Larry Cohen

by Michael Doyle

  What else comes to mind when you think of The Ambulance?

  One of the funniest things that happened was when we were shooting down by the New York Post building. The Ambulance was a non-union movie and the unions turned up to harass us and prevent us from shooting. They were situated across the street from us and were holding horns and pots and pans. They suddenly started blowing these horns and banging on the pots and pans, and were making this incredible noise. As this was all going on we were just setting up the scene and hadn’t actually started filming anything at this point. When we were finally ready to shoot, the picket line had already exhausted themselves from all their efforts and had stopped their racket. So, we just shot our scene with no clamour or complaints. Despite that, they were still parading around with these signs and everything, and they certainly weren’t going anywhere. So, I approached my daughter, Melissa, and said, “I’m going across the street to join the picket line. I want you to take a picture of me on the picket line, picketing my own movie.” I then walked across the street, picked up a picket sign, and at that moment a bunch of these union guys came striding over towards me. They were giving me the evil eye and said, “Who the hell are you? What are you doing?” I said, “Well, gentlemen, I’m the director of this motion picture and I want you to know that I do sympathize. I think this movie should be shut down, too. Unfortunately, I can’t do it because I’ll get sued. I thought I’d just come over here and demonstrate my support.” I then started marching on the picket line, waving my sign about and shouting. It was a crazy thing to do, but I got a couple of great photographs out of it. It’s amazing to think that I actually got out of there without getting beaten up. I thought, “If this stunt doesn’t work out and they realize I’m putting them on, they might knock me out; or at the very least punch me in the stomach.” Anyway, I just marched back and forth a few times, picketing my own movie, before calmly putting down my sign. I then walked back across the street and continued shooting. You know, my feeling is anything can happen when you are making a picture, and, when it does, you should just embrace it and have fun.

  That means a lot to you, doesn’t it — having fun on a movie set, creating memories and lasting friendships?

  Oh, that’s very important to me. It’s what making movies is all about really, the friendships and associations you form. Another wonderful memory has just come back to me that occurred when we were shooting James’ death scene: it was an incredibly hot summer night in New York City and the heat and humidity was intense. We had already shot part of the scene where James is left to die in the street by the evil ambulance attendants. James was still lying down on the ground and looked very comfortable and content. I asked him, “Hey, what’s it like down there?” He said, “It’s really rather nice. It feels so cool and refreshing; I think I’ll just continue to lie here until they get the next shot set up.” That sounded very appealing to me and so I said, “Okay, move over!” I then lay down beside James in the street and it did feel rather cool and refreshing. We were both laying horizontal in the gutter, in New York City, gazing up at the stars shining in the night sky above us. Then James said, “Well, Larry, here we are, back to our original beginnings!” [Laughs] I then asked our still photographer to take a nice picture of me and James lying in the gutter together. It was wonderful. Those kinds of moments endear you to an actor and endear them to you, because you never forget the small things. They somehow magically transform the experience of making a movie into something more meaningful and worthwhile.

  As Good As Dead (1995)

  Four years after the release of The Ambulance, you briefly returned to making television movies again, writing and directing the thriller, As Good as Dead. Who produced the film and what was it about?

  I made As Good as Dead for The USA Channel, which is a cable channel in the United States owned by Paramount Pictures. The story concerns two girls who become friends. One of them is sick and goes to the emergency room of a hospital, but she hasn’t got insurance. The other girl lets her use her medical insurance card, and so they temporarily swap identities. However, it then turns out that the sick girl’s condition is something very serious and the doctors have to perform a surgery. The sick girl unexpectedly dies after her operation, and now — according to the authorities and official records — the girl who lent her the insurance card is officially dead. She is suddenly scared because she has committed a crime. Obviously, she cannot return to her own place, as all the tenants in her building believe she has died, so she goes back to her dead friend’s apartment. The dead girl’s clothes are there and she has to wear them, which alters her own appearance somewhat. Then it turns out, as the story progresses, that the dead girl was actually murdered in the hospital. Somebody deliberately changed her blood type so that she received the wrong blood and that’s what killed her. That was the premise of the film.

  The two girls, Susan [Crystal Bernard] and Nicole [Traci Lords] [1], meet in a nightclub and become instant friends. Do you think you were stretching credulity somewhat by having Susan willingly commit insurance fraud for somebody she has only just met?

  No, not really. I don’t think the one girl lending the other her insurance card stretches credulity. They go to the hospital emergency room and the girl obviously needs attention because she doesn’t have insurance. They hear the hospital staff turning other people away who don’t have insurance, so she just gives her the card. Susan figures that it will only be a temporary thing and the sick girl will be out of there in just a couple of hours. She doesn’t realize that the situation is going to quickly deteriorate into something far graver. I’d be willing to believe that this kind of thing has happened many times before. I’m sure people have been using other people’s identities for insurance purposes, for medical care and dental care, for years.

