Press Democrat
April 12 2002
Being Charlie Kaufman isn't what it used to be. When he knocked off his first script in about six months, he never thought anyone would read it. A diversion from sitcoms like "Get a Life" and "Ned and Stacy," it was a writing exercise.
"I was going to write about a man who falls in love with someone who's not his wife," he would later tell people.
But something went wrong. The surreal script about portals and puppets began making the rounds. Producers began to get that itch. Spike Jonze wanted to direct it -- so badly he convinced his father-in-law Francis Ford Coppola to take a break from crushing grapes and make a few phone calls. Suddenly, the unsuspecting star of the film -- the real-life actor at the core of the story -- actually agreed to play himself.
Being Charlie Kaufman had never been better. When "Being John Malkovich" floored audiences in 1999, Kaufman was hailed as quirky. Insert: wacky, bizarre, offbeat. Some even whispered "genius." When writers really dug deep, he was crowned "Kafakaesque."
Living up to the mystique, he played the part. He described how he was so nervous about wading through an Oscar acceptance speech, he hoped he didn't win. Doing his best Thomas Pynchon (or J.D. Salinger or B. Traven) he never poses for photos. After setting up an interview, his film publicist said, "Good luck finding a picture of him." (i.e. insert your favorite Alan Smithee pin-up).
But, now, after all the hype has died, being Charlie Kaufman isn't so easy: How do you follow up one of the most original scripts in decades?
It's a concern that makes him take a deep breath before saying, "I've certainly thought about it, and I know there will be people wanting to compare them. But I can't think about stuff like that. I'm already working on other projects and trying to keep moving. What people think about the movie is out of my control.
"It's kind of like anything you compare and say it's not as good as that -- well, it's not that."
Granted, most people would call his "problem" a blessing. He's the new quirky kid on the block, and Hollywood is all ears, and pocketbooks.
"It's not easier at all. In fact it may be harder," he says, talking on the phone, describing the expectation that comes with each new script.
When his second film "Human Nature" hits theaters today it will be plugged as "From the creators of 'John Malkovich.'" Not that it would have been hard to figure out.
Tim Robbins plays a lab scientist who, when he's not obsessing over the size of his penis, is busy teaching table manners to mice. Patricia Arquette plays a female yeti, a woman so hairy she could bathe in Nair every morning and still have a six o' clock shadow by nightfall. Rhys Ifans is a feral man named Puff who is "rescued" from the wilds and taught civility.
It sounds absurd and hilarious, but as a story it never gathers the momentum of "Malkovich." Even using the word "momentum" is an overstatement. Kaufman and French director Michel Gondry (famous for his Bjork music videos) introduce a circle of Oliver Sacks characters who never transcend their opening joke.
Kaufman played the role of co-producer this time around. So unlike most screenwriters he can't blame the director.
"I was involved in all of the decisions, the pre-production casting and post-production," he says. "I had complete access."
So what does he think about the final product?
"I'm satisfied with it," he says with all the emphasis of a half-hearted thud. He goes on to wax about the collaborative process and how people tell him that the final product will never mirror the original script, before arriving at: "But I'm not that attached to the result."
Not that attached to your own film?
"I think it's important for me to fail and to be able to fail," he says. "Because I think it's the only way you can take risks. And I think it makes it harder to be willing or able to fail if you're attached to the results."
Maybe it's true, the adage about learning to fail and failing to learn. Maybe, as viewers and fans, we would rather have him stumble now so his next film will dazzle. It's a theory at least.
"If you're not willing to risk failure then you're not risking anything and you're not being generous with your work," he says. "You're just trying to maintain a certain status with your work, and I'm not interested in that. I'm interested in experimenting. And you're going to fail when you do that. It just happens."
In his next film, "Adaptation," directed by Spike Jonze, Kaufman returns to the fine line between fiction and nonfiction that made "Malkovich" so unpredictable.
"I like to take people out of the movie a little bit and remind them that they're watching a movie. It's interesting to me. I feel like there is a lot of seduction in movies that I find troubling; when people are sort of sucked into this reality that doesn't have any resemblance to the real world and I think that people end up feeling bad, at least I do, about their own lives."
He has even inserted himself into "Adaptation" as the quirky screenwriter who struggles to adapt Susan Orlean's "The Orchid Thief." It's a role he seems more than content to play.
"I think people think of me as weird," he says. "I don't care. As long as I continue to get to do the things I want to do, I'm happy."
(Source)