Remember everyone is beneath you. The AD is beneath you such as the camera operator such as the script girl such as the best boy. Communicate this by keeping hands in pockets and never looking anyone in the eye.
Tell whichever yes-man is closest you need a ride to the park. That you need to think and the best place to think is the park. Tell the yes-man to drive you to the park.
Always repeat yourself.
Make an appointment with the doctor. One shouldn’t have to take twelve pills to digest a decent meal.
Tell everyone within earshot that we are a family here. That we have to hunker down and pull together. That we sink the swimmer as a unit.
Let the DP talk about lenses in that ridiculous accent. Look bored. Ask about the tracking shot, the two-shot, the over-the-shoulder. Tell him, We shouldn’t push in like this. Reference Willis and the guy Fellini used, if Fellini used a guy.
Go over budget. Talk about the money people, the bean counters. Dismiss them with a wave of the hand.
Have at least two drinks before watching dailies.
Do not let anyone speak to you while watching dailies.
Take your pills. The woman at the pharmacy called them enzymes.
Consider what else you could be doing with yourself. Consider where you went wrong.
There are no minions when painting a picture.
What the fuck is an enzyme?
Never discuss the project with anyone who identifies himself as an associate producer.
While rehearsing, always remain standing, with arms folded. Sometimes pace while muttering. Say, Listen people.
Say, This scene is about a man taking digestive enzymes. It’s about digestion.
Make friends with whoever is in charge of craft services.
Do not explain yourself. Someone will want to know why he should cross downstage and sit on the sofa. Someone will want to know why he should smoke a cigarette or bounce a ball. Someone will ask ridiculous questions like, Was he an athlete growing up? Did his parents smoke in the house?
Call nearest living relative over forty and ask him how’s his digestion.
Conduct brief meetings with the editing team. Go to the studio where they work. Sit backward on a rolling chair and tell them, This isn’t a music video, people.
Tell the woman who is in charge of craft services that you need bland, easy-to-digest foods. If she asks like what, tell her to do her job.
Don’t get too involved with the music right away. Let the composer compose and then tell him where he’s gone wrong after the rough cut. Never use the word swell in any conversation with the sound people.
When dealing with actors, try to remember. .
Star and actor will ask what the new scene is about, the one in the park. To answer, ask what they think it is about and look grave. Shake your head and squint. Finally, tell them it’s about a homeless man eating an apple and a little retarded kid roller-skating.
When they look puzzled look back at them, disappointed.
Tell the craft-services people to have plenty of apples on hand every day.
Tell them, We will need all kinds of fruits and vegetables. Bland ones.
Every so often, say aloud to no one in particular, Let’s go, people.
Proposition Star’s stylist in a way that makes no sense. Quote an obscure Eskimo poem — one about igloos and ice fishing. Do likewise with the youngest cast member of legal age.
Try to lose your mind.
Tell the actor he can wind a wristwatch or eat a sandwich or look through a photo album but he should do some fucking thing, for Christ’s sake.
Never say, We’ll try it your way. Once you try it their way, you might as well do something else with yourself, something in the insurance business.
Never discuss your digestive problems with anyone involved with the picture. When people ask what is wrong, tell them it’s your gallbladder. Tell them it’s none of their business. Tell them it’s scurvy, shingles.
Give the second unit free reign. Do not show up at a second-unit location.
Dress neatly but devil-may-careless at the same time. How to do this is to wear a frayed white T-shirt beneath your collared long-sleeve, with a sweater draped over your shoulders. Make sure you don’t tuck it in. Never tuck a shirt in under any circumstances.
Remember it is not important how you look so long as the cast and crew fear you.
That they must also love you goes without saying.
Say it anyway.
This actor that won’t smoke, find his mother wherever she works, probably some diner somewhere as a waitress, and go there. Sit in her station and tell her to join you for coffee when she has a break. Ask specific questions and get specific answers. Do not let her avoid any question. She will try to explain why he is the way he is, how she raised him to be the kind of actor he is. All of this is irrelevant and a waste of time, but do it anyway.
Tell the actor you spoke to his mother. Tell him you sat in her station and had coffee with the woman. Tell him you saw his mother smoking a cigarette on her break out back with one of the busboys. Tell him she is good-looking.
Find out who this actor admires and use it against him.
Go to the park and find an unoccupied bench. Watch a black crow chasing after the smaller birds, making that horrendous noise. Then tell the property master, We’re going to need a black crow.
Tell the second-unit director to take all kinds of park footage.
Feel like going for a walk but don’t feel up to it. Feel more like listening to your guts swallow themselves.
Never say Cut when you want them to stop. Say Enough already.
After you say Enough already, you can say Print.
You cannot always confound expectations.
Talk about the nature of art, the nature of everything else.
Schedule a full week for the location shoot. Arrive at the park before six every morning. Sit by yourself.
Consider what else you can be doing.
Being outdoors this time of year can be glorious.
Let the fresh air cleanse and feed you.
Contact the actor’s mother again and ask her to accompany you to Cabo, to Cannes, to Cancún. Ask her if she knows anything about swaddling, if she has acid reflux. Tell her you want to be swaddled in cashmere after fucking her twice over in a location that begins with the letter C. If that’s too much to ask, propose marriage. Promise anything.
Fire the actor for having this mother.
Fall to your knees as the fired actor walks away and say that you’re feeling it for real here, people.
Feel it for real here, people.
Beg the fired actor to stay, promise anything.
Stand at the edge of the man-made lake, surrounded by confused minions. Say, Who the fuck is Shiva, people? Say, Who the fuck is Krishna?
Feel it all. Feel fucking all of it.
Consider the rehired actor’s ascension to stardom. Climbing over your bones.
Secretly open your heart to him and to the craft-services people trying to kill you. Feel the largeness of this moment even as you anticipate destroying them all — your minions, your children, your enemies, your gods and enzymes.
Kneel at the shore of the man-made lake and dip your hands into the water. Say, This is what I’m talking about, people. Hold man-made lake water in the cup of your hands, an offering to them all. Pray that somebody, for the love of Christ, is getting this on film. Baptize yourself. Weep. Pray that somebody somewhere is recording some fucking piece of this. Reject the suspicion that you have nothing to do with your genius, at your very core, you are your genius. You know it and they know it. Look at them. They’re transfixed, captivated. They’re all of them waiting to be directed.
Bless them with man-made lake water. Bless them with Eskimo tears. Accept their gratitude, their supplication.
Order the second-unit director to hire a twelve-year-old Hindu boy to paint pictures on an easel just outside the frame of every shot. Train the black crow to sit on your shoulder.