Farz started this episode with, "I don't know if people are going to be interested in this!" and then proceeded to tell the most hilarious and interesting story! In loving memory of Val Kilmer, Farz walks us through the insane 1996 production of "The Island of Dr. Moreau." From Val being the worst to the director disguising himself as an extra to whatever the hell Marlon Brandon was doing --- it's a wild ride! [Ed Note: Val and Marlon were absolute smoke shows in their day, happy to discuss anytime].
Farz started this episode with, "I don't know if people are going to be interested in this!" and then proceeded to tell the most hilarious and interesting story! In loving memory of Val Kilmer, Farz walks us through the insane 1996 production of "The Island of Dr. Moreau." From Val being the worst to the director disguising himself as an extra to whatever the hell Marlon Brandon was doing --- it's a wild ride!
Hi Friends! Our transcripts aren't perfect, but I wanted to make sure you had something - if you'd like an edited transcript, I'd be happy to prioritize one for you - please email doomedtofailpod@gmail.com - Thanks! - Taylor
Taylor: It is absolutely beautiful here. The wildflowers were out in bloom
>> Taylor: In the matter of the people of State of California vs. Orenthal James Simpson, case number BA097. And so, my fellow Americans, ask not.
>> Farz: What your country can do for you.
>> Taylor: Ask what you can do for your country.
>> Farz: And we are live. Taylor. Hi, how are you?
>> Taylor: Good, how are you?
>> Farz: I am very, very well. I'm excited to go to yoga in a little bit. It'll be a. And it's beautiful here. It is absolutely beautiful. The wildflowers were out in bloom. It' It's a gorgeous time.
>> Taylor: So I'm, I am very hot. What time? What was the temperature here? It is 85 where you are. It's 83 here. Just not. I mean, it's just going to get hotter.
>> Farz: We also have a decent amount of wind, which breaks it up, so there's that.
>> Taylor: That's good for you. Good for you.
>> Farz: Thank you.
Doomed to Fail brings you history's most notorious disasters and epic failures
So would you like to introduce who we are, what we're doing and why people are here listening to this?
>> Taylor: I would love to. Thank you for listening, everyone. Welcome to Doomed to Fail. We bring you history's most notorious disasters and epic failures twice a week. And I am Taylor, joined by Fars.
>> Farz: And today is Farz's turn to tell a story. And honestly, like, nobody's going to care about this. Like, I just know. So I shouldn't have said that. I'm sorry.
>> Taylor: Why on earth would you say that?
>> Farz: I don't know.
>> Taylor: Oh my God, you're going to love this story. What a time consuming hobby we've discovered.
>> Farz: You're all going to adore this, so. But I'm going to cover a topic that or like a subject matter that I don't typically cover. It's going to have to do with movies, a movie in particular. And it all came about because of Val Kilmer's death. So I don't really follow celebrities very much. I don't really care about celebrities very much. And I ran out of like every podcast I had to listen to and the last one on the list was a story about Val Kilmer's life and his death. And it reminded me of a movie that he was in that fasting when I was a kid. Because I had and still have horrible taste in movies. I just don't like good movies. I like bad movies. Like, I thought the Conga was one of the best movies ever saw. And I still.
>> Taylor: Congo is so good.
>> Farz: Oh my God, you have bad taste too.
>> Taylor: Of course I do. I say, I say the lost city of Zinj all the time.
>> Farz: Do you remember our conversations about what Absolute dog s***. Benjamin Button was. And how everybody told me that. Everybody told us we have to love it. I was like, it's impossible to watch.
>> Taylor: It was infuriating. I was like, this honestly could not be worse.
>> Farz: Yeah, it was like a torture session. And everybody's like, best storyline, best script, best. It's like, what are you talking? What do you. What did you guys watch? Congo was better.
>> Taylor: Yeah. Congo is so good.
>> Farz: Thank you. But there was. Yes, it was. Remember the eyeball scene?
>> Taylor: God, I love.
>> Farz: So bad.
>> Taylor: Oh, my God. And then, like. Yeah, like, oh, my God. And then I love. I think I watched it recently. I love when she gets mad at the. At the dad and she's like, you said this was about him. And he's like, it's about the diamond. And I'm like, why can't you have both but take both? Yeah, never throw away the diamond, everyone.
>> Farz: It actually holds up like it does.
>> Taylor: I watched it recently. I watched with the kids. They're going to make fun of the cgi, but they're going to like it.
>> Farz: I don't even think that was cgi. I think that was the real humans dresses like gorillas.
>> Taylor: Oh, good. That's even better.
>> Farz: Yeah.
So there was another movie around the same time that I was super fascinated by
So we're off topic here, but. So there was another movie around the same time that I was super fascinated by that I never saw. I actually didn't even see it for this because the movie itself is kind of irrelevant. I'm gonna get into the production of the movie. The movie itself is called the island of Dr. Monroe. Dr. Moreau.
>> Taylor: Cool. I think we talked about this before.
>> Farz: What did I say about it?
>> Taylor: No, we talked about it because we talked about Marlon Brando and how f****** weird this is. Right?
>> Farz: Yes.
>> Taylor: I'm excited. Also, did you know that conga was written about Michael Crichton, who wrote Jurassic park and er, the TV show?
>> Farz: Oh, my God.
>> Taylor: And you know why I know that actually is because I think it comes up on my author clock. You know, I have this cool clock that does the time with. From a book?
>> Farz: No.
>> Taylor: So every minute of the day it does a different quote from a book or that minute is referenced. You know, that's incredible. And Congo's in here every once in a while. When it gets back in, I'll let you know.
>> Farz: Fun. What is that?
>> Taylor: I'm sorry? It's called an author clock.
>> Farz: Author, wow.
>> Taylor: They also have one like an author weather clock as well that gives you the weather depending on. And it gives you a quote from a book.
