Alex Kustanovich (3)
ACT III -->
HORTON: So getting back to Frye. That was, like, a fantasy world.
KUSTANOVICH: That's right.
H: This guy shows up in L.A. -- the next day he goes to a party, and he has a script . . .
K: Well, not the next day. It was some other day. But I don't remember which day it was. I mean, he used to live in L.A. --
H: So, within a week or two . . . or a few days --
K: Within a week or two or something like that . . . he goes to a party and shows his script to a guy who was a cinematographer of some sort.
Anyway, that's what he told me.
He shows it to him.
That cinematographer says, 'Y'know what . . . it's pretty good. I'm going to show it to somebody I know.'
He showed it to somebody he knows. A week later . . . or two weeks later . . . whatever . . . I don't remember what exactly the time [frame] was --
He gets a call from David Dworski. He says, 'Listen. I really like the script.'
Now . . . David Dworski had some clients . . . no one famous, really. Just a medium-sized or medium-to-lower-sized agent . . . with an agency, y'know?
And he said, 'We have to make some changes. There's, like, a change in shift and tone . . . shift in mood. We've gotta work on that and this.'
So they did . . . and a month and a half later . . . Jonathan Demme buys the script.
H: Okay, so . . . that sorta inspired you to keep on writing or wanting to pursue screenwriting -- possibly . . . is that what happened?
K: That is correct.
H: So you had worked with Yuri on PLUS MINUS . . .
K: PLUS MINUS, that's right. I gave PLUS MINUS to David Dworksi. Frye was very good about . . . y'know, sharing his success. Unlike some other people we know.
So he called up Dworski and said, 'Listen. A friend of mine wrote a script. I haven't read it. But he's a friend of mine . . . so why don't you read it?'
I went to Dworski's place in Mailbu . . . gave it to him. He read it, and he wasn't crazy about it at all. He said, 'There's some nice moments, but I'm not crazy about it. But why don't you take my . . . pitching seminar?'
His pitching seminar was one hundred and fifty bucks.
Anyway, so I figured, 'Listen. I can not get a job as an editor, okay? I always wanted to write. Might as well continue.' I figured, 'Listen, y'know. You're not gonna be Kurt Vonnegut or Norman Mailer . . . because maybe your English's not good enough. But you are a storyteller. And, y'know, the prose that you write for screenplays . . . does not have to be that great . . . as long as you can tell a story . . .'
So I said, 'Okay.'
So I applied to UCLA . . . no sorry. I applied to AFI.
Because my friend, Yuri . . . who by that time had come to L.A. from New York, too . . . as a director . . . [well] wanted to be a director . . . applied to AFI . . . a year before me.
So he went a year before me . . . [and] I was working as a waiter at this Russian restaurant . . .
H: Wait. Yuri went to AFI?
K: Yuri went to AFI for a year, right.
H: For one year?
K: For a year.
He didn't get asked back. Y'know, they usually have to ask the directors to come back.
H: Oh, I see, okay.
K: And he wasn't asked back.
H: So, you applied to AFI and . . .
K: I applied to AFI and got into AFI. At AFI I wrote some more short films . . . two of which got made at AFI. One was called: ALL THE LITTLE DETAILS. And the other was called: THE KING AND IVAN . . . which later became a feature script at UCLA.
H: So, someone else shot those shorts. Not you, but someone else . . .
K: Yes, someone else, right. They had departments at AFI. They had a screenwriting department, directing department, a photography department . . .
H: Okay. How long were you at AFI?
K: For a year.
H: One year?
K: For a year . . . because . . . while I was at AFI, it was very expensive. [It] was, like . . . eleven thousand a year or something like that . . . or even more.
H: Eleven thousand a year?
K: Yeah, something like that. I had to take all the loans, y'know, a lot of 'em. And then I applied to UCLA . . .
H: And what did you think about AFI . . . as far as . . .
K: I liked AFI a lot. I did. But I knew it was not going to help me in any way.
H: Okay.
K: 'Cause . . . old teachers mostly. They're good . . . but old teachers. I liked the students . . . I mean, all the people in my class . . . until this day . . . I keep in touch with all of them, all of them. And that is something I can't say about my UCLA class, unfortunately.
Although I had more fun . . . well . . . maybe not true . . . as much fun . . . at UCLA than I did at AFI.
H: Now, was AFI better than NYU or was NYU better than AFI or . . .
K: Um . . . what I say is not going to be fair because . . .
H: It's apples and oranges or something?
K: No, no. It's just because I was just more acclimated to this culture. I was more permeated with the American sense of cinema . . .
H: So AFI . . .
K: . . . at AFI.
