Last Exit shooting script
OH MY GOD! I went to check my mail today and there was a package from my buddy Jem Cohen.
It was Jem’s shooting script from the movie Last Exit To Brooklyn. Jem was a prop guy on the shoot, and this is his slightly tattered script. (It’s in amazing shape for something that was handled daily for months in 1988 and then stored.)
Jem is interviewed in our film Hubert Selby Jr: It/ll Be Better Tomorrow. On the set of Last Exit, Jem hung out with Hubert Selby, who wrote the book the movie was based on, and was impressed with how humble and sweet Selby was, in contrast with what one might expect from a writer on a large Hollywood set.
When I opened the package from Jem, I was literally trembling a little as soon as I saw what it was. I am not one to fetishize objects, and I am not easily star struck, but I kinda felt like, well, maybe not a Christian handling the Holy Grail, but at least like an archaeologist being handed an amazing specimen that ties together all the work of three years.
The script, written by Desmond Nakano (who is also interviewed in our film) has wonderfully poetic descriptions in the setting and action. They were faithfully rendered by director Uli Edel (also in our film), but it’s amazing to read the actual words on the page.
Jem also sent his crew T-shirt from the set, along with a postcard that said “Dig it Dean, official ancient crew T-shirt too. Don’t be freaked out by the stains. It’s just movie blood!”
Thank you Jem! This is all like Christmas in March for me. Even better.
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(funny self-indulgent side note: The wife and I recently had an essay contest on our podcast to give away our script for the Plump Buffet podiobook with our hand-written notes on it. The woman wrote us and told us she was trembling when she got our e-mail saying she’d won.
(Not to compare our little podiobook story in any way to Last Exit…..I thought it was quaint that the lady was so excited, because I looked at our script as something that had been useful and was no longer useful once we were done, and was a little amazed that she was so happy about it. I was listening to that exact part of our podcast on headphones as I stood in line at the post office. When I opened Jem’s parcel, I knew exactly how she felt.)
March 4th, 2008 at 11:33 am
Nice!
March 4th, 2008 at 10:25 pm
thats a nice find youve got there boy!
watch last exit last night for the first time which was a thrill.
so you framed it or what?
March 18th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
That was an incredible movie - saw it at a theatre near De Paul U. when it first came out. The script notes for the actors’ copies would be especially interesting, trying to convey the sense of the Selby novel.
March 29th, 2008 at 5:06 am
yeah what a truly kind soul jem was to give that thing to you guys and in turn how kind of you to give it to someone else….and also…you would have to bleed at some point making a movie like that one, it only seems right and natural!