D.J.
Caruso has had an interesting career.
He makes movies that are around twenty million and he makes
them well. His films have
drawn much critical praise, with THE SALTON SEA, to critical and box
office disappointment, with TWO FOR THE MONEY.
And he has also made a mark with television including the FX
hit series “The Shield”. He
has also worked with a number of impressive actors including Al
Pacino, Angelina Jolie, and now the criminally underrated David
Morse. Morse plays Shia
LaBeouf’s next door neighbor who may just be a killer in the
popcorn thriller
DISTURBIA.
A film that could have failed miserably in another’s hands
but works well with Caruso’s flair and ability to make a movie
work that mostly plays in one location.
This is a surprisingly effective teen chiller that also works
with a strong show from its talented cast.
When
I got the chance to go one-on-one with D.J. when he stopped by The
Four Seasons in
Beverly Hills
, I really enjoyed the experience. He
is very friendly and is able to look back at his career in a
surprisingly unbiased manner. He
is a very real person and is someone that seems to really respect
his work but is able to dissect it in a positive way to learn from
past mistakes. We talked a lot
about DISTURBIA which opens Friday. And
we also spoke of his respect for Shia and a surprising story of
working with Al Pacino. After
speaking with D.J., I really am impressed by him not only as a
filmmaker but as a human being who is open and honest.
So read on about the new film, voyeurism and the ideal box
office weekend. The dude is a
class act.
D.J.
Caruso
So,
let’s talk about “Disturbia”.
I actually liked the film a lot.
Well,
thank you.
What
was it like working with a younger cast then what you are used to?
It
was fun working with a younger cast because I think there is a lot
more of really looking to the director as the leader, and for
guidance. And not having
some of the experience that the other actors had, not that we
didn’t have great relationships, but I felt more responsibility in
guiding and having a hand on how you can shape the performance.
It was fun. And
also, making the movie for a younger audience with a younger cast, I
really relied on them to help me with the teen speak.
And to keep things real and not kind of let it get over in
that bullshit, sort of like, fabricating teen emotion and trying to
capture the real teen stuff. So
it was very helpful. I
got a lot from them, and hopefully they got a lot from me.
They
were saying how collaborative you are as a director.
Does that sometimes create a
problem?
It
does. It can create a
problem if you have an actor that’s not as skilled as some of the
others that are working because… you might have an actor as gifted
as Shia or Vincent D’Onofrio or Val Kilmer, Angelina [Jolie], or
even [Al] Pacino. Where
you give them a little freedom and they can explore it, come up with
some gold. Other actors
who don’t quite have that depth or have not learned that
technique; if you give them some of that freedom, they get lost.
So you have to find that fine line between who you give that
freedom too, and how you give that freedom to an actor is also
something that can be very personal, and not maybe something in
front of the others that you don’t feel are ready to take that
next step. Unless,
sometimes to… you’ll be surprised at how organic things can
become, just by changing the one actor or the one actors
performance. That you
trust the most, you know.
Shia
was comfortable with this?
Yeah,
he was very comfortable. Because
he just wants it to be real. He’s
one of those actors that, it’s gotta be real, it’s gotta feel
real, and he has his own bullshit meter if its feeling forced or
fabricated. You can see
him just wrestling with it, trying to make it work, and trying to
make it be real. And,
you know, most of the time a great actor like Shia or even like when
I had Pacino; it’s the expositional stuff that’s in the story to
sort of explain things that never feels real to an actor.
You know what I mean, how do you make that exposition real or
how do you write it, and that’s what Carl and Christopher did
pretty well, in this movie, was not have the expositional stuff get
in the way of what real human emotion is.
How
would you have gone about advertising the film as opposed to how it
is being sold?
Are you worried about
how it’s being shown?
I’m
a little bit worried but I think in a way too it also might still be
working out. Because I
think there’s a certain way the studio knows how to get people
interested in the movie. And
then what I find in all these… cuz I’m not going to all the
sneak previews they are doing, but I get all the comments back and
people are pleasantly surprised.
