Alrighty Folks Harry here with PART II of Quint's interview with the screenwriter of DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS... In this half we continue to learn more about how DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS took shape and about his future projects with Joe Johnston and Michael Bay!!!! Here's the brine-swilling bastard.... QUINT.....
For Part 1 of this interview... CLICK HERE!!!
Q: HOW ABOUT A LITTLE RUNDOWN ON THE PLOT?
TL: It's a magocrosy, if there is such a word. It's a society based where magic is the social currency. There had been this great war... part of it had to do with using dragons and controlling dragons. That's like atomic warfare in our lifetime. They have these rods that control dragons and have outlawed them. The one that still exists has been hidden way, way away so no one will ever be tempted to use it again.
There's this guy in Ismir, where it takes place, Profion, who's a high level mage and he's developing, completely illegally, his own rod to control dragons. His own scepter or whatever. He's coming very close to doing this. He's also managed to totally disrupt the government to the point where the Emperor has been mysteriously done away with. Now, Thora Birch, who is the Empress Savina is ruling the country. She's this young girl and it's this total snake pit. It's like Al Gore walking into the Republican legislature in Florida.
She's got to deal with these rumors that this guy is messing with controlling dragons. Dragons in this world... it's kinda like bone marrow in your body. They are to give the universe white blood cells. They're really part of the fabric. Without them, this whole magic world will collapse. They're a link that holds them together. They're like the atom.
Anyway, Profion hears, and the Empress might know where it is, that there's this way to control dragons. A rod. He starts going after it. The long and short of it is it comes down to race between Profion and his henchman Damadar and Ridley, who is this insignificant little thief. Ridley has this whole crew that ends up with him. Snails is Marlon Wayans. Marina the mage-ess, this young girl. Elwood, the dwarf. Then there's an elven tracker that the Empress sends after them, this whole crew. And they're both racing to go after the means to control dragons and thus save the world.
Profion almost, almost wins. It's very close. The end of the movie, the big set piece is a massive dragon fight over the city. It's a pretty archetypal story and I think that's the good thing about it. Again it's one of the stories where the underdog wins the race.
What sets it apart is the special effects that are pretty spectacular, and the characters. It's this big ensemble. That's what you should be looking for next Friday night. Did I just pitch you this right or where you looking at your watch thinking "Who is this guy?"
Q: YOU SOLD ME.
TL: You going out there Friday Night?
Q: HONESTLY, I'LL PROBABLY SEE IT EARLIER, AT A SNEAK.
TL: Good. Just don't tell me you're going to see Russell Crowe and Meg Ryan or I'll come and kill you!
Q: I WILL SEE PROOF OF LIFE, BUT IF I HAVE TO CHOSE WHICH ONE TO SEE FIRST, I'LL TAKE DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS.
TL: There you go! That was very diplomatic! I'm gonna be curious... One of the things about Dungeons and Dragons that's very interesting is Hollywood doesn't understand how large an audience this is. There's like this whole culture and they're not aware of it, but I think they will be in about 10 days.
The thing is in the internet world, it's all over. I mean, Dungeons and Dragons... the talk about this movie. If you just hit a search engine and enter it, you'll get, like, 30 websites. I'm not hoping for Blair Witch, but it's a similar thing. This is outside of this standard avenue.
I think New Line's pretty smart and they know what they have here. Their website's pretty good on it, but it's just amazing to see the activity on the internet about Dungeons and Dragons.
Q: HOW INVOLVED WERE YOU DURING THE ACTUAL SHOOTING? DID YOU GET TO HANG OUT ON SET?
TL: We didn't because it was in Prague. If it had been domestic, we might have, but usually if a writer ends up on a movie set it's a bad time, know what I mean? The compartmentalization of movie making is writing it is one piece, shooting it is another and then editing it is yet the next. As you learn later, releasing it is the biggest piece. You can have a great thing through the first 3 steps, then number 4 comes along.
Look, they just released Wonder Boys, the Michael Douglas movie. It's a great movie. Curtis Hanson, the guy that did LA Confidential... it came out a year ago! I remember another great movie, The Stepfather... did you ever see that?