H: You connected better with AFI.
K: I connected better at AFI.
H: It's probably just a different attitude . . . it's a different type of system there than . . .
K: [It's] attitude. And at NYU I was still an outsider.
H: Okay.
K: I'd be the kind of guy who'd wear Jordache Jeans to school . . . really, cool, y'know? Nobody would wear those things to school. I mean, I had no idea where I was at.
And it was too sad because I could've had a great time at NYU. And I just didn't utilize my time properly. I did not . . .
H: Well . . . you probably still [were] culturally acclimating into . . .
K: That's right. I was acclimating, culturally . . .
H: There's a bit of, as you know, in any sort of academic setting . . . especially in an intense program . . . there's all this . . . y'know . . . snobbery . . .
K: Right.
H: . . . 'in' crowd and 'out' crowd . . . and it's always a struggle.
K: Right. I must say that, that sometimes I . . . when I look back on my life . . . and I say to myself: 'Y'know, I should've been someone else. I mean, I'm at this age, and I don't have a family, and I don't have a steady job . . .
And I blame the professors . . . and not fairly . . . I'm just, y'know . . . [it's] kind of an emotional response to it.
I blame the professors from NYU, AFI, and UCLA . . . Lew Hunter, of whom is one . . . for encouraging me to continue to write. Because if they hadn't encouraged me, I would've probably changed professions . . . and now been a banker or who knows WHAT!
I'm not complaining, y'know, that I'm in the film business, but I'm just saying . . . I very often think that I wouldn't . . .
H: But I think that's very common for a lot of people because the business is such a hard struggle . . .
K: Right.
H: . . . and it's so hard to get in the door . . . [so] that's not an uncommon opinion . . . in that a lot of writers have said the same thing.
K: Yeah, my thing is, for some reason . . . my mind works through this thing . . . is wired very badly in a way . . . because I think that . . . until I have financial security, I can not really look for a serious realtionship.
Therefore -- I remain alone . . . go on this bogus date . . . and hope that some day . . . and then this day [is] . . . y'know, who knows when.
Y'know, I'm already seriously pushing forty, and, y'know, living in this expensive town. Spending every single penny that I make . . .
Anyway, but that's . . .
H: So, you were at AFI . . . you had your degree from NYU, and you were starting to make some connections or had some connections . . .
K: Right.
H: . . . in the business. Now . . . were you also trying to get an agent during all this time period?
K: I was not trying to get an agent . . . simply because I didn't have a good script.
H: Well, that was very intelligent on your part because most wannabes foolishly try to go out and get an agent, and they don't have anything good to shop anyway.
K: Right. No, no. I knew that I didn't want to shoot my wad . . . at that time. I knew . . . that was the time . . . the year was '88, '89 . . . ten years ago. And that was the time the big sales started to happen by young people.
Big sales.
Like, there was a famous sale -- HELL BENT AND BACK. That was a big sale . . . for a million dollars.
There was [another] big sale called: THE TICKING MAN.
H: I have that script.
K: Bruce Willis was supposed to be in it. It sold for a million dollars . . . [then] went into turnaround.
H: And Shane Black had come out of UCLA and . . .
K: And Shane Black had come out of UCLA, and they made a big splash with LETHAL WEAPON . . . so it was a time [I told myself] -- 'No, no. I'm gonna write a good script first, and then I'm gonna . . .'
H: So, that sort of gave you direction to go to UCLA . . .
K: I wanted to be closer to . . .
AFI is a trade school. It's a school where people who work in the industry come and . . . upgrade their training. Y'know, kind or resharpen their tools, as it were.
And I wanted to be more in an academic setting . . . where people from the industry actually participate in [the process].
There's a lot of people in the industry at AFI, too, by the way . . . but not . . .
To tell you the truth . . . I wanted to go to UCLA because it was cheaper.
H: But, I would assume, it had some sort of prestige in your concept at that time.
K: Yes, it did. It did. That's right. Because a lot of people knew about UCLA film school, and very few knew about AFI.
H: Okay.
K: [And] I was lucky enough to get a full scholarship to UCLA my first year.
H: And that's unheard of 'cause they don't give but, like, one or two of those anyway.
K: They give two a year. One to a continuing student . . . one to an incoming [student]. I was just lucky. I was just always lucky with scholarships . . .
And maybe because -- I don't know why. Maybe because I was at AFI . . . because I went to NYU . . . and because of my Russian background. [But] I don't think I mentioned my Russian background on my letter . . .
H: Well, you had a 3.8 out of NYU and a fairly good short.
[And] I think, from what I could tell, Lew liked the short and . . .
