Production Diaries:
June 2004
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HUNDREDS GATHER TO PAY TRIBUTE TO THE LATE MAKO IWAMATSU IN CAGES!
Wed, 14 Nov 2007
A SPECIAL TRIBUTE SCREENING OF MAKO!
Tue, 16 Oct 2007
Perles Acquires Cages Distribution!
Wed, 01 Aug 2007
"CAGES" RUNS 4TH WEEK IN THEATRES!
Fri, 13 Apr 2007
IT'S MY TURN TO FLY!
Mon, 09 Apr 2007
"CAGES" SURPRISES MANY AS IT ENTERS THIRD WEEKEND IN THEATRES!
Fri, 06 Apr 2007
"CAGES" ENTERS THIRD WEEK IN THEATRES!
Tue, 03 Apr 2007
LOYAL FOLLOWING TO THANK, AS "CAGES" ENTERS THIRD WEEK IN THEATRES!
Mon, 02 Apr 2007
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Matt Holland on the Making of Cages: PART THREE - A
09/21/04
Matt Holland on the making of "Cages.” Casting
Along Came Zelda
Graham has parties. Due, perhaps exclusively, to the limited parking at the end of our street, I'm always invited. I typically don't know anyone there. But it was always a sure bet that I can drink heavily and stagger home without worrying about a head-on collision, at least not one involving my car.
One weekend, my then boyfriend Jim, was visiting from New York. (To my mortification, in the writing of these essays, I have become unsettlingly aware that I have gone through no less than five relationships between the first draft and Graham's leaving for Singapore.) I'm currently exploring that in therapy which, regrettably, may be a bit late for Jim, Josh, Mike, Jerry and whoever's name I'm forgetting. Not unlike making that film award acceptance speech, it seems nearly impossible to remember everybody by name.
Jim was a big cheese with one of the record labels. Even though he was on the corporate side-a suit-his big job somehow portended that he possessed some sort of possible clout for either the acquisition of talent or the possible financing of Graham's movie. When Jim was in town, Graham would host Jim and me at his house. A lot.
By this time, the script was more or less in final form. Although Jim and I were going to some corporate obligatory party one Saturday night, Graham corralled us to stop by his house for a cocktail party already in progress. Graham had that uncanny ability to, despite otherwise entertaining forty people, be outside his front door to greet and drag a potential money guy into his front door. It's a talent most frequently associated with bomb-sniffing dogs.
The party, like all of Graham's party's, looked like a Benneton ad. There were people from, I don't know, fifteen different countries and the median age seemed to be between that of Ashton Kutcher or Brandy, neither of whom I could pick out in lineup. For all I know, they may have been there. Jim and I made our way to the coffee table Island, covered with sushi and Belgian chocolates.
En route, martini in hand, I passed Zelda Reubenstein who I had spotted when I came into the house. I knew she and Graham were friends as she was a frequently mentioned participant in weekly Sunday Chinatown dim sum outings. "Zelda and Danny Glover are coming," Graham might say before I declined the invitation. Eleven o'clock in the morning is too early for me to make coherent conversation with strangers or to eat anything deep fried, particularly if I'm not sure what it is.
Zelda came up to about my sternum as I passed her in the hallway. I politely acknowledged her. She beckoned me to lean down, which I did.
"Do we know each other?" She asked in an untenably high-pitched voice.
"No," I said. "But Graham has mentioned you before. My name is Matt. Pleased to meet you."
"I can swear I've met you before. And I said to myself the first time I saw you 'someday we'll dance."
"I'm sure I'd remember. I know who you are. And dancing is not out of the question."
I dismissed the possibility the Zelda could have seen me in my short-lived, failed modeling career, appearing on the cover of "Insurance Today" magazine or on the back page of US News and World Reports sporting a Madonna-style wireless telephone earpiece. "It's possible we may have been at the same movie party, if you go to those things." I said.
"That's probably it. I have a really good memory for faces."
"Come meet my friend, Jim." I introduced the two and Jim later revealed himself to be a starstruck schoolgirl, despite his regularly meeting with corporate billionaires. When he would tell me blandly about his day, I'd say: "That's like business section porn!" He didn't get the joke, although that never discouraged me from repeating it, at least once, every day.
...to be continued...
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