{"id":62,"date":"2010-03-05T11:45:16","date_gmt":"2010-03-05T16:45:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.screenseen.com\/blog\/?p=62"},"modified":"2010-05-10T23:34:26","modified_gmt":"2010-05-11T03:34:26","slug":"interview-with-acclaimed-director-producer-and-actor-joe-dante-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.moviepropcollectors.com\/magazine\/interview-with-acclaimed-director-producer-and-actor-joe-dante-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Interview with acclaimed Director, producer, and actor, Joe Dante!"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Movie<\/span><\/em> Prop<\/span><\/em> Collectors<\/span><\/em><\/strong> <\/span>interviewed director, producer, and actor Joe<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/span> Dante<\/em><\/span><\/strong><\/span> by phone\u00a0 and he shared a very interesting, funny, and informative interview with us.<\/p>\n

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Instead of the typical bio that usually includes date of birth, shoe size, etc, \u00a0Movie<\/span><\/span> Prop<\/span><\/span> Collec<\/span>tors<\/span><\/span><\/em> decided to include a brief intro\u00a0to be a bit different.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>*Joe’s first “official” directing job was with friend Jon Davison in 1968. Dante edited together a series of film clips and trailers into the 7 hour film called, The<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Movie<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Orgy<\/em><\/span>, which was shown on college campuses.<\/p>\n

*Dante was asked to move to California from his\u00a0hometown of Parsippany, New Jersey in 1974\u00a0to work\u00a0as a trailer and film\u00a0editor for Roger Corman’s New<\/span> World<\/span> Pictures<\/span>.<\/em><\/p>\n

*In 1976 Roger Corman asked Dante to\u00a0direct the film, Hollywood<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Boulevard<\/em><\/span>, with co director, Allan Arkush.\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>*As time went by, Dante directed, wrote, produced,\u00a0and had a few cameo’s in\u00a0such films as the classic\u00a0Gremlins<\/em><\/span>, The Explorers<\/span><\/em>, Gremlins 2<\/em><\/span>, The<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Howling<\/em><\/span>, It’s<\/span> a<\/span> Good<\/span> Life<\/span><\/em>, from Twilight<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Zone:<\/em><\/span> <\/em>The<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Movie<\/em><\/span>, Innerspace<\/em><\/span>, Small<\/span> Soldiers<\/span>,<\/em> Piranha<\/em><\/span>,Looney<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Tunes:<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Back<\/em><\/span> <\/em>in<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Action<\/em><\/span>,\u00a0 Homecoming<\/span>,<\/em> from Showtime’s\u00a0, Masters of Horror<\/em>, and many\u00a0other film and television shows, including Police Squad<\/em>, Amazing Stories<\/em>, and CSI NY<\/em> to name a few.<\/p>\n

*Last year in 2009,\u00a0Joe Dante’s\u00a0 3D film, The<\/span> Hole<\/span>,<\/em> a story about a family that moves to a\u00a0home that has a mysterious\u00a0bottomless hole in the basement, <\/em>was\u00a0named best 3-D film of the year at the Venice Film Festival<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Here is part 1 of the interview. Part 2 coming soon, with exclusive\u00a0audio portions for Movie<\/span><\/em><\/strong> Prop<\/span><\/em><\/strong> Collectors<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/em> forum members.<\/p>\n

MPC: <\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

I want to welcome the multi talented director, writer, producer, editor, and sometime actor Joe Dante to Movie<\/em> Prop Collectors<\/em> .<\/p>\n

Joe Dante:<\/span> <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Thank you very much. You are being much too kind in\u00a0describing me as a sometime actor, I am a “never” actor,(laughs). I’ve acted for people, but that is exactly the opposite of acting. Some people, can’t, shouldn’t be, in front of the camera, lol.<\/p>\n

MPC<\/span>: <\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

It is kind of like the Hitchcock<\/em> thing, putting yourself somewhere, in your films.<\/p>\n

Joe Dante:<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Well usually\u00a0he didn’t give himself dialogue, which I think was a smart thing, (laughing).<\/p>\n

MPC:<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

(Laughing along with Joe). Can you tell us about your first 1968\u00a0film, The Movie\u00a0Orgy<\/em>?<\/p>\n

Joe Dante:<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Yes it was a 7 hour movie. The way it started was\u00a0 in the late 60’s there was a phenomenon\u00a0called “camp”, which followed Susan Sontag’s article about it. It was basically old movies people found funny, partly\u00a0because they were dated, and\u00a0because of the sincerity in\u00a0which they were made. It was really the Ed Wood<\/em> approach.\u00a0The old serials from 1943\u00a0had just been released,\u00a0and its success\u00a0led to the Batman<\/span><\/em> resurgence. One of the reasons it was successful was that people would sit through all 3 or 4 hours of it, and watched every chapter and saw the outrageous cheats at the end of the chapters which you weren’t supposed to notice. So you came back week after week.<\/p>\n

