Right now, the highest-grossing film of 2023 by far is The Super Mario Bros. Movie, and nothing is anywhere near unseating it. (Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 3, the current runner-up, is still more than $200 million behind Mario.) In the Mario movie, Jack Black played the voice of the villainous Bowser, and he scored himself a surprise Hot 100 hit by belting out “Peaches,” a heartsick love ballad about Princess Peach. Last night, Black got a chance to sing that song with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. This seems absurd, but it happened.
Last night, the Game Awards presented a 10th-anniversary concert at the Hollywood Bowl. The LA Philharmonic performed selections from the scores of games like Unwritten, Diablo, Elden Ring, Star Wars: Jedi Survivor, and Final Fantasy XVI. In what must’ve been the evening’s biggest moment, Jack Black emerged in the Bowser outfit that he wore in the Cole Bennett-directed “Peaches” video, and he belted the song out with all the hammy brio that he could muster. Tenacious D member and “Peaches” co-writer John Spiker dressed up like Toad and played piono. I genuinely laughed at the moment that Black fell to the floor. Watch a fan-made video below.
Naturally. Tenacious D also took the stage, performing an orchestral version of their recent single “Video Games.” Here’s a video of that:
It would’ve been cool if Jack Black’s The House With A Clock In Its Walls co-star Cate Blanchett conducted the orchestra in character as Lydia Tár, but I guess we can’t have everything.