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Your new movie is called Moonlight
Orchids. In a few words, what is it about?
The Moonlight Orchids is about a ruthless, mean producer who is casting
a young pretty actress for his new
horror movie - but actually he is more interested in having sex with the
actress than to hire her.
The
film is quite a departure from your usual output. What were the
inspirations for this film?
Not
really. I was involved in many projects as a writer, producer or director.
I started with a comedy,
Eine
Kerze für Kaiser Wilhelm made by German network SDR and directed by
Frank Strecker, a very
good
actor and director, long before I started making Unhappy End!
and The 7
Nightmares Girl all around
the
world. But UE and things like
T7NG of course get more noticed.
Kim Baldwin, Katja Bienert, Lloyd Kaufman |
The
inspiration for The Moonlight
Orchids: Lots of things I have heard and
seen. Katja once told me she
met
an actress during Cannes Filmfestival and the actress was very happy, just
returning from an audition
with
a famous producer and she glady told Katie, the auditon went very well,
SHE ONLY HAD TO DO A
BLOW
JOB !!! Hurrah for Horrorwood!
Moonlight
Orchids' two stars, Lloyd Kaufman and Kim Baldwin, are credited
with co-writing the film. How big was their actual input, and was their
dialogue scripted or improvised? I wrote a 7 page outline
and Lloyd and Kim actually improvised, it was great.
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Kim
Baldwin |
A few words about your
cast: What can you tell us about Kim Baldwin?
Kim
Baldwin is an US actress who worked in NY and LA, she had smaller and
bigger parts in soaps and
Baywatch
and some movies.
Rolf Eden with Lloyd Kaufman, Juliane
Wallensteig |
What about
German icon Rolf Eden?
Rolf
Eden is always perfect, polite and uncomplicated. You just can always
count on him. He played in many
movies
before and he is also very good as a singer and piano player. I hope we
can do a musical number one day. He allowed us several times to shoot with his Rolls Royce cars. I
love that.
And then there's of course Troma-legend
Lloyd Kaufman: He is known to do cameos in pretty much every other
independent film (including your own The
7 Nightmares Girl 2), but how did you get him to play your lead?
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Lloyd Kaufman |
I
met Lloyd several times during film festivals and other occasions in LA
and also in Berlin and we chatted. I think he was disgusted when he first
watched Unhappy End! and did not talk to me again for a long time. Only
when I offered him two
snickers chocolate bars for the part of Wénke's dad in The 7 Nightmares
Girl he could not longer resist. How
easy or difficult was Lloyd Kaufman the actor to work with, and being a
director himself, did he in any way try to interfere with your work?
It's
amazingly easy to work with Lloyd. He is very experienced and he doesn't
need my direction. If he does, he asks me and I tell. Lloyd believes a
director should be in charge of the movie, not the actor, so when he is in
as an actor, he IS an
actor
and totally ignores that he himself knows more about filmmaking than the
director he is just working with.
This
shows how great Lloyd really is and I am very grateful he works with us.
In
Moonlight Orchids
Lloyd Kaufman plays pretty much a mean caricature of himself. Did he at all
have a problem with this? No, not at all. Lloyd is above
such feelings. For Lloyd the movie is the only important thing.
Michael Huck, Lloyd Kaufman |
During the movie, Kaufman is
plugging Troma-products
almost endlessly. Whose idea was this? Lloyd's of course. Do you see your
directorial style at all influenced by Lloyd Kaufman and what I would call
the Troma
house-style? I am sure influenced by Lloyd and his wisdom,
of course you noticed that working on The Moonlight
Orchids is something
different for me and Lloyd. I think Lloyd's friend and Marvel
legend Stan
Lee always asked to do more mainstream, something Lloyd and I usually
never really want to do. However working together, we are moving more and
more into mainstream direction, I fear.
The 64 Dollar question is of course: Where
is Moonlight Orchids
available from? You can order it from me, we also have a
contract with a distribution company which will sell it through internet and
mobile platforms and Amazon. I think you also can order it from Troma, if
you need NTSC copies.
As mentioned above, Moonlight
Orchids is quite a departure from your usual product. Are you
planning to make more dark comedies in the forseeable future? Indeed
we are planning a crazy dark comedy about the Parrot of Dr. Goebbels. No
stupid jokes, really intelligent comedy and action Lubitsch-Wilder style.
I love Lubitsch's To Be Or Not To Be. It's a great movie. And such a
great Propaganda! I think I watched it a dozen times before I noticed
Lubtisch totally ignored Stalin invading Poland!!! It's not mentioned
once in the whole movie. Jack Benny was great.
Do
you find a difference in approach between comedies just as Moonlight
Orchids and the (bondage) thrillers you are more known for?
From
technical point of view no. From an acting point of view comedy is much more difficult. I
think The Moonlight
Orchids is considered a comedy because Lloyd is in it
and the way he acts. If we did the same story, absolutely same dialogue
with
Robert
De Niro, I think it would be considered a drama. I have seen this often.
Watch Barefoot in the Park with
Redford,
Jane Fonda and the wonderful Charles Boyer and it's great comedy, watch
the same story done by a German cast and it's not funny at all (German TV
actually did shoot a German version with a very good cast many years ago, but it did
not work).
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Your
favourite comedies, comedy actors and comedy directors?
Millions:
Mr Hobbs Takes a Vaction, Heaven Can Wait, Bluebeards Eigth
Wife, Design
for Living, To Be Or not To Be,
Das
Haus in Montevideo, Hokuspokus, Napoleon ist an allem Schuld (the Curt
Goetz version), Ariane - Love in the Afternoon, Bringing up
Baby, I was
a Male War Bride, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Irma la Douce,
Bel Ami (by W.
Forst),
Der
Florentinerhut and Die Feuerzangenbowle with H. Rühmann, Der Weiße Traum
by Geza von Cziffra, Hellzapoppin,
It's
a Mad, Mad World, Arsenic and Old Lace, The Double Life of Walter
Mitty,
The Court Jester, Houseboat.
Actors:
James Stewart, Cary Grant, Charlie Chase, Charles Chaplin, Maurice
Chevalier, Maureen O'Hara, Lucille Ball,
Fran
Drescher, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis.
Directors: Lubitsch,
Billy Wilder, Howard Hawks, Geza von Cziffra, W. Forst, Curt Goetz
Any
future projects you'd like to talk about? We are shooting
new episodes for The 7 Nightmares Girl in Vancouver and Vienna. Anything else
I've forgotten to ask and you are just dying to mention?
I
do not know if I ever mentioned this, but I think we need more Kaiser
Wilhelm memorials in Germany. And
Tansania.
Actually everywhere...
Thanks
for the interview!
Pictures from The Moonlight
Orchids copyright 2010 by Diana Beppler
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