Book Review: The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside The Room, The Greatest Bad Movie Ever Made by Greg Sestero. Part 1: The Life and Times of Greg and Tommy

(Warning: Spoilers)!

We all have those favourite bad movies which have to be so bad they are incredibly entertaining. For me, it was Troll 2 that sat there on the pedestal of greatest bad movie, until I watched Doug Walker’s 2010 review of The Room.

Holy friggin’ god was this film entertainingly bad. A protagonist played by the writer, producer and director who couldn’t act, and a plot with so many holes there was next to none of it. not to mention all those memorable catchphrases that’ll stick in my head forever and a script so diabolically written you could predict it by the time you’d reached that halfway point on first viewing.

I won’t ramble on about the film too much because you’ve probably seen it already and know exactly what is to come in this review of such a well written memoir of such a terrible movie. The author, Greg Sestero, co-starred alongside Tommy Wiseau as Mark, the protagonist, Johnny’s best friend who is sleeping with Johnny’s future wife, Lisa.

And because there is so much to cover, this review is going to be in several posts. The first will follow the sub-plot on how Greg met Tommy and the worst movie ever was conceived and brought to fruition. 

So let’s dive right into: The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside The Room.

Where did it all begin?

Sestero starts by recalling the last night out with Wiseau before shooting began. He tells how Tommy is a manipulative little bastard who will use all in his power to get an exclusive table in a Hollywood restaurant without a reservation. Greg explains how he was originally the line producer on The Room and never intended to act in it as his acting career had all but dried up by 2002, but Tommy offered him the role of Mark for a ‘life changing’ amount of money and a new car, which at his then girlfriend’s approval got him involved.

Every even numbered chapter in this book tells of how Greg and Tommy got together and became involved in each other’s lives before making The Room. Our hero then explains how he came to be part of a San Francisco drama group in the late 90s where he came across the weirdly accented, long haired man who had the appearance and swagger of ‘a slouchy teenager in detention’. Eventually, Tommy gets the chance to act and how he destroyed a Shakespearian sonnet with such elegance, mesmerised young Greg and led to the duo performing their first scene together.

What did they get up to?

Other points Greg makes about Tommy, is he owns a Mercedes-Benz, has his own retail business, complete with cards, and is obsessed with James Dean. A later chapter has the duo venturing out to Cholame, California where the rebel without a cause met his end; they even speak to one of the last men to see him alive, supposedly inspiring Tommy to get more involved with acting and produce his own movie.

Sestero then goes back even further, explaining how he became a model and landed several deals in France, owing to his ability to speak French, before coming back to America to get involved with acting. His parents do not approve and he gets several roles as an extra, including the God-awful Patch Adams before finding an agent who starts getting him places.

Tommy then lets Greg rent out his own apartment in LA and soon Greg finds his first major movie role: the ‘puppet master’ in direct-to-DVD horror, Retro Puppet Master. Along the way, we find out that Tommy is growing jealous of Greg and wants to get his own movie roles. Greg, already amazed at how this socially awkward man who won’t even reveal how he came by so much money or where he came from, is uneasy about this but eventually grows accustomed to his friend’s surrealism. Eventually, Tommy moves in with Greg in the LA apartment and before you know it, Tommy is typing away on the script for the worst movie ever made.

Most memorable moments?

Regardless of how much Sestero spills to the outside world in this memoir, The Room is still shrouded in enough mystery to rival a 19^th century gothic novel. You certainly feel uneasy when Greg tells of the riches Mr Wiseau possesses buy will never, ever reveal where he came into his fortune. He does later give an account of how he came to America and how he might have become such a rich man, but there is always doubt clouding everything our hero has noted.

There’s a very weird point just before Tommy moves in with Greg, where the long haired loner vanished for nine months, leaving our hero to get his life back on track before The Room was typed up into a stage play. Vampires are constantly alluded to when Tommy moves in with Greg and how he only seems to come out at night to get high on  Red Bull and amaze the world with his personified surrealism.

All in all, you’ll be reading this book and asking yourself, ‘What The Fuck?’ more times than you can possibly imagine. The life of Tommy Wiseau and the poor young San Francisco kid whom he dragged into it will have you laughing ‘til you puke, and make your jaw drop enough times to have it dislocate itself.

Stay tuned for the next instalment, where I shall be reviewing Sestero’s memories of how the greatest bad movie was filmed. 

 

Yes, what a story, Mark!

 

On the desecration of the word ‘Gay’ and the creative need for new insults.

This morning, I noticed on Facebook that a friend of mine had liked a status which made my blood boil. It concerned the current status of the word ‘gay’. As I only just decided to write about this I have to recall the status and its reception from memory:

‘I’m pretty tired of people saying it’s wrong to use the phrase “That’s so gay”. The meaning of words evolve over time and this phrase is following the trend. Using such a phrase is evolution, not homophobia’

The first thing wrong with that statement, is that gay was a word created as an acronym for ‘Good As You’ by the earliest waves of the gay rights movement in the 1960s. Secondly, from my own putrid experiences of people using the aforementioned term; it is mostly straight people who use such a slur when describing something bad. The majority of humanity are heterosexual and therefore they have desecrated this phrase to becoming the shadow of its former self.

