CHRIS NEUMER: Did you shoot this on film?
PAUL REISER: No, we shot it on —
CHRIS NEUMER: But it was digital?
PAUL REISER: It was digital. That was a big turning point when we had such resistance getting the picture bought. I always thought it was going to be a really small film, someone said, "I thought, oh, it’ll be a seven or eight million dollar movie, it must be easy to make those. And that’s the hardest movie to make. You can make a 20 million dollar movie or a 50 million dollar movie, but that [seven or eight million] was the hardest thing to make, I could never quite understand it. And somebody said, well what if, if it isn’t too late in the game, we get a digital camera? And to me, I thought, oh, is that by definition to be second tier? I didn’t know what it looked like, and then I started watching some digital movies, and wow!
CHRIS NEUMER: You couldn’t really tell. The only reason I picked up on it was because there was a shot, I think you guys were in the tow truck, and there’s a shot of the front of the car as it was hoisted up on the tow truck, and the tow truck was moving. And I thought, there’s just no way, for the amount of money this movie was made for, could they have attached a camera to do that, it had to have been digital.
PAUL REISER: Wow, that’s great, because there were places that we actually had to tweak, because you would see a little bit of strobing, or digital noise.
CHRIS NEUMER: That was what did it for me, the tow truck.
PAUL REISER: That’s so funny. Well, we got this lovely call from Peter Bogdanovich, raving about the movie, and he said he couldn’t believe we shot it digitally.
CHRIS NEUMER: Now how big was the camera that you guys were using for most of this?
PAUL REISER: It was small but it wasn’t a tiny hand-held. By the end of the day it wasn’t so different, you can shoot quickly, you can shoot longer because you have one hour tapes. So you get a lot more tapes, and you’re not downsizing, and lightening doesn’t take quite as long to light. But I still had the impression that we were going to have, like guerilla tactics, running out of a car, shooting, grabbing it. No, you’ve got trucks, props and lights; you’ve got dollies and everything. We shot it in 25 days, and everything thought that we could’ve used more time on the set, like I would’ve loved 28 days, but — [Doorbell rings]
PAUL REISER: All right, I’ll be down in five more minutes. He [Chris] asks different questions!
PUBLICIST: I know that’s why we invited him.
PAUL REISER: I like him; it’s so refreshing after a day of same shit.
CHRIS NEUMER: Well, I suppose I could ask you if you have three sisters and how much this reflects on your real life, but —
PAUL REISER: You want to take a couple more minutes?
CHRIS NEUMER: Yeah just let me know when you have to go. This is a feature, like a feature film, and I was thinking about this because I know you’ve done, like HBO specials, I know you’ve done a TV show and now you’re working on a new half-hour comedy. Do you feel that the medium of film afforded you some advantages here that television or HBO couldn’t?
PAUL REISER: The medium, the format, not the celluloid?
CHRIS NEUMER: Yeah, the medium, not the actual celluloid or theater, but the format.
PAUL REISER: Yeah, totally. Even when the film was done and we were finding it challenging to find a distributor, I had all sorts of offers to put it on TV. You know, it could be a CBS movie of the week, or cable, HBO or Showtime? And I was like, no, I want it to be in the theater, and looking back, it was a gutsy choice because it certainly looked like no one was going to pick it up for a while, and they were like, hey, we’re offering you money, what about cable? But I really felt that, something about the lights going down, and the sense of community. I saw this movie at one festival, and there were 1700 people. Seeing 1700 people laugh at this —
CHRIS NEUMER: Do you remember which festival that was?
PAUL REISER: Sarasota, Florida.
CHRIS NEUMER: You have been getting around, wow!
PAUL REISER: That was in January, February. But with 1700 people, the laughs multiply, because you laugh when you hear other people laughing, the silence is staggering, hearing 300 people not moving, everyone is engaged, and you hear the sniffles, and you go further deeper. This week I’ve seen it at these big theaters, these multiplex theaters, and I was like, wow! I didn’t know it was that big. And you can’t substitute that experience, which I’m glad. Yeah, you can get a big screen at home, and a home theater system, but —
CHRIS NEUMER: That comes six months after the theatrical release.
