I was eating at 3am in a diner because that is one of life's truly great pleasures when a thought occurred to me. Well, I'm a writer so thoughts don't occur so much as they spring forth into the universe already whole with a bloodthirsty desire to be imparted to the nearest waitress, stranger, or unenviable girlfriend.
How come there's no name for the meal you eat at 3am?
There's Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner. When you eat, it has a name; but what parameters define what label? It can't be the order; if you eat three meals before 10am, you would not be thin and the third meal would not be dinner. It can't be type; grits eaten at 6pm may be an odd choice but it is not breakfast. Therefore I think the paramater is time.
Don't interrupt. I'm going somewhere with this.
Breakfast: Any meal eaten between 5am and 9:00am
Lunch: Any meal eaten between 11:00 am and 2pm
Dinner: Any meal eaten between 3:30pm (my Grandparents) and 10pm (my Parents).
Which leaves Brunch, the fake meal taking place partially in Breakfast Time and partially in Lunch Time, roughly between 9:00 and 11:00. Really Brunch is more defined by how your dressed than anything else. If you got dressed, left the house, and are eating at 11, then you're eating brunch. If you're still in your pajamas and eating at 11 then you are eating lunch you lazy slob or freelance web designer.
Now before I go on, I know you all have questions, but for the love of science please shut up.
There are two obvious gaps in the meal plan. What am I eating if I'm eating at 2:30 pm? That's not lunch...it's not dinner either, today on Schadenfreude.net I declare all meals eaten between 2pm and 3:30pm: Dunch. That's right, Dunch. Start using it now, we've got years to catch up on. Okay, practical application: let's say you're supposed to meet with someone for Dinner to discuss the potential ramifications of jury verdict against you, suggest to them that you meet a little earlier and say "We should meet for Dunch." When they say "What?" Plug our website.
There's also a large gap between 10pm and 5am. We all know that you can't have dinner at Midnight (nor can you really at 10, but tell my parents that), but what you CAN have is...Midnosh. That's right, Midnosh. Start using it now, we've got years to catch up on. Okay, practical application: let's say you stay out late at the bar with a potential sexual partner or member of your bowling league and perhaps before you go home to have sex or fall asleep full of regret, or both, you want to grab a bite to eat at an all-night diner so you can overhear Adam's latest theory, you would say "Hey, before we go home, shall we partake in some Midnosh?" When they say "What?" Plug our website.
In closing, I know it's not a perfect system but it's a system and if that's good enough for the United States of America then it should be good enough for you. Yes, I know there are third-shifters out there, I was a third-shifter for years myself, I feel your pain. I'm also not bending the rules for you. It's 3pm, you just woke up, you're eating cereal, that cereal my friend, is what's for Dunch.
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
Saturday, April 16, 2005
My Immediate Reactions to Episode 47: :30
Just finished listening to Episode 47: :30 and I think I've found my new favorite episode. The storytelling is some of the best we've done, the story really moves. I really want to listen to it again right now because I know i missed so much (and I already knew the story!!).
Our format has changed significantly over the last two years. I have a few friends and family who have faithfully listened to the show since day one, but i wouldn't expect it of anyone. The show started out as a clumsy amlagamation of sketches with music in between each, in Episode 16 those music cues got replaced with clumsy links that would be recorded week-of, that took us from sketch to sketch and also to the 1,2,3 runners. The links got better as we rerecorded larger chunks of sketches towards the end of season one. When we went on a retreat to write Episodes 30-40 we had this new format in mind, it was like writing for a new show, we came up with a format best Evidenced in Episodes 31, 32, and 34, very streamlined with wild tangents such as World Destroying Volcanoes being stopped by Bootsy Collins or A Giant Dr. Phil destroying Tokyo. Episode 32 is so streamlined that it almost plays out like a linear story.
Which is what was in my mind when I heard our newest innovation - Episode 47: :30.
This is the first time we've we've told a linear story, the parody of 24 was a great excuse to tell a single linear story. It would not surprise me if more shows end up linear stories in Season 3. We have two more coming up this season, they are Part 1 and Part 2 of the Ed Bus story. I don't think it will be much of a stretch to do more linear storylines, we seem to be heading in that direction.
I think the reason this comes naturally is that the mechanics of all scenes are the same mechanics as sketches anyway, scenes in a movie or play just can't lay flat, they all have their own game the way sketches do, opportunities are presented to the hero and obstacles are put in their place, it all plays out the same way.
