Paul Thomas Anderson felt like "a Hollywood asshole" after visiting the set of Eyes Wide Shut
Aux Features Stanley Kubrick
Paul Thomas Anderson meeting Stanley Kubrick in the late ‘90s is some fanfic shit. Two titans of serious cinema crossing paths: one working on the anticipated follow-up to his breakout film, Boogie Nights, the other laboring over what would be his final fully completed picture, Eyes Wide Shut. What insights would be shared? What admiration would express? What torch would be passed? Nothing so lofty, apparently, as Anderson left the set of Eyes Wide Shut feeling like “a Hollywood asshole.”
This story, via Vulture, comes from an excerpt of Brian Raferty’s upcoming book, BEST. MOVIE. YEAR. EVER.: How 1999 Blew Up the Big Screen. In the excerpt, Raferty tells how Eyes Wide Shut star Tom Cruise ushered Anderson onto that movie’s famously secretive set for a visit, which led to the Magnolia director meeting Kubrick himself:
Kidman and Cruise, along with their two young children, relocated to England in late 1996, living in a small house not far from London’s Pinewood Studios, where filming would begin on Eyes Wide Shut that November. The set was heavily secured yet sparsely populated. “Kubrick had a really small crew,” said Magnolia writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson, one of the few visitors to the set. (Cruise, one of his Magnolia stars, had ushered him past security.) “I asked him, ‘Do you always work with so few people?’ He gave me a look and said, ‘Why? How many people do you need?’ I felt like such a Hollywood asshole.”
One imagines it must have been humbling for a young Anderson to meet one of the greatest, most accomplished directors to ever live, only for the man to infer that his productions are too opulent. Still, maybe it’s a lesson Anderson needed to learn, as his Boogie Nights star Burt Reynolds famously described the filmmaker as “young and full of himself.” Thankfully, he’s a lot more chill these days.
You can check out the rest of the excerpt over at Vulture.
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73 Comments
I mean, you can also employ a lot of people by being a Hollywood asshole with a big crew feeding a lot of families?
PT shouldn’t feel bad. Even if he wasn’t Hollywood, Kubrick was most definitely an asshole.
LOL my thoughts.
Beat me to it.
“Wait, you mean you didn’t emotionally abuse and psychologically scar Julianne Moore on Boogie Nights? Pffft, what a Hollywood phony.”
In some cases physically scar people. Only through mutually agreed upon torture though. https://news.avclub.com/hell-yeah-those-eyelid-clamps-hurt-confirms-a-clockwor-1833846014
I’m currently reading a terrific book by Michael Benson about the making of “2001: A Space Odyssey.” At one point, a technician fell 30 feet to a stage while they were filming. When an assistant told Kubrick the guy broke his back, Kubrick said, “Oh! That’s horrible. Did it ruin the shot?” He also got angry when a stuntman doing the spacewalk scenes passed out from carbon dioxide build-up in his helmet quicker than Kubrick expected (they actually thought he might pass out, but shot the scene anyway). The stuntman was so angry about Kubrick’s reaction, he was looking to punch Kubrick, who stayed away from the set for a couple of days until things cooled down.
He sounds like the Nick Saban of auteur directors. Gets amazing results, but just doesn’t care about any humans who aren’t helping him at the moment and will step over your body if it is in his way while he is coaching/filming. And Kubrick is probably my favorite along with the Coens and GDT. And maybe Edgar Wright.
Also, I know it wasn’t Kubrick’s fault, but McDowell almost drowned for real during that one scene near the end.
“You’re not a real director until you’ve forced your actor to endure repetitious humiliations, like when I made Malcolm McDowell get spit on for fifty takes.”
It was only directly in the eye.
Kubrick was also an oilman.
The Shining is a veiled allegory for Kubrick’s love of the petro-chemical industry.
My secondhand Kubrick was a git story:Friend of mine worked for Dolby in London. She got a phone call 2 am in the morning, while heavily pregnant, from Kubrick, promising to destroy Dolby because one of the machines isn’t working. She dragged herself out of bed, goes out into a pouring rain to the studio where a coked-up Kubrick is building up a head of steam. Going over to the machine, she looked it over, carefully bent down and plugged it into the nearest outlet. Followed at least a half hour of excorating Kubrick, who apparently had the sense to not interrupt.
Not sure if true, but, damn, I hope so! (And I’m a HUGE Kubrick fan!)I actually think he’s actually a total pussy if directly confronted (at least by someone he can’t fire). But if not, and if people are deferential to him, he’ll use it to the ends of the Earth. That would explain Lee Ermey’s comments about how Kubrick dealt with Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman – it was one of the few times when he worked with name actors who had more pull than he did, and, while he demanded innumerable takes from them, Ermey talked about how Kubrick was getting pulled around by Cruise.
I’m calling horseshit: Kubrick was not a ‘coke’ guy in any sense of the word.
this is basically my go-to thought for all Kubrick worship. He made some great movies with a dedication to the craft, but so have other directors who didn’t emotionally abuse their actors in the process.
Yeah, even putting aside The Shining and Duvall’s hideous treatment there Vincent D’Onofrio’s account of how horrible his direction was during retakes is a real eye opener. “SHIT! Do it again!” for two days, down a megaphone, in fron of the whole crew.WankerGreat movies
After that Paul Thomas Anderson vowed only to work with small crews, leading to the creation of some of the most intricate and best loved pornos of the last two decades.
there’s shadows in life babe.
