From crazy idea to the Oscars: The journey of 'Crash'
By Mark Caro
ribune entertainment reporter
All five of this year's best picture nominees are underdog stories (even Steven Spielberg's "Munich" was a risky proposition, as is being borne out at the box office), but none took such a long, unlikely path to the Oscars as "Crash."Here's a movie that no studio or independent distributor wanted to make and few wanted to pick up once it actually was finished. This racism-themed ensemble drama was a surprise box office hit after its release at the cusp of the summer blockbuster season, but it had received little end-of-the-year awards attention until a few days in early January catapulted it into the thick of the Oscar race."Crash" wound up receiving six Oscar nominations and is widely thought to be the chief rival of "Brokeback Mountain" for the top prize."It is the little movie that could," said LA Weekly movie critic Scott Foundas, tipping his hat to a movie he despised so thoroughly that Roger Ebert, who named "Crash" the year's best film, wrote a column specifically to tear into Foundas' criticisms that the movie is didactic and exploits racial stereotypes.When it comes to "Crash," the passions are as overheated off the screen as on -- and passion is what earns a film Oscar nominations and statuettes.Cynthia Swartz, a principal in the public relations firm The Dart Group, said Lionsgate hired her and her colleagues to consult on the movie's Oscar campaign back in June."The intention was always to go for best picture," said Swartz, who used to coordinate Miramax's highly effective Oscar efforts. "One week, four academy members I know said to me, 'I loved "Crash." I loved that movie.' When you see passion like that, that's when you go, OK, maybe we have something here."Lionsgate President Tom Ortenberg said he also thought of "Crash" as an Oscar contender from the moment he first saw its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2004.So everyone's a genius now, but the movie world thought a lot less about the film's prospects back when director/co-writer Paul Haggis was spending years trying to get it made.Haggis, 52, was a Los Angeles-based television writer and producer, having worked on series such as "The Facts of Life," "Due South," "EZ Streets" and "Family Law.""I came up with the idea early 2000," he said. "I started at 2 o'clock in the morning, and at 10 in the morning I had the entire story. I didn't think it was a movie, though. I thought it was a television series. I didn't know what the hell it was. I pitched it to a couple of networks, and they didn't have any interest in it."That first effort included the carjacking that had happened to him and his ex-wife 10 years earlier; the story about an African-American director (ultimately played by Terrence Howard) dealing with racial stereotyping ("something I witnessed on a studio lot"); and the white racist cop (Matt Dillon), who was inspired by "a piece of hate mail I received while doing a television show.""It was just things I'd been gathering," Haggis said. "I'd been really intrigued that year about how you affect strangers without knowing it. You and I are driving down the street. You cut me off. I flip you the finger. You go right. I go left. What happens to you?"Nothing happened with Haggis' initial pitch, so he moved onto another project that wound up taking an equally circuitous route to Oscar glory. "I optioned `Million Dollar Baby' and took eight or nine months to write that," he said.Afterward he called his friend Bobby Moresco, showed him the "Crash" treatment and the two got to work."We wrote the script very quick, in a couple of weeks," Moresco recalled while in Chicago preparing for last week's opening of his play "The Way of the Wiseguy" at the Chicago Center for the Performing Arts.Hearing the wordsThey took the script to Moresco's Los Angeles theater company, the Actor's Gym, to hear the actors read it aloud, then finished another draft in a couple of weeks. "That gave us the script pretty much that we shot," Moresco said.Now all they needed was for someone to finance the filming."All the studios turned it down pretty quickly," Haggis said. "All the smaller studios turned it down. All the independent producers turned it down."Finally, their agent got the script to Bob Yari, a producer starting his own production company. Yari agreed to make the movie -- after more than a year of discussions. The main condition was that Haggis, who was determined to direct "Crash," had to assemble a name cast to guarantee the movie's bankability.The breakthrough came in early 2003, when they got the script to Don Cheadle, and he agreed to co-star and more. "I asked him to produce it with us because I thought he'd be a really good guiding hand on this project, and he'd be able to attract other really good actors because everybody wants to work with Don," Haggis said.So the rest of the cast came together: Dillon, Howard, Sandra Bullock, Thandie Newton, Ryan Phillippe, Larenz Tate, Chris "Ludacris" Bridges, Jennifer Esposito, Tony Danza -- and still they didn't have the green light."It wasn't until we had Brendan Fraser that we could get financing -- even with Sandy Bullock," Haggis said.Ortenberg's Lionsgate was one of the companies that