“My name is Kazaam I got the whole plan.” That was the rap uttered by Shaquille O’Neal in his 1996 family comedy Kazaam. Despite being one of the biggest stars in the world due to his dominance in the NBA, the film was a commercial and critical failure for the Diesel, with many labeling it as one of the worst movies of the 1990s.
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It currently holds a 5% on the popular movie review website, Rotten Tomatoes. Yet that doesn’t stop Shaq from speaking about it in the modern day. He poked fun at his infamous genie role during a recent edition of his Big Podcast.
Kazaam may have a better legacy if it had done well at the box office. Unfortunately, it failed even in that regard. On a budget of $20 million, $7 million of which went to the NBA Hall of Famer, it only pulled in $18 million.
One would think that would have killed Shaquille O’Neal at the movies. It did not. In fact, one year later, 1997, the big guy starred in Steel based on the DC Comic. Did that one do better? Not it did not. On a budget of $16 million it only made $1.7 million.
So when Shaq’s guest, SNL legend David Spade, made a joke about how poorly his movies did on Rotten Tomatoes, the four-time NBA Champion couldn’t resist bringing up Kazaam. “Kazaam I forgot about that. Was Kazaam a genie in a bottle?” asked Spade. “No, a genie in a boombox,” answered Shaq. This got a chuckle out of Spade, who couldn’t help but troll the very cringeworthy nature of the entire idea. “Okay, well I have a couple of notes already,” the Tommy Boy star jabbed.
This led co-host Adam Lefkoe to ask Shaq if he remembered the famous rap that the character Kazaam spit when he first emerged from the boombox. “No,” responded the Diesel. “Because then you talking about fighting with the director. I’m like, ‘This is not a rap.’ He said, ‘Say it like this.’ It’s not a fucking rap but I’ll say it how you want me to say it.”
Another thing that doesn’t help Kazaam’s place in cinema history is that many people confuse it with Shazaam, a project that starred famed comedian Sinbad. The funny thing about that is Sinbad has denied ever appearing in such a film, adding another ironic layer onto the tale of the genie who liked to rap.
Shaq has continued to work as an actor even though his acting chops were not nearly as dominant as his game inside the paint. There have been times when the now 52-year-old has shone on-screen. Like when he played himself in the opening scene of Scary Movie 4 alongside Doctor Phil. The parody saw both men trapped in a room in a Saw-esque scenario, where Shaq even had to make a free throw to escape.
To this day O’Neal will continue to reference Kazaam and talk about it being a big swing and a miss. In 2012 he told GQ Magazine, “I was a medium-level juvenile delinquent from Newark who always dreamed about doing a movie. Someone said, ”Hey, here’s $7 million, come in and do this genie movie.’ What am I going to say, no? So I did it.”
