Bringing Down the House

**Bringing Down the House** is a 2003 American comedy film directed by Adam Shankman, which was released by Touchstone Pictures on March 7, 2003.

## Plot

Uptight lawyer Peter Sanderson (Steve Martin) reluctantly helps out an escaped convict, Charlene Morton (Queen Latifah) who was framed and poses as the nanny for Peter's two kids (Kimberly J. Brown & Angus T. Jones).

## Cast

* Steve Martin as Peter Sanderson
* Queen Latifah as Charlene Morton
* Eugene Levy as Howie Rottman
* Kimberly J. Brown as Sarah Sanderson
* Angus T. Jones as Georgie Sanderson
* Jean Smart as Kate Sanderson
* Missi Pyle as Ashley
* Joan Plowright as Virginia Arness
* Steve Harris as Widow
* Michael Rosenbaum as Todd Gendler
* Betty White as Mrs. Kline

## Production

Principal photography for "Bringing Down the House" began on April 19, 2002 and ended in October of 2002.

Filming took place in Pasadena, California; Los Angeles, California; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Santa Monica, California; and Whittier, California.

Jason Filardi's original screenplay was titled "Jailbabe.com". He had Adam Sandler and Angelina Jolie in mind for the lead roles when he first wrote it.

The producers wanted the slang that was spoken in the film to be current and relevant to the time period in which the film was released.

However, this proved to be difficult as words take on different meaning to become "Ebonics" almost everyday and in order to play it safe, some of the "Ebonics" spoken in this movie was made up by the actors and actresses on the spot.

Steve Martin developed a scrape on his forehead after the scene where he hit his head by the steering wheel.

## Box Office

"Bringing Down the House" grossed $31,101,026 during its opening weekend, spending three weeks at #1 at the United States box office.

Overall, it grossed $164,729,679 on an estimated budget of $33,000,000.

## Critical Reception

"Bringing Down the House" has an approval rating of 34% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 150 reviews with an average rating of 4.7\10. The site's consensus reads: *"Though the cast shines, they can't save this comedy, which is overly contrived and filled with outdated and offensive racial jokes."*

On Metacritic, the film has a score of 39 out of 100 based on reviews from 31 critics. Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave it a grade B+ on scale of A to F.

The Philadelphia Inquirer called "Bringing Down the House" a *"high performance low comedy"*, adding that the film succeeds due to *"[Steve] Martin's Peter Sanderson and Latifah's Charlene Morton each plays Henry Higgins to the other's Eliza Doolittle."*

The Baltimore Sun called it *"a gut-busting black-and-white culture clash comedy. It's not elegantly done. Some of the acting is too broad to enjoy. It has plot problems and racial-stereotype problems."*

The Austin Chronicle said: *"Some fine comedy performances bolster this thinly plotted film."*

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times wrote: *"Here is a movie that ignores the Model Airplane Rule: First, make sure you have taken all of the pieces out of the box, then line them up in the order in which they will be needed. Bringing Down the House is glued together with one of the wings treated like a piece of tail."*

In her review of the film, Connie Ogle of the Miami Herald stated: *"Taking a lightweight comedy such as this seriously is probably a fatal error, but there's no way around it: This House is built on a shaky foundation."*

Entertainment Weekly wrote: *"Stock farce characters and stale scenes of mayhem fill the downtime between the Martin-Latifah skirmishes."*

Charles Taylor from Salon said: *"What's offensive in Bringing Down the House is the way the jokes have been calculated not to offend."*