K: He liked the short, and Lew also, I'm sure . . . liked THE KING AND IVAN which was a short script that I'd written at NYU . . . and at AFI . . . the short movie . . .
H: Well, Alex, you know, I mean . . . it takes so long to develop the potential and the craft that . . . people don't look at exactly what you're doing in the present time, they're looking at what you can develop into . . . your potential . . .
K: Right.
H: And trying to forecast potential is not easy, but, y'know, after years and years of trying . . . people say: 'Well, that person . . . may not be up to a high level right now, but they're showing good potential, and maybe they'll get there one day.'
K: Yeah, and you know what? I'll tell you. I blew it. I blew it. I . . . after UCLA . . . I should've stayed in L.A. -- and I should've continued mining that vein . . . that actually gave me some money from Israel. Those Israeli guys and others.
I, instead, decided I wanted to become a family man. And I thought that my life was a dress rehearsal.
So I moved to New York for four and a half years. And I lost all of my contacts . . . and [then] I came back here . . . [and] I had nothing except my own friends.
So that was a big, big mistake on my part. I could've continued from New York, too.
You could live in Paris. My friend who wrote SOMETHING WILD . . .
H: Well, hindsight's easy. I mean, you just . . . y'know . . . it's just such a . . . tyring to figure out . . . it's a financial pressure . . .
K: Right. A lot of different things, yes.
H: It's very complicated . . . trying to pick and choose . . .
K: So now . . . now, y'know, knowing that most of the writers right now who get hired . . . are under 30 . . . y'know, I feel a little over the hill, not to destroy your night . . . because I know that you're older than me.
But it doesn't matter.
I mean, we're both in the same boat because . . . after 30 . . . it has already become a struggle.
Unless, of course . . . you write a good script.
H: Well, I mean, I understand the concept . . . but the truth of it is . . . a lot of the young guys can't write a script. But if they have a great script, and they're young . . . that's just the whole package that they love, obviously.
K: Yeah, right.
H: But . . . if they're young, and they can't write a good script, WHO CARES, Y'KNOW?
K: I agree with you.
H: Y'know -- and if you're old, and you can write a great script . . . WHO CARES . . . I mean, y'know . . . so . . .
K: You may not get a job . . .
(The tape ends.)
(To read ACT IV --> click on --> "Alex Kustanovich (4)" below.)
< (c) 1999 >
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
HORTON: So getting back to Frye. That was, like, a fantasy world.
KUSTANOVICH: That's right.
H: This guy shows up in L.A. -- the next day he goes to a party, and he has a script . . .
K: Well, not the next day. It was some other day. But I don't remember which day it was. I mean, he used to live in L.A. --
H: So, within a week or two . . . or a few days --
K: Within a week or two or something like that . . . he goes to a party and shows his script to a guy who was a cinematographer of some sort.
Anyway, that's what he told me.
He shows it to him.
That cinematographer says, 'Y'know what . . . it's pretty good. I'm going to show it to somebody I know.'
He showed it to somebody he knows. A week later . . . or two weeks later . . . whatever . . . I don't remember what exactly the time [frame] was --
He gets a call from David Dworski. He says, 'Listen. I really like the script.'
Now . . . David Dworski had some clients . . . no one famous, really. Just a medium-sized or medium-to-lower-sized agent . . . with an agency, y'know?
And he said, 'We have to make some changes. There's, like, a change in shift and tone . . . shift in mood. We've gotta work on that and this.'
So they did . . . and a month and a half later . . . Jonathan Demme buys the script.
H: Okay, so . . . that sorta inspired you to keep on writing or wanting to pursue screenwriting -- possibly . . . is that what happened?
K: That is correct.
H: So you had worked with Yuri on PLUS MINUS . . .
K: PLUS MINUS, that's right. I gave PLUS MINUS to David Dworksi. Frye was very good about . . . y'know, sharing his success. Unlike some other people we know.
So he called up Dworski and said, 'Listen. A friend of mine wrote a script. I haven't read it. But he's a friend of mine . . . so why don't you read it?'
I went to Dworski's place in Mailbu . . . gave it to him. He read it, and he wasn't crazy about it at all. He said, 'There's some nice moments, but I'm not crazy about it. But why don't you take my . . . pitching seminar?'
His pitching seminar was one hundred and fifty bucks.
Anyway, so I figured, 'Listen. I can not get a job as an editor, okay? I always wanted to write. Might as well continue.' I figured, 'Listen, y'know. You're not gonna be Kurt Vonnegut or Norman Mailer . . . because maybe your English's not good enough. But you are a storyteller. And, y'know, the prose that you write for screenplays . . . does not have to be that great . . . as long as you can tell a story . . .'
