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
Passion of the Christ was big, but its business was more diffused throughout subsequent weekends. Furthermore a lot of those tickets were purchased by churches and distributed to their parishoners. I’d imagine those sales weren’t completed over online ticketing sites like Fandango, but over the phone or face to face.
They need to update their dang commercial. They’ve had the paper bags singing “You’re the best” for about five years now. Mix it up, y’know?
Actually, even more so than HUNGER GAMES, the reason business surged for them in Q1 is because they stole AMC from MovieTickets.com. That’s thousands of screens.
I did not know that, Danny.
That’s huge.
And at least a major part of this story.
That is definitely huge. I went to movietickets.com March 25 and tried to purchase for me and the wife at the local AMC and was denied. When I hit up Fandango it was a gamble then, I was surprised to see I could purchase on there instead.
Come on DP … Aren’t you breaking one of your golden rules of journalism here? To an outside, it seems you were so anxious to get your Fandango slap-down published quickly that you didn’t perform your due diligence to actually investigate and report the actual story.
Isn’t this exactly the type of behavior that you’re always railing against?
I guess that’s fair… if a little excessive, KrazyEyes.
I wasn’t in a rush to slap down Fandango. Ironically, the AMC thing actually would make it much more a slap down. But you’re probably more interested in telling me that I’m wrong than actually having a conversation about it.
And no, this is not the type of behavior I tend to rail against. What I tend to rail against is running press releases as news without adding any perspective. (See Deadline’s take on the press release) The intention of this piece, obviously, was to add perspective.
I do, however, assume that I get a pretty large chunk of the news as it happens in this industry and Fandango grabbing AMC was not something I knew… and should have.
And when you see any of the people I rail against admit as much in print when they don’t have a significant fact in their pieces, you will have seen a miracle occur.