IntroductionIntroduction| 00:00 | (Applause)
[00:00:5.21]
Roger> Welcome to day number 4 of this
Santa Barbara International Film Festival.
| | 00:10 | It's been terrific!
| | 00:12 | I need to thank lynda.com, who is our
presenting sponsor of the 27th Santa Barbara
| | 00:20 | International Film Festival, and I
also have to thank Pacifica Graduate
| | 00:24 | Institute for being the
sponsor of the Writers' Panel.
| | 00:28 | (Applause)
| | 00:29 | So, let me just get right in and
introduce the panelists for this amazing panel.
| | 00:37 | Mike Mills, director and writer of "Beginners."
| | 00:42 | (Applause)
| | 00:43 | Will Reiser, "50/50."
| | 00:46 | (Applause)
| | 00:48 | Jim Rash "The Descendents."
| | 00:50 | (Applause)
| | 00:52 | Tate Taylor, "The Help."
| | 00:54 | (Applause)
| | 00:56 | JC Chandor, "Margin Call."
| | 00:58 | (Applause)
| | 01:00 | And your moderator, as it's been
for the past of years, Anne Thompson.
| | 01:06 | (Applause)
| | 01:12 | Anne Thompson> I love this panel.
| | 01:13 | It's my favorite.
| | 01:14 | Jim Rash> Oh, yeah!
Anne Thompson> All right, all right! Down we go.
| | 01:17 | Mike Mills at the beginning, for "Beginners."
| | 01:23 | You are telling a semi-autobiographical story.
| | 01:27 | Explain how you maneuvered
between reality and fiction?
| | 01:33 | How did you make that kind of
call in the writing process?
| | 01:38 | Mike Mills> I'm an amazing liar.
| | 01:41 | So, I've always been doing that, I think.
| | 01:45 | Well, I was writing about my father who,
I lived here, my father lived here.
| | 01:48 | How many people knew Jen and Paul Mills maybe?
| | 01:52 | So, you can see how much I
fictionalized and didn't.
| | 01:56 | It was really important to me
that while I was starting from a very
| | 01:59 | autobiographical place that I was
reminding myself constantly that I'm telling a
| | 02:03 | story for an audience, for people who
don't care who my dad was or who I am, and
| | 02:09 | so I was always trying to think of story
first, not how real it was, and then on
| | 02:14 | top of that I'm not sure how real "real" is.
| | 02:18 | I lived with a father who was my
straight dad for the first 33 years of my life
| | 02:23 | and then he was my gay dad for the rest
of his life, and so those definitions of
| | 02:30 | what is solid and factual and real
and what isn't has always been a little
| | 02:33 | slippery to me anyways.
| | 02:34 | Anne Thompson> So, you're a
hometown boy. You grew up here, right?
| | 02:38 | Mike Mills> Yeah.
| | 02:39 | Yeah, my father was director of the
Santa Barbara Art Museum and both my parents
| | 02:42 | were very dedicated to that.
| | 02:44 | He was director for, I don't know, 12-15
years or something, someone maybe knows
| | 02:48 | here, and I should know. But I've lived
here for when I was 4 to 18 and then I ran
| | 02:54 | like hell to New York City.
| | 02:57 | And I've been in here many times and I think
I've seen so many f**ked surf movies in here.
| | 03:01 | (Laugher and applause)
| | 03:04 | Has anybody else been there?
| | 03:06 | But I was like freckly and pale.
| | 03:09 | So, I was basically like racially
prejudiced against, growing up here and trying to
| | 03:14 | be a part of the surf scene
that I couldn't be part of.
| | 03:19 | Sad!
| | 03:20 | Anne Thompson> So, Will Reiser, you
too are telling an autobiographical story
| | 03:27 | and you worked with your buddy Seth Rogen.
| | 03:31 | Explain a little bit of
how the script came to be.
| | 03:34 | Will Reiser> Well, first I should say semi-
autobiographical. It's the same as it goes for Mike with
| | 03:40 | writing it. I tried to tell the best
story possible and sort of not worry
| | 03:45 | about what was true to my own life.
| | 03:49 | And this story came about because 6
years ago I was diagnosed with cancer, 6 1/2
| | 03:54 | years ago, and Seth Rogen is one of
my long time best friends and we were..
| | 04:02 | While I was sick we were to a party
one night and we realized that it was no
| | 04:07 | movie that depicted what it was
like to be young and to have cancer.
| | 04:12 | And that most movies are about a
really sad and melodramatic and maudlin and
| | 04:18 | they're about middle-aged people and
that character usually dies at the end and
| | 04:21 | there's sort of no hope and they're
not-- There's no funny and there's no
| | 04:24 | humor, and, I mean the way we coped
with my illness was through humor and
| | 04:29 | through jokes.
| | 04:30 | And so we thought we should do a buddy
comedy that's about a character who has
| | 04:36 | cancer and his best friend who doesn't
know how to deal with it, and sort of
| | 04:40 | based it mostly on our own relationship
and that that was sort of the launching
| | 04:44 | point of the of the script.
| | 04:46 | Anne Thompson> So, he became your producer and
helped to kind of kind of push it forward and--
| | 04:51 | Will Reiser> Yeah, yeah, I would say we
talked about that night while I was sick
| | 04:56 | and then it was an idea that really
stuck in my head and Seth's head and also
| | 05:01 | our friend Evan Goldberg,
whose is Seth's writing partner.
| | 05:05 | And it was an idea that we all really
gravitated towards, but it was really
| | 05:09 | difficult for me to actually
sit down and start writing it.
| | 05:12 | And so Seth and Evan really would just-- I
mean they just bugged the s@*t out of me for
| | 05:17 | a year and a half, until I actually
just sat down and started writing it.
| | 05:21 | And without them, I mean without having
-- I think had I not had two of my best
| | 05:25 | friends acting as my producers, I don't know
if I would have actually been able to write it.
| | 05:29 | Anne Thompson> So, Jim,
you're an actor and a writer.
| | 05:34 | Jim Rash> Yeah.
| | 05:35 | Anne Thompson> And you've been
an actor. You're in "Community."
| | 05:36 | Jim Rash> Yes.
| | 05:37 | Anne Thompson> So, how did you and
Alexander Payne come to know each other?
| | 05:43 | What was the connection?
| | 05:44 | Jim Rash> Well, my writing partner Nat
Faxon and I had written this original
| | 05:51 | screenplay that was based on
something that happened to me in my childhood
| | 05:54 | and that sort of got the attention
of some people who were looking for
| | 05:58 | writers for other projects.
| | 06:00 | And Alexander Payne's production
company had optioned the "Descendents," and
| | 06:05 | it sort of mirrored some of the tones
that we were going with in our original,
| | 06:08 | sort of the mixture of comedy and drama.
| | 06:11 | And so they brought us in, we read the
book, we loved it, and we gave our sort
| | 06:14 | of take and that's how it sort of began.
| | 06:17 | At that time, Alexander was just going
to be producer, because he was working
| | 06:20 | on another project and then, as luck
would have it, two years later he decided
| | 06:25 | to direct it.
| | 06:26 | Anne Thompson> All right. And Tate Taylor, you and
Kathryn Stockett, the writer of the "Help," are old, old,
| | 06:35 | dear friends and even roommates, right?
| | 06:37 | You actually lived together?
| | 06:39 | Tate Taylor> Oh, we lived in the-- We
still keep an apartment in East Village
| | 06:41 | that we-- it's rent controlled, so shhhh!
| | 06:47 | In the East Village.
| | 06:48 | Yeah, we've been friends since we were
5 years of age and always supported each
| | 06:52 | other and found ourselves living in New
York in the early 90s together and we've
| | 06:58 | kept that apartment.
| | 06:59 | She wrote the novel there and
I wrote the screenplay there.
