{"id":103036,"date":"2012-02-01T13:39:56","date_gmt":"2012-02-01T18:39:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.prosebeforehos.com\/?p=103036"},"modified":"2012-12-26T20:07:48","modified_gmt":"2012-12-27T01:07:48","slug":"crashing-sundance-the-time-i-made-bruce-willis-mad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.prosebeforehos.com\/cultural-correspondent\/02\/01\/crashing-sundance-the-time-i-made-bruce-willis-mad\/","title":{"rendered":"Crashing Sundance: The Time I Made Bruce Willis Mad"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bruce Willis was mad at me. <\/p>\n

He didn\u2019t say it, but there it was: the trademark steely-eyed scowl. The one that’s reserved for Eastern European villains from the 1980s, masked gimps, and now, apparently, irksome members of the press. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m a good skier,\u201d Bruce Willis growled. \u201cI don\u2019t know what your cousin is talking about.\u201d <\/p>\n

With that, Bruce Willis stomped into the Sundance premiere for Lay The Favorite<\/em>. And I was asked to leave. <\/p>\n

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *<\/strong><\/center><\/p>\n

I lied. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Another slow Tuesday afternoon at work. Another lucrative ESPN.com reading day. Until my buddy James found the complete event guide to Sundance, stocked with parties, times, and, most importantly, contact emails.<\/p>\n

I emailed them all: Playboy, ESPN, The Roots concert organizers. Armed with my real work email and a fake story, I spun my tale:<\/p>\n

I was a writer with *&^%#. Our readers are keenly interested in [Insert company here]\u2019s involvement with Sundance. Could I cover the [insert party here] to relay your firm\u2019s contributions to the arts?<\/em><\/p>\n

Isn\u2019t *&^%# a tech company?<\/em> some of the shrewder publicists asked.<\/p>\n

Well, we\u2019re changing our image\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

Playboy saw through the ruse. The BBC, however, did not. Nor did the PR team for Lay The Favorite<\/em>, a sports betting movie starring Catherine Zeta Jones, Vince Vaughn and Bruce Willis. Or, perhaps, they did but were too desperate.<\/p>\n

\"Lay<\/p>\n

\u201cThis true-life gambling world tale can\u2019t cash in all its chips,\u201d demurred The Hollywood Report amid a flurry of tepid reviews and even worse betting puns. Lay The Favorite was a film\u2014in spite of its constellation of aged stars, or perhaps because of them\u2014in desperate need of a Sundance bump for distribution. The PR team pulled out all the stops: a full-on network blitz, social media bombardment, and a jam-packed Red Carpet premiere. <\/p>\n

In short, they would take anyone. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m super excited. I mean it’s Catherine Zeta Jones!\u201d Jayson cooed. \u201cLooove<\/em> her!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTotally,\u201d I nodded. Part sarcastic. Mostly trying to blend in.<\/p>\n

Jayson loooves<\/em> Catherine Zeta Jones. Jayson is gay. And Jayson is a venerable reporter with an equally venerable Hollywood magazine. <\/p>\n

Jayson represents, as he tells it, the last remaining vanguard of traditional media. A throwback to a kinder, gentler era when \u201coff the record\u201d actually meant \u201coff the record.\u201d He hailed from a time before the sleaze of Perez Hilton and the “gotchas” of TMZ.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose were the days,\u201d a pudgy man with E! credentials reminisced with Jayson. \u201cThose were the days.\u201d<\/p>\n

They prattled on about the latest Sundance buzz. Doughy 40-somethings turned locker-gossiping high schoolers all over again. Except they now gabbed about better bankrolled and better looking jocks. Half an hour of giddy Did you hear?<\/em>\u2019s and hushed You didn\u2019t hear this from me<\/em>\u2019s led to the following conclusions:<\/p>\n

– Bradley Cooper and Zoe Saldana\u2014the girl from Colombiana<\/em>\u2014were \u201cdefinitely an item.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Zoe<\/p>\n

– Spike Lee \u201chas totes lost it.\u201d His Red Hook<\/em> movie was not a sequel to Do The Right Thing<\/em> but rather a preening lecture on race that tried too hard. Lee also torched whatever remaining bridges he had with the studios after ranting they knew “nothing about black people.”<\/p>\n

– And no one could get enough of Safety Not Guaranteed<\/em>, a quirky comedy based on a real Craigslist ad seeking a companion for time travel. \u201cIt\u2019s, like, this year\u2019s Napoleon Dynamite<\/em>,\u201d Jayson mused.<\/p>\n

I was lucky, Jayson beamed. To be in the know<\/em>, you know. <\/p>\n

\u201cTotally,\u201d I nodded again. <\/p>\n

In truth, I pitied them. I was there on a lie. For the free champagne and unpronounceable hors d’oeuvres<\/em>. A mischievous Saturday night at Sundance. But this… this was their lives.<\/p>\n

And they were not alone: legions of bespectacled paparazzi shuffled their feet along the Red Carpet, forever confined to the other side of the velvet rope. Their faces were numb from an afternoon waiting on dilettante A-listers. Their fingers perpetually curled around tape-recorders. Forever hoping that they would, for once, out-scoop TMZ. Their careers were built on living vicariously through the lives of the rich and the famous: a celebrity\u2019s off-hand comment about their lives defined their own.<\/p>\n

Jayson was mopey. The snow fell harder. The stars were an hour late.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo\u2026\u201d I tried to force conversation. \u201cHow many times have you been to Sundance?\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cYou go first.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s my first time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst time, wow. How much do you know about it?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cUmm,\u201d I fumbled, \u201cI saw the Entourage episode.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cReally? What was the plot?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOh, you know\u2026 it\u2019s Entourage. There\u2019s no plot. They\u2019re rich. That\u2019s the plot.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cWell, I\u2019ve been coming here since waaaay<\/em> before Entourage. This is my, let\u2019s see, 19th, I think.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Entourage<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Jayson was there in the early days. The first ones, way back in 1978. When Sundance wasn\u2019t Sundance but the Utah\/US Film Festival. Back when it was in Salt Lake City in August, and a wholly \u201cMade In America\u201d affair. Chock-full of flag-waving jingoism and a rock \u2019em sock \u2018em send-offs to America\u2019s cinematic genius. An escapist fortnight to remind a shell-shocked nation that, yes, the gas station lines were long, stagflation reigned, and President Carter dithered, but we still made damn fine movies (Re: Deliverance<\/a><\/em>, A Streetcar Named Desire<\/a><\/em>, Mean Streets<\/a><\/em>, The Sweet Smell of Success<\/a><\/em>). <\/p>\n

Jayson was there three years later when director Sydney Pollack moved Sundance to Park City in January. It\u2019s Utah, Pollack reckoned. Might as well let the celebrities ski. <\/p>\n

\"Sundance<\/p>\n

Jayson was there in the pre-Jurassic Park<\/a><\/em> days of the early 1990s, his favorite time. Before movies looked like video games and when today\u2019s well-fed studio directors were the hungry auteurs of yesteryear. <\/p>\n

Back when Paul Thomas Anderson was another prickly NYU drop out and Steven Soderbergh had never heard of Ocean\u2019s 11<\/a><\/em>. When some motor-mouthed director with a predilection for blood and feet got his big break with Reservoir Dogs<\/a><\/em>. <\/p>\n

And Jayson was there again, fifteen years later, when the same director\u2014a little heavier, a little more entitled\u2014slapped a cameraman:<\/p>\n