It became apparent to people\u00a0that there was a goldmine in these old campy movies, and so we put together a serial at the College of Art (Philadelphia) called The<\/span><\/em> Phantom<\/span> Creeps<\/span><\/em> with Bela Lugosi<\/em>, and we interspersed it\u00a0with commercials, and old\u00a0tv shows. I was a film collector and I had a lot of pieces of film lying around, so we used that too, and showed it\u00a0at NYU (New York University) very successfully. Then when on the road courtesy of Schlitz beer, we would go to college campuses and run this thing, and they would give out free beer, and Schlitz<\/em>would also give us 100 bucks. It eventually got whittled down from 7 hours to 5, then they asked us “can’t it be even shorter?”, so the final\u00a0version\u00a0I think was\u00a03 hours. While I was working for Roger Corman not\u00a0making any money, the only way I was really able to support myself was the movie.<\/p>\n

MPC:<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

So that was not the way you met Roger Corman?<\/p>\n

Joe Dante\u00a0:<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

No, but it did allow me to learn the art of editing in 16 and 35mm film .<\/p>\n

M<\/strong><\/span>PC<\/strong><\/span>:<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Do you remember your first meeting with Roger Corman?<\/p>\n

Joe Dante:<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

I remember very\u00a0well my first\u00a0\u00a0meeting with Roger Corman,\u00a0who\u00a0I\u00a0 had been unsuccessfully trying to meet for a number of years. I would set up interviews and then he would not go to NY, and he couldn’t do the interview. We\u00a0did correspond a bit, and I was\u00a0able to get some of his movies released in 16mm in colleges, when I finally met him, I was working for him doing 35 mm trailers which I had no experience or reason to be doing. I had my reels for this movie I\u00a0cut together for Caged Heat<\/em>, and I didn’t have a car, so I took a bus and I got off at the wrong stop. I dropped the reel\u00a0and it\u00a0rolled down a manhole so I was late for my screening with Roger. The first thing\u00a0he ever said to me was,\u00a0“If\u00a0 I were you\u00a0young man I would try to be\u00a0on time for these things “.\u00a0\u00a0You\u00a0 really don’t forget a moment like that, but luckily this pile of nonsense I had complied together was ok. He\u00a0 must have seen worse so he gave me advice and sent me off and then I\u00a0did the first trailer for him.<\/p>\n

MPC:<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

How did you get to do Hollywood<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Boulevard<\/em><\/span>?<\/p>\n

Joe Dante:<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Alan Arkush and I were the trailer department for New<\/em><\/span> <\/em>World<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Pictures<\/em><\/span>. When we kept making noises about wanting to make a movie, Roger said to himself, well if I let these guys make a movie who’s gonna make the trailers? So he made a deal with us that we could make the movie in the daytime, if we did the trailers at night. We said to him it should only take 10 days and we would not be off schedule, and the other stipulation was that the picture had to be the cheapest movie that had been made at New<\/em><\/span> <\/em>World<\/em><\/span> <\/em>with only <\/em>$60,000. <\/em><\/p>\n

We realized right away that the $60,000 and 10 days, we weren’t going to be able to make anything anyone wanted to see because we couldn’t have any action in it. We hit upon the idea of making a movie about a movie company making movies like the ones New<\/em><\/span> <\/em>World<\/em><\/span> made. Using stock footage from all their pictures as the action. That came at the tail end a series of pictures Roger was doing with girls. There were nurses, there were teachers, and this was to be the beginning of a new series with actresses. The original title was The<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Starlet<\/em><\/span>, and it was a sex comedy basically set on a movie set. It was made very quickly, and most of the time we really didn’t know what we were doing. I would call “action” and while I was shooting Alan would set up a scene in another location, and I would call “cut”. He would shoot his scene, and by that time I would be ready to shoot my scene, and so we managed on a relay system to get the movie made.<\/p>\n

MPC:<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/span> <\/strong><\/em>Part 2 of the interview coming in\u00a0May with bonus\u00a0audio portions.<\/p>\n

Joe talks about Gremlin’s<\/span><\/em> Gremlins 2<\/span><\/em>, his\u00a0film The Hole<\/span><\/em>, and more.<\/p>\n

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Bonus audio portions for Movie<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Prop<\/em><\/span> <\/em>Collectors<\/em><\/span> forum members in the forum.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

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