| | 07:01 | Anne Thompson> And that novel was
really turned down by 60 publishers?
| | 07:05 | Tate Taylor> Agents.
| | 07:06 | Anne Thompson> A-ha, literary agents.
| | 07:08 | Tate Taylor> Yeah, yeah you can't
knock on the doors of a publishing house
| | 07:11 | without-- yeah, 60.
| | 07:12 | And she would not let me read the book,
because she didn't know if it was any good.
| | 07:16 | And for 5 years. And she
got her 60th rejection letter
| | 07:21 | when we were having lunch.
| | 07:22 | She said, "Okay, you can read it, tell
me what's wrong with it," and I got on a
| | 07:27 | plane and I could not believe what
she had done. And I landed and I said,
| | 07:32 | "They're idiots, trust me.
| | 07:35 | Can I make it into a movie?"
| | 07:39 | And so she gave me the rights before
there was-- she just got an agent before
| | 07:47 | there was a publisher or anything. So
I and my producing partner set off to--
| | 07:54 | I was going to adapt my friend's unpublishable
book and we were going to make an independent film
| | 07:59 | and maybe help her get her book published.
| | 08:01 | (Laughter)
| | 08:02 | The business model kind of flipped.
| | 08:06 |
| | 08:07 | Anne Thompson> Yeah, JC, you are
really not someone who had a lot of
| | 08:12 | writing done in the movies.
| | 08:14 | This was a real early attempt for you.
| | 08:17 | JC Chandor> I had written a lot, but
it had never been made into a movie.
| | 08:19 | (Laughter)
| | 08:21 | Anne Thompson> Explain, explain what
that, where you were when this came along?
| | 08:25 | JC Chandor> I had been sort of a not
very successful commercial and documentary
| | 08:31 | director that was trying to do this.
| | 08:35 | I was trying to write
and direct my own material.
| | 08:39 | So, I had written one or two things.
| | 08:42 | I mean written a bunch of things, but
really written one or two projects that I
| | 08:46 | worked on for 7 or 8 years.
| | 08:51 | One finally sort of came together
and then blew up about 6 days prior to
| | 08:58 | principal photography.
| | 09:00 | And we had a deposit, a full crew.
| | 09:04 | I mean we were ready to go.
| | 09:05 | Anne Thompson> That's horrible.
| | 09:07 | JC Chandor> So, I had taken, I
don't know, 8 or 9 months off working on
| | 09:11 | anything else and had a young baby
at the time and had put myself in a
| | 09:20 | terrible financial position.
| | 09:22 | So, I sort of walked away for almost
three years and this story just sort of
| | 09:30 | started to grow in my head.
| | 09:34 | And then finally I sat down and wrote it,
very quickly the first draft and gave
| | 09:45 | it to two people and kind of very
superstitiously felt like if something was
| | 09:50 | meant to come from it, it would.
| | 09:54 | And it was-- not to be melodramatic about
it but it was sort of my last shot at it.
| | 10:01 | And I think I knew it was the best thing
I had ever written up until that point,
| | 10:07 | so I kind of felt like if something
was going to come from it, it would.
| | 10:13 | And it did thankfully.
| | 10:15 | Anne Thompson> Including an
Oscar nomination, by the way.
| | 10:18 | (Applause)
| | Collapse this transcript |
| The road to the first draft| 00:00 | Anne Thompson> So, Mike you have a
very varied background, music videos and
| | 00:05 | shorts and documentaries, and your
movie has a very unusual structure.
| | 00:11 | I mean it moves around, from
different timeframes and uses lots of
| | 00:15 | different media.
| | 00:16 | Explain how your background
helped you to put that kind of very
| | 00:22 | eclectic structure together.
| | 00:25 | Mike Mills> Well, I do think it
comes a lot from going to art school, not
| | 00:29 | to film school.
| | 00:30 | So, like in my film, I use stills or
the screen could go to just full color and
| | 00:35 | all that feels very legitimate and
actually quite easy to me and as many artists
| | 00:40 | from Christian Boltanski to Hontaka
to Hans-Peter Feldmann, all Germans.
| | 00:45 | But that live in my brain all the time
and that excite me and that when I'm writing
| | 00:52 | or thinking about film project, I'm
equally thinking of influences like that.
| | 00:56 | So, maybe it's coming from that kind of pool.
| | 01:01 | All kinds of imagery feels very
legitimate and intuitive to me.
| | 01:05 | Anne Thompson> But explain a little bit
about the structure of this particular movie.
| | 01:10 | Mike Mills> Super confusing.
| | 01:12 | Anne Thompson> Contemporary? Yeah!
| | 01:12 | The contemporary in the past in the way
that you chose to move back and forth.
| | 01:20 | Mike Mills> Well, it's about my
father, that's the kernel of it.
| | 01:26 | And just my parents are very bold,
wildly interesting, very strong people.
| | 01:31 | Got married in 1955 even though
they both knew that my father was gay.
| | 01:36 | That's the foundation of the family and
they loved each other very much in other
| | 01:41 | ways but there's this great huge
contradiction, that to me is a very historical
| | 01:45 | situation, that's very much an
emotional choice, a love, a sex choice that was
| | 01:52 | available to these two people in 1955.
| | 01:55 | So, the beginning of my project was "
What in the hell is 1955 like and how am I
| | 02:00 | going to communicate that to people?"
| | 02:02 | So, I would do these things like well,
if I show you a phone from '55, or the
| | 02:05 | president or a pad or the sky, do we
now understand '55 and sort of emotional
| | 02:10 | space that led these two brave people
to sacrifice so much and get married?
| | 02:15 | And then also I started writing it
shortly after my dad passed away and I'm sure a
| | 02:19 | lot of people have experienced this. When
someone's gone, especially like a parent,
| | 02:24 | you're not in the present in a clean way.
| | 02:26 | You're constantly getting hijacked
back to our memory and unfinished
| | 02:29 | conversation and unfinished emotional place.
| | 02:33 | So that felt very intuitive, again, to
where it was, that kind of time is very
| | 02:37 | fluid, time isn't orderly, time is
more emotional than chronological.
| | 02:42 | That sounded good!
| | 02:45 | Will Reiser> Yeah!
(Laughter)
| | 02:46 | Mike Mills> I don't think I
had ever put it like that.
| | 02:50 | (Applause)
| | 02:52 | By that I just mean I'm not that smart.
| | 02:54 | I'm-- you really just came --
| | 02:56 | JC Chandor> You really just sit there for the--
| | 02:57 | Anne Thompson> Only for one second.
| | 02:58 | Mike Mills> It came -- the process came
very intuitively just to where I was and
| | 03:02 | right now I just made
myself sound like I had a plan.
| | 03:04 | (Laughter)
| | 03:07 | Anne Thompson> Well, for both of
you and Will, how do the films work as
| | 03:12 | therapy for both of you?
| | 03:14 | Were they therapeutic?
| | 03:16 | Was it cathartic to deal with this stuff?
| | 03:18 | Will Reiser> Yeah. I would say
it was incredibly therapeutic.
| | 03:24 | I don't think when I sat down to start
writing "50/50," which at that time the
| | 03:30 | original title for "50/50" was called
"How I Learned Nothing from Cancer."
| | 03:34 | And my whole idea behind the movie
was that like people have this great--
| | 03:38 | there's this great notion that when you
survive cancer, you sort ofhavehow-- it's
| | 03:43 | almost like you reach Nirvana.
| | 03:46 | There's clarity or you have
like this understanding of life.
| | 03:50 | And I came of that just feeling like my
life had just sort of been wrecked and
| | 03:54 | it was like this emotional tornado
swept through my life and I didn't really
| | 03:58 | feel like anything changed.
| | 03:59 | And so I wrote this script in which
the main character didn't change; he just
| | 04:05 | sort of stayed the same.
