It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” â some novel, you know?
So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.
And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it â I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.
There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.
I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury â he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” â and I’d forgot who he was.
So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging â I was with her at that moment â she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.
But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy namedâ” “Yeah, sure â you want his phone number?”
My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher
“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that Iâm on the phone with you now, after all thatâs been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didnât seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. Thereâs not a case of that. He wasnât using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had â if that were what the accusation involved â the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. Iâm not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, âYou know, itâs not this, itâs thatâ? Because â let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, thatâs what it lacked. Thatâs what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.
~ David Simon
The only glitch there is that it’s at the Alamo on S. Lamar which is NOT the downtown location. It’s in a mall if I’m not mistaken. Plus, I kind of refuse to see 22 minutes of an unfinished movie….that’s just lame. But I’m sure lots of other journalists will be there with bells on…
Don,
The 20 or so minutes of There Will Be Blood they previewed at Telluride the year before last was pretty darn awesome …
Not that this is TWBB, but I’m just saying …
It just feels false and blatantly promotional to me, Kim. A rough cut or work in progress (like Raimi’s horror film) I can see pulling a crowd for, especially to get feedback or reaction and make tweeks. But things like this with 22 mins or that BS Pixar did where they showed the first 1/2 of “Up” just seems lame to me, as a writer.
As a FAN though, oh hell yeah, I’d love to see that stuff. But seeing and writing about a portion of a movie feels like you’re doing P.R. for a company that doesn’t even have a finished product to push…yet.
it’s just me, I get weird about crap like that. I don’t think it’s fair to readers and reeks of a “look what *I* got to see and *you* didn’t!” kind of thing.
Plus I’m too lazy to get to Alamo S. Lamar đ
It’s weird that they’re showing this opposite the Raimi screening. Maybe that will cut down a little on the craziness.
Oh, and Don, SX is having a shuttle bus for the firs time to take you to the Lamar if you’re too lazy!
Frigggggin sweeeet, EMFan!!
Oddly enough, this will directly opposite the only SXSW screening of Women in Trouble. I’ll pass.
ISN’T BORAT MARRIED TO ISLA FISHER?
IF MY WIFE WAS ISLA FISHER, MY NEXT MOVIE WOULD BE CALLED:
BANGING MY WIFE.
GOOD POST.
errolmorrisfan,
It’s not showing opposite the Raimi, exactly. It’s showing before, and the Raimi, which is at the Paramount, won’t start until press gets from one to the other. I’ll be going to both.
Joe, I hear you. And I don’t entirely disagree with you, even. But … what a lot of folks want to know is, does SBC have something beyond Borat in him? And 22 minutes or so will be enough to tell that much. Not how well the movie will sustain through its full length, of course, but how does it work, most importantly, is it funny?
You kind of have to think the powers that be at Uni think what they have is funny, and it works, or why bother sneaking 20 minutes of it at a fest at all and risking the press hating it and slamming it four months before release? I think SBC is too smart for that, myself.
Oddly excited to see the new Raimi, considering I’m not a huge horror buff, and it’s probably going to give me nightmares.
I liked BORAT well enough but I haven’t found the Bruno character to be nearly as funny — either on the HBO show or in the clips that have been leaked during production of the feature film. This one is going to need stellar reviews to get my butt in a theater seat.
I’m way more interested in what Raimi is going to come up with. I just hope his idea of a “horror” movie nowadays is the original EVIL DEAD and not ARMY OF DARKNESS. Some of the Ghosthouse productions had their heart in the right place (even if the execution wasn’t always so great) so I’d say I’m guardedly optimistic.
Kim: I likely will see Bruno when it’s a complete and finished movie. But for me, a potentially interesting finished movie trumps a 20-minute preview of anything.
ISLA FISHER IS HOTTER THAN FUCK.
CONFESSIONS OF A BONER-HOLIC.
ISLA = TOTAL FUCKING RAGER.
Kim-I’ll hold your hand in there đ
And I also heard over the twitter transit that there’s a shuttle for press to take you from BRUNO to RAIMI….but I never got an email about it. Ask around…