ÿþ<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> <head> <meta name="verify-v1" content="D+AEZwWGZ9ke/hji8bmsy0F8OH2xmUXGa0xOjN7DfrI=" /> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" /> <title>James Gunn Appreciation Society</title> <style type="text/css"> <!-- body { background-color: #111315; } body,td,th { font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #CCCCCC; } .style2 {font-size: 10px} .style3 { font-family: Steelfish; font-size: 24px; } .style4 {color: #999999 } .style5 {font-size: 12px } a:link {font-family: verdana; font-size: 8pt; color: #00CC00; text-decoration: none; } a:visited {font-family: verdana; font-size: 8pt; text-decoration: none; color: #009900; } a:hover {font-family: verdana; font-size: 8pt; text-decoration: underline; } a:active {font-family: verdana; font-size: 8pt; text-decoration: none; } --> </style></head> <body> <table width="810" align="center"> <tr> <td><img name="JGASlinksheader" src="images/JGASlinksheader_2.jpg" width="810" height="79" border="0" id="JGASlinksheader" usemap="#m_JGASlinksheader" alt="" /> <map name="m_JGASlinksheader" id="m_JGASlinkheader"> <area shape="rect" coords="765,42,794,62" href="home.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="722,42,746,62" href="chat.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="618,42,700,62" href="forum" target="_blank"> <area shape="rect" coords="533,42,594,62" href="downloads.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="462,42,508,62" href="gallery.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="418,42,450,62" href="blogs.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="323,42,398,62" href="news.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="247,42,299,62" href="sitenews.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="691,0,799,33" href="scoobydoo.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="613,0,690,34" href="slither.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="502,0,613,32" href="dawnofthedead.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="478,0,479,1" href="javascript:;" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="415,0,502,34" href="lollilove.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="389,0,394,16" href="javascript:;" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="299,0,399,33" href="thespecials.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="233,0,299,34" href="tromeoandjuliet.html" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="210,0,211,1" href="javascript:;" alt="" /> <area shape="rect" coords="0,0,222,79" href="/home.html" alt="" /> </map></td> </tr> </table> <table width="810" align="center" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="5"> <tr> <td bgcolor="#000000"> <p> <b><font size="4">All I Need to Know About Filmmaking I Learned from the Toxic Avenger</font></b><br> 1998<br><br> <center><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0425163571/qid=1142216926/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&v=glance&n=283155"><img src="images/filmmakingbook.jpg" border="0"></a> </center> <p> <font face="Verdana" font color="#cccccc"><b>Book Synopsis:</b> "When in doubt, vomit green foam" is the motto of the B-movie empire, Troma Studios, the brainchild of Kaufman and Michael Herz, whose exploitation hits, Toxic Avenger, Class of Nuke 'Em High and Tromeo & Juliet, today clutter the midnight movie section of most video rental shops. Here, Kaufman traces his lifelong dedication to big-screen gore, disfigurement, mutation and raunchy sex from his days in the Yale film society as a disaffected undergrad in the mid-1960s (where he made a feature-length film that consisted mainly of a braless woman jogging) to his present career as a leading impresario of bad taste. After a stint with Cannon, a low-budget studio in New York City, Kaufman launched Troma out of a broom closet he rented from McCall's magazine in 1974, while taking mainstream Hollywood jobs on the side, including acting as pre-production supervisor on Rocky. The Toxic Avenger, produced in 1982, catapulted Troma into the international limelight and has since become an icon of fringe cinema, spawning merchandise, a Saturday morning cartoon and hours and hours of ongoing late-night cable exposure. Not content to recount his story in linear fashion, Kaufman free-associates on such topics as the "erotic components of colostomy bags" and the pitfalls of Hollywood cinema. Kaufman's gross-out humor and rambling style will wear thin for all but the most devoted Troma fans, but his perspective on independent film production stands to benefit low-budget auteurs