| | 04:06 | And then all of a sudden I am
like, "What you're talking about?
| | 04:08 | You're a completely different person."
| | 04:10 | Like, you are like-- you have
changed, and that really forced me--
| | 04:15 | And the main character was me but he
wasn't really as close to my voice as Adam
| | 04:20 | ended up actually being.
| | 04:22 | And in that second draft I went back
and I sat down and I started really
| | 04:28 | thinking about what that
journey was like for me.
| | 04:32 | And in doing that, it really forced me
to say all the things I didn't know how
| | 04:38 | to say while I was sick.
| | 04:39 | Whereas the first draft was just sort
of me just sort of vomiting up a lot of
| | 04:44 | the emotion, and this raw emotion,
whereas the second draft was really me sort of
| | 04:48 | corralling that and understanding
what the experience was like for me.
| | 04:51 | And that was really hard and it was
really vulnerable and but in writing the
| | 04:57 | script, it really allowed me to
confront and move past that experience.
| | 05:02 | Anne Thompson> Several of you, Tate
you're an actor and Jim you're an actor,
| | 05:08 | explain how being an actor led to
being a writer and why that goes together?
| | 05:13 | Tate Taylor> Well, for me, I
didn't move to LA till I was 26.
| | 05:17 | I got a late start and I, like Jim,
jumped into the Groundlings program.
| | 05:26 | So, I didn't know exactly what I
wanted to do and what's great about the
| | 05:30 | Groundlings Improvisational Theater
Company, so for those of you who don't know,
| | 05:34 | is that you write, direct,
and act, and the third year
| | 05:43 | I almost didn't do it because I
didn't think I wanted to write and then I
| | 05:47 | quickly learned that that's what I loved.
| | 05:49 | So, they all go together to me.
| | 05:51 | I can't really separate them.
| | 05:55 | I feel like you have to know how to act
to write in a certain way and vice versa.
| | 05:58 | So that's what happened and then
slowly my sketches in the Groundlings kept
| | 06:04 | getting longer and longer.
| | 06:07 | They said "These are
supposed to be 3 or 5 minutes.
| | 06:09 | You can't have an elephant cross," and I
made a short film called "Chicken Party"
| | 06:15 | back in 2004 to see if that's what I
wanted to do. And then that was it.
| | 06:21 | I love filmmaking.
| | 06:23 | I act but don't have headshots in my car.
| | 06:27 | Anne Thompson> So, are you still going
to act or is that over at this point?
| | 06:30 | Tate Taylor> No, I'm available.
| | 06:32 | (Laughter)
| | 06:33 | I haven't had time to, really.
| | 06:36 | I just haven't. I'm
adapting something right now.
| | 06:40 | So, I bet it's going to go the wayside.
| | 06:42 | I'll be a ham at home at Christmas.
| | 06:44 | Anne Thompson> Jim?
| | 06:45 | Jim Rash> Yeah, for me, yes, to
| | 06:48 | as far as coming through the Groundlings
program, that you were exposed to writing
| | 06:54 | sketches and developing characters,
which I think for me at least for as the
| | 07:00 | writing started to become something
that I was very interested in and sort of
| | 07:04 | going further then 3-5 pages of a
sketch into television then into film, was
| | 07:09 | really the development of
characters that we had sort of learned at the
| | 07:13 | Groundlings but also as an actor and
honing voices and really digging into what
| | 07:19 | makes that person, that character, that way.
| | 07:22 | So, I think as an actor you're
already interested in playing dynamic and
| | 07:26 | interesting people and also the challenge of
being seen differently than the way you are.
| | 07:32 | The first time you're out of the gates on television
that they're like "Oh, that's what that person does."
| | 07:36 | And I think the mission that became for
Matt and I was "let's write something for us."
| | 07:42 | Let's write things that people don't
see us as and then develop characters
| | 07:47 | that we know in our lives, which are
the best people to pull from because we
| | 07:51 | know them so well and they're so specific,
and so as an actor I think you look for that.
| | 07:55 | So, I guess in that way it went in
hand-in-hand for me, to that passion of
| | 07:59 | developing characters I think.
| | 08:02 | Anne Thompson> So, JC, even though you
wrote an original screenplay that wasn't
| | 08:05 | really based on your life, you do
know the financial world really well.
| | 08:11 | So, talk a little bit about how that
story came to you and how it was based on
| | 08:16 | some version of something you really knew.
| | 08:20 | JC Chandor> Yeah, when I write I like
to usually kind of do realistic world
| | 08:27 | immersion where I like to go into a
topic and I want to understand it from
| | 08:34 | every different angle.
| | 08:36 | I was at a place in my life
personally where I didn't have the time, the
| | 08:40 | energy, or the sort of self belief to
actually take 4 months or 5 months and
| | 08:47 | kind of learn about a new world.
| | 08:49 | But this world, that it's sort of been
in front of me, through my father working
| | 08:56 | in that world but also my adult life
living in New York City, basically over 10
| | 09:01 | or 15 years watching a lot of my
friends get sort of sucked into this gear
| | 09:09 | system and some of them get spit out in
sometimes positive ways and other times
| | 09:16 | terribly destructive ways to
their life and their confidence.
| | 09:21 | And these were people who were
unbelievably more motivated, successful, smart,
| | 09:28 | well-educated than I was and sort of
after 10 years of watching people of my age go
| | 09:36 | through that, and then having watched
my father and his friends and friends of
| | 09:42 | mine's parents kind of go through that
world, I realized I didn't know anything.
| | 09:48 | Well, not very much, about the sort of
actual nuts and bolts of the situation but
| | 09:54 | the emotionally kind of honest reasons
why people get drawn into that world, why
| | 10:01 | they stay in that world, what they
feel like when you retire from that world,
| | 10:08 | all of those things-- Excuse me.
| | 10:13 | I realized I had a very deep
understanding of and I knew those voices for those
| | 10:19 | characters and interestingly, I started
to believe that sort of a greater truth
| | 10:27 | potentially as to why we all got sort
of so wrapped up in the last 10 or 15
| | 10:34 | years of delusional optimism goes back
to those very basic human reasons, of why
| | 10:43 | did I walk in the door of this place?
| | 10:46 | Our film has 8 characters. You
kind of go up the chain of command.
| | 10:51 | So, why does Penn Badgley's character,
the youngest guy, why is he there?
| | 10:58 | And not just for sort of pure greed,
but really, why did every decision
| | 11:05 | along the way, why did he end up there?
| | 11:07 | None of that really ended up being
written in a dialogue standpoint into the
| | 11:12 | movie, but hopefully it's
there in the sort of subtext.
| | 11:18 | So, it was-- but world's longest
answer to a short question, but it
| | 11:24 | was essentially written from a place
of I knew everything that I was writing.
| | 11:31 | I went back of course, but that first
draft came from just within, which I
| | 11:37 | think unless you're really skilled writer,
that's when you're sort of at you're best.
| | 11:41 | Anne Thompson> Did you
ever show it to your father?
| | 11:43 | JC Chandor> I'm hyper, hyper
superstitious and I had those other projects fall
| | 11:51 | apart in sort of miserable ways.
| | 11:53 | So, he read it about two weeks
before we started principal photography.
| | 12:00 | So, that's very soon.
| | 12:02 | I didn't tell my wife until about four
months until we started shooting, where
| | 12:07 | there was a press release coming out and
I though I should finally tell her what
| | 12:11 | I'd been sort of doing.
| | 12:13 | (Laughter)
| | 12:15 | I had to. I joked with her that it was
world's fastest development process of a
| | 12:19 | project because it was like I wrote
this thing and then I came in the next day,
| | 12:24 | "Somebody wants to make it!"
| | 12:26 | (Laughter)
| | 12:27 | "Kevin Spacey signed on!"
| | 12:29 | Anne Thompson> The point is that you
wrote a screenplay that attracted an
| | 12:33 | amazing cast that is
willing to work for nothing.
| | 12:35 | That movie was made for $3.5
million, which is sort of astonishing.
| | 12:40 | JC Chandor> And that was the scripts.
| | 12:43 | So that's the neat thing about where we
ended up is the script at that point to
| | 12:47 | get that film made was sort of our only tool.
| | 12:49 | Anne Thompson> Right!