>> Farz: I've never heard of this.
>> Taylor: It's awesome one got it for me. A Kickstarter. It took two years to arrive, and it's awesome. I love it.
>> Farz: Wow. Congo. Michael Crichton did not know that. Okay. Anyway, makes sense why it was great, actually. Even more so.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
There's something so human when you learn about celebrities
>> Farz: So we did talk about this, and you kind of touched on this already. We kind of talked about what a nightmare the making of the movie was, and I got super fascinated by it as. It's just so interesting. There's something so human when you learn about, like, celebrities. And I fundamentally think that there's something within humans that once you reach a certain level of, like, wealth and success, I think we all just become. I. I don't even think there's a choice. I think. I think it has to happen. Like, it's too consistent.
>> Taylor: Like, what? Yeah. What are you. What? I don't know. What do you do?
>> Farz: What do you do?
>> Taylor: Yeah, because I think. Okay, go ahead. Please see this. I'm very interested in this. And you haven't even started. I just also just want to mention how handsome Marlon Brando was.
>> Farz: Sure.
>> Taylor: Just like, remember. Remember A Streetcar Named Desire? Oh, my God. Even though he was a very bad man in that movie. Gorgeous.
>> Farz: I never. I never. I only knew Marlon Brando from the Godfather, and back then he, like, played it a very old, decrepit man.
>> Taylor: So I know. Well, that. Well, okay, then also, the reason we brought him up the first place was for Mutiny and the Bounty, which is also. You should watch.
>> Farz: Which is also. Yeah, it's a kind of. It is, actually.
>> Taylor: Okay, I'll let you talk. I'm not. I'm gonna let you talk.
>> Farz: That's actually where it came from. That was the thing I was thinking about, was Muni on the. Okay, anyway. Yeah, so.
The movie itself was super interesting because there's a lot of interesting themes
So anyways, the movie itself was super interesting because there's a lot of, like, interesting themes baked into it that we're gonna get into. If you don't know what the story is. Do you know the story, Taylor?
>> Taylor: I feel like. Is it about hunting humans on an island?
>> Farz: That's the Running Man.
>> Taylor: No, but it's the yes and no. That's the Dangerous Game or something. Okay, but then. No, I don't know.
>> Farz: This is gonna be the longest episode ever.
>> Taylor: I can't stop talking. I feel like my mom watching a movie. Whenever I watch movie with my mom, she cannot stop talking to her. Yet you're like, why can't you stop talking? And she can't. And that's where I am right now.
>> Farz: All good. All good. It's a good Banter.
HG: I watched another movie based on the making of The Lost
So the. The. The gist of the story, the parts that are relevant here, is that there's this guy, he's like a UN Investigator in the movie. He is in a plane crash. He's rescued by some passerby on a boat who is supposed to take him to this one island and decides to take him, that he's going to have to take a detour to this other island. And that island is owned by a guy named Dr. Moreau. Dr. Moreau is a former physician or something, whose experiments drove him out of civil society. And he sought refuge on this island to continue doing his experiments. And his experiment was in creating human animal hybrids.
>> Taylor: So that he watched this movie for this or no, you just learned about it?
>> Farz: No, it looks really, really bad. Like, I. So I watched another movie that's based on the making of this movie called the Loss. What is it called? The Lost. Yeah, the Lost Soul of Richard Stanley. But anyway, so Dr. Moreau, he's doing these hybrid experiments on creating animal human hybrids. And this guy discovers it, and there's a rebellion. And whatever. It's a. Is an H.G. wells book. And reading through kind of the synopsis from HG well, the entire point of the movie, or the entire point of the show, movie, story, whatever, it's that it's trying to create, like, a nihilistic society in a world where being a nihilist will get you destroyed. And that's kind of like the overarching theme of the show is so. Or the movie. Anyways, the movie itself. Who gives a. That's not an important part. The important part is the production of the movie. That's actually where the fun of this comes in and how this became listed as the worst production in history of Hollywood.
Richard Stanley was a passionate fan of the H.G. wells book
And it all starts with a guy named Richard Stanley. So his official title for this role was that of director. But he really was a lot more than just a director. He seems more like a producer and just like a general fanboy who got his wish come true. He was a fan of the H.G. wells book when he was a kid, and it sounds like that book left a huge mark on him. Like, he references a lot about how it met, what it meant to him in terms of humans, relationship with nature and God and what God is and what being a human is. It sounds like it was a very defining book form. So this wasn't like a director who's like, hey, here's 10 scripts. Pick one that you want to do. It was like a director. Like, this is it. Like this Is the my story that I have to tell tell. He was also not a fan of any other earlier film adaptations that had been made to date. So there's one called in 1932 called the island of Lost Souls. There was a movie called Terror Is a man. There's a 1977 movie called the island of Dr. Moreau. He had a lot of choice words about this because he felt like they weren't being true to the H.G. wells book. And that was his biggest beef because he was like such a fan of that book.
>> Taylor: Totally.
>> Farz: So he got his start in filming and filmmaking with short films. His first feature film was made in 1990 and called Hardware. And that actually turned a profit and helped him lock in his next film, which sounds like it was a total disaster to finish. Then his third was basically like a rock album. It was like. It was this band called Marillion who released an album and they wanted a movie to play over that touched on the themes of each song as it happened. It was like an art thing. It was very artsy. Fartsy.
>> Taylor: Right.
>> Farz: Like one of those things. So I'm setting all this up to say that one, this was a super passionate person about the things that he really cared about. And two, he didn't have a lot of background or experience running major productions. That's kind of like the theme here.
>> Taylor: Being like, his first big one.
>> Farz: Yeah. Also, he's 29 years old.
>> Taylor: Oh, wow.
