Tuesday, October 15, 1996
FILM:
Veteran indie-film actor Steve Buscemi makes debut as director
in ‘Trees Lounge’By Emily Forster
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
Some people are better at keeping secrets than others.
Independent-film actor Steve Buscemi, for example, has serious
problems in the secrets department. In his early days, he tried to
keep his acting from friends and co-workers, but failed
miserably.
"When I first took the job (as a firefighter in New York City),
I didn’t want to tell any of the guys that I had any interest in
acting," recalls Buscemi. "But I heard about this crazy guy in
Engine 24 (of the fire department) who did movies. He rode a
motorcycle and he lived in the Village, and you could tell he was a
definite outsider on the job. Everybody loved him, but he wasn’t
your typical married, living-in-Staten Island type of guy.
"When I met him and told him I lived in the east Village, he
totally busted me. He was like ‘What do you do? There’s some reason
you’re living in that neighborhood.’ And then he got me involved in
a theater group he was working in and then everybody knew."
Buscemi’s secret is out. After his role as Mr. Pink in Quentin
Tarantino’s "Reservoir Dogs," Buscemi began to collect a cult-like
following. And now there are several bizarre but oddly likable
roles in films like the Coen brothers’ "Fargo" and the upcoming
Robert Altman film "Kansas City" that Buscemi can boast about. But
he doesn’t boast, self-congratulate, or even easily accept a
compliment concerning his directorial and writing debut in his new
film "Trees Lounge."
Slumped in a chair at a trendy restaurant/bar facing Wilshire
Boulevard, Buscemi’s subdued voice competes with blaring sirens and
roaring traffic in the Beverly Hills business district. The New
York native is in town to promote his efforts in writing, directing
and starring in "Trees Lounge," a movie based on how Buscemi
imagines what his life would be like without acting. The difference
between main character Tommy Basilio and the real life Buscemi is
that Basilio has no career and no direction. He hangs out at local
bar, Trees Lounge (proving the film with a title), drives an ice
cream truck with no other money-making options, and struggles to be
a responsible adult.
As principal promoter of his film, Buscemi appears weighed down.
His rumpled beige shirt adds to the actor’s almost vampiric pallor,
and with his bulging eyes glazed and his small frame sagging, the
interview process seems to be killing him.
But doing press is easier than making a film. After seven months
dedicated to writing the script, Buscemi spent over three years
attempting to pull together a meager $1 million for production.
Although the process was frustrating, like doing interviews, he
accepts that it is a necessary sacrifice for his film.
"What the hell else am I gonna do?" asks Buscemi. "You have
something that you want to do, you try to see it through. My only
fear was that by the time I got the money, the material wouldn’t be
fresh to me anymore. And in fact when we did get the money I
started to really look at the script and rewrite it a little bit
just to make it new again for myself. But also the script needed
work. There always seems to be room for improvement."
Part of the script’s freshness came from Buscemi’s use of actual
life experiences. With his extremely eclectic life, he was able to
draw on characters and experiences as a stand-up comedian,
firefighter and, of course, ice cream truck driver.
"I’ve worked with so many great guys. Especially in the fire
department, they were really character studies. Very funny guys,"
Buscemi laughs, his snaggled teeth poking through his uneven smile.
"I’ve been very lucky. I’ve had a lot of interesting jobs that I’m
grateful for because I think it’s good for writers to have some
real-life experiences."
Some of those personal adventures were more influential to
"Trees Lounge" than others. Driving an ice cream truck, for
example, is depicted in the film as relaxing, but dull. And from
the way Buscemi describes his own feelings about selling ice cream
to kids in the suburbs, it is clear that he had no problem
translating this personal experience into a cinematic one.
"It’s long hours to really make any kind of money at it,"
remembers Buscemi. "You really have to work six or seven days from
morning ’til night. But I really do get along well with kids, and
that was fun. But sometimes it would get boring if business wasn’t
good and sometimes it got lonely."