Q: I DON'T BELIEVE SO...
TL: Whoever released it, it's one of these studios that's no longer in existence, they botched it so badly that no one saw it. Then all the critics just... it was basically a slasher movie...
Q: OH! STEPFATHER, THE '80S FILM! I'VE SEEN THAT. I'VE SEEN THE SEQUELS, TOO!
TL: Yeah, the sequels weren't as good, but the thing is they re-released that movie because the critics just so praised the movie. Wonder Boys is the only time a movie has been re-released, other than the Stepfather, that I can remember. It's very interesting.
We did do work for Corey right before he went into production and then we did some work after he had left shooting then decided to go back and change some things, to reshoot some stuff. So, we've been involved. We've talked to him. Right when he got back from Prague, we were among the first to see the rough cut, but the thing is... Corey has an amazing learning curve. He doesn't need doctors for his scripts anymore. Like, the next movie he directs... He's capable of doing it himself.
If he had any logistical obstacles (on D&D), he would do it himself rather than freak out and have us run over there and do one afternoon's work. So, we were not on the set.
It's very funny. A while ago I was at dinner with a pretty well known writer and he was doing a movie that I would have died to have worked on. He wrote it. I went, "Oh, wow, man! Did you go down to the set?" He kinda looked at me and said, "What? Go to a movie set? I can't think of anything more boring." The fact is if you're not acting or directing, you're just sitting around waiting for them to call you when the actress or the actor decides this line doesn't work. You're there for 5 days and on the 6th day you have to change half a line, then you fly home.
There's a side of me... we would have liked to have gone and seen the set and everything. Especially the senate or the council. The chambers. They took the old Prague operahouse and put in a false floor and it's just spectacular. I would have loved to have seen that kind of thing. Or Profion's castle... it's a real place. But you can also just go to Prague and walk around.
When you're on set as a writer, it's generally a nervous situation because you always have to look as if you're working, but they don't need you most of the time and if they do, then they really need you. Then you don't end up on the set, you're in your hotel room writing.
Q: YOU SAID YOU SAW A ROUGH CUT. WHAT WAS THE FEELING YOU HAD WATCHING YOUR FANTASY WORLD COME TO LIFE?
TL: We've worked on a ton of things and I would say 8 times out of 10, you see a rough cut and you're clinically depressed. You just say, "Oh, my God! This is unreleasable! The director fucked it up!" Or, "I'm a terrible writer, I fucked it up." Or, "Those actors don't know how to act. What are we gonna do?"
Because you're seeing it without the sweetening. Without the foley, the background noise, the score, you know. It's pretty, pretty stunning to see something dry.
We left Corey's office and we were just ecstatic! Corey was doing a lot of the editing over at his offices. He had an editing deck in there. Anyway, we saw it on a deck. Those are really bad conditions to see a movie, too, you know. I'm telling you, we were just warped! It was so entertaining. We're really our own harshest critics, me and Carroll, and we just couldn't believe how much we enjoyed it.
Seeing it at that point and knowing... and this was a rough cut. This was the editor's first pass at an assembly. Seeing it at that point and knowing the leaps and bounds that a movie makes by the time you just sweeten it up, it was just pretty exciting.
I remember the first time I saw something I worked on in a rough form. They asked us to write some ADR lines and they sent us over a timed video cassette. I'm not going to say what it was, but we just went into this 3 day funk. I just went, "Oh, man! I gotta hang it up here!" Seeing what Corey had done was just really, really exhilarating.
I think the bottom line is Justin (Whalin), the guy who plays Ridley, all these characters, I mean actors, really got into it. I mean, Justin's like Corey's best buddy now. They're like totally hanging out all the time and I think that's the level the actors brought to it. It was such an exciting thing to be in Prague and to be doing this thing and being with someone like Corey... I mean, he's taken 10 years of his life... and being around that kind of energy... A lot of times you get on a movie set and it's just some guy there phoning it in, you know what I'm saying? Or he doesn't care or he hates the studio or the actors who he had to pick because it was forced down his throat because that's what the financiers thought would insure their return.