PAUL REISER: Yeah, and it’s just not the same as going to see it with people, and I really think it takes you deeper into the story. I mean it has been panned, it has been dismissed, people have been like, it’s too soft, it’s more like a Hallmark film, but no it’s not. Yes, there’s a lot of emotion —
CHRIS NEUMER: There is sentiment.
PAUL REISER: There is sentiment, but I’ve seen responses to this film that I’ve never seen, people that can’t really talk, because they’re like, I have to go home, and I don’t know what, I have to go ball.
CHRIS NEUMER: Sort of like a Field of Dreams sort of thing.
PAUL REISER: Yeah, Field of Dreams, yeah. There you go, build it and they will come.
CHRIS NEUMER: Yeah.
PAUL REISER: Field of Dreams is the only movie — and I saw it in the theater — on an afternoon when I was on location somewhere, and there were like 12 people in the theater. I was just so devastated; I couldn’t get out of my seat. And I sat and watched it a second time.
CHRIS NEUMER: The question is did you pay to see it the second time.
PAUL REISER: No, no I didn’t. I’ve never done that. I thought I didn’t want to break that wall; I didn’t want to see the sunlight, break that warmth of that movie, and that feeling. At the entire screening, people think, and they go to a place they don’t go, they don’t think to go that deep into their parent’s relationship. They don’t think to be that vulnerable with their father. I wouldn’t ask them about their sex life. The first two parts are correct. People would then want to come back and experience it with another person, like their father, their parents, and their kids.
CHRIS NEUMER: Maybe your new film that film. I don’t know what previous films like that are, but like for Field of Dreams, it’s ok for men to cry, was it Brian’s Song, was that the one from the ‘70’s?
PAUL REISER: Maybe, yeah.
CHRIS NEUMER: I’m not saying that this is the same thing.
PAUL REISER: But when it’s working, it’s very exciting to see. I’ve heard some people say, oh this is a guy’s movie, because it’s only guys, women aren’t going to see it. I don’t suspect that’s true, because I think women are going to love this, because they’re talking about women —
CHRIS NEUMER: It’s guys actually showing emotion.
PAUL REISER: Guys showing emotion, and guys being ok showing emotion, because it’s dad, and it’s not some precious dad, it’s Peter Falk, for god’s sake. This guy is as close to the salt of the earth as they come, everybody’s comfortable with Peter. So I think that’s a huge reason as to why this is working. We have such a long, familiar history with Peter Falk. The minute his mug is on that screen people smile.
CHRIS NEUMER: Or the tone, which you do much better than I do.
PAUL REISER: The tone?
CHRIS NEUMER: Peter Falk’s tone.
PAUL REISER: Oh yeah, his voice, yeah. But in the beginning he doesn’t talk, it’s me narrating over him in the shower.
CHRIS NEUMER: Oh yes, the pleasant image of Peter’s ass.
PAUL REISER: Yeah, a freshly bathed baby and my father’s balls. It’s kind of like Nixon going to China, you trust it with him, and you can go to this place with Peter Falk. You wouldn’t go there with Richard Gere; you wouldn’t have gone there with Sean Penn.
CHRIS NEUMER: I don’t buy much with Richard Gere, it doesn’t really matter what he’s doing, I just don’t buy it.
PAUL REISER: All right.
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE OF STUMPED?
Director Fernando Meirelles
Actress Alison Lohman
Actor Nick Nolte
Director Brian Herzlinger
Director Morgan Spurlock
Actress Bai Ling
Shrek 2 director Conrad Vernon
The Diary of Hollywood Starlet, Rachael Huntley
Location scouting in Manhattan
Hollywood Then (1985) and Now (2005)
Actor Kevin Grevioux
Don't miss writer/director Robert Rodriguez's sumptuous Sin City, writer/director Dan Harris' debut Imaginary Heroes or the rerelease of director Michael Curtiz's epic The Sea Hawk.
Back issues of this magazine are available for purchase.
(c) Stumped, 1998-2006
