Columns
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Back to One: Stage Veteran John Christopher Jones Talks Fighting for the Part, Loving the Text, and not Letting Parkinson’s Have the Last Word
John Christopher Jones is a veteran “actor’s actor” with many Broadway shows including Simon Gray’s Otherwise Engaged (directed by Harold Pinter), Hurlyburly (directed by Mike Nichols), The Iceman Cometh (with Jason Robards), and Shaw’s Heartbreak House. He is the subject of a documentary film, The Endgame Project, which follows him in his tenth year with Parkinson’s as he rehearses and performs Beckett’s masterpiece. A “text-lover” through and through, he continues to translate the major plays of Chekov (he received a Lortel Award for his version of The Cherry Orchard) and work on his memoir. I’ve often heard the word “craftsman” […]
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“I Like Being Aggressive in the Storytelling…”: Michael Dinner on His CBS James Ellroy Adaptation, L.A. Confidential
One of the most haunting and atmospheric pieces of filmmaking I’ve seen this year is the pilot for the television adaptation of James Ellroy’s L.A. Confidential, which, as scripted by Jordan Harper and directed by Michael Dinner, beautifully captures Ellroy’s unique blend of acidic humor, weary resignation, and brutal violence as both a destructive and cathartic force. Working with his Justified collaborator Walton Goggins — brilliant here in the role of Jack Vincennes — as well as an equally fine Brian J. Smith (playing Ed Exley) and Mark Webber (Bud White), Dinner pays tribute to both Ellroy’s novel and Curtis […]
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Back to One Podcast: Keith Poulson on Developing as an Actor in the NY Indie Film Scene.
There is, perhaps, no actor at the moment more synonymous with New York indie filmmaking than Keith Poulson. His uncanny comedic sensibilities first caught my attention in Bob Byington’s Somebody Up There Likes Me. He’s since honed his mastery of the low-key “throwaway” in dozens of low budget gems and appeared in nearly everything made recently by the prolific Brooklyn filmmakers Alex Ross Perry and Nathan Silver. He got to stretch his wings a bit in Zach Clark’s Little Sister, where he played a severely disfigured Iraq War veteran. We talk about the incestuous world of independent film acting in […]
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“I Just Try to Approach It in a Teaching Way, Not an Overbearing Way…”: Bryan Spicer on Directing the TV Series, Hawaii Five-O
I first became aware of director Bryan Spicer when I encountered his lively episodes of Eerie, Indiana back in the early ’90s. In the 25 years since then, he’s built up a resume that would be the envy of any filmmaker, doing excellent work in both features and television in virtually every genre — his filmography includes teen comedies, Westerns, sci-fi, a musical, urban action, romance, procedurals, comic book superheroes, period pieces and more. In recent years Spicer has focused almost entirely on one show, Hawaii Five-0, but that doesn’t mean he has left his breadth of style behind. To […]
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Back to One Podcast: Set it Up Star Zoey Deutch on “Process, not Outcome” and the Miracle of the Pizza Scene
Not every ingénue is deserving of the attention Zoey Deutch is about to get. But this 23 year old already has the miraculous and mysterious skill of a veteran actor. Since her brilliantly nuanced performance in Flower, I have wanted to find out the secret to her magic. Her natural talent shines equally bright in heart-wrenching dramas such as Before I Fall and wild comedies like The Year of Spectacular Men. And now she has delivered a rom-com-pantheon-worthy performance opposite Glen Powell in the Netflix film Set It Up. We talk about “process and not outcome,” being “right for a […]
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Ten Episodes In, A Short Introduction to the Back to One Podcast
Back to One is not a normal interview podcast. There is no greeting, no elaborate guest introduction, no banter, no small talk, no inane humor, no plugs, no closing. Just one actor every episode discussing their own approach to the craft, and one big (perhaps foolish) attempt at something pure. I love actors. As a filmmaker, I believe it is of the upmost importance to love them. But I am ashamed to admit that, at the same time, the filmmaker in me is kind of afraid of actors. Specifically, I am terrified that I am going to give an actor […]
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Why I Spent Months Making An Archival Documentary about The Slenderman
When I was thirteen years old I spent a good deal of my free time posting on an online message board dedicated to Wes Craven’s Scream film series. I was a nerdy, creative kid stuck in suburbia, and I’d stay up late on my parents’ basement desktop computer writing long, elaborate, I’m-sure-illegible fan fiction stories to post on the message board. This was a subculture on the forum: users would regularly post their own fictional horror stories (some inspired by the Scream movies, some original). The stories would often feature the characters from Scream mixed with new characters inspired by […]
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Back to One: Actor Glen Powell on Developing His Process and Starring in the Netflix Comedy, Set it Up
Glen Powell gives me hope for the future of the movie industry. He crushed the role of legendary astronaut John Glenn in Hidden Figures and donned some ’80s duds in Richard Linklater’s Everybody Wants Some, but he really grabbed my attention in the brand new Netflix rom-com Set It Up, where, in my humble opinion, he has crafted a classic, for-all-time, romantic lead performance opposite the incomparable Zoey Deutch. We talk about his process in general and do a deep dive into his work in Set It Up in particular. And by the end, I come closer to understanding why […]
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“There Is a Reverence On Set When the Camera is Spitting Film Through its Gate.”: DP Darran Tiernan on Westworld, Season Two
When I interviewed cinematographer Paul Cameron about his work on the Westworld pilot, he likened the show’s mechanical hosts to the workers on set. “By the end of the day, half the hosts have been shot up and need to get washed down, the lead pulled out and get re-programmed to be put back into work the next day,” said Cameron with a laugh. “It’s kind of like a film crew.” For Season Two of HBO’s sci-fi/western hybrid, cinematographer Darran Tiernan was among the crew getting the metaphoric lead pulled out every night. Tiernan lensed five of the ten episodes, […]
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Back to One: Back to the Future Actor and The Year of Spectacular Men Director Lea Thompson on How Actors Need to be “Director-Proof”
Lea Thompson has a lot of wisdom to share. Her work as an actor spans three decades with hit films like the Back To The Future trilogy and Some Kind of Wonderful to successful television shows like Caroline in the City and Switched at Birth. She recently started a second chapter as a director. Her first feature film The Year of Spectacular Men (opening Friday June 15th) stars her daughters, Madelyn and Zoey Deutch, and was written by Madelyn. We talk about how this true family affair was stitched together with nothing but love, and how actors need to be […]
