The Deltas huddle off-screen around Verna Bloom, who played Mrs. Wormer—the dean's alcoholic, lecherous wife, Marion, in the film. Photos from Fat, Drunk, and Stupid by Matty Simmons. Copyright © 2012 by the author. Reprinted by permission of St. Martin’s Press, LLC.

Like Tiger Woods for golf or Elvis Presley for rock ‘n’ roll, National Lampoon’s Animal House single-handedly redefined the art of comedy and provided a quintessential model for future Hollywood projects. Following its release in 1978, Animal House spent eight weeks at box-office No. 1 and emerged as one of the highest grossing, most successful movie productions in the history of the entertainment business.

Today—and $600 million later—it remains one of the funniest movies to ever hit the big screen.

Fat, Drunk, and Stupid: The Inside Story Behind the Making of Animal House by producer Matty Simmons, recounts the film’s imperishable legacy.

“I wrote Fat, Drunk, and Stupid because I have constantly been amazed at the continued popularity of Animal House,” Simmons says. “People talk to me about it all the time, and I’ve always found it hard to believe that a movie released in 1978 would still be quoted and copied [today].”

Years before Animal House was even so much as a thought, Matty Simmons was living in New York City working as a press agent for local nightclubs and restaurants. However, as he details in the opening chapters of Fat, Drunk, and Stupid, it took but a few strokes of luck for his occupation to change and his career to flourish. From local press agent to company executive, he escalated up the professional hierarchy and eventually founded National Lampoon Inc., earning the title of CEO and propelling him ever closer to Animal House.

(From left) Animal House screenwriter Douglas Kenney, producers Matty Simmons and Ivan Reitman, and screenwriter Chris Miller on the last day of the 32-day shoot. Founder and CEO of National Lampoon, Matty Simmons shares the movie’s outrageous story in Fat, Drunk, and Stupid.

By 1975, Simmons had proven himself as a magazine, television, and Broadway musical producer. Despite Hollywood’s cruel and unpredictable reputation, he decided to embrace the challenges of the film industry, thus vowing never to allow the thought of failure to inhibit his vocational pursuit.

“Hollywood has a way of deflating egos. [However], it never entered my mind that I would remain a New York press agent forever,” Simmons remarked. “All my life, I’ve tried to reach up.”

Humorously appealing and utterly revealing, Fat, Drunk, and Stupid traipses through the development of Animal House and depicts how an unplanned trip through Hollywood resulted in one of the greatest American comedies of all time. Through personal stories and direct testimonies, Simmons reflects upon the days of production and engages his readers with on- and off-set humor from the Animal House undertaking. Complete with behind-the-scenes reports and exclusive cast and crew interviews, Fat, Drunk, and Stupid celebrates the success of Animal House with the unveiling of its incredible Hollywood saga.

For four weeks in 1977, the cast and crew of Animal House invaded the town of Eugene, Ore., home to the University of Oregon. Shooting on the grounds of an actual college campus in a fictional fraternity —Delta Tau Chi House (background)—gave the film a sense of authenticity.

Like all breakthroughs in filmmaking, Animal House experienced its share of difficulties and took time to evolve. In fact, as Simmons openly admits, the initial idea for Animal House received negative feedback and overwhelming disapproval from practiced Hollywood agents. Several networks and multiple Hollywood directors passed on the film’s script, and even when Universal Studios President Ned Tanen agreed to fund Animal House, he prefaced his proposal by saying, “I hate this treatment. … I’d never make this movie—except you’re the National Lampoon.” Thus, according to Simmons, the green light for production was offered somewhat unenthusiastically with Universal confining the crew to 32 filming days and $3 million in finances. However, with stories about luggage requirements and costume efficiency, Fat, Drunk, and Stupid explains how the Animal House team managed to overcome its financial concerns and turn a harshly criticized initial film script into an icon of the American cinema.

Saturday Night Live star John Belushi played the unforgettable character Bluto in the film, directed by newcomer John Landis who went on to direct such hits as The Blues Brother and Coming to America.

With the exception of John Belushi, Animal House cast members showed up on set with very little experience in the Hollywood spotlight. Many were struggling in the entertainment business, and some were even pursuing careers elsewhere. In Fat, Drunk, and Stupid, Simmons reveals the team’s recruiting tactics and explains the evaluation process he and director John Landis adopted to build their cast. He goes on to describe how well they interacted and how impressively they balanced work and fun, saying “It was Animal House during the day and a real-life animal house party room at night.” From fistfights to drunken romances and wild parties to harmless pranks, members of the Animal House team engaged in activities nearly as wild as those displayed in the movie, and Fat, Drunk, and Stupid recounts them all.

Because of the relationships that developed as a result of the Animal House production, many members of the cast and crew kept in touch and continue to meet at celebrations, awards ceremonies, and other social gatherings today. However, several members of the team have since passed away and Fat, Drunk, and Stupid honors them all, commemorating Belushi specifically with a special chapter tracing his illustrious career and recalling his wild, yet inspiring personality.

The cast of Animal House was made up almost completely of then-unknowns. However, the film earned more than $600 million, launched countless careers, and eventually became one of America’s most beloved comedy classics.

