A Movie Inside a Movie

James Franco and Seth Rogen come together yet again on another film project and I can practically hear the cheering. This time, Franco will be directing The Disaster Artist, which will tell the story of the making of The Room (2003), considered to be one the worst drama films of all time. Franco will not only direct the movie, but will also star as Tommy Wiseau, the director of The Room. After The Room was pulled from many theaters due to lack of audiences, Wiseau began to get requests for the film to be shown. Celebrities like Jonah Hill and Paul Rudd began to show up to watch the film and soon it became ritual for movie goers. This cult classic tells the story of a love triangle between a man, his fiancé and his best friend. Tom Bissel and an actor from the The Room, Greg Sestero, wrote a book together about the making of The Room and named it The Disaster Artist. The book explains life on set with a director who had no filmmaking experience when he decided to write, direct and produce this famously bad movie.

We can expect to see some other big names in The Disaster Artist. Dave Franco is already set to play Greg Sestero. Rogen will undoubtedly have a part in the movie, and will possibly feature Evan Goldberg and Vince Jolivette as well. Franco and Rogen have had a fairly successful past collaborating together, with projects including The Interview, This Is The End, Pineapple Express, and Freaks and Geeks. With such an interesting premise for their new movie, I look forward to this project which will start production in December.

I am McLovin

As I am sure all of you know, Dave Franco, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, and the Funny or Die crew came to teach a class here this Friday. This was part of a seven day tour around the country, sponsored by LG, where Chris and Dave go on a quest to accomplish things they have always wanted to do. They are going to prove "It's all possible." They have been sky diving, broken world records, and have now taught a college class here in Ithaca. Check out the intro here.

The news that they were going to be coming, and less than 200 students were going to be able to attend the event, caused some stress. The administration sent an email to the 2,000 Park Students explaining that the event would be first come first serve in the Park Auditorium. How did they think that was even remotely a good idea? That would have turned out to be nothing but disorder and a free for all. There would have been hundreds of students lining up in park early in the morning, crowding the lobby, all while the normal class schedule is taking place. Thank god they realized what a mess that would have been before this Friday, and changed the admission to a ticketing system. The tickets went fast, and some students started to line up at 5:30 in the morning on Thursday.

Chris and Dave talked to the audience about how they got into the industry, and how important it is to work collaboratively with other people. They both love making their own material and encouraged everyone to do just that: get out and make content, don't worry about if people see it or not. They were very funny, and answered everyone's questions. At the end of the event Dave and Chris came into the middle of the audience and took a picture with all the students around them. The event was filmed and is going to be used in the Funny or Die video of the tour.