'Your Name Here' Interview with Matthew Wilder

I've already written about the world premiere of 'Your Name Here' the WJF (William J Frick) "bio-pic" but it's coming right up and the first drips and drabs of press coverage are starting to emerge. I just found a newly posted interview with the film's director Matthew Wilder posted over the Cinevegas website. Here's a new, slightly more detailed description of the film:

"It's the summer of 1974 and visionary science-fiction writer William J. Frick (Bill Pullman) is having a meltdown. Ex-wives are pounding on his door, the IRS is nipping at his heels, bikers are mixing meth in his garage, and his final masterpiece — an account of his collision with God in an East L.A. taco stand — is nearly complete. But after one hit of a curious magic powder, Frick wakes up to discover himself — like one of the characters in his novels — the prisoner of an alternate reality. And then another ... and another ... and ...

Writer/director Matthew Wilder orchestrates it all with deft precision, fully realizing his bizarre vision. And the fantastic actors deliver pitch-perfect performances, notably Pullman, who pulls off an amazing slapstick-nightmare of delusion, befuddlement, and hyperawareness. Buy the ticket, take the ride, and enjoy the trip that is YOUR NAME HERE."

Well, I gotta admit, this sounds like it might be a really interesting film. Plus I like that they're not pushing the PKD angle at all in the publicity.

Here's a few of the choice things Wilder has to say about making lemonade out of cinematic lemons:

"There's a scene where Pullman's character is sitting in a giant theatre, kinda like Abe Lincoln at Ford's Theatre. Suddenly onstage he sees himself-the bad guys have create a doppelganger of him who is a sort of country-and-western fascist, a cross between Andy Griffith in A FACE IN THE CROWD and our current Decider-in-Chief. Now in the script this hayseed character is selling happy pills to the public, and he has giant placards and posters and samples of pills, and he rolls out a screen that he shows a little promotional film on...it's a big to-do. The day we shot this, none of that stuff showed up. Nothing. There was maybe one sad little cartoon on a piece of paper the size of a record album. Pathetic. Horrifying. I could see Pullman go down below water for a second or two, and then suddenly he went, "Awright! Let's just do it in a spotlight! I'll be a one-man band and put on a show!" Now, when you see the scene, it's Pullman and a showgirl under a spotlight, and he's doing this big revival show, kinda like something out of BUFFALO BILL AND THE INDIANS. It works. You can't imagine it any other way. But it was really because the poster guy slept in late that day."

Read the rest of the interview here.
And buy your tickets to the premiere here - it's on Friday June 13 at 8:30.

And yeah, I bought a couple tickets just in case I figure out a way to get there on the ultra-cheap. Please contact me if you'd like to sponsor my trip... or my attempt to see the movie, or if you live in the Vegas area and I can eat your Lucky Charms and sleep on your floor.

Oh, and I said a bunch of mean stuff about this film, Bill Pullman, and the notion of William J Frick, but that was before I thought it was actually going to be released. So producers, publicists, listen up, it's all water under the bridge; I am ready to shill for you - just get me to Vegas (and give me a little what my dad would call 'walking around money')!

Finally (and for the last time) Matthew Wilder is not the dude that wrote the "Breaka My Stride" song.