>> Farz: So while finishing his second movie, he started toying around with the idea of creating a film adaptation of Dr. Moreau and basically fulfilling the vision he thought that HD Wells always had for this to come to come to life as a way to kind of. I learned a lot about, like, what you do to get a film made throughout this process. It really just starts with creating. Just you got to start creating things, start talking to people, start building a vision, start selling the vision, all that. He started doing that by creating these really, like, acid punk looking pictures of, like, what he envisioned the scenes from the movie would look like. It's actually really cool. And a lot of them show Dr. Moreau as like a Jesus like figure. Like, he's like the creator of these animal hybrids and whatever. He definitely had a picture in his mind of what this should be.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: And then he spent four years trying to shop this idea around to producers and studios to build up interest from his telling of it. He was basically living on fumes. Like, he was essentially completely penniless, just going from, you know, side hustle to side hustle to try and pitch this to someone. He, like I said, he wasn't working as a movie director. This was not a guy that you would just hire out of a stack of movie directors saying, all right, Joel Schumacher is busy. Go to the next one. Still work, busy, Go the night.
>> Taylor: He was, like, very specific.
>> Farz: Very specific.
>> Taylor: I wanted to make this movie.
>> Farz: Exactly.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: He had one modestly successful movie. I think the budget was 5 million. Was. I think he made $5 million off a budget of 1 million, which, like, it's good. But by comparison, the year he did that movie, the top grossing directors made 22 to 33x their budget. And the top movies were Ghost, Home Alone and Pretty Woman.
>> Taylor: So, like, I mean, those are top movies.
>> Farz: I know, but that's where you hire a top director.
>> Taylor: Yeah, No, I mean, those are some of the best movies ever.
>> Farz: Also. I. I never really thought of it this way, but, like, if you're a movie director, you're like the CEO of, like, a huge organization. Like, you got all these people beneath you and all those people beneath them. Like, it's like a huge. It's like a real challenging job.
>> Taylor: Well, so my husband, you know, directed a couple of films, and, like, obviously they were, like, small, but, like, it was lonely and hard. Everyone was mad at him. You know, like, it's not easy.
>> Farz: It.
Richard Stanley approached New Line Cinema about making a grindhouse movie
It sounds like it takes a certain grizzledness to do this, and. And we're gonna learn that here in a bit. So eventually, Richard Stanley was able to get a hold of a producer named Edward Pressman, who liked his idea, liked his vision, like the guy himself, and most importantly, he liked the fact that Richard Stanley's agent was also the representative of H.G. wells Estate, because that meant that they could straight line securing the rights, actually making this movie, which they actually did. So I don't know for sure Stanley did that on purpose, but that was really deliberate.
>> Taylor: It feels like. How could that be a coincidence?
>> Farz: That does sound very deliberate. Yeah.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: So Ed and Richard approached New Line Cinema, who was undergoing kind of like an identity crisis at the time. In the early 90s, they were more of an art house film studio. They made movies like Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Lawnmower Man, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, things like that.
>> Taylor: Remember when we watched Lawnmower Man?
>> Farz: Yes. That's a great movie too. It does not hold up because the graphics are pretty bad now, and it's.
>> Taylor: Like, yeah, it doesn't hold up. But I was actually talking about it today because. Or thinking about it today because Pierce Brosnan's wife posted A picture of him soaking a cigarette. And remember how much time, how many times in that movie, he's smoking a cigarette and doing, like, a video diary on the tv.
>> Farz: Oh, my God.
>> Taylor: Yeah, he's smoking cigarettes the entire time. It's so good.
>> Farz: Pierce Brosnan plays big in this. In that, not this.
>> Taylor: Richard Stanley did color out of space, which I really like. And that's also. Is that. You can talk about that.
>> Farz: I'm going to talk about that.
>> Taylor: Okay. It was pretty good.
>> Farz: We'll know in about 20 minutes.
>> Taylor: Sorry, sorry, I thought you continue. I like Richard Stanley's look. FYI.
>> Farz: He has a great look. He definitely looks like he should have filmed Jurassic Park. So long story short is, like, they were New Line Cinema, this time was known as a studio that produced profitable movies, but not good movies. Like, it wasn't known for, like, good, respectable movies, essentially. But they were in a transition period around the mid-90s. So shortly around the time that they had also brought on to do the island of Dr. Moreau, they had just produced seven and boogie nights, like, movies that would go on in history as, like, classics and stuff like that. And the reason I'm bringing that up is because there was a dichotomy happening within New Line Cinema, within the leadership team, which was like, some of them were like, hey, we just want to make cool movies. And some were like, no, we need to be like the. I guess at that time, the Weinstein Company was like, the biggest brand in terms of, like, good movie. Like, you know, like, they were trying to, like, have this internal battle, essentially.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: And learning how this all kind of came together. Like I said, it's just so relationship driven. Like, the connection between the agent and Wells estate, then the producer relationship with New Line Cinema. That's the reason all this came together in the first place. And that's why New Line Cinema started to actually entertain the idea of producing this movie. And this producer was also the reason why Marlon Brando got involved, because he was directly connected to Marlon Brando. And eventually this gets floated to Brando that this movie is. There's interest in you Line Cinema in producing this, and that potentially he. He might be of interest to play the lead of Dr. Moreau. Eventually. What started out as, like, this grindhouse movie of like, a budget of maybe $5 million. Now with Brando attached, it's like a movie. It's like a real thing because now Brando's involved. Basically, for context, at this time, Brando had been nominated for more Academy Awards than movies that Richard Stanley had made. Richard Stanley made one more movie than Brando had Oscars.
>> Taylor: I am like, I'm nervous and excited because I'm looking at pictures of this and I'm like, what is happening? So I just can't. I'm just looking at pictures of this, of this production, and I just can't wait to hear more.