everywhere. <p> <b>What James Says:</b> "ALL I NEED TO KNOW ABOUT FILMMAKING I LEARNED FROM THE TOXIC AVENGER is the book I wrote with Lloyd Kaufman. It s basically Lloyd s autobiography. Our working title was SEX, VIOLENCE, AND TOXIC WASTE, but our editor said book chains wouldn t want to put a book with that title on the shelves, so they gave it what we think is a pretty goofy name. People have asked me how the process of writing it worked. Here it is: <p> Lloyd and I would meet a few times a week. Every time we met we d talk for eight, nine hours at a time. We started at the beginning of his life, talking about his family, and worked our way through to the present day. We covered about a year every two hours, with anything about a movie or prostitutes or porn stars taking longer. I would tape record everything as well as take copious notes. Then I would go home and turn it into the book. I got to know his story so well that I rarely had to refer to the tapes or my notes. Most of the scenes are real, though the dialogue had to be recreated. Some scenes, however, are pretty much fantasies  for instance, the fight scenes between Lloyd and Pat, and most of the stuff between Lloyd and the editor, Barry (who loved being our villain). In non-fiction, veracity is only important with people who might sue you. In a lot of ways the book was practice for melding fiction and fact, as I did in a more shadowy manner in THE TOY COLLECTOR. Still, Lloyd s hyperactive voice was so clearly in my head that I think the book is an accurate representation of who he is. <p> I d finish off a chapter at a time, and show it to Lloyd. He d add corrections, suggestions, and puns, and then I d do a rewrite. The whole thing was a very quick process. It took maybe a couple months. This didn t mean it was easy, however. I had what s since been diagnosed as Tromacitis  it affects anyone who s worked at Troma for more than a year. The disease consists primarily of an eternal loop of complaints in one s head about the way one is being used and underpaid and under-acknowledged. If you want to know what it s like writing 400 pages about Troma while afflicted by Tromacitis, imagine Anne Frank directing Triumph of the Will. I almost quit writing the book in the middle, and it took a spiritual awakening  in Cannes, France in 1997  to agree to stay. <p> In spite of these difficulties, writing the book cemented my friendship with Lloyd. I got to know him in a way that only his wife and family do. And, in the process, he became family to me. <p> When we completed the book, it was far too long for the publisher. We had to cut out interesting stuff on movies like THE FIRST TURN-ON to make room for movies considered a more important part of the  Troma Canon, like the TOXIE movies and CLASS OF NUKE  EM HIGH. We also had to cut a lot of funny stuff on the request of Putnam s lawyers. In particular, I remember a Penthouse Letter written by Lloyd about a hot run-in with Martha Stewart. Even though we put a footnote at the bottom stating that it was all made up, the lawyers told us to cut it because Stewart was  known to be litigious. Oh, and for those of you who read the book  the original actor on JOE was Lawrence Tierney. <p> All I Need to Know about Filmmaking I Learned from the Toxic Avenger was an important step for me creatively. I was pretty much just interested in getting through it and getting paid, and didn t care how well it was written. And yet, despite this  much to my own chagrin at the time  it was coming out better than anything else I had written. I learned that my business is simply the writing. It s someone else s job to judge it as good or bad. I don t need to do any elaborate rituals for inspiration. Simply by sitting down and doing the task at hand I usually find my flow. "</font> <br> <br> </table> </td> </tr> </table> <center> <img src="images/headerbottom.jpg" width="810"> </center> <center> <table width="810" bgcolor="#111111" border="0"> <tr> <td bgcolor="#111111"> <center> <p> <a href="aboutjames.html">About James</a> / <a href="news.html">News & Press</a> / <a href="newsarchives.html">Archives</a> / <a href="blogs.html">Blogs</a> / <a href="gallery.html">Gallery</a> / <a href="downloads.html">Downloads</a> / <a href="http://www.jgas.org/forum/" target="_blank">Message Board</a> / <a href="home.html">Home</a><br> <a href="http://www.cafepress.com/jgas" target="_blank">Store</a> / <a href="chat.html">Chat</a> / <a href="links.html">Links</a> / <a href="sitemap.html">Site Map</a><br><br> <font size="2">JGAS: James Gunn Appreciation Society &copy; copyright 2008. 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