“Go again.” Mr. Fincher is sitting by the camera, looking at his video monitor. “But do it better, please.” These two sentences—“Go again” and “Do it better this time”—have become the catchphrases of this production. Right now, everyone on the crew is wearing production shirts with the movie’s title in familiar Hollywood font: “THE CONTINUING ADVENTURES OF CLIFF BOOTH.” There’s already talk amongst the grips (whom I’ve endeared myself to, as is my wont) of making new production shirts with our director’s favorite phrases; besides “Go again” and “Do it better,” there’s always, always, a third string of words that bring a smile to everyone’s face on the set: “You must be fucking kidding me.”
If this sounds like an indictment, believe me, it’s not. I know artists. They’re testy, nervy, neurotic. That’s okay. As long as they bring home the bacon and peel our bananas, artists can do whatever they want when they’re at work. “I’ve never seen someone work so hard on the first day on the simplest, dumbest pickup shots.” My Sensei Quentin is gossiping with me, but I know where his true allegiances lie: the other rich and famous Hollywood director turning his script into a movie. I asked my Sensei why he didn’t want to direct The Continuing Adventures of Cliff Booth himself. “I’m not in any rush to jump into production… I’ve been doing that for over 30 years. I want to live my life and raise my kids; whatever my last movie is will present itself to me as clearly and immediately as my previous work.” All the movies started with a moment of instant inspiration? “Yes, every single one, except maybe the first three—there were aspects in Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction—Jackie Brown was all Elmore—but actually, now that I think of it…”
My Sensei can’t remember when his “antenna to God” (Paper Mate Flair Pens with a felt tip, black and red) talked to him and when it didn’t. Was God talking to him during the writing of this Cliff Booth sequel? “Sometimes… look, you know, I haven’t really thought all this stuff through out loud yet, and while it is good practice, it’s still only the second week and I want to pace myself. We’re shooting through January, Benny.”
But, I told him, you don’t have to be here—you already wrote the script. Most screenwriters never set foot on the production floor. Why is My Sensei any different? “David and I have a special relationship… we’re peers, we came up at the same time in the early-1990s, we have a lot of the same reference points, and we respect each other as artists. We have our differences, of course, but that’s exactly what makes our collaboration exciting. I don’t make many takes; I think the most I ever shot was on Kill Bill, in China. It was a practical effects shot with a Chinese condom full of blood spraying on Uma in close-up. We had to shoot it 39 times. I had to get it right. But it was trying. It wasn’t fun, and it was barely satisfying when we finally got it. I was just glad that we got it at all. You know I had to digitally erase lights during that sequence.” Which one? “House of Blue Leaves.”
I squawked and told him I couldn’t believe that he wrote that awful book full of mistyped pages and misplaced letters. My Sensei suddenly got annoyed and walked away, back to the set, back to a scene that I wasn’t involved in and had no investment in whatsoever; in other words, parts of life that are none of my business, and while not unworthy of my coverage, certainly not within my purview. I will return to my studies this evening, my readings: the dictionary, People, the manual for the microwave in my trailer. I’m becoming a learned bird and more and more beautiful each day; Hollywood isn’t ready for this level of feathered excellence.
Production Assistant Roland knocked on my door. “Benny, can you come to Mr. Fincher’s trailer? He wants to talk.” I went with him, but I saw that he was pained. I could feel it, too, as an empath. “Is everything okay?” I asked. “No. He’s really upset. Quentin told him what you told him.” I asked him what I told him. “I don’t know. I just know that Mr. Fincher is really angry… we might not shoot today.” Production Assistant Roland is persistent and more neurotic than my cousin Rooster, although much nicer than his wife Monica. Mr. Fincher wasn’t that angry, Roland is just a pussy; he just wanted to gossip with the bird like his screenwriter did. He felt “left out” (verbatim quote).
“Well, okay, what do you want to know?” I asked him. “Were you talking about me with Quentin?” I nodded. “Well, what did you say?” I told him. “Jesus CHRIST, I’ve been talking about this for 25 years; if we’re going to bring 140 people out on crew, on location, on a stage, if we’re going to be spending half a million dollars every day just to get everyone and everything to show up, then why the fuck shouldn’t we try to make it as good as possible?” I told him that the perfect is the enemy of the good. “That’s a bullshit excuse used by lazy pussies like you.” I threatened to spur-claw him, but it turns out that Mr. Fincher is one of the few humans I’ve ever met who knows just how serious that threat is (he says he learned about it making Fight Club—um, sorry, but were there are any birds harmed in the making of that film? I always assumed it was just Brad and the Neo-Nazi from Apt Pupil).
By the end of the day, Mr. Fincher was asking to examine my spur-claw, asking if he could take pictures; I obliged, because I’m here to serve my director, and I’m honestly flattered, as well. Not every day that you get a benevolent human being interested in your anatomy, let alone one of the world’s preeminent film artists. There was none of the blind bloodlust of the meat eaters, no wide eyes imagining “chicken wings” as I spoke. Mr. Fincher, like My Sensei Quentin, was fully present, and acknowledged and respected my dignity as an intelligent being as we discussed philosophy, cinema, war, and the quality of leather in late-1970s San Francisco. “It was just better then,” we agree; but we don’t know why.
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