The living embodiment of the stereotype of the eccentric artist, you're unlikely to find someone as devoted to being unusual than Crispin Glover. He has karate-kicked at David Letterman, sued Steven Spielberg (successfully), played with rats, and played Andy Warhol.
Now Glover is showing his own work, appearing at the Indianapolis Museum of Art on April 24 to showcase his film "It is Fine! EVERYTHING IS FINE!," along with his one-hour dramatic narration of a series of books he's written titled "The Big Slide Show."
Glover sat down with The Yap to discuss suing over "Back to the Future," his passion for his projects, and that famous dance from "Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter." The Yap: Can you tell me about the genesis of the “It is Fine! EVERYTHING IS FINE” project? What inspired you to get involved with what has become more than a decade invested in this?
CG: “What is it?” is my psychological reaction to the corporate restraints that have happened in the last 20 to 30 years in filmmaking. Anything that can possibly make an audience uncomfortable is necessarily excised, or the film will not be corporately funded or distributed. This is damaging to the culture because it is the very moment when an audience member sits back in their chair looks up at the screen and thinks “is this right, what I am watching? Is this wrong, what I am watching? Should I be here? Should the film maker have made this? What is it?” And that is the title of my film. The Yap: You talk a lot about dealing with cultural taboos also and putting them out there for society to deal with. How does that factor into this view of Hollywood-type films? CG: What is it that is taboo in the culture? What does it mean that taboo has been ubiquitously excised in this culture’s media? What does it mean to the culture when it does not properly process taboo in its media? It is a bad thing when questions are not being asked, because these kinds of questions are when people are having a truly educational experience. For the culture to not be able to ask questions leads towards a non-educational experience, and that is what is happening in this culture. This stupefies this culture and that is of course a bad thing. So “What is it?” is a direct reaction to this culture’s film in content. The Yap: I understand Steven C. Stewart, the screenwriter, is also the lead actor in the film.
CG: Steven wrote and is the main actor in part two. When I turned “What is it?” from a short film into a feature, I realized there were certain thematic elements in the film that related to what Steve’s screenplay dealt with. He was born with a severe case of cerebral palsy and he was very difficult to understand. He was locked in a nursing home for about ten years when his mother died. People that were caring for him in the nursing home would derisively call him an “M.R.,” short for “Mental Retard.” This is not a nice thing to say to anyone, but Steve was of normal intelligence.
When he got out he wrote this screenplay. It is written in the genre of a murder detective thriller, but truths of his own existence come through much more clearly than if he had written it as a standard autobiography.
Steve had written the screenplay in the late 1970’s. I read it in 1987, and as soon as I read it I knew I had to produce the film. Steve died within a month after we finished shooting the film. Cerebral palsy is not degenerative, but Steve was 62 when we shot the film. One of his lungs had collapsed, and he got pneumonia.
This was around the same time that the first “Charlie’s Angels” film was coming to me. I realized the money I made from that film I could put straight in to this film. That is exactly what happened. I finished acting in Charlie’s Angels, and then went to Salt Lake City where Steve lived. I met with Steve and David Brothers, with whom I co-directed the film. I went back to LA and acted in an lower budget film for about five weeks and David started building the sets. Then I went straight back to Salt Lake and we completed shooting the film within about six months in three separate smaller productions. We shot “It is fine! EVERYTHING IS FINE.” while I was still completing “What is it?,” and this is partly why “What is it?” took such a long time to complete. I am proud of the film. It will probably be the best film I will have anything to do with in my career. So do you do some films just for the money to fund your personal projects? CG: After “Charlie’s Angels,” I started getting better roles that also paid better, and I was able to continue using that money to finance my films. I have been able to divorce myself from the content of the films that I act in and look at acting as a craft that I am helping other filmmakers to accomplish what it is that they want to do. If for some reason the director is not truly interested in doing something that I personally find interesting with the character, then I may console myself that with the money I am making to be in their production. Usually, though I feel as though I am able to get something across as an actor that I feel good about. It has worked out well. The Yap: So “IT IS MINE.” is the third film in your trilogy? CG: I should not go in to detail for “IT IS MINE.” yet and I will not shoot that film next. There are other projects outside of the trilogy that I will shoot next. I own property in the Czech Republic and am making a small soundstage out there to continue making my own films. It is another culture and another language and I need to build up to complex productions like “What is it?” and “It is fine! EVERYTHING IS FINE.” “IT IS MINE” is an even more complex project than those two films were, so it will be a while yet for that production. I would say at least a