The Hollywood Treatment

Take a good, solid, up-and-coming actor (Larroquette), a reasonably good, somewhat solid, up-and-coming actress (Alley), several (only several) solid, known supporting actors/actresses (Ginty and La Placa respectively), a simple premise and then add zaniness, chaos, calamity and kookiness. That's the Hollywood Treatment, at least in my mind - to make something nice with the potential to be really good and then make it much, much worse, forsaking the craft for profit.

The film itself fits into some oddball genre of cinema from that time (I remember several that sought to emulate "Home Alone" or "Problem Child" or even a few darker films), hence its title. For me, it's about the strength of the acting; seek to induce that, forsaking outrageous antics designed for profit, and a reasonably good film may follow. Then again, if that were the case, Madhouse may have morphed into something else altogether.