There and Back Again

by Sean Astin

  In just about every way imaginable, Warren met my expectations, which is not to say that working on Bulworth was a wholly positive experience. It was, however, an experience I’m proud to have endured, one that meets the standard for Hollywood extremism. Our first meeting was, in my mind, one of those classic Hollywood introductions. Warren entered the room wearing sweatpants and a fanny pack, and despite the casual look, the disheveled hair, the stubble on his chin, he carried himself with a decidedly regal air, like a princely pauperish genius—like a man who knows he’s a megalomaniac and sees nothing wrong with that description. In other words, exactly what you’d expect of Warren Beatty.

  My goal was to harness whatever nervousness I felt and project an image of an honest, earnest, open-faced ideologue, which wasn’t hard to do since that’s pretty much the way I am. And he loved it; he just soaked me in, told me right away that he could use that persona in his movie, which I found genuinely exciting. Toward the end of the meeting, though, he really piqued my interest.

  “I’m going to want you to do some writing,” Warren said.

  “What kind of writing?”

  He smiled. “You know … things.”

  Cryptic as that was, I was intrigued. Would I be contributing to the script? Working on future projects? No matter. I wanted in. But there was one thing that concerned me.

  “I’ll do whatever you want,” I said, “but I have to be honest. I can’t sign on without reading the script.”

  Warren shrugged. “Fine. You can go in the other room there and read the script, but you should know that there’s really no part for you yet. And you should do the movie anyway.”

  He paused, waited for a reaction. I offered none. Then Warren smiled, in the way that only a person who is supremely confident can smile. “Just come along … see what happens. It’ll be worth it.”

  I should have been wary, but I remember feeling something akin to awe. I loved this guy, and I loved the fact that he was, in some small way, courting me. I sat there knowing full well that I was going to be able to add my name to the long and illustrious list of people who got seduced by Warren Beatty, and instead of being conflicted by that recognition, I was excited by it. Even now, nearly a decade later, I remain curiously ambivalent about the experience. My name is proudly on that list somewhere (near the bottom, no doubt), but instead of feeling resentment, I’m grateful that Warren was able to get creatively aroused over me for a minute or two, that he recognized who I was and thus invited me into his inner circle, if only for a brief time, on the simple premise that something interesting could happen. The reason that something interesting ultimately did not happen was my limitation, not his.

  “Okay,” I said, “I’ll look at the script.”

  “Good.”

  I got up, left Warren to his business, and went off to read the script. Indeed, just as he had promised, there was no role for me, no Gary C-Span to be found anywhere. Nevertheless, I shook Warren’s hand and agreed to be part of his movie. I rationalized the decision on any number of levels. We were running out of money, the baby was coming, we had the fall semester of college to look forward to, and I was trying to figure out how to balance it all—how to pay for the house, be a new father, and keep Christine happy while we ran our production company together. I looked at the script, thought to myself, The part is not on the page; this could be trouble, and accepted the job anyway. I figured that I’d have only ten or twelve days of work during a four-month shoot, I’d learn something from working with one of the masters of cinema, and the rest of the time I’d be free to concentrate on school and family and entrepreneurial ventures.

  That proved to be an enormous miscalculation.

  “Great,” Warren said as his hand enveloped mine. “Now remember, Sean, I want to hear your ideas. I want you to be writing. All the time.”

  I looked him in the eye and, with only a trace of irony, said, “Thank you, Warren. I look forward to writing and handing you pages and having you turn them down.”

  It was almost like something buried deep in my consciousness was saying it, the thing that I knew I needed to say in order to get the job. Not to be irreverent, not to be disrespectful or funny, but to let him know that I understood my place in his world, a world in which it is perfectly acceptable for the director and star to torture and humiliate his writers on a daily basis. That’s what it was like on Bulworth. Amiri Baraka, a poet and scholar and sometime actor who played the part of a character known as Rastaman, had been given the same instructions and encouragement that I’d received, and he took them to heart. Amiri showed up almost nightly on the movie with reams of paper, detailed notes on his character and how it fit into the story, only to have them dismissed out of hand. And he kept coming back for more!

  No one experienced more anguish than Jeremy Pikser, the credited cowriter (along with Warren) of the screenplay. (Little known fact: Aaron Sorkin, the creator of The West Wing, is one uncredited writer on Bulworth. Exactly what that means, I’m not sure. Did Aaron write the original draft? Did he rewrite Jeremy’s work? Who knows? I’d be the last person to try to explain how Warren Beatty concocted the idea for this strange and brilliant movie, or how he captured the imagination of somebody like Aaron Sorkin—a genius in his own right—the contract that was written between them, or why Aaron had his name taken off the film. I’m going to understand or explain that? No way.) I watched Jeremy suffer, day in and day out, at the hands of Warren Beatty. Jeremy tried to help Warren create a counterculture figure in the character of Bulworth, while trying to create a career for himself, and toward the end the poor guy seemed like an emotional wreck.