few years if not many more than that. We had to shoot “It is fine! EVERYTHING IS FINE.” because of Steve’s health. The Yap: You’re also doing a performance of The Big Slide Show. What inspired The Big Slide Show and what do you get out of it creatively? CG: The fact that I tour with the film helps the distribution element. I consider what I am doing to be following in the steps of vaudeville performers. Vaudeville was the main form of entertainment for most of the history of the US. It has only relatively recently stopped being that, but that does not mean this live element mixed with other media is no longer viable. When I first started publishing the books in 1987, people said I should have book readings. But the books are so heavily illustrated, and they way the illustrations are used within the books, they help to tell the story, so the only way for the books to make sense was to have visual representations of the images. This is why I knew a slide show was necessary. It took a while, but in 1992 I started performing what I used to call “Crispin Hellion Glover’s Big Slide Show.” People get confused as to what that is so now I always let it be known that it is a one-hour dramatic narration of eight different books that I have made over the years. The Yap: You’ve made something of a minor comeback in a commercial sense doing “Hot Tub Time Machine” and “Alice in Wonderland” this year. Can you talk about what brought you to those roles? CG: Yes Alice in Wonderland has now made more money at the box office than any film I have appeared in previously. In the last decade I have been funding my own feature film projects with money I make from acting in others’ films. Luckily some of this has caused me to be in films that have done well financially, and that has actually improved the sort of roles I am offered in higher budgeted films. When something comes along like playing a great role in a Tim Burton film, it is the best of both worlds. Tim Burton is someone who both has a strong artistic expression, and wants to let everyone he is working with have a strong artistic impact. In doing that, the people that are working with him, including myself, want to fulfill what his vision as a filmmaker is. The Yap: You talked about (in other interviews) of the notion of being “weird” or “offbeat” and how differing points of view are vital to preserving a culture. How does this film further that notion?
CG: I personally would avoid using the words “weird” or “offbeat” to describe what I believe is vital to educating the culture. What does it mean to the culture when it does not properly process taboos in it’s media? It is a bad thing because when questions are not being asked, because these kinds of questions are people having a truly educational experience. For the culture to not be able to ask questions leads towards a non-educational experience, and that is what is happening in this culture. This stupefies the culture. So “What is it?” is a direct reaction to this culture’s film in content.
The Yap: The story of your (lack of) involvement in the “Back to the Future” sequels is something of a Hollywood legend, and the lawsuit that came about from it is something you’ve said you’re very proud of, where you successfully sued for misappropriating your likeness in the sequel. Can you talk a bit about how that is important to you?
CG: Yes. There was never an agreement reached for me to appear in the sequels to “Back to the Future.” The producers hired another actor, and put prosthetic nose, chin and cheekbones on him to make him look like me, then inter-spliced footage of me from the original film to fool audiences into believing it was me. Because of my lawsuit there are laws in the Screen Actors Guild that make it so no producers, directors, or actors are ever able to do this again. I am proud of standing up for actors rights in that situation.
The Yap: One other thing I’m dying to know: in “Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter” you do a dance that was once a sort of cult favorite of a scene that also became a sort of internet sensation. Do you recall your thought processes in developing that dance? The director said in a DVD commentary for the film that he had no idea what you were going to do and wasn’t sure if you planned or ad-libbed that dance scene.
CG: I asked that they play “Back in Black” by AC/DC when my character puts the record on and asks the girl to dance. That song is not what the audience hears in the film, of course, but that is the song to which I was dancing. Of course the dance is not the standard style of dance for that song. I believe someone has syncopated my dancing with “Back in Black” on You Tube, so people can watch how I was dancing to that song. I was aware that this was an unusual form of dance and felt it would be entertaining within the context of the film.
The Yap: You’re still a fanboy favorite for “eclectic” casting choices whenever a high-profile role opens up that requires a flamboyant or off-the-wall kind of performance (you were an almost overwhelming choice by the fanboy community to play the Joker in “The Dark Knight,” and now many of them are clamoring for you to take the role of the Riddler should it crop up in the next film). How aware are you of how prevalent your name is in fantasy casting like that, and would those sorts of high-profile roles interest you? CG: Yes, I am aware that a lot of people felt I would be good to play that role. I thought Heath Ledger did an excellent job in the role. Certainly if a high-profile role should come along, as it did with “Alice in Wonderland,” I would be happy to play it. Sometimes those experiences work out to be excellent ones like I had in “Alice in Wonderland” and “Hot Tub Time Machine.”