20 Ways to Get Your “Arrested Development” Movie Fix*

Until they finally make that movie, here are 20 ways to get a cinematic fix from the Arrested Development cast.

Martin Mull (Gene Parmesan): Colonel Mustard in CLUE (1985)

Possessed of a martini-dry deadpan, Martin Mull is an odd fit for madcap farces like “Clue” and “Arrested Development,” which depend on maximum speed to pull off their hijinks. “Clue” curtails his mordant wit and casts him in a straight-man role, as a fussbudget Colonel Mustard. Nervously muttering his way through the pinballing plot, he’s a sounding board for the exaggerated pantomime of Colleen Camp’s all-bosom french maid and Tim Curry’s sarcastic, all-knowing butler. “Arrested Development” better utilizes his particular skills in the private detective Gene Parmesan. Another of the show’s idiot professionals, his only skill is donning shoddy costumes (fireman, janitor) and flamboyantly introducing himself to his bewildered clients. With these ridiculous facades, though, Mull is smoothly integrated into the show’s screwball universe while retaining his slow-burn technique. In the episode “Amigos” he segues from cartoonishly fake Italian accent to faux serious baritone with a vaudevillian’s gusto, ripping off a plastic nose and pausing an absurd beat… before revealing his true sad sack identity to the squeals of Lucille and the disgust of everyone else.

Patricia Velasquez (Marta Estrella): Meela Nais/Anck Su Namun in THE MUMMY RETURNS (2001)

As (the second actress to play) Marta, the good-hearted star of Spanish language soap opera “El Amor Prohibido,” Patricia Velasquez represented the ultimate object of male lust, pursued, at various points, by Michael, GOB and Buster. She was primarily the focus of a tortured love triangle with her boyfriend GOB, who didn’t appreciate or respect her, and Michael, who was torn between his feelings for Marta and his family-comes-first philosophy. Prior to “Arrested Development” Velasquez was a part of another amor prohibido triangulo, in the first two films of the recent “Mummy” franchise. She plays Anck Su Namun, the mistress to the Pharaoh of Egypt who carries on a secret affair with his high priest Imhotep (Arnold Vosloo). Like the Bluths, Imhotep would do just about anything to be with Velasquez, including murdering his boss and receiving the death penalty for the crime (make that un-death penalty, since he’s to suffer in eternal agony as a mummy). In the sequel, Velasquez plays a woman who appears to be Anck Su Namun reincarnated. She helps bring Imhotep back to life once again, and even has a scene where she makes out with his moldy, rotting corpse. On the scale of sexual perversion, that’s got to rank at least as high as making out with your first cousin.

Jessica Walter (Lucille Bluth): Evelyn in PLAY MISTY FOR ME (1971)

Jessica Walter first rose to prominence in Clint Eastwood’s directorial debut, “Play Misty For Me,” as the demented fan of Clint’s low-key radio DJ. Her performance was so ferociously disturbing she never found her niche in Hollywood. But with Lucille Bluth, Walter was graced with another sociopath to imbue with her coldly charismatic brilliance. Both characters are master manipulators, with “Misty”‘s Evelyn wielding her dimples like daggers (and later, a knife like a knife), while Lucille is a more complex fiend, playing her offspring against each other with barely disguised glee. Lucille is a master at exploiting the insecurities of her children to keep them off her finely attired back (aside from Buster, who acts as her mascot), while Evelyn’s psychosis was limited to destroying the life of one lonely man. In both cases though, Walter is a terror, utilizing her baby-face in “Misty” to convey impetuous pouting shaded with violence, while with Lucille love is conveyed with bitter sniping and calm conversations are laced with menace.

Carl Weathers (as himself): Apollo Creed in ROCKY III (1982)

When Tobias gave his last $1100 to Carl Weathers to be his acting coach, he must have expected their relationship would look like the one Weathers’ Apollo Creed shared with Rocky Balboa in “Rocky III”: intensive training sessions, long runs on the beach in short shorts, homoerotic frolics in the surf. After Rocky’s beloved trainer Mickey dies after an altercation with the brutal Clubber Lang (Mr. T), Creed offers to help train the Italian Stallion for the rematch. Creed thinks that Rocky lost his first match with Lang because he’s gotten soft and lost his hunger. “When we fought, you had the eye of the tiger, man, the edge! And now you need to get it back, and the way to get it back is to go back to the beginning!” he tells Rocky. What “the beginning” has to do with romping in the ocean in another man’s arms I’m not entirely sure, but that had to be an appealing part of the pitch for Tobias; heck he’s already got a pair of short shorts to wear. Sadly for our favorite never-nude, “Arrested Development”’s Carl Weathers is no Apollo Creed. He’s not even Chubbs from “Happy Girlmore.” In an impressively self-deprecating turn, he’s just a desperate skinflint, always on the lookout for some extra cash or a free meal. Most of his advice for Tobias involves how to use craft services so you don’t have to spend a per diem (“Get some raw veggies, bacon, Cup-A-Soup…”). Rocky lost his hunger; I guess Carl Weathers never did.

Henry Winkler (Barry Zuckerkorn): Coach Klein in THE WATERBOY (1998)

Henry Winkler has re-invented himself as a lumpen-proletariat goofball, an aging ignoramus who gets by with fast talk and ingratiating hangdog eyes. It began with his work in “The Waterboy,” in which his Coach Klein is a rather lovable loser, a former assistant at a Division 1 school who suffered a nervous breakdown. He spends his time arguing with his football and drawing up plays that look like a mid-period Jackson Pollack. All that saves him is another sincere idiot, Sandler’s Bobby Boucher, who leads them both to sports movie glory. Winkler takes this characterization and dirties it up for “Arrested Development.” His bumbling lawyer, Barry Zuckerkorn, has the same slovenly fashion sense, only this time it’s ill-fitting suits instead of second hand sweatpants. Zuckerkorn swipes donuts from his clients’ homes while jacking up fees with the flick of his tongue — all the lawyer stereotypes pumped up into a monstrously funny portrait of an incompetently conniving shyster.

See more picks for getting your movie fix of Maeby, George Michael, Buster and others over at Nerve.com.

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