>> Farz: So at this point, like I said earlier, Stanley was 29 years old. The studio obviously didn't want him being responsible for making a movie that now had a huge budget because of this celebrity being attached to it. They ended up hiring Roman Polanski. And when Richard Stanley heard this, he, like, went apeshit. And he basically demanded to meet with Brando because he was like, I have zero clout, I have zero juice. I have nothing that I can do to get around this movie being handed off to Ron Polanski. But maybe if Brando loves being likes me, maybe he can throw his heft around, you know?
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: And that's what he did. He met with Brando at his house, and Brando loved him for some reason and was like. He called New Line saying, I'm not going to do the movie unless this kid is directing. And so he got on the movie.
>> Taylor: Mm.
>> Farz: This really reminded me of this one quote. I think it was Oscar Wilde that was like, there are two tragedy tragedies in life. One is getting what you. One is not getting what you want, others getting it. And this is like, such a great example of that.
>> Taylor: Totally, totally. I was thinking, not I'm not related, but, like, Tina Fey one time was like, when I first met with Lorne Michaels, I was like, I would do anything to work with this man. And then, like, a year later, she was like, in his office at midnight, being like, I would do anything to get out of this office.
>> Farz: You know, that's actually not that uncommon for snl, actually.
Bruce Willis would eventually withdraw from doing the movie
So next up was casting some of the other prominent roles, and Bruce Willis and James woods were the two that were kind of added to really round out, like, the pack of lead actors that you want on this. On the. On the movie. So they started doing smaller shoots off location in LA as sets were being built in Carnes, Australia, for the main production. And during this time, Stanley says that basically, Bruce. This is all Stanley's interpretation. He said that Bruce Willis and Demi Moore decided to, like, separate and eventually move towards a divorce. And that's why Bruce Willis would eventually withdraw from doing the movie. We don't know.
>> Taylor: Play Val Kilmer's character.
>> Farz: Yes.
>> Taylor: Okay.
>> Farz: And so now they're missing, like, Their biggest box office draw. Like, Brandon was a big deal, but he wasn't as big of a deal as he was like the 70s at this point. This is 1986. And so Stanley, Richard Stanley, seemingly ran into Val Kilmer. And at this point, Val Kilmer was a pretty big star. He'd already done Batman Forever and the, the assumption was that he would be as big of a draw to the movie as Bruce Willis would have been if he was still involved in the film. So not to speak ill of the dead, but it does sound like Val Kilmer was an absolute nightmare to be around and deal with. So Joel Schumacher, who directed him in Batman Forever, he, the movie he just finished before he would have joined this project, would later say, quote, val is the most psychologically troubled human being I've ever worked with. It's like. And that was his reputation since the Top Gun days. I never knew this about Val Kilmer because I didn't either. He's probably just like some good looking guy and he just like feed him some scripts or whatever, but apparently he's like a hardcore method actor. Like, he's like a Juilliard. Like I'm an artiste type, you know.
>> Taylor: Oh God, method actors sound like the worst.
>> Farz: I know. And when Stanley met with him about kind of discussing this project, he lived up to his reputation. Immediately off the bat he goes, I value my alone time, I value my me time. I will only do this movie if you cut my time on the set by 40%. So that was his stipulation. The sense I got from watching Stanley's interview about this moment was that this was like a panic moment for him because by all accounts he knew that New Line Cinema didn't want him to direct this movie. It was, they'd made that clear. Losing Bruce Willis was bad enough, but if he had failed to secure Val Kilmer, then they would have just shelved the movie totally. So he would. He agreed to the demands. Essentially. He did this by basically giving him James woods character. So like he replaced him as not being the lead, which was what Bruce was supposed to be, but to do James woods character, which had fewer scenes. He ended up hiring a guy named Rob Morrow as the lead. And apparently this kind of satisfied everybody. So the production team heads to Carnes, Australia to finish casting for the background actors, finishing up sets, getting situated and doing all that good stuff. And then the news comes that Marlon Brando's 25 year old daughter committed suicide by hanging herself at her mom's house.
>> Taylor: Right?
>> Farz: This family, if when you Read what's going on with it. Is it. Is. It could. You could make 15 movies about the people in this family.
>> Taylor: I think we talked about this during. During the.
>> Farz: It was that woman. It was the muni on the bounty woman that he married. That's. Yeah.
>> Taylor: And then the daughter. Yeah, yeah. And then like didn't like a boyfriend beat her up and then the brother killed the boyfriend or something.
>> Farz: Christian Brando killed. Dude, it's crazy.
>> Taylor: Wild. Yeah, it was.
>> Farz: What was that guy? Blake. Blakely, the actor that died. He killed his wife and then he went to jail. This happened when we were living in L. A. I forgot his name. He was like a famous actor named Blakely. Anyways, the rumors were also that Marlon Brando's other kid, Christian Brando, might have also been the one that killed that woman. It's like their stories are unbelievable. Anyway, so, yeah, a lot could be said about the Brando family and the chaos involved in their lives. But anyways, so the daughter kills herself. And the production team predictably were like, we got to give this guy more time. Like, he needs time. He's got to deal with this. He's got to cope with this. And so the. They scheduled to basically film like resequence what they were going to film from not having Brando there, essentially. So he started off filming Kilmer scenes and this is when he probably had the. When Richard Stanley had the realization that this would have been a huge mistake to cast him, he would question the script, he would ask for rewrites, he would question the chronology of the film, question filming techniques. He would tell. He would tell him. So when Stanley would try to go give him direction on what to be doing and how to be feeling, doing all that stuff, he, Val Kilmer would tell the director of the movie, quote, only actors stand in front of the camera and like tell him to go back behind the camera. Like he was a real big jerk. And I think this is a combination of also like Val Kilmers being an a******, which is like generally accepted, mixed with Stanley being super green on like an unusually high budget production for someone with his background. I think that's kind of what was going on here. It was like an alpha clash of like, I'm the boss, so I'm the boss kind of a thing.