‘It’s much funnier than I thought, and then I was really
scared’ or ‘It’s much sweeter… Shia’s so sexy… and then
I get scared.’ So I
think its surprising people.
But
I just somehow wish, in a way, the campaign – cuz I think, if
there’s anything special about this movie, because it is a popcorn
great genre movie – is that we kind of blended these two genres
and we actually… it’s a lot more of a character piece, then most
movies are in this genre. I
would love for that to somehow come across in the advertising.
But I think, you know, in Paramount’s defense, it gets kind
of confusing in a thirty second commercial to have that, boy sees
girl, boy falls in love with girl and all of a sudden, scare the
shit out of you. I think
scaring the shit out of you is always easier to sell for a studio.
When
I saw the film, the woman next to me was literally jumping out of
her seat…
Was
she really?
Yes
she did, especially with the car accident…
How hard was that sequence to shoot?
That
was pretty hard to shoot but we wanted to make it so realistic that
I think, in making it realistic it sort of simplifies what you can
do in the shooting of it. But
it was about two or three days and Conrad Palmisano did the second
unit… he’s a really great second unit director.
But we were a forty-three day movie made for under twenty,
which sounds like a lot for independent, but in a studio movie, that
twenty million dollars goes pretty fast.
We
were very efficient, we were very committed, there was a bigger
scope of that accident that went on that I decided to scale down and
to actually spend those days just to make it as realistic as we can.
As far as the logistics go, it was probably the most
difficult, logistically, to put together.
But that stuff is kind of fun to shoot, you know.
For me it was fun to shoot, also we’re outside and the
whole movie is inside. [Laughing]
That was the last scene that we shot so it actually made it
nice to go outside and get some air.
That’s
cool. Now do you
consider yourself an actor’s director or a visual director because you’re
pretty damn good at the technical side and you’re also very good
at the “character”
side?
Well,
I tend to think when I go back and look at movies… you look at
“JAWS” and you realize that “JAWS” is a monster movie in the
water but what makes “JAWS” JAWS
is, how great the characters are.
And that’s sort of what I aspire to do… no matter what
genre Steven [Spielberg] or some of these great directors are
working in, it’s the characters within the genre that actually
make it a satisfying movie.
So
I’m very, very character oriented, like the main character, the
lead character is everybody and they really help me design the whole
purpose and how I shoot a movie.
And the way the movie looks is all designed from the main
characters point of view. And
then that help’s me, I think, fit the genre because it’s a
character based piece within the genre.
I’m not sure if I could do a full out comedy but as long as
I have a lead character that I can grab on to and get a hold of,
then I feel like that’s my main anchor and that can take me
through any genre.
With
the characters, I liked these guys and I was willing to go for the
ride. I also really
liked David Morse.
How did that come about?
How did he get involved?
One
thing I thought about David, he’s always so strong in sort of the
ambiguity. He’s a
sweet, nice, soft-spoken man but he’s also six foot six inches
tall and he has this incredible power.
And I just think that David uses that to such an advantage
because you can cast David as the wonderful doctor next door who
takes care of everybody and heals little puppies.
And at the same time he could be the same guy who could break
a puppy in half. There’s
that interesting thing where you just don’t know how to read him
and he is like that as a person.
He’s
a sweet guy, completely sweet guy but there’s something he does
that keeps you off-balance and I think he enjoys the power of
keeping you off-balance. And
the way that his thought process works, the way that he approaches
the character, the things that he thought about the character and
what Kale was doing to screw his character, Turner’s life up.
And how that’s what was really starting to drive him, it
got less about these girls and taking over these girls it became
more about, I wanna get this little shit out of my life.
And so David’s process was very, very interesting to me.
I honestly think you can cast him in anything but this was
such a perfect role for him, for me seeing him do this role because
you just never know which way he’s leaning.
