes a .44 slug to the chest. Then we cut back to the beginning and see Lola sitting at the bar in 1985. Sadly she stays at the bar when she could have easily hopped a train to Madison Square Garden and seen Mr. T and Hulk Hogan fight Paul Orndorf and Rowdy Roddy Piper in the first Wrestlemania.