JC Chandor> And we used it well.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Adapting from another medium| 00:01 | Anne Thompson> So Jim and Tate, you
both were adapting a previous book, so that
| | 00:05 | brings a whole other set of concerns.
| | 00:10 | So Jim, your partner and you were looking
at the Hawaiian novel "The Descendents."
| | 00:16 | And how did you approach
making that into a movie?
| | 00:19 | What were the challenges?
| | 00:21 | Jim Rash> Really, it was our first
stab at ever doing an adaptation, so it
| | 00:26 | really was a learning experience from
the beginning, because our first draft was
| | 00:30 | this giant manuscript that would never get made.
| | 00:35 | We just overwrote, because I think
there is so much stuff of the book you loved
| | 00:40 | and you are trying to include
everything and you haven't really had the
| | 00:43 | experience to sort of like look into
the book and really find a central story
| | 00:47 | and the stuff that, while great,
makes the novel great, but not necessarily
| | 00:51 | are going to make the movie great, you know.
| | 00:53 | So I think the challenge for us was,
with the first step was that and then the
| | 00:57 | writers' strike happened, so we sort of
had to take a little time away from it
| | 01:03 | and in that time, you know, just sort of
think and read the book and think about
| | 01:08 | the central part of the story and then
how to take this first-person narrative
| | 01:13 | of Clooney's character and get his
voice out and his understanding of what's
| | 01:19 | internal throughout when you read the
book, and to be able to convey that to the
| | 01:24 | audience, what this man is going
through in this particular moment of his life.
| | 01:28 | Anne Thompson> So Alexander Payne was
eager perhaps to blend comedy and pathos.
| | 01:35 | This was clearly what your task was.
| | 01:38 | Jim Rash> Yes, definitely and I think you
get that also from Kaui Hart Hemmings' book,
| | 01:42 | this sort of balance between the two
and this sort improv feeling moment
| | 01:49 | for all these people in the book.
| | 01:52 | And then the screenplay is about being
in these moments and not having the best
| | 02:00 | answer, the best reaction to how this
will feel, to yell at your wife while she
| | 02:05 | is in a coma in front of you, to be
so angry at somebody and to have those
| | 02:10 | moments, where if we look back on it, and it's
like "I don't know, it's just the first thing
| | 02:13 | that came to my head. It's how I was feeling."
| | 02:16 | You know, to find those moments and
at the same time be able to have a guy
| | 02:20 | say "I am going to punch you" and then punch
this guy, you know, because it just happened.
| | 02:25 | Anne Thompson> So that was in the book?
| | 02:26 | Jim Rash> Yes, well the punch part,
you know. That he was so mad that Sid was
| | 02:32 | making fun of his-- or seemingly making
fun or light of his wife with dementia,
| | 02:38 | and he just had this moment and I think
that was the challenge but also the fun
| | 02:47 | of delving into this book.
| | 02:48 | That you could have this serious thing
and then you have this wonderful Scottie
| | 02:52 | character, his youngest daughter who is
acting out on her own sense and doesn't know
| | 02:56 | what's going on because she hasn't been told.
| | 02:58 | So all of her behavior
sort of has this levity to it.
| | 03:02 | And this moment, it sort
of brings this out of that.
| | 03:05 | Anne Thompson> So how was it working with
Payne, what was his -- how involved was he?
| | 03:09 | Jim Rash> Since he is not here I am
going to throw him under the bus. No.
| | 03:11 | Anne Thompson> He kind of took
-- he was not going to direct it.
| | 03:15 | Jim Rash> He was parked.
| | 03:17 | Anne Thompson> Right, he was not
going to direct it at one point.
| | 03:19 | Jim Rash> No, no, he wasn't.
| | 03:20 | He was busy writing with Jim Taylor,
his writing partner, something that they
| | 03:26 | decide to shelve for a little bit
because of our economic downturn at that time.
| | 03:30 | It was like a big budgeted thing. And
he had just been at that time giving us
| | 03:35 | notes, you know, as we went
through our several drafts.
| | 03:38 | We were also writing with
Stephen Frears with at one point.
| | 03:41 | He was going to direct.
| | 03:44 | So we had gone through at
least a moment with him.
| | 03:47 | And then Alexander decided to do it,
around 2009 I think it was, and we sat down
| | 03:53 | with him, went over everything that we had done.
| | 03:56 | He sort of asked us questions about
drafts and stuff from the book and then
| | 04:00 | he took his pass and then sort of
the collection of our work became the
| | 04:05 | shooting draft, so.
| | 04:06 | Anne Thompson> Did you get to go on the set?
| | 04:08 | Jim Rash> For five days, and
we had to get ourselves there.
| | 04:11 | (Laughter)
| | 04:13 | Tate Taylor> Are you serious?
| | 04:14 | Jim Rash> "Here is where we are going
to be, we are going to be down there,
| | 04:17 | we'll see you there," whoooooshh, you know. Hey!
| | 04:20 | Anne Thompson> That's the lot of the writer.
| | 04:23 | Jim Rash> That's the joy of
the writing, ah the luxury.
| | 04:28 | Spare no expense.
| | 04:30 | No, we were like "Alright
well let's take a trip."
| | 04:32 | So we went down there for like five
days and it was great to sort of eavesdrop
| | 04:38 | on that side of Alexander, as far as the
director, but also to watch, you know, sort
| | 04:42 | of that process and watch this
movie sort of just come to life.
| | 04:46 | Anne Thompson> When you saw the
final film, what was your reaction?
| | 04:49 | Jim Rash> Well I was livid,
because he never asked us to audition.
| | 04:56 | (Laughter)
| | 04:58 | It was weird to watch it because you
are sort of out of it as far as the whole
| | 05:03 | shooting process, the whole editing process.
| | 05:05 | So you're watching this thing and
you're like "Oh why is that scene, oh okay,"
| | 05:08 | you know, because they shot a lot of
stuff that doesn't make the cut and
| | 05:11 | understandably for you're just like "Ah,
it was a great scene but it sort of
| | 05:15 | slowed it down, you know."
| | 05:16 | So at first you watch it the first time
and going like "Ah well, I missed that,"
| | 05:20 | you know, and then you sort of look at
-- and the second time you can sort of
| | 05:23 | look at it as what it is
and then enjoy what it became.
| | 05:27 | So I think the first time you're
judging and the second time you're hopefully
| | 05:31 | loving. "Oh this is nice thing,
it's not as smart but you know."
| | 05:36 | (Laughter and applause)
| | 05:39 | Jim Rash> You said better words but mine rhymed.
| | 05:42 | Mike Mills> Yours is more
accessible though. I could really feel it.
| | 05:45 | Anne Thompson> We have some alpha
males up here. Okay so Tate, alright.
| | 05:50 | So the book was very difficult to
get published but it finally it did.
| | 05:55 | So talk about how difficult it was for
you as the writer and the director to get
| | 06:00 | to the movie made, the
process you had to go through.
| | 06:02 | Tate Taylor> Well, I think the biggest
gift of this whole thing was the fact
| | 06:07 | that I started adapting it without
any fans, without any studios, nothing.
| | 06:13 | It was just me.
