National Public Radio, Used With Permission of Terry Gross
October 31st, 1997
Terry Gross: That's Burt Reynolds and Mark Wahlberg in a scene from "Boogie Nights," a new movie about a group of people who make porn films. Reynolds plays a director who's slightly more ambitious than the average X-rated director. He aspires to make movies that people will watch for the story as well as the sex.
Mark Wahlberg plays the well-endowed teenager who, with the help of the director, becomes one of the biggest stars of adult films.
Boogie Nights takes place from 1977 to '84 and chronicles how the business was turned upside-down by cocaine and video. Boogie Nights shared the Toronto Film Festival's top award with "L.A. Confidential." My guest is the screenwriter and director of Boogie Nights, Paul Thomas Anderson. Although he's only 27, this is his second feature film. His first, "Hard Eight," was set in the world of casino gambling.
Friday, October 31, 1997
Interview: "Boogie Man: Roughcut Q&A"
Roughcut Q&A, Written By David Poland
October 30, 1997
Paul Thomas Anderson grew up in California's San Fernando Valley with a father well-known for his on-screen appearances. No, not THAT kind of on-screen work. Paul's dad was Ernie Anderson, Cleveland's most beloved horror movie host. As a TV personality, Anderson was the first guy on the block to have a VCR, which allowed the young Paul to immerse himself in movies, pornographic and otherwise. By the age of 22, Paul's love affair with film took him to the Sundance Film Festival with his short film, Cigarettes and Coffee. He was then invited to join the Sundance Filmmaker's Workshop where he developed his first feature, Sydney AKA Hard Eight starring Philip Baker Hall, John C. Reilly and Gwyneth Paltrow. Now, at 27, his second feature, Boogie Nights has left Anderson Tarantino-hot and well on his way to a long, successful directing career. Rough Cut's David Poland caught up with Anderson in Los Angeles, a week before Boogie Nights premiered at the New York Film Festival.
>> You were 26 years old when you shot this film. How could you know about the sexy '70s?
I was 7 when the movie begins and 14 when the movie ends. Maybe it is a twisted sort of version of my childhood. Because I grew up in the valley. And I had brothers and sisters who were going through this stuff. It wasn't like I said, "I want to make a movie set in the '70s and we'll use all this cool music." It was just icing on the cake. Moving into the early '80s was kind of, pick your headband and I'll have the Capezios.
October 30, 1997
Paul Thomas Anderson grew up in California's San Fernando Valley with a father well-known for his on-screen appearances. No, not THAT kind of on-screen work. Paul's dad was Ernie Anderson, Cleveland's most beloved horror movie host. As a TV personality, Anderson was the first guy on the block to have a VCR, which allowed the young Paul to immerse himself in movies, pornographic and otherwise. By the age of 22, Paul's love affair with film took him to the Sundance Film Festival with his short film, Cigarettes and Coffee. He was then invited to join the Sundance Filmmaker's Workshop where he developed his first feature, Sydney AKA Hard Eight starring Philip Baker Hall, John C. Reilly and Gwyneth Paltrow. Now, at 27, his second feature, Boogie Nights has left Anderson Tarantino-hot and well on his way to a long, successful directing career. Rough Cut's David Poland caught up with Anderson in Los Angeles, a week before Boogie Nights premiered at the New York Film Festival.
>> You were 26 years old when you shot this film. How could you know about the sexy '70s?
I was 7 when the movie begins and 14 when the movie ends. Maybe it is a twisted sort of version of my childhood. Because I grew up in the valley. And I had brothers and sisters who were going through this stuff. It wasn't like I said, "I want to make a movie set in the '70s and we'll use all this cool music." It was just icing on the cake. Moving into the early '80s was kind of, pick your headband and I'll have the Capezios.
Thursday, October 30, 1997
Interview: "Boogie's Young Creator Had Plenty Of Homework To Do"
Detroit News, Written By Susan Stark
October 30th, 1997
Producer, director and screenwriter Paul Thomas Anderson was all of 7 years old in 1977, a vintage year for the porn film troupe whose '70s adventures and '80s misadventures he chronicles in Boogie Nights.
Yet Anderson says he has firsthand memories of the particular gestalt of the era in California's San Fernando Valley, where he grew up, where the film is set and where the porn industry still thrives.
"I remember how things looked," Anderson says by phone from Los Angeles. "And I can remember at 10 or 11 knowing how porno films looked. My dad was one of the first guys on the block to have a VCR."
October 30th, 1997
Producer, director and screenwriter Paul Thomas Anderson was all of 7 years old in 1977, a vintage year for the porn film troupe whose '70s adventures and '80s misadventures he chronicles in Boogie Nights.
Yet Anderson says he has firsthand memories of the particular gestalt of the era in California's San Fernando Valley, where he grew up, where the film is set and where the porn industry still thrives.
"I remember how things looked," Anderson says by phone from Los Angeles. "And I can remember at 10 or 11 knowing how porno films looked. My dad was one of the first guys on the block to have a VCR."
Interview: Charlie Rose Show Transcript
Charlie Rose: At age 17, filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson made a mock documentary about the life of a porn film star. Ten years and $15 million later, Anderson's project has become Boogie Nights.
