In 2007, Seth Gordon shed light on the pursuit for, arguably the most cherished video game world record there is in The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters. The movie follows two main characters throughout, the video game savant turned hot sauce empire builder Billy Mitchel and the affable Steve Wiebe who encounters one string of bad luck after the other. The movie tracks Wiebe as he dedicates his life to attaining the highest score ever recorded in Donkey Kong and thusly to dethrone Mitchel from his decades-old pedestal.
What made The King of Kong such a hit at the time was the two dueling personalities with the long-haired Mitchel relishing in his video game accolades and garnering much attention and success whether or not completely deserved. Wiebe is his complete opposite, a man who puts in the effort only to come in second place in every aspect of life imaginable. Wiebe, the hero of the film, seems to continually have the deck stacked against him such as having one of his world record Donkey Kong game struck from the record books.
With such a compelling story for a classic video game, what next from a decade-old documentary? A musical rendition of the film of course. ING spoke with Seth Gordon as he was promoting his latest film Baywatch and discussed what was in store for The King of Kong. Apparently, Gordon has big plans stating, “Yeah, some scripts have been written – we’re actually working on a musical right now, which is pretty great.” He went on to clarify that the musical would be a stage production expanding, “I think it lends itself to that – there’s such a melodrama, and so many of the characters are actually musicians, and the music of the games, too, is a thing.”
For Donkey Kong historians, Wiebe did end up achieving the world record although it has since been surpassed. He also held records for Donkey Kong Jr.