| | 06:15 | And I had the luxury and I wasn't being
paid, so there was no ticking clock and
| | 06:21 | Like Jim said, I mean for those of you
who've read Kathryn's book, it's long
| | 06:26 | and it's delicious, I mean every page.
| | 06:28 | So I gave myself the gift of writing it
really long, just because I knew I would
| | 06:33 | be directing it and I wanted to
digest the words, every scene.
| | 06:38 | So my first draft was like 220 pages,
and I knew it would be ridiculous, but
| | 06:44 | what was great is then when I started
to doing the surgery and cutting it down,
| | 06:48 | when you have written, overwritten,
you can then cheat a little bit and grab
| | 06:55 | moments from scenes, whether it's a
glance or just two characters being in the
| | 07:01 | same location, which causes tension,
and bring them to other scenes.
| | 07:05 | And what happens is collectively when
the movie is shot, you, the audience,
| | 07:11 | thinks that's what was in the book.
| | 07:14 | And so I did that and so then when
finally when the book-- even when Kathryn got
| | 07:21 | her publisher, we didn't know if
anybody was going to buy it, or I mean if it
| | 07:28 | would be a successful book.
| | 07:29 | So when it debuted in the top 20, I
had already done the script, it was done.
| | 07:35 | So it was finished when it hit the bookshelves.
| | 07:38 | I'd done the entire thing.
| | 07:39 | So that pressure was gone and then
the process was tough because, you know,
| | 07:46 | I have been in LA for 15 years trying to
get into the rooms with powerful people
| | 07:52 | and when the book became successful,
they started calling me and they would say,
| | 07:59 | "You have the rights to The Help?" "Yes."
| | 08:03 | "Well what are your intentions?"
| | 08:04 | "I have adapted it. I am directing it."
| | 08:10 | "Okay really what are your intentions?"
| | 08:13 | (Laughter)
| | 08:14 | And for about six months, I would have
to say "That's my intention and if you
| | 08:19 | are not interested in that, don't call."
| | 08:23 | Now I'd hang up the phone and be
like "Oh my God, I just told...?"
| | 08:26 | Anne Thompson> Now you had
directed one film, right?
| | 08:28 | Tate Taylor> I had directed a short
film and a feature film, my first indie.
| | 08:32 | And this went on and this went on and
this went on and the book kept climbing,
| | 08:39 | climbing, I just kept sitting there,
and so finally it took Stacey Snider at
| | 08:48 | DreamWorks, it was September of 2009,
and she called and goes, "Okay I love your
| | 08:52 | script, I love the book.
| | 08:55 | Would you consider making it
in to a TV series or HBO film?"
| | 09:00 | And I said no.
| | 09:02 | So that went away and I was like,
"Oh my God what am I doing?
| | 09:05 | Ugh, I look like an idiot" and then later that
fall, Chris Columbus, he'd been following my work,
| | 09:15 | my short film he liked it and he loved
my first feature, and he came on board
| | 09:22 | and said "I'm going to help you" and
even with Chris, nobody wanted to finance
| | 09:27 | this with me directing.
| | 09:28 | I mean period, nobody.
| | 09:31 | And we went and I said "No, I am
directing it" and this went on and this went on
| | 09:35 | and this went on and then finally,
Stacey Snider at DreamWorks, she called and
| | 09:43 | she was like-- "For six months,
I have been mad at myself.
| | 09:46 | I can't let this go."
| | 09:48 | And Spielberg read my adaptation, he
was a big fan of the book, and he said
| | 09:52 | "If he adapted this, this way, we
got to believe he can direct it" and he
| | 09:58 | green-lit it.
| | 10:01 | (Applause)
| | 10:07 | Anne Thompson> Did they put
Chris Columbus on the set?
| | 10:09 | Tate Taylor> Chris, he was there, he--
Well, it was really funny because even
| | 10:16 | with Steven Spielberg blessing me, you
know, I jumped through some hoops getting to
| | 10:23 | the first day of filming, believe me.
| | 10:25 | Because, for those of you who've read
the book, it's very, very specific to the
| | 10:29 | part of the country where I grew up.
| | 10:31 | I grew up in Jackson, Mississippi,
and unless you are from there, Jim's a
| | 10:36 | southerner, there is certain weird,
quirky things that are in the script that
| | 10:42 | are not easy to understand.
| | 10:43 | So I didn't-- I wasn't defending the
script but I was constantly educating
| | 10:48 | Hollywood, like this is how it works,
this is what ambrosia is and paprika is
| | 10:53 | what goes on deviled eggs and
some people don't like that.
| | 10:58 | And you wouldn't have that,
they would never say that.
| | 11:00 | I am not having a lynching scene and I am
not having the KKK, that we are sick of that.
| | 11:05 | That's what not what the story is.
| | 11:07 | So, and then I decided to cast
Leslie Jordan, who was Beverly Leslie in
| | 11:14 | Will & Grace, as Skeeter's boss
who gives her the job and they
| | 11:17 | went "What?!"
| | 11:19 | And I am like, "I am telling you.
| | 11:21 | Every southern town has a closeted gay-
man who is also the organist at church
| | 11:26 | and I think that is who needs to
be her boss. I am telling you!"
| | 11:33 | And so Chris was there, everybody
was there, to see if I was going to
| | 11:38 | completely take a crap in the
Mississippi Delta on my first day of filming.
| | 11:42 | And it went great and they saw Leslie
Jordan and they saw what I was doing and
| | 11:47 | that's when they said, "We don't
understand fully the South, but this is really
| | 11:52 | good and it's really funny, go."
| | 11:55 | And that was after that
first day dailies it was--
| | 11:57 | We were just off. It was fantastic.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Working with Actors| 00:01 | Anne Thompson> So speaking of actors,
Octavia Spencer is also a roommate
| | 00:07 | of yours apparently.
Tate Taylor> Yeah.
| | 00:08 | Anne Thompson> And so
talk about that relationship.
| | 00:10 | Tate Taylor> Yeah Octavia who plays
Minny, she and I met in 1995. We both were
| | 00:16 | PAs on "A Time to Kill" in
Mississippi and just became best friends.
| | 00:21 | And then we decided to move out to LA
and become overnight successes in 1996.
| | 00:28 | (Laughter)
| | 00:31 | Whoa. And I have been in those financial...
| | 00:35 | And-- but no, she is a dear friend and
I've put her on everything I've ever done.
| | 00:39 | It's funny.
| | 00:40 | Jim and I'd known each other, we've
been friends, and Melissa Mccarthy, we all
| | 00:44 | kind of started at the same time
and it's been a really cool year.
| | 00:50 | But Octavia lived with me. She was my
roommate while I was adapting "The Help"
| | 00:54 | and she always was going to be Minny
and Allison Janney was always going to
| | 00:59 | be Charlotte Phelan, because she was one of
my best friends who has been in everything.
| | 01:03 | So yeah, it was really cool.
| | 01:05 | We, Octavia and I, packed up and went
to Mississippi to go make our little
| | 01:10 | movie at the same time.
| | 01:12 | It's so cool to see what's happening for her.
| | 01:14 | It's just the greatest feeling for one
of your best friends to do be able to--
| | 01:19 | for DreamWorks to let me cast my
friends who are talented and for it to work
| | 01:24 | and-- It's just been, it's been really cool.
| | 01:26 | Anne Thompson> Four Oscar
nominations including Best Picture.
| | 01:31 | (Applause)
| | 01:34 | So Mike, talk a little about Christopher
Plummer and how you worked with him and
| | 01:39 | how he helped make the
movie what it turned out to be.
| | 01:42 | And here is someone else is
doing pretty well in the Oscar.
| | 01:46 | Mike Mills> And we were roommates.
| | 01:48 | (Laughter)
| | 01:51 | Tate Taylor> Were you beginners?
| | 01:52 | (Laughter)
| | 01:58 | Mike Mills> Well, there is so
much to say about Christopher.