ANDERSON: I want a minimal thing.ROBERT ELSWIT: Right, well, very often, minimal means a lot more photographically than most people understand.ANDERSON: What I’m talking about is minimal. Not really natural, but minimal.
He clearly killed whoever his editor is. So that narrows down the crew.
There are worse things to be than “full of yourself”, especially when you make the movies he makes
FknA
Ya, he could be a serial pedophile like that Polanski.
Or Singer, or Epstein, or or or…
Still, maybe it’s a lesson Anderson needed to learn, as his Boogie Nights star Burt Reynolds famously described the filmmaker as “young and full of himself.”Burt Reynolds also famously fired his agent after he made Boogie Nights because he thought the movie was going to be a major disaster when released. A few months later Reynolds was nominated for an Oscar for that disaster.
Yeah seriously I’m amazed “Burt Reynolds” isn’t slang for “Conflict on the set” at this point. Take anything he said with a grain of salt.
Yeah, Reynolds wasn’t known as the most humble guy. So I don’t know how much we should read into that quip. Also, don’t we want a filmmaker behind such an ambitious project to be at least somewhat “full of himself?”I think it’s the “young” part that actually pissed Burt off…
BJr can be right and an asshole at the same time.
Yeah Reynolds is pretty well known as being an asshole himself.
Burt was very much old and full of himself.
Still, he played himself on Archer, so he has that going for him.
Paul Thomas Anderson, Wes Anderson and Paul W. S. Anderson should all collaborate on a movie some time. Imagine what a glorious mess that would be.
Paul Thomas Anderson, Wes Anderson and Paul W. S. Anderson should all collaborate on a movie some time. Yes, but only if it can be a remake of If…. Get it?
Well played … well played, indeed
If they could somehow also collaborate with Orson Welles, they could call it The Magnificent Andersons.
AAnd get Hugo Weaving back in his Matrix suit.
This is where I again admit that I have trouble keeping track if which is which.
PTA – prestige filmsWA – twee moviesPWSA – schlocky video game adaptions starring his wife, Milla Jovovich
I’d replace “twee movies” with “emotionally damaged family figures collide, usually rich” but it doesn’t roll off the tongue quite as well.
Moonrise Kingdom and Grand Hotel Budapest are totally my jam. Brilliant films, beautiful, with humour and an emotional punch. But they are twee, can’t be denied.
I once read a description of Wes Anderson’s movies as “Children who act like adults, and adults who act like children.” I think that’s pretty apt.
Imagine if they switched genres. I’d totally watch a Wes Anderson Zelda movie.
Me too… I recognize their movie styles, but that doesn’t mean I can put a full name to them…(I don’t even know which of them is the one I envy for his wife….)
I know that’s the hack, but I have to think a minute to remember which initials he is.
Best part? He doesn’t care we think he’s a hack. Look at the expression on his face standing next to her.
Well PT Anderson is married to Maya Rudolph, who is a comedic gem, so pick your jealousies!
Oh wow I had no idea they were together.
Actually they are all characters played by Laurie Anderson as a piece of performance art.
Bill Murray as an emotionally stunted zombie killer in a candy pink world? I’m into it.
So, Jim Jarmusch then.
There Will Be the Life Aquatic with Resident Evil will have the most amazing mid-film gory stop-motion musical number of all time.
Throw in Paul ‘PT’ Thomas and you got yourself a movie.
A movie Way too long, way too cemitrical and …….. ? Scary,? I dont know wtf the other Paul Anderson does.
Roy anderrsson too
seems more like kubrick was implying rather than inferring.
One imagines it must have been humbling for a young Anderson to meet one of the greatest, most accomplished directors to ever live, only for the man to infer that his productions are too opulent.First of all, he implied; he didn’t infer. Second, I think he was implying that Anderson was less talented, not that his productions are too opulent.
Because he is a hollywood asshole.
You are devoting an entire entry of your website to what it`s just a little bit more than a footnote. The original article is not about PTA visiting the set of a movie, and the guy was actually try to joke with Kubrick. Why?
i know we’re not supposed to comment on the personal appearance of famous people* but, gosh, he’s kind of a handsome fellah.*because we’re not shallow teenagers or something, right?
He does have purty eyes.
I thought you were saying Burt Reynolds was more chill. Which would also be correct, figuratively.But also, literally. Because he’s dead, you see.
TOO SOON
If memory serves me, Paul tells a story about how Kubrick barely gave him the time of day, until Stanley found out PTA not only directed Boogie Nights but also wrote it. Bloogie Nights is one of those perfect movies. The setting et al. PLos I hate Wahlberg but he is perfect in this role. Perfect.
God I love Boogie Nights. The scene where Marky Mark* is fighting with his mom and he says something like, “I’m going to run away and you’re never going to find me again!” never fails to make me laugh. It’s so perfectly whiny.
While on set, he drank Kubrick’s milkshake! HE DRANK IT UP! Or, perhaps, drunk it…whatever. I’m finished!
PTA lost his balls on The Master and changed many parts of the original script due to Cruise’s dislike of many direct references to Scientology’s madness. He ruined the impact of that movie and he is a Hollywood Asshole.
Kubrick always said he didn’t know how other people shot movies because he never watched other people shooting movies.
The more le the merrier…
Maybe Kubrick should have had a few more people on set telling him that Eyes Wide Shut was gonna end up being a shitty film if he kept doing what he was doing.
Eyes Wide Shut is a masterpiece.