But with Corey, it was like... He's this new guy and this is what he's around to do. It was just the energy on it was way different. I really hope for the actors and Corey that it really works out.
Q: WELL, IT LOOKS LIKE NEW LINE'S KEEPING THEIR END OF THE BARGAIN...
TL: Yeah, I'm really happy that New Line picked it up because they really know how to market this kind of thing.
Q: THEY'RE DOING A GREAT JOB ON THAT END. I TOOK MY FAIR SPANISH LADY TO LUNCH THE OTHER DAY AT APPLEBEES AND THEY HAD A FEW TVs OVER THE BAR. WE WERE THERE FOR 40-45 MINUTES AND DURING EACH AND EVERY ONE OF THE COMMERCIAL BREAKS THERE WAS A DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS TV SPOT.
TL: Good!
Q: SO, THEY SEEM TO BE REALLY PUSHING THIS SUCKER.
TL: I'm told the commercial looks good. Carroll's seen the commercial because he's got a 12 year old kid that's glued to WB and MTV and he says the commercial looks great.
And, I mean, the real spirit of the thing, too, is like this big,fun pulp movie. If people go in there expecting it to change their lives... that's not what it's about. This is just about having a fun time, but being engaged, too.
It's not like... you know... I remember when Star Wars came out, which shows how old I am, the reviews, you know, Pauline Kael, they were just mocking the characters and the dialogue, but saying it was, nonetheless, like a big comic on the screen. A sci-fi comic. That's a little of the fun of the Star Wars movies. That's what made them work so good. The first one didn't take itself... Harrison Ford! I mean, that was a great character. He was not this self serious, pompous figure. And the robots and Carrie Fisher. I think the spirit of the thing, if that succeeds in coming across as we all intended it to be, it's going to please a lot of people.
Q: YOU BROUGHT UP THE CAST. I LOVE THE CAST OF THIS MOVIE. YOU KNOW, THORA BIRCH CAME TO AUSTIN LAST YEAR TO A REGIONAL PREMIERE OF AMERICAN BEAUTY AND HARRY GOT TO TALK WITH HER A LITTLE ABOUT D&D AND SHE REVEALED SHE GETS TO RIDE ON A DRAGON...
TL: (laughs) She's really talked about that a lot!
Q: COOL. BUT I MEAN, THE CAST IS FULL OF GREATS. JEREMY IRONS LOOKS TERRIFIC IN THE TRAILER... BUT THE TWO THAT I'M REALLY LOOKING FORWARD TO ARE TWO SUPPORTING CHARACTERS.
TL: Right.
Q: AND BEING THAT THIS IS FOR A BIG FILM GEEK WEBSITE, I THINK THIS IS WHAT MOST OF THE READERS ARE GOING TO BE DIGGING ON TOO. YOU HAVE BOTH DR. WHO (TOM BAKER) AND RIFF-RAFF (RICHARD O'BRIEN) IN THE MOVIE.
TL: That's right and that's all Corey. They're great! Believe me, they're so fun! When those guys get on the screen, it just becomes a whole nuther level. I mean, they were eating up the scenery, just chewing it up. They were having so much fun. It was great to see those guys.
I mean, yeah, the casting I think is really well done. How do you like that Corey cast Marlon, right, then Scary Movie this summer. Suddenly Marlon is a serious commodity. And Thora! She had just finished American Beauty, but it hadn't come out. It's a very interesting cast. Then you have Jeremy Irons! He just did Lolita for God's sakes, you know!! That's pretty funny.
Q: HE LOOKS ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC IN THE TRAILER. COMPLETELY OVER THE TOP. IT LOOKS LIKE IT'S GOING TO BE MARVELOUS!
TL: Yeah, I think he also had a lot of fun, too, just letting it rip. Yeah, Thora was at some signing on November 12th out here and I heard that she was just totally a knock out. I think she's very compelling, just from American Beauty. There's something about her that's really interesting. Apparently people are just totally bowled over by here.