>> Taylor: Right. They're like maybe trying to take advantage of the situation.
>> Farz: Yeah, yeah.
>> Taylor: To be like, oh, I can.
Kilmer comes from a perspective like, hey, I have this Vision
I can be in charge here, you know?
>> Farz: Yeah, that's essentially it. Because this guy's like coming from a perspective like, hey, I have this Vision. And Kilmer's like, look how great I am, guys. Everybody knows I'm great. So let's just make. Let me do the rewrites. F*** these people.
A tropical cyclone also hits the region and floods out outdoor sets
So in the middle of all this, there's growing tension between the main stakeholders. A tropical cyclone also hits the region and floods out or washes out the outdoor sets. And the general tone amongst the people who are there and had the option to leave was, please let me leave. Let me out of my contract. I don't want to be around. This production is a disaster. Everybody's mean to everybody. The tension is palpable. That how much everybody hates everybody. And a lot of them started calling out the studios asking to get released from their contracts. Except Al Kilmer apparently was like, the only problem on the set.
>> Taylor: Mm.
>> Farz: So most important to the people that were complaining was Val Kilmore actually did call the head of the studio and basically said, this guy doesn't know what he's doing. He's too green. Just like, s*** talking. And he wasn't asking to get taken off the movie. He was just like, this guy sucks, essentially. And that was the final straw for New Line Cinema and Richard Stanley. He was fired via fax from the movie and was given his entire fee for directing the movie in exchange for immediately getting on a flight back to LA and not disparaging the movie, New Line or the production.
>> Taylor: Wow.
>> Farz: So some of the production people drove Stanley to the airport and he was supposed to. That's supposed to be the end of the story. He was supposed to catch a flight back to la, move on to the next project. Everybody's good. None of that happened. Which is, like, so fun.
>> Taylor: It's so funny to be like, you have to leave now.
>> Farz: I will get to. This is so fun. This is such a fun story. It almost. The production story is so much better than the actual movie story.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: Incredible.
John Frankenheimer was hired to replace legendary director Marlon Brando
So moving on to New Line Cinema's dilemma now, because the flooding production was fully shut down so they can rebuild it. And so they had time to find a new director, which they did in a guy named John Frankenheimer. Again, this was like stack of papers. Here's the director. What's he worked on? Nothing. Like they just pick this guy out of the box. Apparently John's talked to his wife about whether to do this movie or not, because he. It sounds like he didn't want to do this movie. And I'm paraphrasing this. I'm going off memory. But it was something to the effect of his wife said, either ask them for so much money that they're going to say no or whatever they give you, we're going to be super happy with. And apparently he asked for a ton of money and for a three picture deal immediately after this and they gave it to him.
>> Taylor: So amazing.
>> Farz: He also didn't want to be a part of this. Everybody in Hollywood knew that this was.
>> Taylor: A s*** show, but they were like too far in.
>> Farz: Too far in. So John was kind of on the last leg of his career. He did do the follow ups like I mentioned earlier, with two additional bangers before passing away in 2002. He did Ronan and he did Reindeer Games, which were like great movies, I think.
>> Taylor: Yeah, that's cool.
>> Farz: But he was a veteran and he was quite the opposite of Richard Stanley. He was not a pushover. He was like an old military guy. He served in World War II. He looks, his face looks like he chews cigars like it does. He's a very gruff looking person. And he also had a ton of commercial success in the 60s. Again, this is an older dude. He did the Manchurian Candidate, Bird of Birdman of Alcatraz and a bunch of other movies that I don't know, but look like they got a lot of awards. So kudos to him. He knew what he was doing and he mostly did this because he wanted to work with Brando. Everybody in this era wanted to work with Brando, which is so inexplicable to me because everything you read about him is like he's a fudgeing nightmare to work with.
>> Taylor: He's like 100 years old and he's like, weird as s***.
>> Farz: Yeah, yeah, super, super weird. Which we're going to talk about a decent length here.
>> Taylor: I can't wait.
>> Farz: So they decided because the outdoor sets were being rebuilt, that they would film the internal shots, which was the ones that Brando was involved in. And enough time seemingly had passed and rebuilding the set, finding for John that Brando could kind of come to the set. He shows up a week late. So he's scheduled to be there. He shows up a week late. Brando, towards the back half of his career, famously, famously detested the film industry and acting in general. He once, quote, was quoted as saying, the only reason I'm in this business is to make money. If the only. If you want, if you want to know the truth, I actually hate acting like he really, really didn't like his craft and he would be angry if anybody called it a craft. It also sounds like he deliberately tried to f*** with the industry and anybody who would be stupid enough to hire him, knowing that they would have no choice but to deal with him, given his name and who he was. I call him mostly mischievous rather than just outright cruel. But he did a lot of crazy s*** on the set. And it sounds like he just did it to mess with people.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: If you ever see an image of Brando from the film, he's in white face. Like, it makes no sense. Did you see.
>> Taylor: Looks like he's wearing, like. Well, since he's wearing just, like, way too much sunscreen. Why? Why is he doing that?
>> Farz: So here's why he did that. He told people it's because he's trying to protect his skin from the sun. But the prevailing theory is that he had a body double. Again, he did not want to work. He did not want to work. He had a body double and he was like, if I cover myself with enough of this stuff, you can't make out my features enough so that my body double. Because it's like, double as me. Nobody's going to know.
>> Taylor: I feel like they would know.
>> Farz: There's one story I read that blew my mind. So he again, he just, like, want to, like, f*** with you. This is the 1970. It was like 1976 or 78 when they made the Superman movie where he was supposed to play Jordan and.
>> Taylor: He.