| | 02:00 | Anne Thompson> Well, he wasn't your dad.
| | 02:03 | He was an actor and what did-- how
did he change what you had written?
| | 02:08 | Mike Mills> Well, the funny thing--
you know the-- So Christopher is kind of
| | 02:13 | playing a version of my dad and Ewan
is kind of playing a version of me.
| | 02:16 | I was very worried with both of them
that they'd feel what I'd be sort of a--
| | 02:20 | I don't know.
| | 02:21 | You know, like sitting on them as a
writer/director, with these very sentimental
| | 02:24 | portraits of me and my dad.
| | 02:25 | So I kept all the time saying "don't
worry about us," and that really was sort
| | 02:29 | of freeing.
| | 02:31 | And I was very lucky in casting them.
| | 02:34 | They are just the right ages and
culturally or spiritually they end up sharing
| | 02:39 | so much for the characters.
| | 02:40 | My father was born in 24, Christopher early 30s.
| | 02:43 | My father is an art historian.
| | 02:45 | Christopher is pretty much
like a dramaturgical historian.
| | 02:48 | My father is from sort of a blue-
blooded, slightly refined world.
| | 02:52 | Christopher's definitely from that.
| | 02:54 | So the more I pushed Christopher, just
like "What would you say, Christopher?
| | 02:57 | What would you think?" and whenever
they ask me a question I try to ask
| | 03:00 | a question back.
| | 03:01 | You know, "What would he do here?"
| | 03:02 | "Well, what would you do here?" you know.
| | 03:04 | And Christopher's instincts were so close
to my dad's, it was little spooky at times.
| | 03:09 | When Christopher first met me, he walked
in and he said, "Thank God he has a wit."
| | 03:16 | And I was like "That's so
something my dad would say."
| | 03:19 | I was telling him, I can tell some
stories, I am going to tell later today.
| | 03:23 | But I was telling him a story about my
dad, and he said, "Oh yes, let me steep
| | 03:29 | myself on one of your father's
stories" and I was like "steep?" you know.
| | 03:35 | (Laughter)
| | 03:36 | But that's so something my dad would have said.
| | 03:39 | So they shared so much and it
was very easy to let him go.
| | 03:43 | And what Christopher brought I think... I
think Christopher is a very hungry young
| | 03:49 | spirit and I think Christopher feels,
he wants to be freer than he is on some
| | 03:57 | levels and he-- There is some level
that Christopher, with all that he has
| | 04:01 | accomplished, there is some
biting, unsatisfied part of him.
| | 04:06 | And that was great and I think he
brought all that to my dad's newfound freedom
| | 04:13 | and newfound love and having
all of his lights fully turned on.
| | 04:16 | And that came very easy to Chris.
| | 04:18 | That was something very one-to-
one between those two people.
| | 04:21 | Anne Thompson> Now, the romantic
relationship with Ewan McGregor and
| | 04:26 | Melanie Laurent, they play that part,
in your-- are they a version of you
| | 04:33 | and Miranda July?
| | 04:34 | Mike Mills> No, it's more me and me.
| | 04:37 | It's like a weird homosexual,
narcissistic… I am a hot French blonde.
| | 04:45 | (Laughter)
| | 04:48 | Mike Mills> It's true actually.
Will Reiser> I have that too!
| | 04:49 | Mike Mills> It's the most
honest answer I can give you.
| | 04:51 | Mike Mills> All of Melanie and Anna's
stuff, and her emotional background, her
| | 04:58 | emotional architecture and needs and
stuff, it had to be me for it to work.
| | 05:02 | I am not that good of a writer.
| | 05:04 | I had to come from something I knew.
| | 05:06 | But being very much in love with
Miranda and being really challenged by Miranda
| | 05:12 | and having our love kind of show me
all of my shadowy parts that I can't deal
| | 05:16 | with and all of the stuff that scares
me and then like made me feel very bold,
| | 05:22 | that was very inspiring and I was
trying to capture that. But not directly us.
| | 05:27 | But that turf, that territory, the
way that love can really change you.
| | 05:31 | Anne Thompson> And Will, when Joseph
Gordon-Levitt came in to play you, did you
| | 05:39 | work with him, did you
change it, did it get...??
| | 05:42 | Will Reiser> No, I mean, actually
you know the original, the actor we
| | 05:48 | originally cast to play the role of Adam
was James McAvoy and we shot for a week
| | 05:53 | with him and he had an emergency back
in England that basically prevented him
| | 05:58 | from finishing the film and we had five,
four more weeks of filming and he was
| | 06:02 | not going to be able to come back.
And we we had this decision to make.
| | 06:07 | Were we going to put the film on hold
and go back to LA and just wait and see
| | 06:12 | if we can start back up sometime and
figure out everyone's schedules and try and
| | 06:17 | make, you know finish the film, six
to nine months a year down the road
| | 06:22 | or do we recast?
| | 06:24 | And with James's blessing, we went
out and we started thinking about who we
| | 06:31 | could cast and we had a window of like
two or three days to find a replacement.
| | 06:37 | And I remember I was driving home from
set and we were at the Vancouver and Seth
| | 06:42 | and I were living together, and you know
we were-- you know the first actor that
| | 06:46 | came to my mind was Joe.
| | 06:48 | And he immediately agreed.
| | 06:49 | I mean it was really, it
was sort of like a no-brainer.
| | 06:51 | It was like what actor can do both comedy
and drama and walk that line in a real way?
| | 06:58 | And there's very few young actors that can
do it and Joe was just our number-one choice.
| | 07:03 | And Seth called Joe.
| | 07:05 | He told him the situation, he said "Listen.
| | 07:07 | Like, this is not ideal, we have
to find a replacement in the next.."
| | 07:13 | "By Sunday night we need a
replacement" and it was Friday and you know.
| | 07:19 | I mean it was like there was no bullshit and
Joe said "Alright, just send me the script."
| | 07:24 | Joe read it that day and then the next
day he got on a plane, came to Vancouver,
| | 07:27 | got drunk with everybody and then
the next morning, he said "I'll do it."
| | 07:31 | And he then had one week to prepare.
| | 07:36 | He had one week.
| | 07:37 | And the only reason he had a week is
because it took that long to make his wig.
| | 07:40 | So literally. Because we had to shave
his head, you know there is a head shaving
| | 07:45 | scene in the movie and so then for
most of the movie he is wearing a wig.
| | 07:49 | And in that week we rehearsed and
you know, I worked on stuff with him.
| | 07:53 | But you know we really told him that
he should make the character his own.
| | 08:00 | I mean he should not look at me and
try and do and an impersonation of me.
| | 08:05 | He should really make Adam
his own, his own character.
| | 08:10 | And he did that and I
mean we would work on scenes.
| | 08:17 | He would ask me questions like "What
was it like for you when you're going
| | 08:21 | through a situation like this?" and you
know, "What was your emotional state?"
| | 08:24 | But it was never trying to-- I never tried
to enforce any ideas about who I am onto him.
| | 08:30 | And yet despite that, most of my
friends and family members when we're watching
| | 08:34 | the movie say he does the most dead-
spot-on impersonation, so go figure.
| | 08:39 | (Laughter)
| | 08:40 | Anne Thompson> Was there a therapist?
| | 08:41 | Will Reiser> In real life
? I did have a therapist.
| | 08:46 | In real life, she was in her mid-60s.
| | 08:49 | (Laughter)
| | 08:50 | We did have a bit of a romantic… No.
| | 08:53 | (Laughter)
| | 08:56 | Anne Thompson> There is
some serious transference.
| | 08:58 | Will Reiser> Yes, yes, I am mortified to think,
you know, what she thinks after seeing it.
| | 09:02 | I have no idea, I can't even imagine.