Yeah, she did talk about, "What girl wouldn't want to ride a dragon?" Well, she got to.
Q: THAT'S COOL. SHE'S A GEEK, TOO. THAT'S GREAT!
TL: Yeah, and I think it's really refreshing to hear you saying "Geek" because TSR was very aware... We started this 8 years ago. It's a totally different company now, but there was kind of a chip on this shoulder from this world in terms of how they were going to be treated by the Hollywood mainstream, you know what I mean? There's a fear.
But I think things have actually changed now, so you can actually say you're a geek and be proud of it, but when we started this movie the internet didn't exist, for instance. I'm serious! It was a different world. Fax machines. You didn't have plain paper faxes. You had those rolls of paper that you could never really read after it came through.
All I'm saying is this whole network of global support for people that're into this stuff, which is giving it this credibility and a strength, it didn't exist back then. It'll be so interesting to see what happens when this movie opens because I think there's this big, big underground worldwide group that loves this stuff. I think the powers that be out here will be very surprised.
Q: WELL, YOU ALSO THROW IN THAT NEW LINE'S BIG RELEASE NEXT YEAR IS LORD OF THE RINGS AND IT'S BEING SO HIGHLY ANTICIPATED THAT EVERYBODY'S THIRSTY FOR SOME FANTASY NOW.
TL: Well, the only difference between D&D and Tolkien is, I've thought about this a lot, is basically the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings; once those passed over into the realm of literature, they've been accepted by the mainstream on many levels. D&D has not yet been.
I think New Line was very savvy to pick up this movie because, A: they're not competing with anyone. They don't have Lord of the Rings competition. They're controlling the whole show, which I thought was brilliant. B: it gives them the dry run for the marketing on this kind of thing. I think they're smart enough to know that there is a market.
I can't wait. I mean, Corey always maintains, he says, "OK you guys," to me and Carroll, "December 11th, we're starting the sequel. The Monday after. You're up at 9, in my office. We're doing the sequel." There's a side of me that goes, "Oh, man! I'm too old for this shit! It's going to kill me." But Corey's a trip. He's a total lunatic. I mean, in a good way. He's gonna go places. He's so determined and single minded that I'm just going, "Man, I got a family now. I don't know if I can live on Corey time!"
Carroll and I worked for the Weinstein Brothers over at Miramax in the early/middle days, and one time we were in London with them in a townhouse rewriting a movie that was about to start, frantically rewriting. Harvey Weinstein was in the townhouse, too, because Miramax rented it. I swear to God that guy never slept! And he never ate! He just lived on cigarettes and Diet Coke.
I swear to God! He'd go to bed 5 in the morning, 'cause we'd be up writing 'til 5 in the morning, then we'd be back at the kitchen table writing at 7 am and he'd come out with a cigarette and a Diet Coke. He'd be going off to meetings or getting on a plane to fly back. Corey has that kind of energy. You just gotta be around the guy to realize he's made for this.
I'm looking forward to the sequel actually because we're all more experienced at what we do now. If the thing gets success and he gets a bigger budget we'll be able to do...
One of the big things, and this will be interesting for the interview, when we first wrote the script CGI stuff, I was saying there was no internet, CGI was pretty new. No one really understood how much it cost. So, Corey and his partner were always saying, "Oh, yeah! Put in 200 dragons!" We had this thing called a Pocket Dragon that was on the whole quest that we had to eventually cut out because it was too expensive.
But we probably wrote the most expensive movie ever written for our first few drafts. Then the technology was coming into focus. The studios were figuring it out. Then it was just like, "You gotta pare this down, guys! Come on!"
Carroll and I worked on Jumanji, we were the script doctors on Jumanji, and you know that animal stampede in the movie? I forget the actress's name, she was the mother of the kids. Not Bonnie Hunt, but the Mom. She's in the car doing her self-help tapes and the stampede runs by her. At first she doesn't see it and then she sees it and has her reaction.
We thought it'd be funnier if she didn't see it all, but just kinda sensed it, she was so involved with her self-help tape. Then she had to look to the right. There's a beat. Then she realizes something monstrous and huge has just passed by her. She looks to the right and then there'd be this shot of the stampede receding. So, the audience would see it crossing and then there'd be another shot of it receding into the distance.
