The Franco brothers chat to us about The Disaster Artist, The Room and Tommy Wiseau… And Dave Franco, who is the co-lead.
The two brothers tell the tale ofThe Room, Tommy Wiseaus infamous bad movie thats become a cult hit.
Youve spent the last day or so bouncing from interview to interview, havent you?
DF:We spent the last month and a half or so bouncing from interview to interview.
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That must be exhausting.
DF:It is, it is, but it could be worse.
At least we like the movie.
The alternative is not fun.
No, I can imagine.
Have you talked it to death?
DF:Yes and no.
But were going home tomorrow, and weve got few days off.
Howd the screening go last night?
DF:The Prince Charles?
DF:So fun.
Id never been to that theatre.
What a cool spot.
Because in the UK thats the theatre that pushedThe Room.
DF:Thats, in the world, the theatre thats the bestThe Roomscreenings ever.
Have you seen it there?
Its kind of a part of the job.
Im guessing youve seen it quite a few times.
DF:About twenty-five to thirty times, yeah.
DF:Oh yeah.
Well wait until James joins us to talk about that.
James Franco:Oh God.
That wasnt really a crew, that was my students.
Are you still teaching?
JF:No, I took a year off, it was too much.
Ive sort of cut back on everything.
I was teaching at three schools.
JF:Im the only one that was surprised, everyone else told me I needed it.
Did you ever do anything with the footage of all those interviews?
JF:No, I did not.
All over the world?
You should watch the videos.
JF:I think I kind of had a…
I just got really exhausted on that press tour.
Fortunately this is a movie that I love talking about, I could talk about it forever.
We were just talking about you guys have clearly seenThe Rooma lot.
JF:At least 30 40 times, yeah.
How did your re-staging of it work?
JF:The recreation scenes?
DF:And spent just as much time capturing the awfulness that he would on his good lighting.
JF:Where there were bizarre shadows coming from places that he couldnt even wrap his head around.
DF:He spent more time trying to figure that out.
JF:Did I tell you how we were going to do it beforehand?
DF:I dont think so.
I dont think we really talked through it very much.
And when we got into that we realised, Oh no, we can go all the way.
Match the lighting, we can just perfect every movement.
DF:She was incredible.
JF:Oh yeah.
I thought Dave, actually, timing-wise, was kind of the best.
Hes my best friend, know what I mean.
So that presented its own unique challenges.
How much did you reshoot?
JF:I think we have theres more than whats presented in the film or in the side-by-side.
We could have about as much as twenty-to-twenty-five minutes worth of recreated scenes.
Maybe thatll come out at some point.
That sort of gets to the point I was going to ask about before you arrived.
Does that change the way you feel about the original film?
JF:recreating the scenes?
DF:I dont know if that necessarily our perspective, but I think this whole journey definitely has.
So theres something beyond just Tommys performance, would you say?
JF:Oh yeah.
I think that is granting permission for people to laugh.
And I think that partly comes from his taking credit for the laughter.
Its a kind of arrogance, but its a loveable arrogance, and it liberates people to laugh.
Its interesting you bring that up, because you treat Tommy and Greg very well in the film.
And you leave it where hes not.
JF and DF in unison:No.
Which we did because that was how we were told that he did it.
I suppose the entire movie then is hanging on getting that scene right.
JF:In a way, yeah.
What am I trying to say here?
JF:I know what youre trying to say.
But you cant really blame him, and what we show is he has been rejected by the word.
I totally respect him for that.
Then what happened though, is he didnt know to turn off that wilfulness when he got on set.
But he didnt do that, he didnt know how to collaborate while working in a collaborative medium.
Because Tommy now is kind of inscrutable, especially because hes rewritten history.
He takes credit for it being a comedy, so he wouldnt give me a clear answer.
Hes like, Yeah, he dont understand me, but you know what?
I think he senses my power, and hes intimidated.
Thats exactly what happens in our movie.
Judd Apatow, as the producer, rejects him.
The casting directors reject him, then he says, You know what, they dont understand me.
I will make a movie that will blow them all away.The Room, you know what I mean?
And so thats how I got to Tommy, and thats what we tried to put into our film.
James and Dave Franco, thank you very much!
The Disaster Artistis in UK cinemas from Friday.
