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By DP30 david@thehotbuttonl.com

DP/30: I AM, director Tom Shadyac

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17 Responses to “DP/30: I AM, director Tom Shadyac”

  1. J. Ronald Trost says:

    Tom: You do not know me. I saw you on Morning Joe this morning and said to myself: That’s got to be Dick Shadyac’s son. I worked with your Dad for several years in the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice but we moved apart when I went back to my home state of California in 1962 but managed to stay in touch a little bit.. I just googled your Dad and found out that he passed away 2 years ago. He was a great man. Even in his early years he was obsessed with St Jude’s Hospital.Being Jewish, we had many spirited but friendly conversations about the Middle East. A wonderful, wonderful human being. Am going to see I Am in New York where I live.

  2. I was so deeply touched by this film. We need to hear this message over and over again.

  3. I was so deeply moved by this movie that I just saw this afternoon. This message needs to be told around the world. Bless you for your effort to do just that.

  4. Hi Tom,

    Rats! I missed you in Denver last Friday. Would have loved to partake in the Q/A at Chez Artiste. I saw the film yesterday with a big crowd of people. It’s the first time in a long time that I heard spontaneous clapping at the end. Folks loved it, as did I…especially the HeartMath segments. (I heard about HeartMath several years ago & was blown away by their research.) You might like a film that I directed that was just released on Amazon a few days ago. It’s another fun paradigm-shifter called “Black Whole.”

    Look forward to getting the DVD of “I AM” and watching the extras!

  5. Maria Ustinova crane says:

    This is the very best film I have ever seen I am 8m 81
    I would love to get the DVD when will it be available I want to see it over and again- its outrageously good!

  6. trish koser says:

    Saw Tom Shadyak on Oprah Show. He sounds phenomonal. Very interesting. Opens up eyes. Thank you for being a shiny spirit!

    Best, Trisha (warm hearted soul doing her best in Portland, OR)

  7. Tonya Paez says:

    I am wondering if you can help me in the process of opening a non-profit organization for seminarians? Please let me know. I will give you detailed information if I get an answer back! I need your help!!!
    Tonya Paez

  8. Cindy Kraft says:

    I love Tom Shadyac! Invisible Children is how I connected
    today on Oprah and found out who Tom Shadyac really is …..wow ….what he has to offer this world in a positive light!!! Looking forward to seeing the documentary “I Am”. Invisible Children is close to my heart and I am so proud of our hometown youth, finding and connecting our future to lifting up children in the world that need you. Thanks for giving this world hope.

  9. Eileen Lawrence says:

    Hey Tom, I couldn’t see you on the Oprah show, but checked out your appearance on her website. I had just had a challenging conversation at a party last week about what constitutes success that caused me to dig up a quote that I had saved that I thought you might be interested in.
    ” He has achieved success who has lived well, laughed often and loved much;who has gained the respect of intelligent people and the love of little children; who has filled his niche and accomplished his task;who has left the world better than he found it,whether by an improved poppy, a perfect poem or a rescued soul; who has never lacked appreciation of earth’s beauty or failed to express it; who has looked for the best in others and given the best he had; whose life was an inspiration; whose memory a benediction.” Mrs A.J.Stanley
    Words to live by- I look forward to seeing I AM. Thanks for making it.

  10. Tom,

    I saw you an OPRAH yesterday.I too experienced the shamanic journey of almost dying in order to wake up!!
    I can’t wait to see the film when it comes to Metro Detroit, MI. God bless you!!

    Eileen McDevitt

  11. margaret says:

    I just saw your film, thank you for the old shots of Peace Pilgrim, I met her in 1971 and had a 10 year exchange of letters with her before her death. I have always been trying to find peace inside. I wonder, looking at my 40 year old son if it is not hard when you are struggling to survive financially. You did come from the financially secure side of the scale and did not have to worry about a roof over your head. Have you looked at that side of the story?
    I know you are correct in what you have presented. I have known physicists who talk about the molecular and even planetary phenomena mentioned in the film. I have also been practicing spiritually most of my life. I cannot think of anything more important or enriching.

  12. Jaime Lyn Brisebois says:

    Tom,

    I know you will understand this!
    In 1982 at the age of nineteen I moved to California to pursue a career in special effects make-up. After three weeks of schooling my little brother of 11 years was hit and killed on his bike by a drunk driver. My inspiration and joy had left this world. I came back to Toronto to deal with my new life and all the pain I was too endure. I struggled for years to find some truth in life. I was searching always searching.
    Finally in 2007 my great nephew was born to my disabled niece. I took both of them in as they had nowhere to go. It was discovered in 2009 my great nephew also had a disability. In taking these children in I have been able to open that place in my heart that I thought was forever hardened. My great nephew gives me the light to feel my little brothers spirit. Although he is only three he is my teacher. Some little life force so small is my guide to understanding.
    Tom with G-d’s will, at some point in time I hope to be able to talk to you. I have an idea to share. The truth for me is; If it is meant to be it will happen.
    I am so grateful you have expressed through action that there is another way to live.We all seem to get caught up wanting more than we need.

    Jaime Lyn Brisebois

  13. I relish, lead to I found just what I was having a look for. You’ve ended my 4 day lengthy hunt! God Bless you man. Have a great day. Bye

  14. I’m so happy to see someone like you tell this kind of story.

  15. Ozaltin says:

    Hi Tom,

    I would love to watch the film and to be a part of your journey. I’m leaving in Turkey and don’t know how to get it. Please help! 🙂

    Please accept my love,.. ”love without condition”

    Ozaltin Ucok

  16. ora says:

    Saw you briefly about I am reading about you now God bless you on your journey of life. Will write more next time.

  17. Hideki Oshiro says:

    I watched the film by Netflix, with legend in Portuguese.
    I regret that many deep messages was lost due to legend in yellow color is impossible to read printed on white or yellow screen.
    Netflix should repair this mistake in all films.

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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” — 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 — 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 — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.

So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — 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 named—” “Yeah, sure — 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 I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s 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 didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — 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. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s 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