Driving Jules Fieffer + Elliot Gould + Weekly Vlog

This week welcomes two legends, Mr. Elliot Gould and Jules Fieffer, to our crew.

It was kind of cool how I got to meet them.

Jules was to be in town from NY to screen his film Little Murders at the Silent Movie Theater. My friend Amalia, who has been volunteering when possible, works at the Silent Movie Theater and knows that The Phantom Tollbooth is one of my favorite books (Jules did the illustrations). Jules had flown into Ocean Side to visit friends, and needed a ride 2 hours up to LA. So Amalia, who doesn't drive, asked if I could volunteer, and I happily said yes. She and I drove down together Sunday, picked up Mr. Feiffer, and got to spend an amazing 2 hours in a car getting to know him.

Jules is 80 now, and super hilarious. Aside from hearing lots of amazing stories about his creative process, I also got to give him his first Skittle (which he did not like), and to explain the rules of Ultimate Frisbee, which he had never heard of. I also got to tell him about The 1 Second Film, which he found interesting, and joined as an Associate Producer! We stopped at El Pollo Loco where we started to talk about the concept of perfect moments. Jules shared this moment as a possible one-second film:

During the McCarthy years, around 1955, Jules was in the NY subway waiting for his train when the news ticker caught his eye: the headline read that a Brooklyn artist had been arrested and accused of being a Russian Spy. Jules knew most of the NY artists, and couldn't help but wonder if it was one of his friends. He looked away for a second, and when he looked back at the ticker, it had changed... and sure enough, the spy was one of his friends. In that moment, all of his assumptions were turned upside down. This wasn't one of the cases of paranoia, this guy actually turned out to be a spy. Jules wasn't sure who anyone was anymore... he later wrote a play about that feeling.

I thought that was a pretty cool moment. Not just the drama of discovering one of your friends was an international spy, but also hearing this story in an El Pollo Loco.

From there, we  stopped to visit Jules friend, three time Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist Paul Conrad. It was amazing to hang out with these two artists. I didn't even think to pitch The 1 Second Film, I was way too busy soaking in their stories. It was a short, but very sweet visit.

Later that evening, before the feature, we were treated to a beautiful 35mm print of Munro, the Academy Award winning animated short that Jules wrote. Then came Little Murders.

Here is Munro:

Little Murders was made in 1971 and still holds up. There are all sorts of amazing and absurd details. I especially loved the wedding scene with Donald Sutherland as the minister. You can see a bit of that scene in this original trailer. Supposedly the film has been recently released on DVD, which is awesome.

Elliot Gould, who plays a lead in Little Murders, was at the screening, and hung out after to do a Q & A. It was great to hear Gould and Fieffer share stories. After the questions and answers, I waited until everyone had said hello to Mr. Gould before attempting to pitch him our project. By then, he was in a bit of a rush to get home- it was around midnight and he wakes up at 3am! - but he took a moment to hear about our project.

I told him I was collecting some of my favorite people to make this film, and that it would mean alot to have him on board. He dug into his pocket, and asked if 52 cents in change would help. I told him it would, but that there was a $1 minimum to be a producer. With very good humor, he smiled and pulled out a dollar from his pocket. 

And with that, we raised another $1.52 and added two more amazing folks to our crew. It was a pretty great Sunday.

Work this week continues with digitizing, editing, and site development. There was a bunch of progress on the site today. Making bug lists and inching ever closer to the beta launch... oh, I can't wait for that! I'm also putting the finishing touches on an edit of the pitch to Stephen Colbert and his wife Evelyn. Will be posting that with the launch of the new site.

Here is the weekly vlog:

Best to all,

nirvan