And that’s kind of the gift of David as an actor.
Is
it hard to direct someone who is as “method” an actor as that?
No.
I’ll tell you why it’s not.
Because he gives you what you want and then he’ll say to
you, ‘got it?’ and then he’ll say, ‘do you mind if I explore
this one where I’m going to be really shy, really… I have no
social skills to talk to a girl alone in a car.’ So he would do
one like that, and it might not all work, but there’s a moment of
that take where you pull that take out.
Because he’s not interested in doing the same thing over
and over again, which I think is very nice.
So it was really a joy to direct him.
Each
actor, in every movie I’ve ever done, there’s no one universal
directing technique I have. You
have to sort of adapt to the actor as if they’re your own
children, how do you discipline them, how do you guide them.
How do you get them to do something that they really don’t
want to do but you need them to do.
I don’t wanna say manipulate, but there are different ways,
each actor requires a different [way].
But David, I always got what I needed with David and I would
always give him something to do more.
Speaking
of actors, Angelina Jolie, Al Pacino, David Morse… who was the
most fascinating to work
with?
Hmmmmm.
It’s
a hard one, I know.
No,
it’s a hard one because they all have their different processes.
But I think it was interesting to work with Al because what
you really tend to get is… you know, you would think that Al
Pacino would not need to have a director.
But what he really wanted to be was directed… badly.
Like he just really was reaching out in being directed and
also really, really tough on himself about how not good he is and…
Really?
Yes,
so it was very interesting to me, it was very eye-opening and he’s
genuine. He just wants
to be good and so it was interesting to me that I was really
directing Al and really guiding him and really supporting him on his
journey. Whereas
you’ve got a guy like David who is there and I loved talking to
David, but I probably didn’t have to talk to David at all.
As opposed to… you know, because he was just there, he was
dialed in, he was confidant in what he was doing.
So every personality is different, and Angelina, the thing
that I always was amazed with her was the commitment to being good.
Like the commitment it would take.
I
remember one time; we had two days of complete weathered out at this
bridge in Quebec City. It
was just the worst weather you could possibly have.
And it was pouring, pouring, pouring, pouring, and what
happened was, they said, there is gonna be a weather break in ten
minutes. And base camp
was like an hour away. And
Angie just said, you know what I’ll do… I was up all night
because I had to do a promo for something… she slept in the car
right next to my director’s chair, so that the second the rain
stopped, we could wake her up and put her in the car.
And
that’s like, to me, that’s a movie star, but a committed movie
star. You know what I
mean? So each one, and
with Shia, I can just see the future is just wide open for him
because he’s just so gifted and he loves acting, he loves being on
the set so much that the crew loves him.
He became like the son of the crew.
I swear to God this crew would die, they would kill for that
kid, they loved him so much. So
every actor is different, but I learned a lot from them all and was
just most surprised at how Pacino, being an actor from the Seventies
with a director and the actors working with was really, really
respectful and just wanted to be directed.
I
think it’s healthy.
Well,
it is… but I was surprised.
How
did you react to the lack of success of “Two for the Money”?
Well,
you know, it hurts. It
really hurts because I was really, really into that movie,
particularly from Matthew’s [McConaughey] point of view, with the
whole gambling aspect, you know.
It’s interesting, in a way there is such a media backlash
on how that I didn’t really ever experience until after the movie
came out. And you
realize, people don’t want to give Al a chance anymore if he’s
doing the mentor sort of role. But
then… it hurts, it definitely hurts because it was not well
received and it didn’t do well.
Again, I only make movies for twenty million dollars so it
didn’t lose money. And
I also got some wonderful notes, and even Spielberg sent me a note
that said, ‘this by far, and I’ve directed him, was Mathew
McConaughey’s best performance that he has ever given in a film.
You should be very proud.”
So I got a lot of that but it hurts.
You want to make movies that people go see and people enjoy
and it felt like, I guess I missed, you know.