We try to have seven jokes a minute, this is very evident in :30, it's packed with jokes, just because they're jokes doesn't mean they're all gut-busters, but I think filling time with smaller jokes, asides, and references that keep the energy up while we build to something larger is an art itself. Also, while Todd Voorhies travels from sketch to sketch you can fill time with jokes which makes the audience less aware that we're linking from one thing to another.
I laughed out loud more at :30 than I think I have at any other show, and I just know this one will get better with successive listenings. That was fun.
Our format has changed significantly over the last two years. I have a few friends and family who have faithfully listened to the show since day one, but i wouldn't expect it of anyone. The show started out as a clumsy amlagamation of sketches with music in between each, in Episode 16 those music cues got replaced with clumsy links that would be recorded week-of, that took us from sketch to sketch and also to the 1,2,3 runners. The links got better as we rerecorded larger chunks of sketches towards the end of season one. When we went on a retreat to write Episodes 30-40 we had this new format in mind, it was like writing for a new show, we came up with a format best Evidenced in Episodes 31, 32, and 34, very streamlined with wild tangents such as World Destroying Volcanoes being stopped by Bootsy Collins or A Giant Dr. Phil destroying Tokyo. Episode 32 is so streamlined that it almost plays out like a linear story.
Which is what was in my mind when I heard our newest innovation - Episode 47: :30.
This is the first time we've we've told a linear story, the parody of 24 was a great excuse to tell a single linear story. It would not surprise me if more shows end up linear stories in Season 3. We have two more coming up this season, they are Part 1 and Part 2 of the Ed Bus story. I don't think it will be much of a stretch to do more linear storylines, we seem to be heading in that direction.
I think the reason this comes naturally is that the mechanics of all scenes are the same mechanics as sketches anyway, scenes in a movie or play just can't lay flat, they all have their own game the way sketches do, opportunities are presented to the hero and obstacles are put in their place, it all plays out the same way.
We try to have seven jokes a minute, this is very evident in :30, it's packed with jokes, just because they're jokes doesn't mean they're all gut-busters, but I think filling time with smaller jokes, asides, and references that keep the energy up while we build to something larger is an art itself. Also, while Todd Voorhies travels from sketch to sketch you can fill time with jokes which makes the audience less aware that we're linking from one thing to another.
I laughed out loud more at :30 than I think I have at any other show, and I just know this one will get better with successive listenings. That was fun.
Friday, April 15, 2005
The Glorious Mess
If you don't know, there's something big on the Horizon, or depending upon your interest in the history of Schadenfreude, something average may be on the horizon. I am currently compiling 8 years of Schadenfreude Footage for the Schadenfreude Web Documentary Series. A multi-part series which will air once a week starting in May. I am hip-deep in shitty old 8mm footage of us from Second City. The goal right now is to boil all this shitty old footage into a few entertaining shorts and then get into the footage from 2000 when I got my slim DV cam, that's when the footage gets really good. It will be quite an accomplishment when it's up and going. If you see me glowing around May 1 it will be from an intense sense of accomplishment. Oh, and I will no longer be living with my psycho roommate, oh man, I need to blog about that, but I must get back to work, which I should also blog about. That's it! Next week, new lease on life, I will blog every day, I'll let you know how the doc project's going, I will let you know where I work, and I'll let you know about the Psycho Roommate From Helllllllll. bye.
Thursday, April 14, 2005
Viva Voce with Scotland Yard at the Metro tonight!
I don't know shit about music, I don't know shit about the indie scene, the last concert i went to was Def Leppard at the UIC Pavilion two years ago, but there are two bands I like right now and somehow they have ended up on the stage at the Metro tonight. Pure twist of fate brought Viva Voce to my attention, I discovered them while acting in their music video, check it out at
http://www.amorephonics.com/alivewpleasure.mov
It's directed by the brilliant Steve Delahoyde and it stars me as the Mayor Of Music Videos, reportedly it's playing on a loop in the H&M on Michigan and has been a big hit on the show 120 minutes on MTV Europe.
Bottom line, Viva Voce is awesome, and I never declare any music awesome. I heard Alive With Pleasure on the set of the shoot and thought it was SO good. Then they gave me a CD after the shoot and the whole thing was GREAT! EVERY SONG! You must check them out, go to iTunes, listen to "Daylight" and if you like it, just buy the whole damn album. Then come to the show.