  The film was shot in San Diego, correct?

  All of The USA Channel’s movies were shot in San Diego. I don’t know why, but that was their deal. They had an arrangement in San Diego and it wasn’t up to me where they did the picture. We shot the movie in about two and a half weeks, which was the allotted time in which all of these films were shot. I have to be clear on this: As Good as Dead was not a Larry Cohen production. I was just working for a company that was producing movies for cable, one after the other on a regular weekly basis. So, I had to go along with their production people, their cameraman, their editors, and their producers. I didn’t have the prerogative to do what I wanted to do, and I did the best I could under those circumstances. It was a very unpleasant experience, actually. Any picture that I make where I don’t have control of every aspect is an unpleasant experience — with the notable exception of The Ambulance, where the producers were totally supportive.

  Did you enjoy good relations with the cast?

  I didn’t care for Crystal Bernard very much. She was the star of a TV series called Wings [2] and the company that were doing these movies wanted a television name in there. So, they settled on her, but that particular casting choice was not up to me. I had nothing against Crystal; she just didn’t bring anything special to the part. She was merely a competent actress and that was about it. However, I did choose Judge Reinhold to play the murderer. He was a very charming and capable actor, but certainly not in the class of Michael Moriarty. As a matter of fact, I tried some of the same improvisational stuff with him as I had with Moriarty, but Reinhold just fell apart. He simply couldn’t handle it. If you interrupted him during a scene and gave him some new piece of business to do or a new line to say, he got completely flustered. He didn’t have the focus and creativity that Moriarty had. I actually gave Reinhold some tapes of my movies and he was very impressed with Moriarty’s performance in Q and with Eric Roberts’ performance in The Ambulance, but when we tried to experiment a little, as I had done previously with those actors, he couldn’t do it. So, I gave up trying, but Judge was a nice enough fellow. He actually told me he was manic depressive and that on certain days he had bad mood swings. He would apolo
gize for it, but I never noticed anything really negative about him.

  Before As Good as Dead, Reinhold was mostly known for playing comedy roles in films like Beverly Hills Cop, Ruthless People, and Vice Versa. Were you deliberately playing with his benign, goofy image so that the later reveal of his character being a murderous psychopath would have more impact?

  Yes, that’s absolutely correct. We cast him against type.

  Did Traci Lords’ notorious history as a former porn star deter the production company from hiring her in any way?

  Well, time and time again, Traci had been up for various parts in these Movies of the Week at The USA Channel. She always did a great job at the auditions and was often acknowledged as probably being the best one at many of them. Unfortunately, the company never gave her the part due to her previous association with porno movies. They actually told me, “Oh yeah, she’s great, but we would never hire her because she’s done porno.” I said, “Well, she did the best reading, so I’m giving her the part.” Before they could do anything, I told Traci she had the role. Naturally, the company were furious with me. They did not like the fact that I had overstepped them and made my choice, but by that time they couldn’t do anything about it. Traci had already talked to her agent, and I had talked to her agent, and she had been hired. That was it. After all the auditions she had done without any positive results, Traci finally got to do a part — simply because I told her she had the job. I didn’t like the idea that they kept constantly bringing Traci back to do readings with the intention of never hiring her. To me, that seemed utterly futile and a little cruel. Traci did a good job on As Good As Dead and I had a nice time working with her. She was a good little actress, very attractive, friendly, and easy to direct. We had a couple of dinners together and she was an intelligent, professional young woman. There was nothing social about it, or anything between her and me, but I enjoyed her work. I’m glad she was in the film.

  Did the casting of Lords gain any unwanted or negative attention?

  No, not really, but we did have some idiot show up on location one day saying he wanted to meet her. He claimed to have seen every one of Traci’s porno movies. I quickly got him thrown off the set.

  A lot of directors have complained about not always getting an opportunity to supervise and approve the final editing of the TV movies they have shot. Was that also true of your experience on As Dead as Dead?

  I was present in the editing room, but the editor was an extremely obnoxious fellow. He was not my editor; he was the editor that The USA Channel had on the picture. [3] He wasn’t very pleasant at all and certainly wasn’t receptive to any suggestions I made. It seemed to me that he was irritated that I was even there. Of course, there was nothing he could do about it because under the Director’s Guild contract the director gets to make the first cut. So, I was there and I made the first cut. That was pretty much the cut that they then telecast. Again, all in all, As Good A Dead was a deeply disagreeable experience. The producer of the film — whatever his name is — was not particularly pleasant to deal with either.

