An open letter to Eugene Levy

Dear Mr. Levy,

We like you, we really do. You were fantastic in "A Mighty Wind," "Best in Show," and "Waiting for Guffman." You practically made us laugh until we cried with your writing, acting, and singing as part of Christopher Guest's wonderful crew of comedic actors. Your dry wit in these movies is worth more than a thousand stupid Farrelly brothers' gross-out jokes or Jim Carrey mugs. You've provided voices for 2 recent kids' movies that got good reviews from the munchkins I work with. IMDB even tells me that you were in an episode of "Road to Avonlea," a Kevin Sullivan series loosely based on the stories of Lucy Maud Montgomery, and that wins you huge points in this Anne of Green Gables fan's heart.

But then we started to get worried about your choices. An Olsen twins movie? The man who brought us the slow-motion, anti-depressant-addled Mitch in "A Mighty Wind" getting billing after the Olsen twins from "Full House"? And we didn't even have the stomach to see "The Man"- just the previews were enough to make us cringe. You even got a worst supporting actor nomination in the Razzies for it.

But possibly most troubling is your presence in the American Pie series, and it is this continued association which brings us to this letter today. Your participation in the first one is kind of understandable. One can imagine that reading the script made it clear that it was just the kind of sex-obsessed silliness that would bring horny teenagers to the theatres in droves. Still a little below your talents, but an understandable proportion of money to effort. Okay, we said, but surely he'll have the dignity to get out of this embarassing role before the sequel. But there you were, in the second and third installments too. Then, shortly after the direct-to-DVD release of the abysmal "American Pie: Band Camp," the unfathomable fourth entry in the series, in which you were the only returning cast member from the original movies, CNN brings us the depressing news of a fifth movie in the series. Why, Eugene, why?

To be fair, IMDB does list a new Christopher Guest movie, "For Your Consideration," in your resume. This is a good sign, although our hope is tempered by your track record of stinkers in the last few years.

So please, we beg you- stop taking these crappy jobs. Leave them to the Rob Schneiders and David Spades of this world, a Baldwin or Sheen/Estevez brother, or pretty much any member of the Girls' Bike Club. Stop this slide before you end up with top billing in one of the Sci-Fi channel's laughably awful movies!

Sincerely,
Your hopeful-despite-all-evidence audience