And then, through a completely unconnected series of events (though, are there really ANY unconnected events?) I ended up at a show for the Scotland Yard Gospel Choir who puts like 15 people on their stage playing up to four guitars and horns and three singers, it's so much music, I've never heard such a multilayered sound out of a band that you could see at a bar. I was hooked on them too.
So: Number of Bands discovered in the last year - 2
Number of those bands that are playing together tonight at the Metro - 2
See you there.
http://www.amorephonics.com/alivewpleasure.mov
It's directed by the brilliant Steve Delahoyde and it stars me as the Mayor Of Music Videos, reportedly it's playing on a loop in the H&M on Michigan and has been a big hit on the show 120 minutes on MTV Europe.
Bottom line, Viva Voce is awesome, and I never declare any music awesome. I heard Alive With Pleasure on the set of the shoot and thought it was SO good. Then they gave me a CD after the shoot and the whole thing was GREAT! EVERY SONG! You must check them out, go to iTunes, listen to "Daylight" and if you like it, just buy the whole damn album. Then come to the show.
And then, through a completely unconnected series of events (though, are there really ANY unconnected events?) I ended up at a show for the Scotland Yard Gospel Choir who puts like 15 people on their stage playing up to four guitars and horns and three singers, it's so much music, I've never heard such a multilayered sound out of a band that you could see at a bar. I was hooked on them too.
So: Number of Bands discovered in the last year - 2
Number of those bands that are playing together tonight at the Metro - 2
See you there.
Tuesday, April 12, 2005
Monday, April 11, 2005
Streets of Japan
Hey all, just testing out the wonderul Flickr program at Flickr.com. This should be a good way to post when I don't have tons of time to formulate thoughts for the blog (unlike the astoundingly prolific Justin Kaufmann). Also finally you can see some of the cool photo's I took in Japan. Like this one!
Wednesday, April 6, 2005
I Think I Have A Secret Desire to Get Stuck In An Elevator
I have this huge Chrome bag. www.chromebags.com Best backpack/sidebag ever EVER invented. They took every complaint I've had about every backpack or sidebag I've owned for 25 years and fixed all of the problems I had. Bravo. I love this thing, one of it's great attributes is that it's very big. "The Metropolis" is name of this size. There is one bigger, called "The Kremlin" which, I'm not kidding, could fit a five year old.
I take my day with me, my bag today contains, my journal, computer, workout clothes, palmpilot, digital camera, sunglasses, coffee cup, and ipod. Already too much. But my reading material is too much too, an obsession. Here's what there is to read in my bag, A Devil's Due comic (Breakdown, on sale now), A 120 page script, a workout magazine, A Final Cut Pro HD tutorial CD-rom, and a Scr(i)pt magazine. Now, how many of these could I actually read today? One, two if you include the comic. But I actually make decisions on what third and fourth piece of reading I take with me. It's retarded. Should I take this or this? When I'll never get around to it anyway. That's why I think I have a subliminal desire to get stuck in an elevator, because I would have plenty to read unlike most people. Because, of course, that's the real danger when you get stuck in an elevator, boredom.
I would stop doing this, but it makes me interesting.
I take my day with me, my bag today contains, my journal, computer, workout clothes, palmpilot, digital camera, sunglasses, coffee cup, and ipod. Already too much. But my reading material is too much too, an obsession. Here's what there is to read in my bag, A Devil's Due comic (Breakdown, on sale now), A 120 page script, a workout magazine, A Final Cut Pro HD tutorial CD-rom, and a Scr(i)pt magazine. Now, how many of these could I actually read today? One, two if you include the comic. But I actually make decisions on what third and fourth piece of reading I take with me. It's retarded. Should I take this or this? When I'll never get around to it anyway. That's why I think I have a subliminal desire to get stuck in an elevator, because I would have plenty to read unlike most people. Because, of course, that's the real danger when you get stuck in an elevator, boredom.
I would stop doing this, but it makes me interesting.
Monday, April 4, 2005
Pledge Drive Show - Minute By Minute
4/2/05 Pledge Drive Shot by Shot
9:40 - Sandy picks me up Grace and Inner Lakeshore.
10:00 - Arrive at Navy Pier, four hours to showtime.