So I said, 'Okay.'
So I applied to UCLA . . . no sorry. I applied to AFI.
Because my friend, Yuri . . . who by that time had come to L.A. from New York, too . . . as a director . . . [well] wanted to be a director . . . applied to AFI . . . a year before me.
So he went a year before me . . . [and] I was working as a waiter at this Russian restaurant . . .
H: Wait. Yuri went to AFI?
K: Yuri went to AFI for a year, right.
H: For one year?
K: For a year.
He didn't get asked back. Y'know, they usually have to ask the directors to come back.
H: Oh, I see, okay.
K: And he wasn't asked back.
H: So, you applied to AFI and . . .
K: I applied to AFI and got into AFI. At AFI I wrote some more short films . . . two of which got made at AFI. One was called: ALL THE LITTLE DETAILS. And the other was called: THE KING AND IVAN . . . which later became a feature script at UCLA.
H: So, someone else shot those shorts. Not you, but someone else . . .
K: Yes, someone else, right. They had departments at AFI. They had a screenwriting department, directing department, a photography department . . .
H: Okay. How long were you at AFI?
K: For a year.
H: One year?
K: For a year . . . because . . . while I was at AFI, it was very expensive. [It] was, like . . . eleven thousand a year or something like that . . . or even more.
H: Eleven thousand a year?
K: Yeah, something like that. I had to take all the loans, y'know, a lot of 'em. And then I applied to UCLA . . .
H: And what did you think about AFI . . . as far as . . .
K: I liked AFI a lot. I did. But I knew it was not going to help me in any way.
H: Okay.
K: 'Cause . . . old teachers mostly. They're good . . . but old teachers. I liked the students . . . I mean, all the people in my class . . . until this day . . . I keep in touch with all of them, all of them. And that is something I can't say about my UCLA class, unfortunately.
Although I had more fun . . . well . . . maybe not true . . . as much fun . . . at UCLA than I did at AFI.
H: Now, was AFI better than NYU or was NYU better than AFI or . . .
K: Um . . . what I say is not going to be fair because . . .
H: It's apples and oranges or something?
K: No, no. It's just because I was just more acclimated to this culture. I was more permeated with the American sense of cinema . . .
H: So AFI . . .
K: . . . at AFI.
H: You connected better with AFI.
K: I connected better at AFI.
H: It's probably just a different attitude . . . it's a different type of system there than . . .
K: [It's] attitude. And at NYU I was still an outsider.
H: Okay.
K: I'd be the kind of guy who'd wear Jordache Jeans to school . . . really, cool, y'know? Nobody would wear those things to school. I mean, I had no idea where I was at.
And it was too sad because I could've had a great time at NYU. And I just didn't utilize my time properly. I did not . . .
H: Well . . . you probably still [were] culturally acclimating into . . .
K: That's right. I was acclimating, culturally . . .
H: There's a bit of, as you know, in any sort of academic setting . . . especially in an intense program . . . there's all this . . . y'know . . . snobbery . . .
K: Right.
H: . . . 'in' crowd and 'out' crowd . . . and it's always a struggle.
K: Right. I must say that, that sometimes I . . . when I look back on my life . . . and I say to myself: 'Y'know, I should've been someone else. I mean, I'm at this age, and I don't have a family, and I don't have a steady job . . .
And I blame the professors . . . and not fairly . . . I'm just, y'know . . . [it's] kind of an emotional response to it.
I blame the professors from NYU, AFI, and UCLA . . . Lew Hunter, of whom is one . . . for encouraging me to continue to write. Because if they hadn't encouraged me, I would've probably changed professions . . . and now been a banker or who knows WHAT!
I'm not complaining, y'know, that I'm in the film business, but I'm just saying . . . I very often think that I wouldn't . . .
H: But I think that's very common for a lot of people because the business is such a hard struggle . . .
K: Right.
H: . . . and it's so hard to get in the door . . . [so] that's not an uncommon opinion . . . in that a lot of writers have said the same thing.
K: Yeah, my thing is, for some reason . . . my mind works through this thing . . . is wired very badly in a way . . . because I think that . . . until I have financial security, I can not really look for a serious realtionship.
Therefore -- I remain alone . . . go on this bogus date . . . and hope that some day . . . and then this day [is] . . . y'know, who knows when.
Y'know, I'm already seriously pushing forty, and, y'know, living in this expensive town. Spending every single penny that I make . . .
Anyway, but that's . . .
H: So, you were at AFI . . . you had your degree from NYU, and you were starting to make some connections or had some connections . . .
K: Right.
