Infinity Laughs

"It's Us" anniversary post

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before. That’s what the listener should assume we—the middle aged—imply before we get going. Before we get a half-empty head of steam. It’s been years since we’ve accrued more stories worth telling and our audience naturally pared itself back over the years. Nobody gives a shit about your kids. Well, she moved up not one but TWO levels in swim class in a week AND I’m 90% sure she’s the only kid who’s not annoying when they sing songs from Frozen. Cool.

You’ve heard this before and surely felt it, too. A courtesy glaze-over is all that’s required; a scroll and a skim, a charitable boost to the meaningless algorithmic metrics of a newsletter from just another Oregon Trail Gen member who’s listing, wilting, dying: cholera of confidence.

So stop me if you’ve heard this one before, but: I almost thought I was the shit once.

It’s subjective, this “the shit” stature. Those who were close but never got there are the only ones who can wax poetic on the matter. Who can bring it level discourse. Because that’s most of us. We saw it on the horizon, through the hot-tar mirage waves of improbability and witless hope. The rabbit at the dog track just around the bend, close enough to almost think it possible before you get to the straight and remember: “Fuck! I’m just a mutt!” Lapped by the purebreds. But it was there and you tasted almost tasting it and now, well, you’re tenured on what almost was.

“Fifteen weeks of almost thinking you’re the shit” is more mouthful than “fifteen minutes of fame.” But it suits fitter. My brother was in Rolling Stone fifteen years ago. Played in front of 20,000 people once. My wife was in a girl-band and then 9/11 happened. I forget how the dissolution of the group connects to the felled towers, but I think it did a little bit. Ten years ago to this day, for fifteen weeks or so, I almost thought I was (going to be) the shit.

On the heels of making our first feature flick (LOSER'S CROWN, budget of 10K), a friend of a friend who became a great friend said: “here’s 150K. Go make another.” I said “okay!” I borrowed a car fight I had had with an ex-girlfriend (“don’t hit the fucking driver!!!!” – you know the fight) and used that as an opening scene and springboard for a romantic comedy script, which I called: IT'S US. The story is about a young couple who move from Los Angeles to Vermont in an effort to save their marriage. They both work in entertainment (he a talent agent, she in wardrobe), yadayadayada, and use Hollywood as the fall-guy for their woes. Zip-zap, though, it was a good script.

In LOSER’S CROWN, I played the lead, the 30 y/o dickhead, because we didn’t have any money and my actor buddy told me “nobody but you can play this dickhead.” Which at the time I took as a compliment. For the romantic comedy, I briefly entertained getting a real actor to play the co-lead but I had HEAT, acting wise, having just come off a movie which I wrote and directed and co-paid for courtesy of the City of Los Angeles Housing Department (another story / another time). A movie which nobody had seen and most nobody would. I didn’t know what I was doing as a director, actor, youngish man—none of it. Which made it easier in a way and more exciting. I was just making shit up and people were listening to me. I adopted a persona of working class unhingedness, a blue-collar madman. Everyone bought in, and, well, I can’t speak for everyone, but it was the most fun I’d ever had.

A few months later, late July in Los Angeles, hot n’ ready rom-com script (it’s a rom-com, swear!) and a go picture; same crew, no cast. Well, we had me. My agent friend Bobby was sending me actresses nobody’d heard of and I tried to ask a friend of mine if she could introduce me to Emily Wickersham (she NCIS’d for many years). She didn’t introduce me and trying to find a woman to fight and fuck on screen felt increasingly creepy and predatorial. As a guy who is not an actor, frankly it felt insane. We wanted to shoot the movie in late September/early October in Vermont to take advantage of the splendor. Let the VT foliage do the heavy lifting. But none of that mattered because we needed a goddamned actress! And on top of that, she needed to be perfect because behind my blue-collar bravado, I was a wuss. Thespianically, I was terrified.

Years ago, in the early teens, there was a short-lived millennial series called HAPPY ENDINGS. Maybe it was Gex X. I think it was millennial though. Oregon Trail Gen. It was great. Really funny, sharp and Adderall quick. My rom-com had to cook, dialogue-delivery wise, and I knew this chick (Eliza Coupe) from the aforementioned Adderall program would be perfect. But when you’re nobody, mid-level television stars feel as accessible as Jane Fonda. I was on the clock, however, August came quick and I could feel the Green Mountain leaves turning early, testing my mettle and resolve. The kitchen sink needed to be thrown at the wall. And it needed to stick.

I wrote one of my signature self-effusive and effacing emails to Eliza’s manager, attached the script and a link to our first flick, pressed send, felt silly and hoped.

*** I, too, hate people’s stories. So I’ll do my best to get to the relatable stuff: aging, laughing, bills, intermittent melancholy, hindsight, et al.

They liked me! Eliza loved the script, loved or liked our first flick and before I knew it I was biking up from Venice to Hollywood to meet them at whichever vegan restaurant was in vogue that season. I had car troubles. And by troubles I mean I was without one. Getting around a driving town without a car was troublesome, but I made do, showing up sweaty wherever I went. I had worse problems. Plus I was about to enter my fifteen weeks of thinking I may someday be the shit, so a little fixed-gear perspiration was grist for the mill.

Eliza was in. We were (television) STARRED UP, officially a go. I half-asked her if we could get Adam Pally or Jake Johnson to play her husband, but having seen my star turn in LOSER’S CROWN, she assured me that I was the guy. Schedules worked, we made one another laugh early and often, and at the end of the Turmeric Latte meet n’ greet she offered to walk me to my car, so I told her that I was not a feminist plus I had parked really far away. I got on my bike and pedaled into my fifteen weeks.