10:05 - In Justin's Office Shiow is editing the "Indiana Jones pledge sketch." We wrote these little sketches that are pledge-centric. In this scene I, as an Indiana Jones archetype fight off Dr. Nemeesis from Episode 34 (or whatever one had the Angry Volcano in it) and he saves himself by dialing 1-877-DONT-WAIT to pledge to CPR. After he does this Gretchen Helfrich, Steve Edwards, and Carlos Hernandez Gomez drop out of the sky in a helicopter and save him. This bit was written on Tuesday, Recorded on Wednesday and being edited Four hours prior to airtime. We get a good laugh because there's all kinds of new elements to it, like Steve Edwards and some of his improvised lines, also Carlos saying "Grab onto my fedora!"
10:20 - Justin, in full producer mode, sends us to the studio to rehearse and overrehearse the live spot we will be doing. He'll be in later.
10:35 - Sandy and I work on Ted Dinnerbansky Spot. Three times during the show Justin will toss off to me int he pledge room (LIVE!), and I will give an update and talk about the volunteers, and then I will put a "volunteer" on the air, the first time this is Kate as Zoey, the second time it's Mark Hanner as a guy who used to do the automated phone tree for SBC Ameritech and therefore makes all the people call in think they're on hold and they all hang up. The third time i get interrupted by Ted D. who offers up a matching challenge, for every 10 million dollars we raise in the next hour, he will give us a million, it's full of great rich guy jokes including the fact that Ted not only has the personal luxury Jet and Helicopter, but also an Akula Class Submarine, which is rich extravagance taken as far as possible.
11:00 - Zoey Dunkle, this is hilarious, Zoey is obsessed with Steve Edwards and has a blog called Eight-Forty-Date Me Steve Edwards, and as we rehearse she's frantically making entries in Blogger to make it look like Zoey's been doing it for a while. I wouldn't surprise me if Steve puts Zoey's Blog as an option under our Blogs, I would read Zoey's blog.
11:30 - Justin pops in, drops the schedule for th e night and says keep rehearsing.
11:35 - I rehearse my bit with Mark as the Voicemail guy who doesn't understand why he's getting lots of calls but no members, and then we listen into a call and he says "Doors open on the right at North & Clybourne...are you still there?...i'm sorry you're having trouble...goodbye..." This wraps into the final bit in which earth is going to crash into the sun so the crew has to engage not the hyper-drive (which we gave ritalin) not the warp drive (which is owned by Paramount) but the PLEDGE DRIVE! One last call to save the earth, but then Mark answers with the phone tree guy and we say damn, nobody there and the earth crashes into the sun.
12:00 - Since some of the characters will be answering the phones after they are introduced, we are walked through how to make someone a member.
12:30 - We rehearse again with Justin in the room, he adds some bits and the live bits are really rockin' now. It's going to be a great show.
1: 45 - Fifteen minutes until airtime. Pre-show nerves kick in, we all hit battle stations and get ready to give the audience the show our lives.
1:59 - Pope Dies
2:10 - We all go home.
9:40 - Sandy picks me up Grace and Inner Lakeshore.
10:00 - Arrive at Navy Pier, four hours to showtime.
10:05 - In Justin's Office Shiow is editing the "Indiana Jones pledge sketch." We wrote these little sketches that are pledge-centric. In this scene I, as an Indiana Jones archetype fight off Dr. Nemeesis from Episode 34 (or whatever one had the Angry Volcano in it) and he saves himself by dialing 1-877-DONT-WAIT to pledge to CPR. After he does this Gretchen Helfrich, Steve Edwards, and Carlos Hernandez Gomez drop out of the sky in a helicopter and save him. This bit was written on Tuesday, Recorded on Wednesday and being edited Four hours prior to airtime. We get a good laugh because there's all kinds of new elements to it, like Steve Edwards and some of his improvised lines, also Carlos saying "Grab onto my fedora!"
10:20 - Justin, in full producer mode, sends us to the studio to rehearse and overrehearse the live spot we will be doing. He'll be in later.