| | 09:04 | (Laughter)
| | 09:06 | So humiliating, I stop seeing her.
| | 09:08 | (Laughter)
| | 09:11 | Anne Thompson> So, when you guys were
writing the screenplay, did you have
| | 09:14 | George Clooney in mind?
| | 09:15 | Jim Rash> No, not really because I think--
| | 09:18 | Tate Taylor> Did you--
| | 09:19 | Jim Rash> It was me, and I
had a horrible screen test.
| | 09:24 | (Laughter)
| | 09:25 | I tried an accent, it did not go over
well. But oddly I'd said the same thing to
| | 09:30 | Clooney, "Don't look at me and
don't.." Same thing happened.
| | 09:36 | (Laughter and applause)
| | 09:37 | I said them, "I know this book is not
about me, but don't play me in this movie."
| | 09:43 | Tate Taylor> And yet he is exactly like him.
| | 09:46 | Jim Rash> He is exactly like me!
| | 09:49 | Every mannerism is there on the--
| | 09:52 | (Laughter)
| | 09:54 | When we started, you know, I think people ask
| | 09:58 | that question and I think the best
answer for me is that Kaui had written
| | 10:04 | this great character of Matt King, who
was complex and interesting, and I think
| | 10:10 | our job was just to get that voice on the page.
| | 10:14 | So it wasn't about going "What actor
am I thinking of?" to write, because I
| | 10:19 | think it's a better credit to
Clooney to say he came and brought this and
| | 10:25 | brought himself into this role and
found that and made a great performance out
| | 10:29 | of it, rather than.. I understand that.
| | 10:31 | But I think for us it was just we
want to get this book on the page
| | 10:35 | in this movie form and then I think
when Alexander decided to direct it, his
| | 10:42 | instinct was to, he saw Clooney in his
mind and went and that's how that happened.
| | 10:48 | Anne Thompson> And Tate, when you
wanted to cast Aibileen Clark, who was your
| | 10:53 | first choice there and how did that go?
| | 10:55 | Tate Taylor> Well, when you have a
movie with Leslie Jordan and these big
| | 11:02 | southern characters, I just knew that
like in the book that Aibileen had to be kind
| | 11:08 | of the dignified glue that made it all work.
| | 11:13 | And I wanted Viola. I did, period.
| | 11:17 | I mean there is just
nobody like her. She is just..
| | 11:21 | I mean good acting is being fearless but
that doesn't always mean that you'll do
| | 11:26 | anything. To be truly fearless as an actor,
| | 11:29 | it's being willing to do nothing and
just be still and quiet and let what's
| | 11:36 | behind your eyes tell the story.
| | 11:38 | The first two weeks of her filming,
Viola poured tea with all the cackling
| | 11:44 | girls and bridge and that's what she
did for the first two weeks, which is so
| | 11:49 | hard and she did it so well.
| | 11:51 | And I just knew that I needed that
powerful… She is like a tornado.
| | 11:58 | You want to-- you can't turn away,
you better run, but you just don't.
| | 12:02 | You don't want to miss something.
| | 12:03 | I mean you want to get
closer and that's how she is.
| | 12:06 | Anne Thompson> So her
agent turned it down initially.
| | 12:08 | Tate Taylor> Well it was scheduling.
| | 12:10 | It was a scheduling problem.
| | 12:13 | We were going to go and she was committed
to "Fences" and I think they were scared
| | 12:19 | she would back out of "Fences" if she
knew she could do "The Help," because Viola
| | 12:24 | tried to option the book.
| | 12:25 | Well did you know that?
| | 12:27 | It's hilarious.
| | 12:28 | She tried to option the book.
| | 12:30 | She fell in love with it and she was
like, "who the hell is Tate Taylor, who is
| | 12:35 | this son of a b&*ch?" And funny enough,
Nelsan Ellis, who is on "True Blood"-- he
| | 12:41 | plays Lafayette, he is a very good
friend of mine-- he is also in "The Help."
| | 12:45 | Viola is his godmother and they were
having Christmas dinner and I was told she
| | 12:51 | has passed, which really she wasn't
available, and she was talking about this--
| | 12:55 | It's so funny. They are all
drinking wine and she goes "oh God, there
| | 12:58 | is this book called 'The Help' and man,
if anything ever happens with that I'd
| | 13:03 | love to be in it" and Nelsen goes "Ah,
Aunt Viola you passed on The Help."
| | 13:08 | She said "What?!"
| | 13:09 | I am in Memphis, Tennessee, we are
into our third bottle of wine on Christmas
| | 13:14 | night with my sister, and the phone rings.
| | 13:16 | I go "Hello."
| | 13:17 | "This is Viola Davis."
| | 13:19 | "Yes?"
| | 13:21 | "Talk to me about 'The Help.'"
| | 13:24 | And we talked about it and we ended up
pushing and she finished "Fences" and it
| | 13:29 | was two weeks later it was Aibileen.
| | 13:30 | Anne Thompson> Wow.
| | 13:31 | Tate Taylor> Yes she worked.
| | 13:34 | Anne Thompson> Alright, so
you got this extraordinary cast.
| | 13:40 | Who came in first?
| | 13:41 | Was it Zachary?
| | 13:42 | JC Chandor> Yes, Zachary and his
producing partners signed on and then that
| | 13:51 | original 82-page draft went to Ben
Kingsley to play the Jeremy Irons role.
| | 13:58 | So, and I am again kind of weirdly
superstitiously, so I hadn't spellchecked it.
| | 14:04 | It had many-- literally we sent that
that original draft, that character was sort
| | 14:09 | of the most fleshed out.
| | 14:13 | And he said yes, sort of amazingly
without-- I think we pretended to have some
| | 14:18 | money but didn't. And, so a year-and-a-
half later he was not-- He is actually
| | 14:25 | doing this Scorsese film, which I
understood why he made that choice.
| | 14:31 | So we had an unbelievable kind of chess match.
| | 14:37 | My next film has one actor in it,
because the thought of trying to cast such a
| | 14:45 | large group… And it puts the project
is at risk both creatively and from a
| | 14:53 | business perspective.
| | 14:55 | You know you have to be casting
opposite who you have already put in place and
| | 15:01 | then when one person falls
out, that sort of changes.
| | 15:05 | Our film was very much about power
structure and so the way actors believably
| | 15:12 | for an audience can interact with each
other was constantly changing bizarrely.
| | 15:19 | And I'm not bitter about this at
all anymore because things have worked
| | 15:23 | out well for the both of u. But Joe at
one point was actually attached to play--
| | 15:29 | Joe Gordon Levitt.
| | 15:30 | I just almost threw up in my mouth when he
told that story, because that Friday night--
| | 15:37 | (Laughter)
| | 15:39 | Will Reiser> Oh great.
| | 15:41 | Jim Rash> Hold on, hold on, let him finish.
| | 15:46 | JC Chandor> It was very intense.
| | 15:49 | James McAvoy had to leave at shoot in
the middle of their shoot and we were not
| | 15:54 | sure we had all our money and Joe
Gordon Levitt was just actually attached to
| | 15:59 | play Zachary's role, because even
though Zachary was producing the film,
| | 16:05 | bizarrely Steven Spielberg
had three films all on...
| | 16:08 | Talk about--
| | 16:09 | Tate Taylor> Bizarrely...
| | 16:11 | JC Chandor> He had the essential
elements for three films all on hold to sort of
| | 16:17 | decide which one he was going to do
next and this was an amazing role for
| | 16:22 | Zachary to potentially play.
| | 16:24 | So Zachary could not play Peter and so
we actually, there was a couple of weeks
| | 16:29 | where Joe came on and then you know,
he called and said about this amazing
| | 16:33 | opportunity to go play this role in a go
movie, so we of course you know let Joe go.
| | 16:42 | Will Reiser> I appreciate that.