  I think of all of this now as I remember that first conversation with Warren at his office, when I stood in the doorway and told him I’d be honored to experience his firm editorial hand, to have him reject every idea, every written word and thought, that I threw his way.

  And his response was a single simple word, spoken with a smile: “Good.”

  * * *

  The next day I visited the set of Bulworth, primarily to soak up some atmosphere and meet a few of my coworkers, including Oliver Platt. Oliver is a big hulking behemoth of a brilliant actor, and a man who has, shall we say, a presence. He entered the stage like a summer thunderstorm and thrust out a meaty hand.

  “Sean, nice to meet you! Man, I loved you in Rudy. What a great movie!”

  “Uh, thanks, Oliver. Nice to meet you, too.”

  “Yeah, this is going to be special. Gary C-Span is so cool, the way he doesn’t do anything the whole movie, and then he gives a speech at the end? That’s brilliant, man. Fucking brilliant!”

  Whoaaaaa …

  I didn’t agree with him, but I didn’t want to disagree either, because the truth was I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about. Oliver had more information about my character than I did, and it occurred to me that somehow he’d gotten deep inside Warren’s head (in much the same way that Ian McKellen would burrow into Peter Jackson’s head during the filming of The Lord of the Rings). He was so far inside Warren’s head, in fact, that there was almost no way to separate them. Oliver, I suspected—and later this was demonstrated to be true—had suggested to Warren that the character of Gary be mute throughout the film, and then spring eloquently to life at the climax; Warren had liked the idea, and so they had moved forward believing it. My heart began to race. A day earlier I had met with Warren, had heard him say, “Come along with me, and we’ll see what evolves.” And now I was standing on the set, having my hair blown back by Oliver Platt as he dissected the character I had been assigned the task of not merely playing, but interpreting—even, to a degree, creating—a dissection I found baffling, but that apparently made sense dramatically to the director. I hadn’t even signed a contract yet, and already I felt trapped. The only way to get out of the trap was by advocating for myself, quickly and aggressively. Why I didn’t want to do that is … well, it’s the imp of the perverse, isn’t it? That little node of self-destruction t
hat people allow in themselves, and that always leads to trouble.

  Bulworth proved to be an unbelievable four-month apprenticeship that I wouldn’t trade for anything in the world, because I learned so much not only about the art of filmmaking and cinema culture, but also about what it means to use and abuse power. It was in some ways the most important four months of my professional life, although I’m not sure I’d want to live through it again. Before accepting the job, I had sought the advice of a friend and mentor, and his response was thoroughly negative.

  “Don’t do it. You’ll hate it.”

  He was right—and he was wrong. I accepted the job not only because it would allow me to be in the Los Angeles area when my daughter was born (in November 1996), and because it was, I thought, a small amount of work for reasonable remuneration, but also because I wanted to test myself, to see if I could acquit myself admirably while working alongside one of the most inspired and notorious taskmasters in Hollywood. Whatever else might transpire, I figured I’d at least learn a lot from Warren so I made the decision to do it. I don’t blame Warren for anything that happened. I think he was exactly as I thought he would be, but I did suffer on that production. And the suffering was mostly of my own doing.

  If you watch Bulworth, you’ll notice that I’m barely in the movie, which doesn’t really bother me; I understand the reason. I don’t think Warren respected my capacity as an actor or an artist, and the fact that he didn’t, coupled with my own hurt feelings, created a kind of sour mixture on the set. The responsibility for inspiration was on both of us; the implied understanding when I agreed to do the picture was that we would both be inspired. So it was disappointing in terms of output. In a sense, merely by watching him, I was inspired every day, but what I was writing and what he was capturing on screen were all overshadowed by Warren and his megalomania.

  Of course, it was his movie. He was the writer, director, producer, and star; I was contractually merely a piece of casting. It was Warren’s prerogative to use my acting talents as much or as little as he saw fit. The contribution of any writing on my part was a private understanding between Warren and me. This dynamic exists a lot and shouldn’t be condemned by the Writer’s Guild or its arbitrators. It goes to the notion that a healthy creative environment should allow for inspiration from all quarters to the betterment of the film. Credit and remuneration can impede creativity, and the balance is rightfully left to the development of trust between artists. To that end, I went willingly into Warren’s world to see what the sky looked like.

  There was one particular day when I watched with what can only be termed immense fascination as Warren staged a close-up of himself. Vittorio Storaro, one of the most brilliant and accomplished cinematographers ever to light a scene (his credits include Last Tango in Paris, Apocalypse Now, and Reds), was shooting it, and I remember being fascinated with Warren’s capacity for introspection in the middle of this huge multimillion-dollar movie. Afterward, I quizzed him about it. I had seen Dick Tracy and loved it, and so I asked him about how he had put that movie together and how it had led to Bulworth. Everything on Dick Tracy, he explained, was planned to the inch—it was the exact opposite of Bulworth. Dick Tracy was an artistic endeavor, to be sure, but it was intended to be a big-budget, mainstream popular success. Bulworth was different, almost experimental in nature. Here Warren was using his stardom in service of the promotion of certain liberal ideas; to be perfectly honest, I’m not sure how he even got the studio (Fox) to pay for it. I believe it had something to do with Warren forgoing bonus money on an earlier film in exchange for the right to make a smaller, more personal film. Or agreeing not to sue the studio and forcing it to incur big legal costs. Only Warren and the studio really know. Either way, the movie was smart and in some ways courageous, and it spoke volumes about Warren’s commitment to his craft and to his personal ideology. He is a formidable man and artist.