We wrote that and Joe (Johnson, Jumanji director) or the studio or someone said, "Hey, you can't do that! That's like $100,000!!" (laughs) So, that's what we learned.
But Corey, he went to Prague and he got $35 million for his budget. If this thing goes big, there'll be more money and we can really go to town with the effects. I think he's been through the wash and the rinse on the effects with the effects houses. He's learned how to deal with them and he's learned what is possible. This outta be a lot more exciting.
Q: YOU MENTIONED EARLIER YOU WERE WRITING A POTENTIAL MICHAEL BAY FILM. IS THIS "GORY DETAILS"? WHAT'S THE RUN DOWN?
TL: Yeah. Well, Michael was going to do this thing, Phonebooth. You know about that script? Then whatshisname? Joel Schumacher was going to do it. It's a script that basically takes place in one location. It fell through, but what he always maintained is that after all these big budget things like Armageddon and Pearl Harbor that he wants to just do like what Barry Levinson did with Wag the Dog. He justs wants to do, like for vacation, a $10 million movie.
The woman who runs his company, Jennifer Klein, came to us with an article from People Magazine about Crime Scene Cleanup, a guy who has his own company who goes into crime scenes. You know, like if someone goes into a house and shoots all the occupants and it's a rented house (laughs) Who cleans it up? Not the Police Dept., not the Fire Dept. You have to hire someone or you do it yourself.
So, there're these guys that have made huge, huge companies out of this niche business. So, they gave us this article and Carroll and I came back with this whole idea about 2 Crime Scene companies in a turf war. It's these moonlighting cops versus these slacker kids who had had a pool cleaning company. The kids felt like they missed out on Amazon.com and Starbucks and Borders. They never got a chance to go global, so now they're going to do it with Crime Scene Cleanup because crime is universal. It's a world market.
So, they're totally whacked out kids. Then these moonlighting cops who are just overdosed on, you know, gore, blood and mayhem and they want to get into Crime Scene Cleanup because when you get to the crime site people aren't shooting at you. They're dead!
So it's these two people, these cops, who had been the only ones. Suddenly one day they get to a crime scene, it's a mass suicide like the Hale-Bopp comet suicide, they get there... this religious cult just all took poison. There's all these corpses in there and there's this realtor who's trying to sell the house. And these kids are there bidding for the job. So, that's the beginning of the movie.
So, wrote that for Michael. It's pretty out there, but it's very funny and it's very perverse. The interesting thing about what Michael does, if you look at Armageddon, he gets the best actors from the Indie World to do these big, mainstream movies. If you look at Armageddon's cast, it's every major Indie actor from Bottle rocket to Pulp Fiction to Fargo... everybody's in there. Steve Buscemi for God's sakes! The king! So, I think he finally wants to... we'll see. You know how it goes, but we sure had fun. And through that he asked us to come and flesh up a bit on the Pearl Harbor script. That was pretty exciting. We went down to the set on that.
Q: WHAT'S YOUR FAVORITE DIRTY JOKE?
TL: My favorite joke... I'm so out of dirty jokes. Oh, God. I just have to think... I don't even have a favorite joke, for God's sakes. You know what I think my favorite dirty joke is right now? OK... George W. Bush. OK? You can put that down. That's my favorite dirty joke and that's a four year dirty joke. That's a better joke than I could have ever come up with, than anyone ever could have come up with AND it's real! You know what they always say about humor when it's grounded in reality it's the funniest.
So, there's my favorite dirty joke. Thank you! I swear to God. Really, that's my favorite dirty joke. I can't think of anything dirtier or funnier. (laughs)
THERE YOU HAVE IT, MATIES. WITH THAT, QUINT'S OL' TREASURE CHEST CLOSES ONCE MORE. 'TIL NEXT TIME, SQUIRTS. THIS IS QUINT, SIGNING OFF.
-QUINT
Write me something to get sticky over me darlings!