Jobs he has taken and people he has studied are not the only
influences that have affected "Trees Lounge." Although Buscemi has
generally worked with renowned directors like Martin Scorsese and
Tarantino, he has followed directing examples from various
filmmakers in order to make a movie unique from films by those who
directed him.
"I’ve been influenced by a lot of people," says Buscemi. "I love
Scorsese as a filmmaker but I think his world and Tarantino’s world
are not what I am going for. What I like about them is they make
character-driven genre films. But for what I wanted to do, it
didn’t fall into a genre. It’s just really slice of life. And so
Cassavetes and films like ‘Fat City’ and ‘Wise Blood,’ they just
have more of a similar feel for what I was after."
Buscemi did emulate Tarantino in terms of amassing an eclectic
cast. The colorful group rages from Samuel L. Jackson, Daniel
Baldwin (of the Alec, Billy and Stephen clan) and Debi Mazar to
Buscemi’s brother, father and son. Buscemi does not chalk up these
casting calls to nepotism alone. He feels that he was as entitled
to put in his family members as he was to cast Jackson, Baldwin and
Mazar.
"In the case of my brother, he’s an actor and I’ve always wanted
to work with him," explains Buscemi. "I thought, ‘Why wait for
somebody else to give us the opportunity to work together?’ I
decided I should just do that myself. My father didn’t have a
speaking role. I just wanted to put him in there because he’s in a
funeral scene where it’s all Tommy’s family, so who better than to
have my father to give it that authenticity? And my son, I just
wanted to involve him. I asked him if he wanted to do it and he
said, ‘ya.’ It wasn’t something I wanted to force upon him but when
you do a film like this you don’t get to see your family much, so I
took advantage of any time I could get them on set."
Buscemi will have more of a chance to see his family on his next
project. Relinquishing any directorial efforts, he will play a
convict in Simon West’s "Con Air" with Nicholas Cage.
"I don’t think I can do a better job than what Simon West is
doing," says Buscemi. "He’s really got his hands full. It’s a
relief not to have that responsibility. It’s not my film, it’s his,
so I can just enjoy acting. If I want to direct again, then I’ll do
it."
It’s no surprise that Buscemi is secretive about future
directing desires. With his "Trees Lounge" script, similar to his
acting, he did not want anyone to know about it.
"I was very tentatively showing the script around because I was
very intimidated by the idea of directing," admits Buscemi. "I was
hesitant about it until Stanley Tucci, we’re good friends from
acting together, he called me one day and said that he had a
screenplay. He was doing a reading of it, and asked if I would do
the reading.
"It was when I did his reading that I thought, ‘This is similar
in feel to what I’m trying to do.’ It was really inspiring to me
that somebody else was trying to get something very personal made
in a character-driven film. So I showed him my script, but before
that I was tentative even to show my good friends this thing that I
had written."
Buscemi attributes his reluctance to talk about his acting and
directing partially to his roots. As it is clearly depicted in
"Trees Lounge," Buscemi’s home town of Stream Valley is a typically
blue-collar community.
"In the beginning they probably thought that I was a little bit
crazy for wanting to pursue my career," says Buscemi. "People there
had been supportive. They used to come see me when I was doing
plays and they get a big kick out of seeing me on TV or in the
films. But in the beginning it wasn’t something that I felt very
comfortable telling anybody about because the suburbs, in Long
Island anyway, are just not very conducive to anything cultural or
creative. That’s a shame but that’s the way it is."
There will be a free screening of "Trees Lounge" in Ackerman at
8:30 p.m. The film opens this Friday.
Orion Pictures
(r.) Steve Buscemi and (l.) Bronson Dudley contemplate life at
Trees Lounge.Orion Pictures
Steve Buscemi and Debi Mazar see their lives cross in his
directorial debut, "Trees Lounge."Orion Pictures
Steve Buscemi sips java on the set of "Tree Lounge."