gave "Crash" a pass. "We loved [the script], but we thought it was very execution based," he said.Translation: It would take a talented director to film such a dense, challenging script, and Haggis was too big of a question mark.But Lionsgate got a second chance at the Toronto festival and bought the film the morning after its premiere, edging out a couple of other interested parties. Ortenberg, who professed surprise "that there wasn't a fierce, all-out bidding war," said his company paid $3.3 million for its North American rights (theatrical, home video, television).Haggis hoped to get "Crash" into theaters by the end of the year (when it would have been competing with "Million Dollar Baby"). Instead, Lionsgate opted to wait till the following May so it would have more time to mount a publicity campaign."Our feeling was `Crash' will be an awards-contending film no matter what time of year we release it in, and there was no reason to rush it out in the fall if we weren't ready," Ortenberg said. "And we didn't feel like we needed awards for the movie to be a success."He was right. When "Crash" finally came out, it received mostly positive reviews -- with some notable exceptions. Ebert gave it 4 stars, the Tribune's Michael Wilmington 3 1/2, and Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly (who's no pushover), wrote, "The stunning, must-see drama `Crash' is proof that words have not lost the ability to shock in our anesthetized society."Surprise successAudiences fell in with the majority viewpoint, and "Crash" became one of the summer's sleeper hits, grossing $55.4 million in North America. Since its December home video release, it has sold more than $4 million worth of DVDs, Ortenberg said.The key to its success, many agree, is that it provokes viewers to inject themselves into the movie's racially charged situations so they examine their own prejudices and discuss them."I think any movie that gets people arguing and talking after the movie stays with people and has an effect on them, and `Crash' did that," said Tom Rosenberg, who produced "Million Dollar Baby" as well as the upcoming Haggis-scripted comedy "The Last Kiss."As the movie took off, Lionsgate hired Swartz and crew and set its sights on Oscar, despite Haggis' professed misgivings. "Six months ago, probably in September, Lionsgate said, `We're going to go for best picture,'" the director recalled, "and I said, `Don't humiliate me. Don't take out ads like that because that's just embarrassing. We're not going to get it. We might get something for the actors.'"Haggis' prediction appeared accurate as "Crash" seemed barely on the awards radar toward the end of the year. It received just two Golden Globe nominations, for the screenplay and Dillon as supporting actor, and Ebert's top ranking aside (and a subsequent Chicago Film Critics Association best picture award), it wasn't a mainstay of many critics' top-10 lists.In the Village Voice's year-end poll of 100-plus North American critics, "Crash" ranked 66th among the 2005 releases, behind "Jarhead" and ahead of "March of the Penguins." Among the other best picture nominees, "Brokeback Mountain" was No. 11, "Good Night, and Good Luck." No. 13, "Capote" No. 16 and "Munich" No. 31. ("A History of Violence" was No. 1.)Yet when guild nominations were announced in early January, "Crash" cleaned up, snagging nods from the Directors Guild (historically the most reliable best picture Oscar predictor), the Screen Actors Guild (for its ensemble cast plus Cheadle and Dillon for best supporting actor), the Producers Guild, Writers Guild and American Cinema Editors.Suddenly "Crash" was a shoo-in Oscar nominee.The key strategic move, many agree, was that Lionsgate turned the perceived disadvantage of its May release date into an advantage: Because the film was out on DVD, the distributor could send copies to guild and academy members without fears of piracy, unlike those companies campaigning movies still in the theaters.Lionsgate initially mailed out about 30,000 DVDs to those doing the nominating for the various guilds (aside from the directors, who don't allow screeners). Once "Crash" received those nominations, the company sent out more DVDs, most notably to the remaining 90,000 SAG members who could vote on the final awards.All in all, Lionsgate distributed 130,000 DVDs -- and "Crash" won the top SAG prize. Given that actors make up the largest academy branch, the mailings also no doubt helped the movie's Oscar prospects."That is the biggest voting bloc, and it's a real actors' film," said Sony Pictures Classics Co-President Tom Bernard, whose company distributed the best picture nominee "Capote." "The fact that they revealed that they sent out 130,000 DVDs certainly helped them. When I saw that, I thought, OK, they've got a heck of a shot."Now, Ortenberg said, the strategy is to get any remaining academy member stragglers to see the film and otherwise to remind everyone else how much they liked it. "We're using the tag line: `"Crash," remember how it made you feel?'" he said.To Haggis, who was nominated last year for his "Million Dollar Baby" screenplay, this whirlwind end to this improbable journey is mind-boggling."I love it," he said. "I'm not going to say I don't. But it's hard to comprehend."
