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Played with villainous aplomb by Ben Stiller, Tony’s goal is to get the children in shape and turn his weight loss program into a money-making machine. From this point on Tony will be the bad...
For one, it was written and directed by Judd Apatow, who has a majority hold on the comedies of the last decade and for two, it marks one of Ben Stiller's first prominent roles as fitness wack-job Tony Perkis, who takes over a once-adored fat camp and harasses the kids.
Jun 19, 2022 · Ben Stiller is electric in this role; his face nimbly transitioning from faux–positive, TV-ready friendliness to eerily menacing and capable of violence.
When Ben Stiller is in disguise in Starsky & Hutch (the "Do it, do it" character), his backstory is "Maury Finkle, founder of Finkle Fixtures, biggest lighting fixture distributer in the Southland." In Heavyweights, Tony Perkis Sr. is referred to as "the lighting fixture king" ("All the lights you see in this camp were donated by him.") and ...
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is a 1995 American comedy film directed by Steven Brill and written by Brill with Judd Apatow. The film centers around a fat camp for kids that is taken over by a fitness guru named Tony Perkis (Ben Stiller).
As school ends for the summer, Gerry Garner (Aaron Schwartz) is sent by his parents to Camp Hope, a weight loss camp for boys. Despite worrying at first, Gerry makes friends easily at camp and learns that Camp Hope won't be nearly as bad as he thinks because as veteran camper Roy (Kenan Thompson) put it, "You're not the fat kid, everyone's the fat kid"). He also discovers that the other campers have smuggled in enough junk food to easily stave off the hunger pangs and probably counteract any weight loss that the camp programs cause.
But all is not well at Camp Hope. The first night of the summer brings the revelation that the original owners of Camp Hope, the Bushkins, (Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara) have entered bankruptcy and the camp has been bought by fitness entrepreneur Tony Perkis (Ben Stiller), who announces his plan to make the camp's new exercise regimen into the top weight loss infomercial in the country. Tony tries to make himself seem like someone the campers can relate to, saying that he was a fat kid when he was younger too, but his methods of motivating the campers border on psychotic.
Tony cleanses the cabins of the campers' food caches, cuts off their contact with the outside world, and installs an exercise outline of trendy fitness techniques that downplay fun to the point of humiliation.
The campers discover a secret food stash (which is restocked by other people in exchange for money at night) and actually gain weight despite Tony's fitness regimen. Eventually, at the halfway point of summer, Tony decides to weigh the boys and mark their progress. Once he realizes that the boys have been gaining weight instead of losing it, Tony forces them on a 20-mile hike, reasoning that this will not only help the boys work off some of their extra weight, but will also restore discipline. On the hike, the campers trick Tony into falling into a deep pit, severely injuring him. The boys bring Tony back to camp and imprison him in a makeshift cell of chicken wire electrified with a bug zapper. They also undo all of Tony's modifications to the camp, and incapacitate his counselors, some of whom eventually turn to their side.
In the celebration of Tony's downfall, the boys throw a bonfire party with a lot of binge eating. They order in junk food such as pizzas and submarine sandwiches, gorge themselves on chocolate and drench themselves in soda.
The next morning, Pat Finley, a counselor who had come to Camp Hope every summer since he was 10, tells the kids to finally start taking responsibility and start actually losing weight. The boys begin following a more healthy regimen and start to make Camp Hope a fun place again.
•Aaron Schwartz as Gerald "Gerry" Garner
•Ben Stiller as Tony Perkis, Jr. / Tony Perkis, Sr., Tony’s father
•Tom McGowan as Pat Finley
•Tim Blake Nelson as Roger Johnson
•Jeffrey Tambor as Maury Garner
•Joseph Wayne Miller as Salami Sam Dampier
There he meets Pat (TOM McGOWAN), a camp counselor for eighteen years and Josh (SEAN WEISS), a young Jackie Gleason-like, wise cracking kid. But things take a turn for the worse when it's announced that Tony Perkis (BEN STILLER), a motivational guru is the new owner.
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Aug 17, 2022 · Even as Ben Stiller delivers a career-best performance filled with pointed barbs and cruel descriptors for their husky frames, the film never once takes the side of the fatphobic jerks.
