With George Clooney and Marlee Matlin
Greg’s step-father. Flip Wilson. Two British documentarians. Surprise party. Robert Kardashian. Cue cards. An Assistant Director. “Screenplay” by Syd Field. Girl in the laundromat. Literary agent. Variety classified ad. Free option (with strings). David Jacobs.
Staff writer gets the axe.
A riddle?
More like notches. That shaped the key. Which unlocked the door to my career in Hollywood.
In May of 1979, I completed my second degree in architecture. I liked architecture. The art. Structure. Form and function. Process. Inspiration. Committed to paper. Made real through creative collaboration of multiple disciplines, trades, and artists.
With Dolly Parton and Michael King at Radio & Records 1979
Over the previous four years, I worked summers at a small Kansas City firm. $200 per week (when the principles could afford to cut me a check). I understood. Architecture is a tough field. It was valuable experience. All good.
Upon obtaining my Master’s, the firm made a full-time offer. Annual salary, $10,400. Do the math. $200/week. Still. With a master’s diploma now on my wall. Did I mention architecture is a tough field?
I liked architecture. I loved film. Everything about it. The way celluloid smelled. The sound it made chattering through a projector. The stories it told. Places it took me. “Nanook of the North.” “The Guns of Navarone.” Saw it at the Waldo Theater. Seven times. “A Hard Day’s
Night.” At the Uptown Theater. Eleven times. And “Help!” “Bridge on the River Kwai.” “Lawrence of Arabia.” “Time Machine.” “The Great Escape.” “The Great Race.” “2001: A Space Odyssey.” Get the picture?
At age eleven, I bought my first 35mm camera. A Yashica TL. My father built me a dark room in the basement. I took a lot of photographs. I made movies with my father’s Bell & Howell 8mm Sun Dial 220 movie camera. At the University of Michigan, I commandeered students in
the theater department to make movies with an Eastman Kodak 16mm K100 motion picture camera that I borrowed from my brother-in-law’s father. A huge improvement in film quality if not film content.
I wanted to be a film maker so bad I could taste the silver halide. But growing up in Kansas City, the dream was a dream too far for my Midwestern parents. They were nothing if not realists. Like all children of the Great Depression. “The motion picture business is a business of
connections. You have none. Get a practical degree. In something you can actually earn a living.” I couldn’t argue that.
Finally a director CHARMED cia set Paramount stages-1
As the end of graduate school neared, a little voice inside my head began to whisper. The whisper became a nag. By the time I rode my ten speed down “The Hill” after a hard day’s night in the design studio at Marvin Hall, the voice drowned out my parents’ well intentioned advice.
It burst out of my head. Perched squarely on my left shoulder. And screamed, “Dumbshit, look! Something big is going down at Memorial Stadium.”
A thousand feet of trailer trucks circled the parking lot. Years later I learned that film crews call the production caravan “the Circus.” They were taping a Super Bowl XIII commercial to air in January. Why this particular circus came to Lawrence, Kansas, I have no idea. Watching the crew
in action was poetry in motion. A choreographed ballet of grips. Electricians. Make-up and hair. Costumers. Dancers. Lights. Cameras. All focused on legendary funny man FLIP WILSON. He made famous the phrase, “The devil made me do it.” Supernatural forces were
indeed at work. I just didn’t know it yet.
March 1979. A girl who lived upstairs in my apartment building mentioned that TWO BRITISH DOCUMENTARIANS she met in London the previous summer were stopping in Lawrence to film. Something about the U.S. criminal justice system. I eagerly volunteered my services. The
following week I gophered for Giles and Noel. To this shameless Beatles fanatic, their British accents made the experience all the cooler. My biggest responsibility was slating each camera take. To this day, the sound of the clap board gives me goose bumps. It means I’m making
movies. I was in heaven.
Capital Records Studio A – 7th Heaven Musicians 2006 with Laurence Juber, Michael Jochum, Jim Cox, Dominic Genova
In April came the aforementioned underwhelming full time job offer. Followed by a surprise graduation party in May. It took me twenty-three years to learn my parents were excellent poker players. I had never been on the receiving end of a SURPRISE PARTY. This one caught me
completely off guard. Thirty of my childhood friends. Brisket. Fries. Beer from the land of sky blue waters.
One of these friends had recently moved to Los Angeles with his girlfriend. They happened to be back in K.C. that weekend, invited me to visit before I started my job. Los Angeles. The movie capital of the world. Coincidence? I don’t think so.
Southern California was exactly like the Beverly Hillbillies’ theme song. “Swimmin’ pools. Movie stars.” Only better. My first day I spotted Paula Prentiss and Richard Benjamin strolling Wilshire Boulevard. James Garner on Day Two. And Oscar winner, Lee Marvin! Talk about star struck. Palm trees. Rolls Royces. Mountains. Smog. I was walking on mustard brown air. Relishing every choking breath.