10:35 - Sandy and I work on Ted Dinnerbansky Spot. Three times during the show Justin will toss off to me int he pledge room (LIVE!), and I will give an update and talk about the volunteers, and then I will put a "volunteer" on the air, the first time this is Kate as Zoey, the second time it's Mark Hanner as a guy who used to do the automated phone tree for SBC Ameritech and therefore makes all the people call in think they're on hold and they all hang up. The third time i get interrupted by Ted D. who offers up a matching challenge, for every 10 million dollars we raise in the next hour, he will give us a million, it's full of great rich guy jokes including the fact that Ted not only has the personal luxury Jet and Helicopter, but also an Akula Class Submarine, which is rich extravagance taken as far as possible.
11:00 - Zoey Dunkle, this is hilarious, Zoey is obsessed with Steve Edwards and has a blog called Eight-Forty-Date Me Steve Edwards, and as we rehearse she's frantically making entries in Blogger to make it look like Zoey's been doing it for a while. I wouldn't surprise me if Steve puts Zoey's Blog as an option under our Blogs, I would read Zoey's blog.
11:30 - Justin pops in, drops the schedule for th e night and says keep rehearsing.
11:35 - I rehearse my bit with Mark as the Voicemail guy who doesn't understand why he's getting lots of calls but no members, and then we listen into a call and he says "Doors open on the right at North & Clybourne...are you still there?...i'm sorry you're having trouble...goodbye..." This wraps into the final bit in which earth is going to crash into the sun so the crew has to engage not the hyper-drive (which we gave ritalin) not the warp drive (which is owned by Paramount) but the PLEDGE DRIVE! One last call to save the earth, but then Mark answers with the phone tree guy and we say damn, nobody there and the earth crashes into the sun.
12:00 - Since some of the characters will be answering the phones after they are introduced, we are walked through how to make someone a member.
12:30 - We rehearse again with Justin in the room, he adds some bits and the live bits are really rockin' now. It's going to be a great show.
1: 45 - Fifteen minutes until airtime. Pre-show nerves kick in, we all hit battle stations and get ready to give the audience the show our lives.
1:59 - Pope Dies
2:10 - We all go home.
Friday, April 1, 2005
The Man Who Made Sin City
So here comes Sin City, which coincidentally I read right after watching Robert Rodriguez' El Mariachi as I worked at a video store and a comic book store at the time. I got paid in comics.
How fucking cool is Robert Rodriguez? I fucking love that guy. He had the best personal ad campaign ever with that $8,000 movie and before Hollywood had a chance to say he couldn't make REAL movies he made Desperado. Which makes him smarter than the average new entry into Hollywood, ALWAYS have your next idea ready and if you have no next idea, tell them you do and pitch a thinly veiled remake of your previous work (Evil Dead, Desperado). It'll keep your career going while you do work on that next idea. Rodriguez v. 2.0 got stuck in director-for-hire mode and seemed to lose some of his independence with Dusk Til Dawn and that Post-Scream Josh Hartnett School Movie who's name is (clearly) eluding me right now. People cried foul, "how dare the $8,000 kid make these big budget movies, sell out, sell out" People, who, of course, have never made a movie or had a film career to maintain themselves, but it always seems like celelbrities owe something to nobodies (this is a great rant that Katie Watson has, I won't steal her thunder here). and Rodriguez failed to make headlines the way he had with El Mariachi. It seemed like he was all ready to slip into obscurity like so many indie darlings and go down in film history as "that $8,000 movie guy." But then it all turned around for some very exciting reasons. It all started with Spy Kids, which, at the time, sounded like a death knell. Oh great, now Mr. Desperado has dropped his John Woo firefights for Wendy's Kids meal? And I know in the film industry they give shit to whatever kids film is only able to secure the Wendy's Promotional Tie-in. "Hey, Ice Age, yeah, it's me Mulan *snicker*, where you guys at?" "Guys, for the last time, I'm at Wendy's stop calling me." I thought Rodriguez was going to go be the next Christopher Columbus (Mrs, Doubtfire, That Robin Williams Robot movie which had the the kiss of death for any movie, Robin Williams riding that heartfelt/ funny line, ew, just got the shivers, Robin, be funny, or be serious, don't ride the line you funny doctor overgrown kid syndrome holocaust victim). The only bright side to Spy Kids was that this was a project he had written, which he hadn't done in a while. Also when the film turned out to be really good, that didn't hurt. Nor did it hurt him in the industry because the movie made a shitload of money and definitely revitalized his career in the eyes of the studios.
