Disco Beaver from Outer Space
If you've seen Mr. Mike's Mondo Video, The Groove Tube, Tunnelvision, or Loose Shoes, then you have some idea of what to expect from National Lampoon's Disco Beaver from Outer Space. The difference is, the tone and comedy is a little more consistent than any of the aforementioned. Following the early success of Saturday Night Live (simply titled Saturday Night in those days), there was an onslaught of coked out sketch comedy films and TV specials released including this one, which was made for HBO. The premise is pretty simple: A couple sits down for an evening of channel-surfing, and the programs they flip past on the TV are some of the most bizarre one could imagine!
There's Dragula, a gay vampire who turns straight guys into raging queens (this skit seems to be the inspiration for Curse of the Queerwolf), a schizo ventriloquist, confessions of a Perrier addict, an Oscar Wilde skit that's captioned for a then-modern American audience, an off-kilter country singer, commercials for people with chronic gas, plus plenty of other weirdness and depravity... and Lynn Redgrave (who probably fired her manager soon after)!
Unfortunately, this is yet another case of a TV special being unavailable on home video and largely unseen for decades. Weirdly, the special (or more likely excerpts from it) were released on a Super-8 film reel (with Magnetic Sound!).
Despite it's legitimate unavailability, copies of the special have popped up on online video sites and can frequently be found for sale on i-offer. If you like moronic '70s skit comedy with a perverse edge, you've just found the motherload.