H: . . . in the business. Now . . . were you also trying to get an agent during all this time period?
K: I was not trying to get an agent . . . simply because I didn't have a good script.
H: Well, that was very intelligent on your part because most wannabes foolishly try to go out and get an agent, and they don't have anything good to shop anyway.
K: Right. No, no. I knew that I didn't want to shoot my wad . . . at that time. I knew . . . that was the time . . . the year was '88, '89 . . . ten years ago. And that was the time the big sales started to happen by young people.
Big sales.
Like, there was a famous sale -- HELL BENT AND BACK. That was a big sale . . . for a million dollars.
There was [another] big sale called: THE TICKING MAN.
H: I have that script.
K: Bruce Willis was supposed to be in it. It sold for a million dollars . . . [then] went into turnaround.
H: And Shane Black had come out of UCLA and . . .
K: And Shane Black had come out of UCLA, and they made a big splash with LETHAL WEAPON . . . so it was a time [I told myself] -- 'No, no. I'm gonna write a good script first, and then I'm gonna . . .'
H: So, that sort of gave you direction to go to UCLA . . .
K: I wanted to be closer to . . .
AFI is a trade school. It's a school where people who work in the industry come and . . . upgrade their training. Y'know, kind or resharpen their tools, as it were.
And I wanted to be more in an academic setting . . . where people from the industry actually participate in [the process].
There's a lot of people in the industry at AFI, too, by the way . . . but not . . .
To tell you the truth . . . I wanted to go to UCLA because it was cheaper.
H: But, I would assume, it had some sort of prestige in your concept at that time.
K: Yes, it did. It did. That's right. Because a lot of people knew about UCLA film school, and very few knew about AFI.
H: Okay.
K: [And] I was lucky enough to get a full scholarship to UCLA my first year.
H: And that's unheard of 'cause they don't give but, like, one or two of those anyway.
K: They give two a year. One to a continuing student . . . one to an incoming [student]. I was just lucky. I was just always lucky with scholarships . . .
And maybe because -- I don't know why. Maybe because I was at AFI . . . because I went to NYU . . . and because of my Russian background. [But] I don't think I mentioned my Russian background on my letter . . .
H: Well, you had a 3.8 out of NYU and a fairly good short.
[And] I think, from what I could tell, Lew liked the short and . . .
K: He liked the short, and Lew also, I'm sure . . . liked THE KING AND IVAN which was a short script that I'd written at NYU . . . and at AFI . . . the short movie . . .
H: Well, Alex, you know, I mean . . . it takes so long to develop the potential and the craft that . . . people don't look at exactly what you're doing in the present time, they're looking at what you can develop into . . . your potential . . .
K: Right.
H: And trying to forecast potential is not easy, but, y'know, after years and years of trying . . . people say: 'Well, that person . . . may not be up to a high level right now, but they're showing good potential, and maybe they'll get there one day.'
K: Yeah, and you know what? I'll tell you. I blew it. I blew it. I . . . after UCLA . . . I should've stayed in L.A. -- and I should've continued mining that vein . . . that actually gave me some money from Israel. Those Israeli guys and others.
I, instead, decided I wanted to become a family man. And I thought that my life was a dress rehearsal.
So I moved to New York for four and a half years. And I lost all of my contacts . . . and [then] I came back here . . . [and] I had nothing except my own friends.
So that was a big, big mistake on my part. I could've continued from New York, too.
You could live in Paris. My friend who wrote SOMETHING WILD . . .
H: Well, hindsight's easy. I mean, you just . . . y'know . . . it's just such a . . . tyring to figure out . . . it's a financial pressure . . .
K: Right. A lot of different things, yes.
H: It's very complicated . . . trying to pick and choose . . .
K: So now . . . now, y'know, knowing that most of the writers right now who get hired . . . are under 30 . . . y'know, I feel a little over the hill, not to destroy your night . . . because I know that you're older than me.
But it doesn't matter.
I mean, we're both in the same boat because . . . after 30 . . . it has already become a struggle.
Unless, of course . . . you write a good script.
H: Well, I mean, I understand the concept . . . but the truth of it is . . . a lot of the young guys can't write a script. But if they have a great script, and they're young . . . that's just the whole package that they love, obviously.
K: Yeah, right.
H: But . . . if they're young, and they can't write a good script, WHO CARES, Y'KNOW?
K: I agree with you.
H: Y'know -- and if you're old, and you can write a great script . . . WHO CARES . . . I mean, y'know . . . so . . .
K: You may not get a job . . .
(The tape ends.)
(To read ACT IV --> click on --> "Alex Kustanovich (4)" below.)
< (c) 1999 >
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