But my modern love affair with Rodriguez came with Spy Kids 2, which should've had the opposite effect because if you thought Rodriguez had sold out with SK1 like I (kinda) did, then your eyes rolled so hard they hurt at seeing that McDonald's had picked up the licensing rights to the sequel. But he once again made a trademark Rodriguez Headline by refusing the doubled budget for the sequel, instead choosing to make the movie for the SAME budget as the first one (which was the skeptical studio budget given to a movie that they felt would bomb). But i was sold when I took a look at the extra features on the SK2 DVD and listened to the commentary track (best commentary track I've ever heard, commentary track fans, TRUST me on this one). I was surprised to see that most of this huge looking film was shot in his backyard in Austin, TX, that he had edited and scored in a studio he had built in his garage and a greenscreen just down the street! That it had been shot digitally and he was giving up on film, that he'd written the film in a couple weeks and took on the role of Composer and Production Designer because he had no idea how to to the jobs, but wanted to learn! THIS IS THE $8,000 kid, big budget style! What a leap forward for Rodriguez.
Now I was SO excitied to see what he'd do next. It would be something more exciting in it's conception than it was as a movie. After Desperado the studios kept asking him for a third sequel, Quentin Tarantino even told him on the set of Desperado that he had to make a third movie as an homage to Sergio Leone's dollar's trilogy and that it had to be called Once Upon a Time in Mexico, yes Quentin named the movie in 1995. But Rodriguez had no desire to make it, but they asked him every year to make another one. RR had used the digital camera once on Spy Kids 1 as a test and loved the result, but he wanted to give the Camera a full test, THAT's when he decdided to make Once Upon a Time. He immediatly called the head of Columbia and told her he had a script for Desperado 2 and that he'd send it to her at the end of the week, HE HADN'T WRITTEN A WORD. But he wrote it that quickly, In fact the script was so thin when he handed it over to her that he stuffed thirty pages of another script in the middle to pad it out. The studios first note to him "drop the dentist subplot". It was greenlit and RR shot the whole film in one month and played even MORE roles on the set of this film ALL TO TEST OUT THE CAMERA! Now here's the cool thing, he pulled the trigger on Once Upon A Time so quickly that the shoot barely fit in between the shoots on Spy Kids 1 & 2. That's right, Once Upon a Time was shot before Spy Kids 2 and was edited after SK2 was in theatres. And this is the reason I love the New Rodriguez, he throws caution to the wind and rides on pure creativity, he tells everyone that this result will happen on this date and then he figures out how to get it done by riding on pure creativity, he takes on roles he's never played in production and figures out how to do them and succeeds brilliantly in a high profile positions with millions of dollars on the line, the time when everyone else in the industry get conservative and looks for the next John Grisham adaptation so their next movies a guaranteed hit (which has the opposite effect, Gingerbread Man anyone? It's an Altman film? It's got Kenneth Branagh? No? No takers? Did I mention John Grisham? What's that? No, he's the other guy, Michael Creighton, he wrote Timeline, you can tell the difference because there's no lawyers in it?).
Constantly challenging ourselves, putting it all on the line and trusting in our talents to achieve the impossible and unprecedented. It's a lesson we all could use.
And this is the man who made Sin City.
Hopefully anyone who reads this will enjoy Robert Rodriguez as much they enjoy the movie itself when they see it tonight. I know I will.
How fucking cool is Robert Rodriguez? I fucking love that guy. He had the best personal ad campaign ever with that $8,000 movie and before Hollywood had a chance to say he couldn't make REAL movies he made Desperado. Which makes him smarter than the average new entry into Hollywood, ALWAYS have your next idea ready and if you have no next idea, tell them you do and pitch a thinly veiled remake of your previous work (Evil Dead, Desperado). It'll keep your career going while you do work on that next idea. Rodriguez v. 2.0 got stuck in director-for-hire mode and seemed to lose some of his independence with Dusk Til Dawn and that Post-Scream Josh Hartnett School Movie who's name is (clearly) eluding me right now. People cried foul, "how dare the $8,000 kid make these big budget movies, sell out, sell out" People, who, of course, have never made a movie or had a film career to maintain themselves, but it always seems like celelbrities owe something to nobodies (this is a great rant that Katie Watson has, I won't steal her thunder here). and Rodriguez failed to make headlines the way he had with El Mariachi. It seemed like he was all ready to slip into obscurity like so many indie darlings and go down in film history as "that $8,000 movie guy." But then it all turned around for some very exciting reasons. It all started with Spy Kids, which, at the time, sounded like a death knell. Oh great, now Mr. Desperado has dropped his John Woo firefights for Wendy's Kids meal? And I know in the film industry they give shit to whatever kids film is only able to secure the Wendy's Promotional Tie-in. "Hey, Ice Age, yeah, it's me Mulan *snicker*, where you guys at?" "Guys, for the last time, I'm at Wendy's stop calling me." I thought Rodriguez was going to go be the next Christopher Columbus (Mrs, Doubtfire, That Robin Williams Robot movie which had the the kiss of death for any movie, Robin Williams riding that heartfelt/ funny line, ew, just got the shivers, Robin, be funny, or be serious, don't ride the line you funny doctor overgrown kid syndrome holocaust victim). The only bright side to Spy Kids was that this was a project he had written, which he hadn't done in a while. Also when the film turned out to be really good, that didn't hurt. Nor did it hurt him in the industry because the movie made a shitload of money and definitely revitalized his career in the eyes of the studios.