----------mcaro@tribune.comRead Mark Caro's blog, Pop Machine, at chicagotribune.com/popmachine.
ribune entertainment reporter
All five of this year's best picture nominees are underdog stories (even Steven Spielberg's "Munich" was a risky proposition, as is being borne out at the box office), but none took such a long, unlikely path to the Oscars as "Crash."Here's a movie that no studio or independent distributor wanted to make and few wanted to pick up once it actually was finished. This racism-themed ensemble drama was a surprise box office hit after its release at the cusp of the summer blockbuster season, but it had received little end-of-the-year awards attention until a few days in early January catapulted it into the thick of the Oscar race."Crash" wound up receiving six Oscar nominations and is widely thought to be the chief rival of "Brokeback Mountain" for the top prize."It is the little movie that could," said LA Weekly movie critic Scott Foundas, tipping his hat to a movie he despised so thoroughly that Roger Ebert, who named "Crash" the year's best film, wrote a column specifically to tear into Foundas' criticisms that the movie is didactic and exploits racial stereotypes.When it comes to "Crash," the passions are as overheated off the screen as on -- and passion is what earns a film Oscar nominations and statuettes.Cynthia Swartz, a principal in the public relations firm The Dart Group, said Lionsgate hired her and her colleagues to consult on the movie's Oscar campaign back in June."The intention was always to go for best picture," said Swartz, who used to coordinate Miramax's highly effective Oscar efforts. "One week, four academy members I know said to me, 'I loved "Crash." I loved that movie.' When you see passion like that, that's when you go, OK, maybe we have something here."Lionsgate President Tom Ortenberg said he also thought of "Crash" as an Oscar contender from the moment he first saw its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2004.So everyone's a genius now, but the movie world thought a lot less about the film's prospects back when director/co-writer Paul Haggis was spending years trying to get it made.Haggis, 52, was a Los Angeles-based television writer and producer, having worked on series such as "The Facts of Life," "Due South," "EZ Streets" and "Family Law.""I came up with the idea early 2000," he said. "I started at 2 o'clock in the morning, and at 10 in the morning I had the entire story. I didn't think it was a movie, though. I thought it was a television series. I didn't know what the hell it was. I pitched it to a couple of networks, and they didn't have any interest in it."That first effort included the carjacking that had happened to him and his ex-wife 10 years earlier; the story about an African-American director (ultimately played by Terrence Howard) dealing with racial stereotyping ("something I witnessed on a studio lot"); and the white racist cop (Matt Dillon), who was inspired by "a piece of hate mail I received while doing a television show.""It was just things I'd been gathering," Haggis said. "I'd been really intrigued that year about how you affect strangers without knowing it. You and I are driving down the street. You cut me off. I flip you the finger. You go right. I go left. What happens to you?"Nothing happened with Haggis' initial pitch, so he moved onto another project that wound up taking an equally circuitous route to Oscar glory. "I optioned `Million Dollar Baby' and took eight or nine months to write that," he said.Afterward he called his friend Bobby Moresco, showed him the "Crash" treatment and the two got to work."We wrote the script very quick, in a couple of weeks," Moresco recalled while in Chicago preparing for last week's opening of his play "The Way of the Wiseguy" at the Chicago Center for the Performing Arts.Hearing the wordsThey took the script to Moresco's Los Angeles theater company, the Actor's Gym, to hear the actors read it aloud, then finished another draft in a couple of weeks. "That gave us the script pretty much that we shot," Moresco said.Now all they needed was for someone to finance the filming."All the studios turned it down pretty quickly," Haggis said. "All the smaller studios turned it down. All the independent producers turned it down."Finally, their agent got the script to Bob Yari, a producer starting his own production company. Yari agreed to make the movie -- after more than a year of discussions. The main condition was that Haggis, who was determined to direct "Crash," had to assemble a name cast to guarantee the movie's bankability.The breakthrough came in early 2003, when they got the script to Don Cheadle, and he agreed to co-star and more. "I asked him to produce it with us because I thought he'd be a really good guiding hand on this project, and he'd be able to attract other really good actors because everybody wants to work with Don," Haggis said.So the rest of the cast came together: Dillon, Howard, Sandra Bullock, Thandie Newton, Ryan Phillippe, Larenz Tate, Chris "Ludacris" Bridges, Jennifer Esposito, Tony Danza -- and still they didn't have the green light."It wasn't until we had Brendan Fraser that we could get financing -- even with Sandy Bullock," Haggis said.Ortenberg's Lionsgate was one of the companies that gave "Crash" a pass. "We loved [the