>> Farz: Was supposed to work for three days. No, sorry. I think it's 13 days for $3.7 million. What? What? What's quoted? Thirteen days for $3.7 million in the 1970s, that's, like, probably $20 million today for two weeks of work. He gets to set and he tells the director, you know what? I don't actually think you'd need me on camera. What if Jor El was a suitcase? Why don't we just, like, film a suitcase and my voice will come out of the suitcase instead of me being on camera. Even that amount of work he didn't want to do.
>> Taylor: Totally crazy. Pretty incredible.
>> Farz: So he would be just as annoying as Val Kilmer, but again, not maliciously so. Valkyrie was a malicious. Like, he was a mean dude. But Brandon would also try to rewrite the script. He'd not show up to the set when he was supposed to. There's a story about how he insisted that his character had to have an ice bucket on its head to convey how hot the jungle is. So they had to go cut out the top and a bottom of an ice bucket or, like, a tin bucket and then turn it into, like, clothing looking. It was like, it looks so stupid if you see the picture? There's a picture of Faruza.
In the early days of his career, he was known as a method actor
Bulk filling it up with ice is sitting on Brando's head. It looks like a joke. It looks like a comedy.
>> Taylor: Oh, my God. That's so funny that she's in it too.
>> Farz: Yeah. He insisted. He's like, I have to wear an ice bucket on my head. That's like part of the theme here to show his decline about caring about his career at this point. In the early days of his career, he was known as, like I said earlier, like a method actor. So he wouldn't just memorize lines. Memorizing lines is like a given, right, for any actor. He would, like, become that person and literally be that person throughout, like, the whole shoot. That's how he did his stuff. That's how Streetcar Name Desire and all those good stuff. Yeah, that's. That's what he did for those. By the 1970s, and when the Godfather came around, Francis Ford Coppola resorted to taping cue cards of his lines to the other actors chest during scenes. So you just read the lines off the chest. Is that amazing?
>> Taylor: They're just like, please do anything.
>> Farz: Anything. So by the late 70s, he actually couldn't even be bothered to read the cue cards because by then what he did was he piece in on set and then his assistant would be in his trailer reading the lines into his ear, and then he would just recite them.
>> Taylor: Oh, my God, that's so funny.
>> Farz: There's. There's one story about how the signal of his radio connection got, like, mixed up with, like, a radio transmission. And he just started talking about, like, a robbery at Woolworth's department store.
>> Taylor: So it was like the police thing. He didn't even notice. That's so funny.
>> Farz: So, yeah, obviously, given his disdain and hatred for Hollywood and Hollywood culture, it's no surprise that he also hated Val Kilmer because he showed up with this I'm a God mentality.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: And, yeah, like I said, to be fair to Brando, literally everybody hated Val Kilmer. The director, John Frankenheimer, the one who was doing this movie, he was once quoted as saying, quote, if I was filming a movie titled the Life of Val Kilmer, I wouldn't have that p**** in it. I love the drama, the petty drama. It's so fun.
>> Taylor: That's so funny.
Australian and indigenous crew were extras on the movie. They were put up in luxurious hotels
>> Farz: So meanwhile, the Australian and the indigenous crew that were there as extras and helping out on set, they were like, having the time of their lives. Apparently. They were put up. Put up in these really nice hotels way above their normal living. Situations or paid a ton of money to basically do nothing. That's what a lot of them said was like, we didn't do anything. We just, like, drank, did drugs and had sex. That's basically all we did when we aired this movie. And yeah, it was cute. They kind of formed their own little community. And one member of that community, one day, this extra, he made money part time by making Didgeridos. And he left the set because, again, they were doing nothing most of the time. And he's traveling through the rainforest to the next closest town. And he stumbles on this, like, super disheveled Englishman living in a tent in the middle of this rainforest.
>> Taylor: Amazing.
>> Farz: Do you see where this is going? So the extra explained, like, what he did. He was like, yeah, I'm here doing this movie. They exchanged some words and the extra went back to the hotel. And some of the people that were there in the early days of when the filming kind of started, they were like, oh, that's Richard. He's still here. So a couple of them, they go to this campsite and talk to Richard. And Richard says that he wants to come back to the set to see what's going on. A lot of talk was made about the fact that he wants, like, sabotage a set and destroy it and, like, just destroy New Line. He actually took some vengeful actions when he was initially fired by destroying, like, big chunks of the scripts. They have to. They're forced to rewrite it, which is probably a good thing anyways. But anyways, they smuggle Richard back onto the set, back to the hotel, and that was against his separation. Agree with New Line Cinema because of all the threats of sabotage. New Line Cinema is a stipulation of him getting his full payout. He wasn't allowed within 25 miles of production, so he was being smuggled in and doing all this on the radar.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: And to go even further, he decided that he really wanted to actually see the production and what was going on with it. And so one day he borrows the costume of an extra and it's like this full body mask thing of a band dog hybrid. And he goes, definitely.
>> Taylor: I'm sorry, I'm definitely looking. I watched. Just watch the trailer just kind of in the background. And. Yeah, I feel like they've totally skipped over genetics.
>> Farz: Yeah, yeah, there's no.
>> Taylor: That part is just ridiculous. Just people with, like, animal faces.
>> Farz: Yeah, yeah, that's all it is. That's all it is. And so he goes back to the set and he's actually in the Movie. Like, he is. He's an extra in the movie. And in one scene where they were supposed to destroy part of the set to show kind of like the hybrid revolt against Moreau, he is, like, just as the most enthusiastic, just destroying the set and the directors and other people who didn't understand who he was, like, wow, this guy's really good. He's, like, super into it. Like, he really gets what we're going for here. Not realizing that it was literally the former director trying to sabotage and destroy.
>> Taylor: The says who did his makeup. Did they know?
>> Farz: We don't know. We don't know.
>> Taylor: I hope if they knew. Yeah, I kind of hope they didn't. I don't know. I can't decide.