  In your mind, what sparked this animosity between you and the company?

  Well, one thing was the fact that they were constantly bothering me about shooting schedules: “You have to shoot this! You have to be finished here by twelve o’clock! You have to be finished here by four o’clock!” I didn’t like that kind of thing, because I always finish on schedule or under schedule. All you have to do is leave me alone and I’ll give you a finished picture. I’ll probably even end up saving you some money. But these idiots kept badgering me all the time. As Good as Dead was another example of having a production manager looking over your shoulder and behaving like they are herding cattle. It wasn’t the same thing as being able to make my own movie at my own pace. It was unfortunate that I wasn’t always permitted an opportunity to do the little touches and nuances that dress a picture up and make it a Larry Cohen movie. But you can’t argue with people when they keep hustling you around all the time. You just can’t. If I wanted to do something that was clever or cinematic, they simply wouldn’t go for it. They were only interested in shooting an establishing medium shot, then a couple of over-the-shoulder shots of both actors, and then maybe a close-up, and that was it! You then quickly moved on to the next scene and the next scene, and so on. The USA Channel didn’t need a director to direct these films; they could have been done by a machine. That is not the way I work. I like to work in modified masters; I’ve got moving shots and innovative stuff, and I really get into the scene and have some fun with it. They didn’t want you to do anything but the most basic television coverage. So, I was constantly in conflict with them and half the time I felt like quitting. I mean, things were always just stupidly done.

  Can you give me some examples?

  One example concerns the casting of the girl’s father, which was the top supporting role in the film. The agent called me up and said, “We can get Rod Taylor for this.” Of course, Taylor had been the star of The Birds and several other great features, like The Time Machine. I thought to myself, Oh, I’ll have some fun with him! We can talk about Hitchcock. So, I said to the company, “I’d like to have Rod Taylor for the father.” They said, “Oh no, he wants $10,000 and we don’t want to spend that amount.” I said, “Okay, what kind of money do you want to pay for the actor who plays this part?” They said, “$5,000.” I said, “I tell you what, we’ll get Rod Taylor and you pay him $5,000 and then deduct $5,000 from my salary and pay it to him. It won’t cost you any more money and I’ll cover the difference.” They said, “Oh no, we can’t do that!” “Why can’t you do that?” “No reason, we just can’t do that.” I then said, “Fine, I’ll pay the whole $10,000 for Rod Taylor.” “Oh no, we can’t do that!” Finally I just said, “Okay, if that’s the way it’s got to be, but I don’t understand why you can’t do it.” [Sighs] Once you have a few experiences of dealing with people like that you just say to yourself, “Oh, to hell with it! I’ll just shoot the damn picture the best I can and then get out of there!” I did not want to get fired on another job, and the money was decent, so I decided to just go through it and endure it.

  Did you have to lose a particular shot or scene in As Good As Dead that was especially galling for you?

  Oh, there were some wonderful little touches I’d planned to do. One was to occur when the girl who dies first comes to visit Susan at her home. She rings the doorbell, and it’s a glass door. When Susan comes to answer the door, the girl on the outside plants a kiss on the glass, leaving a big lipstick mark. Later on in the picture, after that girl is dead, Susan briefly returns to the apartment to get some stuff and when she reaches the door she sees the lipstick stain. They are the lips of her dead friend and she reaches up with her finger and traces the lipstick on the glass. It was a very nice piece of business, but they wouldn’t let me do it. Apparently, that would have taken up too much time. I mean, any time I came up with anything clever they didn’t want me to do it. So, what the hell! I just drifted through it as best I could.

  Were you able to sneak in at least one Larry Cohen moment?

  I did come up with a clever ending that was not featured in the original script. Susan has come to a mortuary which is located on a cliff overlooking the ocean. She is going to dispose of the ashes of her dead friend by throwing them into the water. Judge Reinhold then shows up and tries to attack her. She suddenly throws the ashes into his face and he is blinded by the remains of the very girl he murdered. He then stumbles backward and falls over the cliff. So, in effect, the dead girl has brought about her own killer’s death from beyond the grave. I thought that was a clever piece of business and I was able to incorporate that into the movie. So I did have a little fun with it.

  Despite the tensions that surfaced during pre-production, production, and post-production were The USA Channel happy with the finished film?

  I have no idea. As Good as Dead did get some good reviews. I think Variety said it was one of the best of T
he USA Channel movies that had been made, but that wasn’t saying much. Most of them were stinkers.

  I’m assuming there was no offer to come back and helm another movie for them?