A master of the oblique in his screenwriting, Charlie Kaufman has for the first time directed one his scripts. It's another mindbender of art imitating life, reports Helen Barlow
Wild and woolly-haired, Charlie Kaufman has helped breathe new life into American cinema in the past decade.
Known as the writer of cult movies directed by Spike Jonze (Being John Malkovich, Adaptation) and Michel Gondry (Human Nature, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind), Kaufman creates characters who live in oddball universes that are mostly figments of his over-active imagination. It was only a matter of time before he would direct a movie himself.
"Spike and Michel have been very generous in allowing me to be part of their movies, where I've done more than write; I've worked on all different aspects of the films," he explains. "I don't often hang around on the set though. During the shooting everyone's racing around, so I feel like a tourist and it doesn't make me feel great. Now that I've directed a movie myself, I must say, I do like making all the decisions."
It's no coincidence that his directing debut, Synecdoche, New York, is set in the independent theatre world of New York, where he had directed plays and films while studying film at New York University. "It's a world I'm familiar with. I like working with actors," he says.
Far from the punk wunderkind devoted to undermining conventional storytelling, as he is often painted, Kaufman moved to Los Angeles in 1991 and learned his tools of the trade working on American sitcoms and devising comedy sketches. It was during this time that he penned the inventive screenplay, Being John Malkovich.
Synecdoche, New York, came about when Kaufman was asked to direct a horror movie. Of course it wasn't going to be your average horror movie. "We didn't want to do a genre piece. We wanted to talk about loneliness and relationships and relentlessly moving through time towards death. Falling apart physically and becoming more fragile were the starting points."
Like many first-time directors Kaufman probably tries to fit too much into his story, which jumps through time and in and out of the play his protagonist - played by Philip Seymour Hoffman - is directing.
Hoffman's theatre director Caden Cotard starts out to write a play about life - he builds a replica of New York City as the set. But he gets so carried away, constantly changing his mind, that he can't finish the play even after years of rehearsal.
"I think when you're working on something it's hard to know when you've finished," Kaufman admits. "You can always change things as you learn things in life, and if you want something to be accurate, it's impossible to cut it off. You just keep on building and building as the world changes and obviously those changes have to be reflected in the work. It's always hard for me to finish things, though I wasn't thinking about that literally when I was writing
this. But it's true that once you stop being creative there's no reason to live; you don't live any more. So if the play's a metaphor for a person's life then it just goes on until it stops."
Add to that Cotard has marriage woes which sees him shift his affections from painter wife Adele (Catherine Keener) to ambitious actress Claire (Michele Williams) and a mystery stress-related illness.
"He's struggling, but I think everybody struggles," says Kaufman. "I think it's very hard to arrive at something. Caden's desperate to impress Adele by doing something important in the world and he's trying to escape death by leaving his mark. It seems like a noble effort to me, and it's very exciting to imagine building this entire city as a theatrical piece."
Kaufman insists the film's story is fairly linear when compared to his other works, like Adaptation, where Nicolas Cage's blocked writer was based on Kaufman himself.
"Adaptation was all over the place. We had the title cards with the scene numbers and it was like scene 1 then scene 800 and back to scene 30. It was like that all the way."
Kaufman threw himself into the film's complex design. "I think it's very important to remind people they're watching a movie. I think it's really cool when you see a set. We built an exact replica of Michelle Williams' apartment in a warehouse on a platform. I love fake real. Ever since I was a kid I've loved it."
Filming took place over 45 sweltering days during the 2007 New York summer. "Phil, Samantha and Jennifer Jason Leigh [Adele's best friend] were under a lot of prosthetic makeup that was very uncomfortable for them."
While Kaufman doesn't write for specific actors, he notes, "Phil was the first person I went to for Caden. Usually you have someone else in mind if they aren't available, but I couldn't think of anybody else for the part. I was glad he decided to do it."
Hoffman is tired of explaining that his character is not Charlie Kaufman."As the film's writer, Charlie is naturally going to have a connection. The protagonist is going to have something to do with who he is, every character is going to have something to do with who he is. But this is not a film about Charlie's life."
LOWDOWN
Who: Charlie Kaufman, lateral minded screenwriter turned director.
Writing credits: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), Adaptation (2002), Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002), Human Nature (2001), Being John Malkovich (1999).
Latest: Synecdoche, New York screens at as part of the World Cinema Showcase, Academy Cinema, Auckland tonight at 8.30pm, Thursday April 23, 8.30pm and Monday April 27, 8.30pm.
