It doesn’t take much work to make an awful movie, but it does take a considerable amount of effort to make something to monumentally terrible that it becomes a beloved, cult classic. Tommy Wiseau knows this firsthand as the director of the infamous “The Room,” and now the story of how it happened is getting brought to life by none other than James Franco. Not only does he play the oddball director, but he helmed the film too, and apparently went a bit method on set.
“Franco directed the whole movie in character as Tommy Wiseau,” co-star Jason Mantzoukas told EW. “Well, I should amend that — he wasn’t in character as Tommy Wiseau, but once he started the day doing Tommy’s voice, he would spend the rest of the day doing the voice. So, it wasn’t like he was pretending to be Tommy, but it was like James using Tommy’s speech pattern and accent. It was really special and very funny.”
Indeed, the high wire movie came out of a work-in-progress screening at SXSW with considerable buzz, and now has unlikely awards season release date. Here’s the official synopsis:
A delightful tribute to the joy and madness of making movies, The Disaster Artist follows the outrageous adventures of eccentric filmmaker Tommy Wiseau and his best friend, actor Greg Sestero. These two endearing misfits move to L.A. and try to live the Hollywood dream by making their very own feature film, but end up embarking on a wildly unpredictable and hilariously unforgettable production. Leading to one of the most infamous, bizarre, and beloved midnight movies of all time, The Room.
“The Disaster Artist” opens on December 1st in limited release and goes wide on December 8th.