The legacy of Animal House extends far beyond Otter’s testimony or Bluto’s aggression against the guitarist, and despite an inauspicious start, sits perched atop the list of Bravo TV’s “100 Funniest Movies.” In what is Matty Simmons’ eighth book publication, Fat, Drunk, and Stupid rationalizes how a bunch of unknown actors came together to spearhead the movie production that will forever remain embedded in the culture of Hollywood and the roots of modern film comedy.

Book Review: Fat, Drunk, and Stupid The Saturday Evening Post

So when my cousin Phil told me about his three
days in Las Vegas, I believed him. It sounded like a movie, but it happened to him.

It starts like this: Phil is a junior executive at a big company in Chicago. One day his boss called him in and told him he was going to represent the company at a trade show in Las Vegas. Pretty exciting feather in his cap. He’s single, got a nice little apartment, and just bought a luxury car. He’s doing well—very well.

So, he packed his fine Italian suitcase, which he bought with bonus money his firm gave him, stuck $400 in his wallet, and took off to Sin City, deciding to drive and see a little of the country.

In Denver, he found a book called Beating the Games 
in Vegas. He stayed up most of the night reading it. As he got in his car in the morning, he decided that his game would be “21.”

He detoured to visit Provo, Utah. He liked the name—Provo—there was something about it that made him smile. While there, he found a book that appealed to him as much as the name Provo. It was simply titled Moe on 21. “The book,” the cover said, “will make you a winner at the table.” Phil memorized nearly every line in the book. He arrived in Vegas early in the morning, got some sleep, went to the trade show, checked in and shook some hands, then went to the casino. He got a hundred dollars worth of $5 chips, then strolled along the 21 tables, watching players and reconnecting each of their “moves” to what “Moe” had written. Most of them, he found, obviously did not know how to play the game.

Phil sat down at a table and put a $5 chip in the card box. He won immediately, doubling his bet. He then lost six hands in a row, picked up his remaining chips, and left the table. “Dealers can get hot,” Moe had written. “Never forget, it is gambling.”

Phil played some more and won back his losses. This went well into the night. By 3:00 a.m., he was ahead. Now he sat alone at a table, just Phil and the dealer. He was 
soon joined by a seedy, elderly man with a soiled tie at half mast, badly in need of a haircut and shave, with two $100 chips. He pushed them into play. His face card was a six. 
He asked for another card and turned over his hand. He 
had 26. He busted out.

Phil couldn’t resist giving this unfortunate man some advice. “The dealer had a five up,” he said. “You shouldn’t 
hit on 16.”

The man looked at him in disgust. “How do you know?”

“Here, in this book, Moe on 21, by Moe,” said Phil.

The man nodded. “I know,” he said. “I am Moe.” He got 
up and started to walk away, but then turned to Phil. “Sometimes,” he hesitated, “you gotta forget what the book says and just play a hunch.”

The next day, Phil went back to the trade show, but all he could think of was what Moe said after going against his own advice. Phil had reread Moe’s book, and there it was, in bold print: “DON’T,” the line read, “PLAY HUNCHES! 21 is a game you can win if you play it right.” But this, obviously, wasn’t true. Moe looked like he was done, broke, busted. Why was he now playing a “hunch?” Because it’s more exciting. That was what Phil decided.

That night, Phil went back to his room, got his stash, which had grown substantially the previous night, and went back to the casino. He stopped at a roulette table. “Provo,” he said to himself, “five letters.” He took his entire pocketful of $100 chips and put them on number five. The wheel went round, and the silver ball hopped and spun and landed on his number.

He now had more than $5,000. He walked to the 21 tables. He played only hunches, and by midnight, he’d won $96,000.

But things started to change. At 3:20 a.m., he counted his chips. He had just about $10,000 left. He’d lost. He was tired and hungry.

He scooped up his chips and turned to leave, then collided with someone and the chips flew to the floor. “I’m sorry,” a voice said. And there, helping him pick up his chips was the prettiest girl he’d ever seen. “Hi,” she said. “I’m Gladys and I’m clumsy.” She handed him the rest of the chips and he smiled at her.

“I’m starving,” he said. “Would you like something to eat?”

So, they ate and talked. She said she was in the carpet business in Oregon. No husband. No boyfriend. Just taking a couple of days off on her own. They walked up to his room, and she poured them a couple of Scotches from the mini-bar. … He woke up two days later with a terrible headache. His $10,000 in chips were gone, as were his credit cards, cash, and car keys.

Leaving the hotel that day, he walked through the casino, and there was Moe, clean-shaven and wearing an expensive suit, a pile of $100 chips in front of him. He saw Phil and smiled. “Sometimes you play hunches,” he said. “And sometimes you go by the book.”

Phil went back to the convention and borrowed money from a friend to get home. “I did great,” he told me. “I went to Vegas in a $60,000 Cadillac and went home in a $600,000 Greyhound bus.”

Phil told me that someday he was going to go back to Vegas, play it by the book, and maybe run into Gladys again.

But then he met Blanche, who works in human resources at his company, and they fell in love and decided to get married. He asked her where she’d like to go on their honeymoon. She’d already thought about it.

“I’d like to go somewhere,” she said, “where there are bright lights, great shows, and gambling.”

So they went to Atlantic City.

3 Days in Vegas The Saturday Evening Post