(Laughter)
| | 16:43 | JC Chandor> That's a nice way to put it.
| | 16:45 | Jim Rash> Say thank you.
| | 16:46 | JC Chandor> But the sort of point of it is--
| | 16:49 | Will Reiser> I owe you a very big hug.
| | 16:51 | JC Chandor> But the interesting thing
there is that you know that then creates
| | 16:56 | this sort of negative space within
this puzzle that you are trying to put
| | 17:00 | together and you know it worked out amazingly.
| | 17:03 | Zachary came back in, because you
know a couple of weeks later, you know
| | 17:09 | Spielberg went to do "War Horse," so he
was not going to do "Gershwin," which is
| | 17:13 | what Zachary was going to play.
| | 17:16 | And so it becomes you know this sort
of luck and then you hope when everyone
| | 17:25 | gets there that you know it's going to work.
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| From notecards to final draft - the writing process| 00:00 | Anne Thompson> Before we go to the
questions, it's a tradition for each of the
| | 00:03 | writers to, in this case briefly
because we're running out of time, tell us
| | 00:09 | what your process is literally, pen,
paper, computer, the writing process,
| | 00:14 | starting with Mike.
| | 00:17 | Mike Mills> The last, "Beginners", and the
script I'm writing now, I started with just
| | 00:21 | 5x7 cards and try being as formless
as I could and sort of free and as
| | 00:27 | far away from writing in final draft
as I could, to be just as wild as I
| | 00:32 | could be and I have a box
that's full of these 3x5 cards.
| | 00:35 | And then I go to try to make an
outline of some kind and then I finally go to
| | 00:40 | writing in final draft.
| | 00:43 | Anne Thompson> Okay.
| | 00:44 | Mike Mills> Was that it?
I was trying to be short.
| | 00:45 | Anne Thompson> That was good!
| | 00:46 | Will Reiser> I guess for me the process
with the way "50/50" started and the movie I'm
| | 00:53 | writing right now, the way that starts
is I just will have a basic idea and I
| | 00:58 | will start thinking about my
characters and I will just start...
| | 01:01 | And I won't actually sit down
and start writing on my computer.
| | 01:04 | I will just randomly just throughout
the day just have thoughts and I'll
| | 01:08 | maybe email ideas to myself about my
characters or I will write them down in
| | 01:12 | scraps of paper and I'll just
kind of collect them and pool them.
| | 01:15 | And then eventually, the characters
start talking to me and the story starts--
| | 01:22 | They start guiding me through the story and
the arc of the story and where it's going.
| | 01:26 | And then I eventually just start pooling
all these ideas and I create a document
| | 01:33 | that ends up just being a mess of ideas,
which is-- It's not organized in any
| | 01:38 | way whatsoever and then I spend a
week going through all of those ideas and
| | 01:41 | trying to organize them with a
highlighter and figuring it out and sort of--
| | 01:46 | It's sort of like there's very chaotic
period when I'm sort of trying to shape it.
| | 01:50 | And that's sort of where it all begins for me.
| | 01:52 | Jim Rash> For me, I don't think anyone
ever would like my process because it's--
| | 01:58 | You read these books like "write from your
heart, just don't edit yourself," and I have
| | 02:02 | the hardest time doing that because I'll
just read it and I'll go "This is horrible,
| | 02:08 | change it now in case someone finds it."
| | 02:10 | "If you pass out now or die, they'll go
'At least we don't have to see that shot.'"
| | 02:18 | (Laughter)
| | 02:20 | For me it's all about the first scene.
| | 02:23 | I will spend forever because I
just like writing the first scene.
| | 02:26 | It may not end up being the first
scene of whatever we've written.
| | 02:29 | I just enjoy the idea of "what's
the first thing they're going to see?"
| | 02:33 | And so it might be a very long
scene that you will never use.
| | 02:36 | It's not necessarily just an image.
| | 02:38 | I just enjoy that first scene
of the movie and how it starts.
| | 02:42 | And for me, then I sort of set it aside
and I just think "I want to get from there to
| | 02:47 | where I imagine or end."
| | 02:48 | And that's it and then everything else is
insanity and no one ever would be interested.
| | 02:52 | Anne Thompson> Now on "The
Descendants," did you get your first scene?
| | 02:56 | Jim Rash> Well, we had several
different things because we had the draft
| | 03:00 | where you sort of see the image of
her on the boat, just sort of enjoying
| | 03:06 | riding the motorboat.
| | 03:07 | We had one that started-- The one that
I sort of like, we did a thing that sort
| | 03:13 | of revolved around Scottie.
| | 03:14 | It was her. We wrote this long scene
where she was at her elementary school and
| | 03:20 | they were showing show and tell.
| | 03:22 | So what we thought we would do is we
had all these kids showing what they
| | 03:25 | brought the show and tell, which we
thought you could either do the written ones.
| | 03:28 | Or it might be fun to get real
kids and have them bring stuff.
| | 03:31 | And then Scottie comes up with her
book that has all the pictures of her mom
| | 03:35 | in a coma as sort of the end of this scene
that sort of takes us into meeting Matt King.
| | 03:40 | But then ultimately, yes, you
want to get to Matt King's story.
| | 03:45 | So that was within the draft, but I
enjoyed, it took a long time and just like--
| | 03:49 | Because we just kept spitballing what
kids would bring, a conch shell, whatever
| | 03:55 | we could think of.
| | 03:56 | So that was one scene that you'll never see.
| | 04:00 | (Laughter)
Anne Thompson> Tate?
| | 04:01 | Tate Taylor> I spent a lot of time
with my characters thinking about them
| | 04:04 | and writing down.
| | 04:05 | I love to come up with
funny bits for my characters.
| | 04:09 | And for me it's about tone.
| | 04:11 | Pathos and humor and the
tone I'm going to establish.
| | 04:14 | And I start outlining once I've got
all my characters down and I kind of have
| | 04:19 | all their Bibles of who they are.
| | 04:22 | I then try to figure out how to
have the humor and pathos and rhythm.
| | 04:27 | And that kind of dictates my outline
and then I outline it extensively, then I
| | 04:34 | write the first scene, then I come to
what I had as the second scene and I go
| | 04:38 | "I hate that," and then I just start writing.
| | 04:42 | But it's all in there, kind of, I don't know.
| | 04:46 | That's all I could say.
| | 04:46 | Anne Thompson> JC?
| | 04:49 | JC Chandor> Yeah, I have a tiny little
notebook that I carry around with me.
| | 04:55 | I usually jot down...
| | 04:58 | You know, it can take a year or two
years or ten years just sort of thinking
| | 05:05 | about a thing, it bounces around.
| | 05:08 | And then at some point, I sort of don't
have the-- I don't know what it is but I
| | 05:16 | write very quickly once I finally sit down.
| | 05:18 | So sometimes it could just be six
things that happen throughout a story and you
| | 05:24 | don't really know how any of those
things are going to connect to one another.
| | 05:29 | And then I usually go into a very
intense sort of lockdown where this was
| | 05:34 | written, the 81, whatever,
82-page draft was written.
| | 05:39 | In three-and-a-half days, I
sat down and it was just whooosh.
| | 05:42 | And then I usually stop for months, let
it sit, and dialogue and stuff like that
| | 05:53 | normally doesn't change at all.
| | 05:55 | I usually end up just adding. And I've
written other things that dialogue-wise
| | 06:03 | were good and that's just-- I try
not to over-think that part of it.
| | 06:11 | So I guess I'm not sitting down to
actually do it until I really do probably
| | 06:16 | subconsciously know what's going to happen.
| | 06:18 | But then it all usually comes out very quickly.
| | 06:23 | And if it doesn't, I will stop and
procrastinate for another three months or something.
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