Fast forward to 2018, just before I went out with my now-wife on our first date to that Japanese place in Chelsea, she watched IT’S US as a background check. Twice. I recently (45 seconds ago) asked her what she thought of the movie when she watched it.

I wanted to sleep with you! was her first text. Followed by: It’s half the reason I let you boff me that first night. Solid review!

She also went on to say: I thought it felt funny and true, like, under the skin and into the marrow…It was smartly written, quick and clever. There was a lot of chemistry - with you and Eliza but also Jay and her, and him with you. And finally: a love letter to toxic relationships. See: rom-com!

I don’t enjoy watching my movies because it’s live-action regret as opposed to the abstract lament I waltz with on the daily. I don’t hate the guy who made those movies but I would love to go back and be his first AD.

But, if that movie is any different—darker, tighter, more polished—maybe my daughter isn’t born? So I guess it’s only right—and I’ll check with Jess on this—for Eliza to be the godmother.

As a writer, I am of the “jesus, just shut the fuck up and say the words” mantra when it comes to acting. I know how good my dialogue is—say it fast and don’t try to be funny. The funny’s already there. But with a certified tv star climbing aboard our po-dunk operation, I was suddenly second-guessing all the things I already didn’t know. Luckily for me, Eliza was the least-actressy actor around. I mean, she had her mushroom supplements and weekly colonics, bathed in vodka (for the epidermal purification, as she was sober then) and was married to a super food hunter. She was plenty actress. But her actor bone—that was funny to her. Not to be taken too seriously. And despite the temperature of my unseen screen-heat, acting worried me. Specifically, acting with an actor.

Yes, of course: I am really good in the movie. But I’m only good because Eliza was better. Early on she saw that the only way the movie worked was if we—crew, cast, etc.—laughed for three weeks straight. It’s hard to explain, especially a decade in the rearview, but right when she pulled up to Vermont, we were in-step, synch, riffing and running bits like fucking Elaine May and Mike Nichols on speedballs, whippets and sherry. We went berserk and I have to believe that no two actors have ever had more fun, had more laughs, than us.

This eventually gave me pause, however. The fun, the laughs, the nonsense. Reverse-pause. Having no experience in the marriage department at the time, I worried about the couple’s authenticity, especially after we shot the movie. Ultra-Low Budget Indie Hindsight. Were we laughing too much? Was this couple having too much fun? The darkness in the movie runneth over—you can taste it. I wasn’t worried about that. But. Was the fun stuff too sunny? Eliza and I had just met, so on day one we had to cut the brakes and floor it. By day three we’d known each other for twenty years. There was very little money and a tight schedule not to mention the leaves. The leaves! We took swings like early Aughts Barry Bondses, up to eleven, infinity and beyond. We killed the governor. Three weeks, fifteen hour days. You do the impossible, pull off the improbable and you wrap and then…it’s just me, Myles, Jerry (the dog) and Final Cut Pro. The software begets the worry. And worry I did. Did we have too much fun? Did I fuck this up?

Ten years later, I can officially say: I did not. Would I change certain lines, shots, scenes in the movie? The title font? Sure. Would I direct myself to say three or twenty less “fucks,” getting the F-count down below five hundred? I’m not sure I would have listened. When in doubt, when excited or nervous, I said “fuck.” It was a condition, a conjunctivitis. I’m better now. Not much but a little goes a long way when speaking in fucks. Also, I would not have cut Andrew Friedman’s Terrell Suggs scene (seen HERE). Andrew daydreaming aloud about Terrell Suggs’ penis deserves a place in the pictures. At the time I felt it didn’t move the story along. I’ve been staring at my computer screen for ten minutes, poured another cup of coffee and still cannot muster even a cheap, funny propeller to keep that scene. So, again: I was right. But my past worries, in particular the worry regarding the plausibility and relatability and authenticity of this couple: that’s a laugh. Because the good stuff, the happy parts, the laughs—that’s real, possible and probable. Fuck, it’s everyday for me. That’s my reality. With a few exceptions, of course, but that’s mostly because I can be cranky and mental and mad at my place in the world and mad at the world itself. But I’m happy more than I am not. It’s 3:05 EST and I can’t hardly wait for Jess to get home so we can get to that first laugh. The mortgage monthly went up, the property taxes in this stupid town are relentless, I leave my sweaty dry-fit on the dining room table next to the Sunday Times from three weeks ago, the world is burning, the bad guys are winning, I keep having less hair, where does the money go?, it’s fuckin’ TOUGH, BUT…I laugh everyday with my beautiful best friend. Which is pretty cool.

The movie was originally supposed to lean on the dark parts. The gnarly fights, the things you don’t normally see said in the pictures. THE BREAK-UP by way of Cassavetes. I was a single thirty-two-year-old who was trying to sleep with Los Angeles’ West Side when I wrote it, wary and unversed in relationships, marriage. The female brain. The dark parts will shine bright like obsidian! I sang to myself, thinking it’d be edgy, indie. Real. But luckily for me, Eliza Coupe got on board and swashbuckled the black duvetyne of my script and the laughs shone through. The movie was better for that, but more importantly, more real. If this movie isn’t exactly what it is, it’s possible Jess cancels on our Japanese Chelsea beers. And without Jess, I would forever second guess the plausibility of this movie’s laughs and love. Too many laughs?! Ha! What an adorable worry. Oh, to be 32! What a joke! Because now, ten years later, laughing along in a long-game relationship, I can assure my old, young idiot self: it’s fucking perfect. And it’s the shit. Trust me.