Although now considered a cult classic, one of John CusackJames's most underrated films nearly ended in disaster, as his co-star recalls. The Golden Globe nominee first broke into the world of coming-of-age films in the '80s, appearing in everything from John Hughes' Sixteen candles for her teen romantic comedy-drama debut Say anything…. In the years since, Cusack has expanded his talents to a wide variety of genres, including the action thriller co-starring Nicolas Cage. Air conditioningthe Stephen King adaptation 1408 and the blockbuster disaster thriller 2012.
In addition to this on-screen work, Cusack has always been a key figure behind the camera in his films, including co-writing and producing several of his projects. Some of his most notable include the 2000 film adaptation of High fidelitywhich earned him a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy, and Hot Tub Time Machine. His first stint as a writer and producer, however, proved to be one of his most difficult.
Grosse Pointe Blank almost collapsed due to the film's script
Cusack pulled some strings to get the Hitman comedy on the right track
Likewise, having found himself a decade removed from the world of high school stories, Cusack found himself introduced to a twist on the genre in Grosse Pointe in white. Cusack led the cast as Martin Blank, a disillusioned killer who returns to his hometown for his 10-year high school reunion, where he reconnects with his high school sweetheart while also determining what to do with his life. . Also starring Minnie Driver, Dan Aykroyd and Alan Arkin, Grosse Pointe in white it received largely positive reviews from critics and was a modest box office success, gaining a cult following in the following years.
During a recent appearance on This Life of Mine… with James CordenDriver reflected on his time working on Grosse Pointe in white. The star began by recalling how she was hooked by “this great idea“of the killer returning to his high school reunion, although she, Cusack and many others felt the “the script is not that good“presenting a problem at the beginning of filming:
So now we are doing [Grosse Pointe Blank] and the script isn't that good, and everyone knows the script isn't that good (really). It's a great idea. Hitman returns to his 10-year high school reunion and reconnects with the girl he dumped when he disappeared to become a hitman. And we needed to shoot the movie, so we shot it for a couple of days, and I remember it wasn't really disastrous, but it just wasn't funny. And it wasn't working the way I think [John Cusack] I knew I could.
Driver goes on to reveal that Cusack, hoping to save the film, turned to then-Disney studio head Joe Roth with the idea of ​​improvising a week of filming and seeing if that approach would work better, which director George Armitage was “forced to agree“. She went on to tell how Cusack, DV DeVincentis and Steve Pink met with her to get started “bouncy ideas“on improving the script, especially Martin and Debi's first scenes:
So he went to Joe Roth, who was then head of Disney, and said, “Can we just wing it? Can you give us a week and watch the dailies and tell me if you don't think it's great? And George Armitage, who was the director, bless his heart, was kind of, I think, forced to go along with it. So we were all in Venice, at New Crime or in a hotel in Pasadena, and it was DV DeVincentis and Steve Pink, who were John's co-writers on Grosse Pointe Blank, and me. We sat there exchanging ideas and thinking: “Okay, this is what’s going to happen. This is the beginning of the scene. Martin Blank goes to Debbie's house. We need to show that there is this history between the two, and she can't make things easy for him, and it must be hot. So what's that like? We improve everything.
Driver would end his reflection with the reminder that there was many days of production where they worked on the script pages”hot from the press“but that despite the obstacles, she felt part of “a revolution in the way you make films“, referencing some other independent films from the era where creative teams had to figure out how to put their stories together on the fly. Check out the rest of what Driver shared in the quote and video below:
There would be these pages that were still hot in the press and we would [do] the next day, and there was this immediacy and this piracy in the way we were doing it. It seemed like we were going to catch fire every day, but that wasn't what happened. And it got funnier and funnier and more and more rooted in the insanity of the story. I did Sleepers, Big Night and Circle Of Friends before that. That was kind of a revolution in the way you make films. And I knew this was in a bubble, and I probably wouldn't make a movie like this again because it was like a runaway train. It was incredible.
Our Take on Grosse Pointe Blank Production Hurdles
Cusack's intervention was the right decision
While an actor asserting creative control over one of his projects doesn't always work, Cusack does it for Grosse Pointe in white it actually proved to be beneficial to the film. The concept requires a pretty deft hand to balance its comedy with its drama, and Driver's note that the original script wasn't all that funny really could have led to its demise. However, considering Grosse Pointe in white It often tops many lists of Cusack's best films, including mine, and was a critical success at the time, he and his creative team clearly did a great job of saving the big idea.