script], but we thought it was very execution based," he said.Translation: It would take a talented director to film such a dense, challenging script, and Haggis was too big of a question mark.But Lionsgate got a second chance at the Toronto festival and bought the film the morning after its premiere, edging out a couple of other interested parties. Ortenberg, who professed surprise "that there wasn't a fierce, all-out bidding war," said his company paid $3.3 million for its North American rights (theatrical, home video, television).Haggis hoped to get "Crash" into theaters by the end of the year (when it would have been competing with "Million Dollar Baby"). Instead, Lionsgate opted to wait till the following May so it would have more time to mount a publicity campaign."Our feeling was `Crash' will be an awards-contending film no matter what time of year we release it in, and there was no reason to rush it out in the fall if we weren't ready," Ortenberg said. "And we didn't feel like we needed awards for the movie to be a success."He was right. When "Crash" finally came out, it received mostly positive reviews -- with some notable exceptions. Ebert gave it 4 stars, the Tribune's Michael Wilmington 3 1/2, and Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly (who's no pushover), wrote, "The stunning, must-see drama `Crash' is proof that words have not lost the ability to shock in our anesthetized society."Surprise successAudiences fell in with the majority viewpoint, and "Crash" became one of the summer's sleeper hits, grossing $55.4 million in North America. Since its December home video release, it has sold more than $4 million worth of DVDs, Ortenberg said.The key to its success, many agree, is that it provokes viewers to inject themselves into the movie's racially charged situations so they examine their own prejudices and discuss them."I think any movie that gets people arguing and talking after the movie stays with people and has an effect on them, and `Crash' did that," said Tom Rosenberg, who produced "Million Dollar Baby" as well as the upcoming Haggis-scripted comedy "The Last Kiss."As the movie took off, Lionsgate hired Swartz and crew and set its sights on Oscar, despite Haggis' professed misgivings. "Six months ago, probably in September, Lionsgate said, `We're going to go for best picture,'" the director recalled, "and I said, `Don't humiliate me. Don't take out ads like that because that's just embarrassing. We're not going to get it. We might get something for the actors.'"Haggis' prediction appeared accurate as "Crash" seemed barely on the awards radar toward the end of the year. It received just two Golden Globe nominations, for the screenplay and Dillon as supporting actor, and Ebert's top ranking aside (and a subsequent Chicago Film Critics Association best picture award), it wasn't a mainstay of many critics' top-10 lists.In the Village Voice's year-end poll of 100-plus North American critics, "Crash" ranked 66th among the 2005 releases, behind "Jarhead" and ahead of "March of the Penguins." Among the other best picture nominees, "Brokeback Mountain" was No. 11, "Good Night, and Good Luck." No. 13, "Capote" No. 16 and "Munich" No. 31. ("A History of Violence" was No. 1.)Yet when guild nominations were announced in early January, "Crash" cleaned up, snagging nods from the Directors Guild (historically the most reliable best picture Oscar predictor), the Screen Actors Guild (for its ensemble cast plus Cheadle and Dillon for best supporting actor), the Producers Guild, Writers Guild and American Cinema Editors.Suddenly "Crash" was a shoo-in Oscar nominee.The key strategic move, many agree, was that Lionsgate turned the perceived disadvantage of its May release date into an advantage: Because the film was out on DVD, the distributor could send copies to guild and academy members without fears of piracy, unlike those companies campaigning movies still in the theaters.Lionsgate initially mailed out about 30,000 DVDs to those doing the nominating for the various guilds (aside from the directors, who don't allow screeners). Once "Crash" received those nominations, the company sent out more DVDs, most notably to the remaining 90,000 SAG members who could vote on the final awards.All in all, Lionsgate distributed 130,000 DVDs -- and "Crash" won the top SAG prize. Given that actors make up the largest academy branch, the mailings also no doubt helped the movie's Oscar prospects."That is the biggest voting bloc, and it's a real actors' film," said Sony Pictures Classics Co-President Tom Bernard, whose company distributed the best picture nominee "Capote." "The fact that they revealed that they sent out 130,000 DVDs certainly helped them. When I saw that, I thought, OK, they've got a heck of a shot."Now, Ortenberg said, the strategy is to get any remaining academy member stragglers to see the film and otherwise to remind everyone else how much they liked it. "We're using the tag line: `"Crash," remember how it made you feel?'" he said.To Haggis, who was nominated last year for his "Million Dollar Baby" screenplay, this whirlwind end to this improbable journey is mind-boggling."I love it," he said. "I'm not going to say I don't. But it's hard to comprehend."
----------mcaro@tribune.comRead Mark Caro's blog, Pop Machine, at chicagotribune.com/popmachine.