But my modern love affair with Rodriguez came with Spy Kids 2, which should've had the opposite effect because if you thought Rodriguez had sold out with SK1 like I (kinda) did, then your eyes rolled so hard they hurt at seeing that McDonald's had picked up the licensing rights to the sequel. But he once again made a trademark Rodriguez Headline by refusing the doubled budget for the sequel, instead choosing to make the movie for the SAME budget as the first one (which was the skeptical studio budget given to a movie that they felt would bomb). But i was sold when I took a look at the extra features on the SK2 DVD and listened to the commentary track (best commentary track I've ever heard, commentary track fans, TRUST me on this one). I was surprised to see that most of this huge looking film was shot in his backyard in Austin, TX, that he had edited and scored in a studio he had built in his garage and a greenscreen just down the street! That it had been shot digitally and he was giving up on film, that he'd written the film in a couple weeks and took on the role of Composer and Production Designer because he had no idea how to to the jobs, but wanted to learn! THIS IS THE $8,000 kid, big budget style! What a leap forward for Rodriguez.
Now I was SO excitied to see what he'd do next. It would be something more exciting in it's conception than it was as a movie. After Desperado the studios kept asking him for a third sequel, Quentin Tarantino even told him on the set of Desperado that he had to make a third movie as an homage to Sergio Leone's dollar's trilogy and that it had to be called Once Upon a Time in Mexico, yes Quentin named the movie in 1995. But Rodriguez had no desire to make it, but they asked him every year to make another one. RR had used the digital camera once on Spy Kids 1 as a test and loved the result, but he wanted to give the Camera a full test, THAT's when he decdided to make Once Upon a Time. He immediatly called the head of Columbia and told her he had a script for Desperado 2 and that he'd send it to her at the end of the week, HE HADN'T WRITTEN A WORD. But he wrote it that quickly, In fact the script was so thin when he handed it over to her that he stuffed thirty pages of another script in the middle to pad it out. The studios first note to him "drop the dentist subplot". It was greenlit and RR shot the whole film in one month and played even MORE roles on the set of this film ALL TO TEST OUT THE CAMERA! Now here's the cool thing, he pulled the trigger on Once Upon A Time so quickly that the shoot barely fit in between the shoots on Spy Kids 1 & 2. That's right, Once Upon a Time was shot before Spy Kids 2 and was edited after SK2 was in theatres. And this is the reason I love the New Rodriguez, he throws caution to the wind and rides on pure creativity, he tells everyone that this result will happen on this date and then he figures out how to get it done by riding on pure creativity, he takes on roles he's never played in production and figures out how to do them and succeeds brilliantly in a high profile positions with millions of dollars on the line, the time when everyone else in the industry get conservative and looks for the next John Grisham adaptation so their next movies a guaranteed hit (which has the opposite effect, Gingerbread Man anyone? It's an Altman film? It's got Kenneth Branagh? No? No takers? Did I mention John Grisham? What's that? No, he's the other guy, Michael Creighton, he wrote Timeline, you can tell the difference because there's no lawyers in it?).
Constantly challenging ourselves, putting it all on the line and trusting in our talents to achieve the impossible and unprecedented. It's a lesson we all could use.
And this is the man who made Sin City.
Hopefully anyone who reads this will enjoy Robert Rodriguez as much they enjoy the movie itself when they see it tonight. I know I will.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)