  As far as my acting and writing and how I was perceived by Warren, however … well, that was a different story. For example, when it came to the letter of the contract, Warren was utterly unforgiving. The production owned me; Warren owned me, and he wanted me in close proximity—on the set, in the green room, or in my dressing room—all day, every day, no matter what. I was one of the colors on his palette; he wanted to have the freedom to go to that color whenever the mood struck him, and frankly I resented it. On a purely human and interpersonal level, I thought it was rude and inconsiderate, mainly because I didn’t think he had any intention of using whatever talent I could supposedly bring to bear. Warren abused the privilege of having me at his disposal. I had signed a contract giving him power over where my physical body would be, on the premise that he would be respectful of it, and he was not respectful.

  Over time, as it became apparent that I would play no major part in the construction of Bulworth, my frustration grew. As did my body. Warren had a very small dressing room by movie-star standards, but it was substantial compared to the tiny cubicles assigned to some of the actors, myself included. These were painfully small, private changing stations in which you couldn’t spend more than a few seconds without suffering bouts of embarrassment. Whether this was by design (to discourage performers from hiding out in their dressing rooms) or simply a prudent cost-saving measure, I don’t know; I do know that I, like most of the actors, tended to gravitate toward the motor home that served as the cast’s green room.

  The green room was a fairly lavish setup, with satellite television, gourmet food prepared by a cadre of chefs, and an assortment of newspapers and magazines. The green room was where Warren spent most of his off-set time, too, and it was indeed a place where interesting things happened. He invited all kinds of movers and shakers and people of cultural, artistic, and political influence. I saw them come and go, because I basically sat my widening ass in a chair not far from him, and said to myself, If Warren is going to have me here, he’s going to have to see me every time he walks in and out of this room. I was determined not to be out of his sight. He’d developed a pattern of telling his assistant directors to find particular actors and bring them to the set, and I didn’t want to make it convenient for him not to need me. (One of the assistant directors, by the way, was Frank Capra III, grandson of the idealistic director of countless Hollywood classics, including It’s a Wonderful Life and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. It would be absolutely awesome when Warren would shout, “Frank Capra!” People would stop in their tracks, and you’d find yourself thinking. I’m a part of Hollywood history—this is so cool!)

  But those were small and fleeting moments of joy, of legitimate creative wonder. By and large, for me Bulworth was a bizarre and discouraging experience, a marathon of boredom punctuated by strange and humbling interactions with the director and star.

  “You should be writing your speech,” Warren would admonish me from time to time, when he’d see me sitting in the green room, reading a book for some class I was taking at UCLA. “Remember, what’s in here” (he’d tap me on the chest, over my heart) “is more important than what’s in here” (then he’d tap me on the forehead).

  “I know, I know. I’m working on it.”

  But I wasn’t. Not really. I remember thinking, You know, Warren, if I had even an iota of faith that you would honor my thoughts or contributions, I’d allow myself to go there. I’d plumb the depths of my soul. But you basically just want me to clean up a mess so you don’t have to look at it. That’s how frustrated and angry I’d become. One day, though, for reasons I still don’t quite understand (perhaps out of some pathetic need for approval, or maybe just to prove I was right), I surrendered to Warren’s will and went off with my laptop. And I wrote. And wrote. And wrote. In a single, frantic, cathartic session I produced a seven-page, single-spaced treatise on the character of Gary C-Span, his importance to the film Bulworth, and what I believed Warren Beatty was trying to accomplish. These weren’t pages from a script, but more of an intellectual diatribe—an attempt to demonstrate my passion for art and id
eas.

  Did it work? Of course not.

  On the day I presented the pages to Warren, we were sitting together in the makeup room. Warren had just finished eating lunch and was expressing an interest in returning to the buffet table for a refill. With a wry smile he turned to me, held up his plate, and said comedically, for he isn’t really a tyrant or a bully, “Sean, do you suppose there is a minion about?”

  Now, I believe this was Warren’s way of jokingly pointing out that on movie sets there are always people milling about, people whose job descriptions can never quite be pinned down. He wasn’t really asking for a minion because he felt he was entitled to it—in fact, he wasn’t asking for a minion at all—but he was enjoying the kind of self-awareness that comes from knowing that he is a man who does indeed have minions. When push comes to shove, I believe Warren Beatty is as in touch with the common man as any multimillionaire actor/director/mogul could be. And yet, he did say, “Is there a minion about?” Which I find rather amusing.

  “I’ll tell you what, Warren,” I said, taking the plate from his hands. “I’ll go get you some more food, on the condition that you let me read my pages to you when I get back.”