9/4/23
Newsletter #448
The Crack of Dawn
Since I’m pretty sure that my former friend, Paul, doesn’t read this newsletter, I’m now going to take a mighty shit on him. I first met Paul in 1984 when he came to my office looking for a job on post-production on my movie, Thou Shalt Not Kill…Except. Paul had already made six or seven Super-8 movies that I found quite impressive, so I hired him as the assistant editor. I was the editor. The two of us spent four months in an office cutting the film. I would make a cut, then fling the excised piece of film over my shoulder. Paul would pick it up and file it wherever it was supposed to go. We had a great time, the film all cut together, and Paul and I became friends. We began going to movies all the time.
Paul is one of these people who pretty much likes everything he sees, which I am most certainly not. This made for some lively discussions. Paul hadn’t seen a lot of the “classics,” but had seen most every western movie ever made, as well as every episode of every western TV show. On the topic of westerns, he was an expert.
Paul’s dad was the vice-president of a huge automotive supply company. He got Paul a job there twice. Both times Paul quit. Paul wanted to make movies, but he was flatly against what me and my buddies were doing with Evil Dead, TSNKE and Evil Dead 2, on which Paul worked. He wanted to make his own movies with absolutely no constraints at all, whatever that meant. And since it never meant anything he never made any movies.
Paul had spent his youth in the south before moving to Detroit. Every now and then he’d let out an offhanded comment that boggled everyone in the room. He once said, “The KKK isn’t a bad organization. They have picnics and events, and many families show up, and a lot of kids, and everyone has a good time. They don’t discuss racist things. They just have fun.” My cousin Eric, the lefty lawyer, was aghast, stating, “The KKK is a hate organization.” Paul waved that away like it was nonsense. “They used to be, they’re not anymore.”
Paul and I saw Roman Polanski’s The Pianist (2002) together. The film contains some very brutal scenes of Nazis shooting Jews. In one scene in a train station, there are ten Nazis with machineguns guarding a line of a dozen ragged Jews. The officer walks down the line of Jews and with a pistol shoots each one in the head. It’s deeply disturbing. After the movie as we walked across the parking lot, Paul said, “I’d never let them do that to me. I’d never stand there and just let them shoot me in the head.” I asked, “Oh, yeah? And what would you do about it?” He said, “I’d have grabbed one of the soldier’s weapons.” I was a tad skeptical, “Oh, really? Not like those cowardly Jews?” After a few more steps Paul had to give it up. “No, not like them.” Well, I’m a few years older than him, as well as his first employer is the film business, and said, “In your dreams, motherfucker. You would have shit yourself just like everybody else and took your bullet.” He had the audacity to get angry and verbally fight with me, actually trying to make a case for his fantastic, imagined bravery.
I have another former friend, Chris, who I’m also pretty sure doesn’t read this epistle. Chris is a big guy and a former MMA fighter. Chris and Paul met through me, then became best buds. They both have big untrained dogs. Chris and Paul and I made a web horror series called Spine Chillers together. The idea was to make 10-15-minute episodes, each one written and directed by each of us, every couple of months, while keeping in mind that we had no money. Part of the idea was to make them very simple and shoot in a single weekend. We actually got nine episodes completed, but, unfortunately, it ended up taking three years. Well, that’s not how the internet works. Content, content, content. If you say, once a month, then that’s what it is. You can’t just take as much time as you want. Chris and I both got it, but Paul didn’t. His third episode took a year and was a half hour long. He couldn’t function within the format. Fine, we still got nine episodes made, and they’re on YouTube if anyone cares to watch.
Perversely, a thing that I’m most proud of was that I got a whole web series up and running and made while I was still a drunk. I truly thought things like, “I may be a drunk, but at least I’m a creative drunk,” were valid thoughts.
So, why am I telling this story? Virtue signaling? Maybe because it actually happened.
As I did for far too long, I was sitting here in my house on a sunny afternoon, already half-in-the-bag, but feeling good when both Chris, in his new pickup, and Paul, in his dad’s former Lincoln, arrived in my driveway. I could check, but I’m guessing this was 2018, right when #MeToo had just caught fire. Like Al Franken and others, one of the saddest victims of when this good-hearted movement gone wrong was with Michigan Congressman John Conyers, whom I’ve always admired. Amidst allegations that he did business with his subordinates attired only in his skivvies, some of his staff were female and were offended, so he resigned after more than 50 honorable years in Congress. He died soon thereafter.
So, Paul and Chris came over, plunked themselves down, and went right into making fun of John Conyers, who had just resigned. The man served over 50 years in Congress, and he really didn’t do anything worse than show silly bad taste. He ran around his own house in his skivvies.
Alcohol is liquid courage. I told both of them to knock it off. I admired John Conyers, this charge was bullshit, and it was sad that he had to retire this way. But they weren’t done. Conyers was a pervert. I swear I warned them again, and they kept going again. Well, I’d drunk half a bottle of Tito’s Vodka. I stood up, walked over the where Chris was sitting, pointed down at him, and flatly stated, “If you make one more remark about John Conyers, I’ll kick the shit out of you.” Very slowly, very deliberately, keeping eye contact with me all the time, Chris stood, looming over me, and left. He got it into his truck and drove away. I wouldn’t see him for a couple of years, but I’d say he and I are OK.
Paul was still there. Paul, whom I had known since 1984 when I hired him as assistant editor. Who had managed to never get anything going or make any movies in his life and it was at that point 2018, so he was 57 and I was 60. Paul said in his snottiest tone, “Chris would’ve kicked your ass.” I sat back down, returned to my drinking, and said, “Yeah, what of it?” Paul insisted, “He could’ve.” I said, “Yes. He did me the favor of not doing it.” Paul stood up, shook his head in disgust and left. His dad’s old red Lincoln backed down the driveway. I’d known him for 34 years. I’ve never seen him again.
People come and go so quickly around here.