The film was completed and was instantly panned
>> Farz: Well, so here's the thing. Later on in the documentary, the. The one I mentioned earlier, the lost soul of Richard Stanley, that's the one I actually watched. And I watched the movie itself. In the documentary about the making of the movie, one of the production assistants mentioned how between takes, extras would always take their mask off because it was super hot, except one guy would not take his mask off. And they're like. Was kind of weird. Like, it's kind of weird. This guy's done taking his mask off. I think largely so funny. I think largely the extras who are like, who cares? They're like hippies doing drugs. Like. Like, whatever. This guy's cool. We like him. They smoked a joint and like, come on, join this thing. They all knew. And nobody who was actually high up enough to do anything about it knew or cared to pay attention. So, yeah, ultimately the film was completed and was instantly, like, panned. It made. It made its. It didn't make its money back. It made a 49 million off a budget of 40 million. But that doesn't include marketing and everything else that went into it. But the president of New Line, when he was interviewed, was like, we made. At least we made. We lost less money than we would have if we didn't produce anything. So there's that. That's that year. Val Kilmer, Marlon Brando, and the director John Frankenheimer were all nominated for Razzies of the Year. And Richard Stanley basically just retreated. In the documentary, he said he basically wandered around England penniless and committed to never being in a movie again. It looks like it took him six years or so to get back into filmmaking with some random Indian film that he made in 2002. He did have a good movie, though. He did do. His only feature film since 1996 was in 2019. It was the film you mentioned filming Nick Cage called Color out of Space, which received pretty good reviews, actually.
>> Taylor: I liked it. I thought it was good. Yeah.
>> Farz: So very purple. So, yeah, that's. That's kind of where the story ends. Nobody's tried to do another remake of this movie. And we'll go down as the most hilarious, disastrous production in history.
Marlon Brando insisted on having small man around on set
>> Taylor: You didn't even mention the small man that Marlon Brando insisted to have.
>> Farz: Okay, so mini Me. The mini me that Mike Myers, like.
>> Taylor: Is based off of this.
>> Farz: It's based off of this.
>> Taylor: Oh, that's so funny, because he, like, insists on having him around.
>> Farz: So here's what happened. So that guy was the smallest man in the world. He was 17 inches tall. Okay, I forgot where he's from. Dominican Republic or something. And he was on set as an extra. And Marlon Brando apparently would, like, just start talking to people and just, like, shooting the s*** with them. And he started talking to this one guy whose character was M. Ling or something. And he was this very German dude. And Marlon Brando was like, hey, I speak German too. He started saying a bunch of gibberish to him. And the German guy goes, you're not saying anything. It's just gibberish. It makes no sense. And he's like, you're not understanding me. And he keeps repeating himself. Eventually, the director's like, oh, no. I think he's trying to say this. And he's like, okay, cool. It's fine. Marlon Brando is off that. Then he turns to this small guy and he starts saying gibberish to him, too. But the guy doesn't understand English. Like, he's. He's. He only speaks Spanish. He had a translate. His sister was his translator. He just said, see? See, Mr. Brando? And Marlon Brand was like, I love this guy. He's in every scene. Kid, the German guy. Your scenes are out. We're taking this guy from now on. And that's why that. That guy is, like, constantly around him. Because he just, like, agreed with him, even though he didn't know what the h*** he was saying. And then Marlon Brando just, like, adopted him as, like, you're the main guy.
>> Taylor: That is so funny.
>> Farz: And there's a scene with, like, a grand piano with Marlon Brando, like, playing the piano. And then another grand piano on top of the other grand piano with the little guy playing the piano. All of this is how many me from Mike Myers and Austin Powers came.
>> Taylor: About like, that's so ridiculous. You, like, couldn't imagine someone doing that.
>> Farz: And then Crazy.
>> Taylor: I can't. That's so funny, the pretending to speak another language and not actually speaking it to someone and being like, you don't understand me is so funny. Like, I can't.
>> Farz: I think.
>> Taylor: Do you think he thought that he was speaking German or whatever?
>> Farz: No, I think he's a crazy person. I think he just likes to. With you. I think that he pegs you as, like, hey, you're a part of the industry, so you. I'm gonna. I'm gonna with you and use my. My name to mess with you versus you're not. And you're gonna go. I think that's what Richard Stanley did. When he talks about, like, how he went up to his mansion, it was like. It was the most intimidating moment of my life. I'm going to Marlon Brando's house. I never met this guy. Everybody told me, he's gonna yell at me and tell me to get the out of his house. Then he shows up and he's like, dude, I don't know anybody. I don't know anything. I don't know. Hollywood's like, I love you. You're the director. Take Roman Polanski off this. Like, I think that's what happened.
>> Taylor: Oh, my God, that's so funny.
Everybody that worked with Val Kilmer hated him, unanimously, apparently
>> Farz: It is a very, very energy in, like, learning how much everybody hated Val Kilmer, like, unanimously across the board. Everybody that worked with him hated him.
>> Taylor: That's a bummer.
>> Farz: Which I. You know, what I was actually thinking was like, my probably my favorite, favorite actor is, like, Daniel Day Lewis, although he hasn't done anything in a very long time. But I kind of think he's probably more of a Val Kilmer ilk.
>> Taylor: Yeah. I mean, anyone who's like.
>> Farz: Is super serious. He's like, this is my craft. It's my art. It's like he's. There's an intensity there, I sense.
>> Taylor: Yeah, I think so, too. Like, I feel like whenever I hear about it, everyone else on set is always like, oh, my God, that guy. Such a jackass. Like, when, like, Jim Carrey, like, wouldn't stop being the Grinch, you know, I didn't know that. Oh, my God, can he please stop doing. Oh, that wasn't he. He, I think, I think, was mostly the Andy Kaufman movie where Jim Carrey wouldn't stop being Andy Kaufman.
>> Farz: Oh, yeah, that. That offset.
>> Taylor: And people were like, oh, my God.
