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Jack Black Went The Extra Mile To Get A Song In 'School Of Rock'
When it comes to comedic actors, nobody is a more lovable, mischievous scamp than Mr. Jack Black.
Whether it's with movies like Shallow Hal and Be Kind Rewind, TV appearances on shows like Mr. Show or Community, or even cartoons like Ice Age and Kung-Fu Panda, the man has been entertaining us with his in-your-face, wacky hijinks for decades now, and we love him all the more for it.
He's not even just a great comedic actor! With his band Tenacious D (which is really just him and fellow comedian Kyle Gas), he's put out three albums, a TV miniseries and a feature-length movie, all of which were big sleeper hits and absolutely hilarious.
With all of these factors in mind, everyone can agree that his best-cast and most iconic role was as Dewey Finn in 2003's School of Rock. Finn, a musician who's been kicked out of his band, takes a job as a substitute teacher by lying about his credentials, and ends up teaching his class to love music.
It's a fantastic movie, and one that Black himself was clearly very passionate about. When it came time to try to license a classic rock song for use in the movie, the one he desperately wanted to use was Led Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song." The problem is, Zeppelin were notoriously reluctant to let their music be used for commercial reasons. However, much like many of his characters, Black wasn't going to let a little setback like that get in his way of using his favorite Zeppelin song.
He went to some pretty big lengths to get to use it...
In a video recorded from the set of the film, Black shows up in front of a massive crowd and speaks directly to surviving Led Zeppelin members Robert Plant, Jimmy Page, and John Paul Jones, begging them to let the film use "Immigrant Song." He does this in his typical over-the-top fashion, getting the crowd to join in on his increasingly exaggerated praise of the song.
Amused by the plea (which was actually directed by the movie's main director, Richard Linklater), Led Zeppelin let the song appear in the film, and the rest is rock history.