Day Three, my buddy took me to meet his boss. Earl was a multi-media genius. Years before, he created a traveling show which combined motion picture projectors synchronized with an array of slide projectors to tell a visually rich history of the Beatles. It pulled in big bucks on
college campuses across America. Within the entertainment division of the trade publication, Radio & Records, Earl now developed “The Rock and Roll Time Machine” – a multi-media and live action attraction for the Six Flags Magic Mountain group.
Abbey Road in St. John’s Wood
On a very tight schedule, Earl needed an additional photographer to help complete the show. Unbeknownst to me, my friend had already lobbied Earl on my behalf. The job was mine if I wanted it. $250 per week. $50 a week more than the job which awaited me back in K.C. But…
this gig only lasted three months. I worked my ass off for six long years to earn a “practical degree.” It made my parents proud. But what did it make me?
GREG’S STEP-FATHER. Flashback. New Year’s eve 1977. A bunch of high school buddies
met at Greg’s house before going to a party. His step-father poured shots. Raised his glass, “To
taking chances.”
I thought, that’s a strange toast to ring in the new year. He proceeded to wax philosophical about the many chances he’d taken in life. Not crazy chances. More like calculated risks. Some paid off. Most fell flat. Epic fails. In life. Business. Love. Yet he didn’t regret a single one. “If
you don’t risk, you’ll never grow. You’ll never know.” He encouraged us to take a risk. Or ten. Now. When we’re young. Before marriage. Children. The responsibilities that go along with them kill the appetite for risk. He saw us sharing sideways glances – what’s up with the stepfather? “Trust me,” he said, “when you get to be my age, you don’t want to look back on your
life and ask, What if? Make damn sure. No regrets.”
Sadly, a few months later I understood what was up with the step-father. He died. Cancer. His words lived on.
So I took a risk. Not a crazy one. Calculated. If, by the time I turned thirty I failed to realize my passion of destiny, I’d go back to architecture. I made two phone calls. Quit the full time architecture gig in K.C. before I’d even started. Told my parents I was extending my stay in Los
Angeles. Six years. My parents thought I’d lost my mind.
Directing Mickey Rooney 1999
That’s how I ended up working across the hall from ROBERT KARDASHIAN. Father of Kourtney, Kim, Khloé, and Rob. Friend and attorney of O.J. Simpson. Robert had started Radio & Records with former DJ, Bob Wilson in 1973. The offices were in Century City. A futuristic
office, apartment, hotel, and shopping complex built on most of what used to be the 176 acre back lot of Twentieth Century Fox. The studio sold off the land after it’s sword and sandal picture, “Cleopatra,” all but bankrupted the company in 1963.
The three months at Radio & Records were heady times. I met many amazing recording artists and celebrities. Felt my first earthquake rumble across the Los Angeles basin. A powerful reminder this star struck kid wasn’t in Kansas any more.
September 1979. “The Rock and Roll Time Machine” wrapped. I was out of a job. Zero prospects. Less than $100 in the bank. No typewriter to peck out my very short resume. One of the first things you learn in architecture school is a precise style of printing that matches every
other architect’s lettering on design and construction drawings. I hand lettered my resume. Made 50 copies at ten cents a page. Knocked on the doors of every studio and independent production company in town.
On the advice of the receptionist at Radio & Records, one of those doors was Bob Banner Associates. The receptionist was married to Sam Riddle. A former KHJ disc jockey, host of nationally syndicated tv show, Hollywood A-Go-Go. By 1979, Sam was a producer at BBA.
The company produced a lot of variety television. Perry Como specials. “Solid Gold.” And was about to launch a country version of Solid Gold’s countdown of the top of the charts.
On set directing a Charmed episode
I got a call from Sam’s assistant. Sam was impressed with my resume. “Really?” The assistant clarified, “Not your experience. ‘Cause you don’t have any. Your printing. Sam wants to know if you do cue cards.” Honestly, I had no idea what a cue card was. Calculated risk. I lied, “Oh,
yeah. CUE CARDS. Sure.”
Thus began a long run of flying to Las Vegas every few weeks to tape “Country Top 20″ at the Tropicana Hotel. I worked my way up to Production Coordinator. Got my first screen credit. Pulled down $400 a week when we were in production. And when we weren’t in production, took every gopher job I could land on commercials and non-union movies. AN ASSISTANT DIRECTOR. In June 1980, I gophered on a Herman Joseph’s beer commercial. Shot at the legendary Desilu Studios (now RED Studios) on Cahuenga Boulevard. Coincidently, that week the Eagles rolled onto the lot each night about 8 p.m. to rehearse their next leg of the Long Run tour on the lot’s biggest sound stage. Glenn Frey saw me gaping. Smiled. Invited me to come in and watch them argue. And play. How cool was that? But I digress.
On the beer commercial, I picked the assistant director’s brain. How did she get to into the Directors Guild? Because what I really wanted to do was a direct. She laughed, “Everyone wants to direct. You have zero qualifications. Good luck with that.” She saw my disappointment. Threw me a bone. Which turned into a pearl. “If you really want to direct, you need the one thing every studio wants. A great screenplay. Better start writing.”
(To Be Continued)