>> Farz: Yep, yep, I did hear that.
>> Taylor: We're going to kill you.
>> Farz: Yeah, yeah. It is. It is the. The fact that. That the fire director lived in a tent for, like, probably five months in the rainforest alone. It's just like.
>> Taylor: Just like, right outside being like.
>> Farz: It's so crazy. It is so funny that he's in the movie.
>> Taylor: I wish that I could see the person that Marlon Brando thought he was fooling us with with the white paint on his face. Like, the other fat guy that he had his white pan on his face and being like, it's me, dude.
>> Farz: He just gave up. It's so funny, dude. This is 1972, when he did the Godfather and, like, just picturing Francis Ford Coppola running around from extra to extras, like, taping lines on their chest. Like, it's like, there wasn't. Like, he. I guess he was already super famous then, but, like, I don't know.
>> Taylor: I love it.
>> Farz: So that's my fun story. I re. I found, like, these other crazy production stories, but none of them were as bad as this one, so. Or. Or as entertaining, I should say, is this one.
>> Taylor: Yeah, totally.
>> Farz: Water World was also apparently a nightmare to film.
>> Taylor: Or that too.
>> Farz: Yeah, there's like. There's, like, a lot of those out there, but.
>> Taylor: Oh, my gosh. Well, I kind of want to see it now.
>> Farz: I mean, it might be worth it.
>> Taylor: Yeah. I mean, why not?
The Lost Soul of Richard Stanley is actually free on Amazon prime video
So, anywho, we see Rotten Tomatoes.
>> Farz: You can actually. So anyone wants to see the. The Lost Soul of Richard Stanley. It's actually free on Amazon prime video, so that was very entertaining to watch. And a lot of the stuff that I pulled for this episode I got out of that movie. So worth a watch, if for nothing else. And to see, like, Richard Stanley as a human, because the more you see him interacting with the world, the more you realize what a ludicrous person he is. Like, I can. It makes sense that he did what he did once. You see how he. Like, when he went to meet with Brando, he had some buddy who was like, his drug dealer in England. And he called his buddy and was like, I'm going to be at his house at this time. I need you to put a magic spell out there. And that's. I'm going to get him to make me the director. And, like, he firmly believes that that happened. And so he's. He's a kook. He's definitely a kook, but he's a passionate kook and we need those in the world. So.
>> Taylor: Yeah, yeah, it makes sense. He did the color one. What's it called again? Color of out of Space, because that's an HP Lovecraft. And Nicholas Cage is also crazy, so, like, that kind of checks out that he would choose to.
>> Farz: It's very fitting with those.
>> Taylor: With those parameters as well. Oh, my God, I love it. One of the reviews says on Rotten Tomatoes says that the director. Where'd it go? The director functioned. John Frankenheimer functioned more like a bemused traffic cop than a director.
>> Farz: Yeah, I got that sense too. I think he was also. He. He realized that his dream of working the Brando was kind of a nightmare and dealing with those personalities. Val Kilmer and this guy. Also his production assistant, who was with him when they first went out to the set was like, this makes no sense. Why did you build a film set 50 miles away from the closest town? He's like, well, we wanted to look tropical, but it's 50 miles of jungle. You could have done it in mile 48. You could have done it. 40. You could have done that. 32.
>> Taylor: Mile two. Yeah.
>> Farz: Yeah. And then also, they. Apparently the original director had them plant an entire banana farm there to make it look as, like, real as possible. It was just crazy ideas.
>> Taylor: Oh, my God. So good.
>> Farz: So, anywho, that's what I'll get.
>> Taylor: Awesome. I can't wait to see it. That was really fun and really funny. I mean, just looking at the pictures of it are hilarious.
>> Farz: The pictures are amazing.
>> Taylor: I just, like, ridiculous. He has this, like. He has. His face is white, but then he has, like, a white pantyhose around his face also. And then he's wearing a hat.
>> Farz: Yeah, one. One extra set. I think he was wearing, like, a cheesecloth as clothes.
>> Taylor: Yeah. I want to read. I would like to also read the story and be like, what happened here?
>> Farz: Yeah, there's. There's. Well, hopefully we also get another remake of the movie so they can actually do it justice. But this was a. It was. It was. It was an amazing debacle. So awesome.
Do you have any listener mail for us? I do. I would take constructive feedback
>> Taylor: Well, thank you for sharing.
>> Farz: Yeah. Do you have any listener mail for us?
>> Taylor: I do. Real quickly. Just want to let you know that Morgan lives by that, like, ten million dollar toilet or whatever you said costs. The San Francisco toilet.
>> Farz: Oh, yeah.
>> Taylor: Cost like a bajillion dollars. And, like, a whole example of how hard it is to do things.
>> Farz: I think it was 1.7.
>> Taylor: Yeah. So that's my. That was my one update.
>> Farz: Fun. Do you want to shout out Patreon or anything else?
>> Taylor: Yeah, Please find us on Patreon. I'm yawning as I say this. Find us on all social media at Doomed to Fail Pod if you have any ideas for us, any questions, anything you want to learn about let know we'd love to dig into it and please tell your friends and leave us reviews if they're good or bad.
>> Farz: We'll take anything.
>> Taylor: No, I guess, I guess I. I would take constructive feedback. I do not take the man. I'm assuming it's a man on YouTube who told me that my voice sounds like I have ground glass in my throat which I don't think is true.
>> Farz: If you think constructive if you think Taylor has ground glass in her throat, can you please write to us@uniflpgmail.com I.
>> Taylor: Was thinking like I have so many kid activities after school that I'm unable to day drink and I just wish that softball would end.
>> Farz: I'm taking a breather from the booze and good for you. I would like to stop that which I might soon put tbd.
>> Taylor: Good for you. Cool. Thank you everyone. Thank you.
>> Farz: First thank you Taylor. We'll go ahead and cut it off.