I’ve touched upon how using this slur is ‘watered down homophobia’ before in my article ‘Why I am a Straight Man for Gay Rights’ which I wrote for Gay Star News. I won’t go into too much detail here on why I think it’s homophobic to use this slur because it’s quite clearly put in the article.

And it is for that sole purpose that I will post this beautiful photo of James Franco, which helped me gain so many hits on GSN. (And because he’s been my most recent obsession with my discovery of the outstanding Freaks and Geeks).

Returning to the reception of this status – another comment concerned how gay is not being recalled in its definition like the terms ‘bitch’ and ‘slut’ are by Third Wave Feminism. I certainly agree that the SlutWalk is making an excellent job on this, but I don’t see anything happening within the gay movement to make a word of pride and self respect into a term for hatred and bigotry. So if you ever see a ‘GayWalk’ marching for you to use this slur, please let me know about it.

But what stood out for me in the reception of this status, is this comment:

‘People obviously can’t think of any new insults to use and therefore must resort to the most commonly offensive words.’

Now this is something I’ve been keen on for many years now. Insults are an excellent way of expressing your anger and help to relieve stress when we need to chill out. But what makes them most surprising and hilarious is not their delivery, but the vocabulary you use when telling someone how disgusted you are.

Using just a few of the phrases deemed ‘most offensive’ by society is just plain lazy. The English language is the most advanced language in the world with thousands of new words coming into use every minute of every day. We have tons upon tons of luscious verbal gems that can be used to express just how truly treacherous life is for us. So next time you’re trolling someone on twitter or thinking of leaving an enemy dumbfounded, consult a dictionary beforehand and amaze them with words they may never had heard in common usage. Be creative for once. People are scared easily by things they don’t understand and that’s the best way to break someone or something if they have made your life utter hell.

With that said, I’ll leave the almighty (and very gay) Stephen Fry to give us a tirade of the finest insults imaginable:

On Ian Watkins, Jimmy Savile and the hopeful downfall of celebrity culture

It seems another entertainer has been ensnared by the proverbial witch hunt gripping the nation. Ian Watkins of Welsh band, Lostprophets, pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a baby last night, making him the first musician since Gary Glitter to be charged since the onslaught of ‘Savilegate.’

Hundreds of people across the country are saying their childhood has been wiped clean from them by the press revealing the disgusting underworld of Savile and co. Comedy writer Graham Linehan mentioned how sad things must be for all those children who weren’t abused on Jim’ll Fix It and how they should get their own back on the cigar chomping weirdo.

But I for one, am actually enjoying the goings on of Operation Yewtree and anything linked to the Savile enquiry. The reason for this, is I just don’t believe in role models. That’s what celebrity culture is built on: worship of an idol, and role models have always appeared to be a form of idolisation encouraged to keep young people from breaking the mould of society.

I remember in school being told to be a good role model for younger pupils, something which I despised, not because I hated the little brats, but because I’ve always had a problem with heroes. I never wanted to be a hero, nor have I ever regarded a celebrity or notable individual as a hero/heroine.

What I’m saying here, is don’t have heroes, and 'Savilegate' is exposing the side of the celebrity which you would never even touch upon in your wildest dreams. Like all parts of society, every person has a Blue Velvet lining (note the David Lynch reference there). You never know who is going to stab you in the back and trample your dreams forever – and all the keen Lostprophets fans are the latest to know this. Celebrity culture, in my opinion, has gone too far and has downgraded humanity to a shadow of its former self. Because of people like Savile we gobble up cheap gameshows and reality television without a single thought otherwise. Britain has been regarded by outsiders as a nation that is easily attracted to trash, and I hope that with the seizing of these celebrities we will know to look over our shoulders more when it comes to the new faces of TV and culture.

I never enjoyed the works of Lostprophets, but my brother was a keen fan in his youth. He mentioned to me the other day how ‘uncomfortable’ he feels remembering that he used to have a Lostprophets poster on his wall when he was 13. The best I can wish for now, is nobody will even dare to play their music at any parties or gatherings now that Watkins has admitted to his crimes.

With all that said and done, I’ll leave Power Quest to play us out:

This Week In Weird: Microwave Porn

Greetings internet. I know it ‘s been a couple of weeks since my last instalment but I’m still alive and writing for myself and anyone out there who needs a scribbler.

One segment I am keen to continue here is ‘This Week in Weird’. And this week’s instalment is on the funnier side of the surrealism that inhabits the internet. By that I am referring to webseries: Microwave Porn.

The title alone is enough to make you go, ‘What the fuck?’ But trust me, you won’t be left disappointed when you tune into it. Microwave Porn was a webseries posted on YouTube around 2009/2010 by independent production group: Cancelproof. The theme song will summarise the entire series for you so there’s no need for me to ramble on here.

You’ll find all 12 episodes on Cancelproof’s channel. This, I have to say is the only sitcom which has made many great laughs out of the kooky world of urban dating. All that’s left to say, is why the hell did they stop? If only more episodes of this show existed. And it would have done well on some cable channel for independent comedy shows.

With that said, enjoy your Microwave Porn.