CR: Boogie Nights is being compared to films by Martin Scorsese, Robert Altman and Quentin Tarantino, and was called "the most seductive cautionary tale ever made" by the New Yorker. Joining me now, filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson, and I am pleased to have him here to talk about this film and the extraordinary attention being devoted to an independent film. Welcome.
PTA: Thank you.
CR: Boogie Nights is being compared to films by Martin Scorsese, Robert Altman and Quentin Tarantino, and was called "the most seductive cautionary tale ever made" by the New Yorker. Joining me now, filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson, and I am pleased to have him here to talk about this film and the extraordinary attention being devoted to an independent film. Welcome.
PTA: Thank you.
Interview: IndieWire, New York Film Festival
IndieWire.Com, Written By Mark Rabinowitz
October 30th, 1997
At the '97 New York Film Festival press conference for his new film Boogie Nights, writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson commented on the 157 minute length of the film: "You're paying more, you should get more.", and the now notorious "dick shot" at the end of the film: "I wasn't going to subject you to 157 minutes without showing it to you." Needless to say, Anderson doesn't take himself too seriously, but his film is a serious look at the porn industry in America, bridging the late 70's and early 80's and is a study in the rise and fall of an extended "family" of actors and their poppa figure, director Jack Horner (Burt Reynolds).
About as polished and accomplished as a second film by a 27-year old can be, Boogie Nights features standout performances by Mark Wahlberg, Philip Seymour Hoffman and an Oscar caliber turn by Burt Reynolds, and it marks Wahlberg and helmer Anderson as serious talents to watch. Several days later we got together at his hotel suite in New York to further delve into the world of Boogie Nights.
>> It's a pretty big jump from Sundance to the New York Film Festival (NYFF) with your second feature, isn't it?
October 30th, 1997
At the '97 New York Film Festival press conference for his new film Boogie Nights, writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson commented on the 157 minute length of the film: "You're paying more, you should get more.", and the now notorious "dick shot" at the end of the film: "I wasn't going to subject you to 157 minutes without showing it to you." Needless to say, Anderson doesn't take himself too seriously, but his film is a serious look at the porn industry in America, bridging the late 70's and early 80's and is a study in the rise and fall of an extended "family" of actors and their poppa figure, director Jack Horner (Burt Reynolds).
About as polished and accomplished as a second film by a 27-year old can be, Boogie Nights features standout performances by Mark Wahlberg, Philip Seymour Hoffman and an Oscar caliber turn by Burt Reynolds, and it marks Wahlberg and helmer Anderson as serious talents to watch. Several days later we got together at his hotel suite in New York to further delve into the world of Boogie Nights.
>> It's a pretty big jump from Sundance to the New York Film Festival (NYFF) with your second feature, isn't it?
Monday, October 27, 1997
Interview: "Porn Tale Has Moral Overtone"
Now Magazine, Written By John Harkness
October 16th, 1997
With a single small film under his belt, little seen but highly regarded Hard Eight writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson wants to paint on a broader canvas. Which brings us to Boogie Nights, co-winner of the Critics' Award at the Toronto International Film Festival, a film that sprawls across almost a decade in the life of the L.A. porn industry from the late 70s to the mid-80s.
Anderson is all of 27, so there is no autobiographical element in this film.
In a room at the Sheraton Centre during the film festival, he says, "I'm from the Valley, which may explain a few things." Well, a few -- the San Fernando Valley, over the mountains from L.A., is home to the porn industry.
October 16th, 1997
With a single small film under his belt, little seen but highly regarded Hard Eight writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson wants to paint on a broader canvas. Which brings us to Boogie Nights, co-winner of the Critics' Award at the Toronto International Film Festival, a film that sprawls across almost a decade in the life of the L.A. porn industry from the late 70s to the mid-80s.
Anderson is all of 27, so there is no autobiographical element in this film.
In a room at the Sheraton Centre during the film festival, he says, "I'm from the Valley, which may explain a few things." Well, a few -- the San Fernando Valley, over the mountains from L.A., is home to the porn industry.
Sunday, October 26, 1997
Interview: "Boogie Oogie"
Premiere Magazine, UK - Written By Glenn Kenny
October ??, 1997
How the stars and director of Boogie Nights created an audacious epic about the world of '70s porn
"You can't say it's not about porn, " insists writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson of his new movie Boogie Nights, an ambitious tale set in the late-'70s/early - '80s world of hardcore porn. And he's right, but it seems reductive to say the movie is just about porn. Sure, there's sex, and naturally, since it's the '70's, there are drugs, and, again, since its the '70s, there are synthetic fibres and disco and ELO; and there are the timeless topics the movie tackles, such as family, community, losing your mind, getting it up, not getting it up, and a lot more. Boogie Nights is a film about the '70s that could have been made in the '70s, an era of exuberant Hollywood risk taking. It will have funny stuff, gross stuff, tragic stuff. None of which is conveyed by the phrase "about porn."
