Adam Sandler

For the record, my wife and I are actually quite fond of The Wedding Singer. Adam Sandler, Henry Winkler and Drew Barrymore take a trip down Memory Lane in this panel from MAD's spoof of The Waterboy. "Whattabore," originally appearing in MAD #379 (March '99), was one of only two MAD movie parodies illustrated by the hugely underrated Timothy Shamey. Both were written by Dick DeBartolo, with the first - "The Ecch-Files: Fight This Feature" - originally running in MAD #374 (October '98).

In one single panel from MAD's mini-spoof of 1999's Big Daddy, writer Desmond Devlin reminds me exactly why I don't tend to watch Adam Sandler movies on a regular basis. Angelo Torres illustrated "Big Bladder," the first of three Devlin-penned parodies bundled into the ambitious nine-page article "Foley and Walsh Go To The Movies." Originally making its bow in MAD #387 (November '99), it got the color treatment for the second issue of MAD Classics in 2005.

Mort Drucker got his hands on Adam Sandler twice in a seven-month span, midway through the past decade. First up: One of my favourite MAD covers of the past 15 years and one of my favourite Drucker covers of all time, billboarding Sandler's role in the Scott Maiko-Hermann Mejia article "MAD's 50 Worst Things About Movies" (#432, August '03). (Footnote: "Item #19" concerned Sandler's frequent casting of Rob Schneider in his films, so he'd look funnier and more talented by comparison.)

Seven issues (and months) after the "50 Worst Things About Movies" cover, Mort Drucker plopped Adam Sandler onto his "Oscar Winners and Losers" dartboard for the cover of MAD #439 (March '04).

A year after hitting the #19 spot in "MAD's 50 Worst Things About Movies," Adam Sandler soared up to #2 (behind only MAD itself!) in "MAD's 50 Worst Things About Comedy" for his annual updating of "The Chanukah Song." Writer Scott Maiko and artist Hermann Mejia were the driving forces (farces?) behind both features, with the comedy list running in MAD #445 (September '04).

Reviewer Roger Ebert suggested that Adam Sandler had "unexpected depth as an actor" in the 2002 drama Punch-Drunk Love, but the film failed to recoup its production budget, setting the stage for 14 years' worth of nonsense like Click, Grown-Ups and Pixels. Drew Friedman, who also memorably caricatured Sandler in "What Is A Terrorist?" (MAD #418, June '02) and "A Day In The Life of Adam Sandler" (MAD #458, October '05), handled the art chores for this portion of "MAD Sizes Up The 2003 Oscars: B