Kaufman, was the intention. “It’s a comedy and it was always intended to be a
comedy. It’s interesting actually because I’ve been reading lately this
argument online about people laughing about certain parts of the movie.
And some people who are very attached to the movie are offended by that;
they think that people who are laughing are heartless. I would like the movie
to be a personal thing – if you find this part funny it’s designed to give you
the freedom to experience it as you. If you find this funny that’s good and if
you find it not funny that’s good too.”
“What’s kind of cool about it when people are affected in the way that
they like the movie, or are open to it, is that people can laugh and weep
almost at the same moment. I love that.”
A TRIAL BY FIRE
By the time Kaufman had the screenplay ready Jonze was in pre-production
on his adaptation of Maurice Sendak’s children’s classic Where The Wild
Things Are and Kaufman stepped forward to direct. “I just saw this movie not
getting done for five years or more and I wasn’t really comfortable with that,”
he says. Kaufman studied at NYU Film School and has a background in
theatre. “So I asked Spike if he would mind letting it go and maybe I could
direct it,” says Kaufman. Jonze agreed, and remained
involved as a producer.
“There’s a certain flattery to the ‘Kaufmanesque’
Backed by Sidney Kimmel Entertainment and with a
cast that also includes Samantha Morton, Michelle
thing but it’ll turn around and stab you in the
Williams, Catherine Keener, Emily Watson, Dianne Wiest,
face. I really, really want to separate myself from
Jennifer Jason Leigh, Hope Davis and Tom Noonan,
Synecdoche was shot on location and in a rented
all of that stuff” armoury in Brooklyn. Kaufman says the shoot was
logistically very intense. “It was a trial by fire for me
because there was a lot of scheduling issues, having to
do four and a half hours of prosthetics for Phil [Philip
Seymour Hoffman]. And Phil is in every scene of the movie so it really
screwed up our turnaround time.”
“We’d lose hours every day that he was in old age makeup and we had
204 scenes in the movie,” Kaufman adds. “We had to shoot that in 45 days.
20 I inmotion
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