When we get together there is an almost free-form discussion about films. Ron and I will often trade war stories about our own film and television careers, and I told him one such tale where I applied for a job as an art director on a science fiction film called Proteus....
Two people in the film's production office interviewed me, then I was handed a script to read. As is common in the business, the script was numbered and I was to read and return it promptly. Somewhat buoyantly I departed to absorb the film's blueprint.
"What the?...." I read more pages.
"This sounds awfully close to Solaris." It was a page-turner, due to the fact that I was reading an almost exact copy, a transcription, of the Tarkovsky feature film (based on a novel by Stanislaw Lem).
Time to return the copy....in more ways than one. As I handed the script back to the gentleman who had interviewed me, I said: "This is almost an exact copy of Solaris." His face did not frown, just neutralized.
Ron made a good point as he laughed out: "That's probably why you didn't get the job!"
1 comment:
As I understand it, my losing out was no big deal.
Years later I met a guy, and he became a good friend, who had been an extra on Proteus. He played "a stormtrooper".
A year or two after that chance meeting, I started working at Film Effects, Toronto. They had produced optical effects for the long-in-production show.
Then I met a visual effects guy who worked on the much-troubled film.
Yes, we count our lucky stars sometimes, even if a modicum of sloppiness-of-the-mouth was my lucky charm.
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