Was
there ever a point where you said, “I know this is a good
film…”?
I
do and I think what happened was, I think as I look back, I think
the movie is too long. I
think there is like a fifteen minute segment towards the end of act
two that I think the movie would still be the same movie, now that
I’m backed away from it. It
would have kind of moved the movie forward a little bit more and
ultimately, that is a downer ending.
I mean, in a way, where a guy has to walk away from
something. But I’m
proud of it. I’m proud
of the performances, but you know, I guess you really can’t
control that aspect of it, you know.
And it’s interesting because, that was a twenty million
dollar movie that made like twenty-four, twenty-five million
dollars. It did okay
overseas and the video was good.
So it didn’t lose money.
But here, we have another thing… a twenty million dollar
movie now, but I feel more pressure on this movie because people
like it. And also
because some of the expectations are high and… like on “Two for
the Money” I barely saw a commercial on TV.
I
know… you’re right.
Now
I’m seeing commercials for “Disturbia” all the time.
So all of a sudden I’m feeling more pressure then I would
on that one. So we’ll
see. They’re all
different; they’re all like your babies.
Well
are you the kind the kind of guy that says, “I need to see the
paper. I need to see the
box office.”?
No.
I’m the kind that gets out of town.
Because it gets too much, I don’t know why, it’s probably
like passive aggressive fear. Where
you just go, I really just hope I can come to work on Monday and
open the paper and see, “Okay, we did really well.” But
unfortunately with these phones [cellular] and all that other shit,
you know.
Yeah.
[Laughing]
With the technology it’s hard.
But I would, you know, in a perfect world, I’d go to Las
Vegas, I’d stay away from the world.
I’d gamble. I’d
win. I’d come back on
Monday morning and I’d open up the Los Angeles Times and go,
“hey, we did really well.” That
would be the perfect directorial opening weekend for me.
I’m not sure if that ones gonna happen, but that would be
perfect.
It
seems like a very audience friendly movie.
It
does. It’s definitely
a film that I think, I consciously knowing that it has the best
chance to be like… this is like a popcorn movie.
A good popcorn movie and I think commercially this is
probably the most… I’ve been out on a line saying okay, I made a
commercial movie. Do you
know what I mean?
Yeah.
So
that’s how I feel about this.
So hopefully it will make its money back and then some.
Earlier
we were talking about you and Shia’s character.
How much of a “voyeur” were
you when you were like,
fifteen or sixteen?
I
was a big voyeur. I
think I told ya I had a girl who moved in next door and watched her
and was always… you know, there’s something about that
“thing” or that girl that you always… it’s like a fantasy
that you want to reach
out and get it. But that
you don’t, you keep that perpetual… you keep that going because,
it’s hope. I think
being a voyeur actually instills hope in you.
That there is more out there, there is something out there.
I remember when I was young, on a clear day when I grew up in
Connecticut; you could see just the tip of the Manhattan skyline.
And of course it would be The World Trade Center.
And I would be like, “Someday I’m getting out of this
town.” You know what I
mean?
Yeah.
It
sort of represented like Oz or some other place I can go.
And I think me as a voyeur growing up, it was always about
like, fantasizing about certain things or like places that I
couldn’t really go or girls that I really couldn’t get.
But there is something about, like, placing her on that
pedestal and that experience. And
I still am a voyeur now as a director, that’s what I do.
The
world is open to it now. You
have YouTube or you’ve got reality television shows that
are taking off.
And
people are saying, “Watch me!” You know what I mean?
It’s not so much… it’s watch my private moment, watch
this. Yeah, it’s, “I
want you to experience this with me.”
It’s a whole different culture and like you said, you can
go to an office cubicle with a hundred people who are supposedly
selling insurance and God knows on twenty-five or thirty of those
computers what the f*ck people are doing.
I’d be one of those twenty-five or thirty by the way.
[Laughing]
Let
me know what you think. Send
questions and comments to
jimmyo@joblo.com.