So why did the 26-year-old Anderson choose this milieu? It's hard to get a fix on that. You can tell a lot about a man by where he drinks; for a few pint with his Boogie Nights lead, Mark Wahlberg, Anderson picks a place on Third Street in LA called St Nicks. The atmosphere here can be best described as Bukowski-lite: kind of seedy but with little actual menace. Hell, it's just around the corner from the Beverly Center Mall. And in a near-by booth, in a blur of cell phones and ponytails and loud orders to the bar, what appears to be an informal pitch meeting is taking place. This depresses Anderson. "God, I should never have left Studio City, " he says, referring to the place where he grew up, in relative affluence (his father was one of the top voiceover artists in the business).
October ??, 1997
How the stars and director of Boogie Nights created an audacious epic about the world of '70s porn
"You can't say it's not about porn, " insists writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson of his new movie Boogie Nights, an ambitious tale set in the late-'70s/early - '80s world of hardcore porn. And he's right, but it seems reductive to say the movie is just about porn. Sure, there's sex, and naturally, since it's the '70's, there are drugs, and, again, since its the '70s, there are synthetic fibres and disco and ELO; and there are the timeless topics the movie tackles, such as family, community, losing your mind, getting it up, not getting it up, and a lot more. Boogie Nights is a film about the '70s that could have been made in the '70s, an era of exuberant Hollywood risk taking. It will have funny stuff, gross stuff, tragic stuff. None of which is conveyed by the phrase "about porn."
So why did the 26-year-old Anderson choose this milieu? It's hard to get a fix on that. You can tell a lot about a man by where he drinks; for a few pint with his Boogie Nights lead, Mark Wahlberg, Anderson picks a place on Third Street in LA called St Nicks. The atmosphere here can be best described as Bukowski-lite: kind of seedy but with little actual menace. Hell, it's just around the corner from the Beverly Center Mall. And in a near-by booth, in a blur of cell phones and ponytails and loud orders to the bar, what appears to be an informal pitch meeting is taking place. This depresses Anderson. "God, I should never have left Studio City, " he says, referring to the place where he grew up, in relative affluence (his father was one of the top voiceover artists in the business).
Interview: "Naked Talent"
Interview With Paul Thomas Anderson
By Jeff Simon, Buffalo News - October 26th, 1997
With Boogie Nights -- A movie about the porn industry - Paul Thomas Anderson shows off his startling skills as a director
Sometime after the millennium, we'll all know who the great emergent young American filmmaker of the sensation-mongering '90s was. All we can see now are two major candidates: 34-year-old Quentin Tarantino, the brilliant but detestably influential director of "Reservoir Dogs" and "Pulp Fiction"; and 27-year-old Paul Thomas Anderson, whose bold, sweet and extraordinary film "Boogie Nights" opens Friday.
By Jeff Simon, Buffalo News - October 26th, 1997
With Boogie Nights -- A movie about the porn industry - Paul Thomas Anderson shows off his startling skills as a director
Sometime after the millennium, we'll all know who the great emergent young American filmmaker of the sensation-mongering '90s was. All we can see now are two major candidates: 34-year-old Quentin Tarantino, the brilliant but detestably influential director of "Reservoir Dogs" and "Pulp Fiction"; and 27-year-old Paul Thomas Anderson, whose bold, sweet and extraordinary film "Boogie Nights" opens Friday.
Saturday, October 25, 1997
Interview: "Boogie Beat Putting Director In The Groove
Hollywood Reporter, Written By Martin Grove
October ??, 1997
"Boogie" business: With New Line's "Boogie Nights" having grossed about $150,000 through Thursday night at two theaters in New York in just five days, it's clearly a winner as it widens today to 30 theaters in 18 markets.
Written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, "Boogie" was produced by Anderson, Lloyd Levin, John Lyons and Joanne Sellar with Lawrence Gordon executive producing. It stars Mark Wahlberg, Burt Reynolds and Julianne Moore. The film, which New Line is distributing worldwide, cost only $15.5 million to make. It expands again Oct. 24 and goes wide Oct. 31 to about 1,000 more theaters.
"Paul's agent John Lesher (of UTA) called me and said he had this script he thought New Line, in particular, would respond to. He hadn't submitted it anywhere else. He's got pretty good taste, so I read it and just decided from that point that we should do the movie," Michael De Luca, president and chief operating officer of New Line Prods., told me.
October ??, 1997
"Boogie" business: With New Line's "Boogie Nights" having grossed about $150,000 through Thursday night at two theaters in New York in just five days, it's clearly a winner as it widens today to 30 theaters in 18 markets.
Written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, "Boogie" was produced by Anderson, Lloyd Levin, John Lyons and Joanne Sellar with Lawrence Gordon executive producing. It stars Mark Wahlberg, Burt Reynolds and Julianne Moore. The film, which New Line is distributing worldwide, cost only $15.5 million to make. It expands again Oct. 24 and goes wide Oct. 31 to about 1,000 more theaters.
"Paul's agent John Lesher (of UTA) called me and said he had this script he thought New Line, in particular, would respond to. He hadn't submitted it anywhere else. He's got pretty good taste, so I read it and just decided from that point that we should do the movie," Michael De Luca, president and chief operating officer of New Line Prods., told me.
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