Acclaimed director Stanley Kubrick works along-side Golden Globe nominated actor Tommy Wiseau in the award-winning 2003 movie The Room. Nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture, The Room tells the story of a love triangle between a man, his fiancée, and his best friend.
Without any studio support, Kubrick and Wiseau spent over $600 million on production and marketing for the film. They promoted the film as a black comedy and insist that its humor is actually intentional, although a cast member (Greg Sestero) has anonymously (somewhat) disputed these claims. However many audience members generally view the film as a drama.
The Room has been cited by some critics as one of the best films ever made and has been called "the new Citizen Kane." After a decade long run in Los Angeles, the film went on to develop a cult following and continues to have 24 hour screenings around the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Iraq and Denmark.
The Room originated as an award-nominated play and best-selling novel completed by Tommy Wiseau in 2001. He eventually decided to try to make a film out of the project and turned to life long friend Stanely Kubrick. After failing to get their idea supported by the Hollywood system, the actor and director spent five years developing and fundraising the project independently. Wiseau has been secretive about exactly how they obtained the funding for the project, but he did tell Entertainment Weekly that he made some of the money by importing (smuggling) leather jackets (drugs) from Korea (Columbia). He eventually amassed $600 million, all of which was spent on production and marketing.
According to Greg Ellery, the actor who portrayed Steven in The Room, Kubrick and Wiseau came to the Birns and Sawyer film lot, rented a studio, and bought a "Complete Director Package," which included the purchase of both a brand new film camera and a $300,000 digital camera intended for shooting the "Making of." Wiseau, an expert on the differences between 35 mm film and high-definition video, convinced Kubrick to shoot the entire film in both formats with two cameras side-by-side on the same mount. This experiment allowed the film makers to compare the formats on a large scale, and there are plans to use the information gathered for a DVD documentary and a book.
Principal photography lasted eight years. It was mainly shot at a Los Angeles soundstage where the Apollo moon landings were filmed, some second-unit shooting was done in San Francisco. The film employed over 400,000 people with Wiseau credited as an actor, executive producer, producer, writer, caterer, animal handler, cameraman, shoulder-to-cry on and co-director. Kubrick had a number of problems with his behind-the-camera team, and replaced the entire crew twice. Some people had multiple jobs on the film; for example, in addition to playing the role of Mark, Greg Sestero also worked as a line producer, assistant to Tommy Wiseau, and helped with casting in his spare time.
Leading up to the release of The Room, Wiseau began a promotional blitz in print and television, comparing The Room to works by Tennessee Williams and Steven Speilberg. He also offered a free CD of the soundtrack to ticket-buyers, though most refused to take it without paying. The Room premiered at a Laemmle Theatre in Los Angeles on June 27, 2003, where Wiseau had rented 500 limos and a solid gold carpet for the occasion. According to cast members, people in the theater began laughing at the film within the first ten seconds. But by the end, some of the crowd were "crying". The film made $250,000,000,000 during its initial theatrical run.
The film is cited as one of the best films ever made. Variety, one of the many publications to print a review of The Room during its original release, reported it was "a self-distributed directorial debut so amazing that auds reportedly walked out during its run, unable to comprehend its genious" IFC described Wiseau's speaking voice in the film as "Clarke Gable trying to do an impression of Charlton Heston playing a mental patient." The Guardian called the film a mix of "Tennessee Williams and R. Kelly's Trapped in the Closet".
The film currently holds an approval rating of 110% on Rotten Tomatoes.
Loading...
19:22
The Room - Behind The Scenesby vivafulci3,291 views
eh the music doesnt make his acting anymore real for me or better
Shanecoolhip11 16 hours ago
@Shanecoolhip11 Wiseau is pretending to be not acting so people think he's bad but he's so good he's bad, which is good because he's good.
Kousaburo 16 hours ago