Here’s something that happened: when I arrived for the fall semester of my 8th grade year I noticed that my class was light about four dudes. I went up to the teach to ask where the dudes were at. He told me that they were skipping class to act in a “major motion picture” starring Steve Martin. I heard this and nearly shat my Skids, man, I needed to find out what this movie was...where it was...and how to get cast in it immediately. Since it was 1991 this took me at least two....two and a half days of old fashioned detective work. I had to pound the pavement...crack the yellow pages...knock on doors! I eventually learned that the flick was called School Ties. I got the casting people on the phone and said “I would like to be in your movie, please” and they said “cool with us.” I arrived on set to find that not only was there no Steve Martin, there were no famous people at all! (Steve Martin was filming Housesitter down the street). To be clear, the cast of School Ties does include names like Brendan Fraser, Chris O’Donnell, Matt Damon, and Ben Affleck but no one knew who those guys were in ’91. Shit, Encino Man hadn’t even come out yet! I also learned that my classmates weren’t actually acting but were, in fact, just extras. So I was gonna get paid $50 to sit in the bleachers and watch Matt Damon pretend to drop a touchdown pass for 12 hours straight? Dude, sign me up! After my five days on School Ties I caught the extra bug...hard! I went out and got professional headshots (see bio) and spent all of my momma’s hard earned money making long distance calls to the Massachusetts Film Office to try to suss out what films were filming in the state. I went out for Hocus Pocus, The Good Son, and The Next Karate Kid...and I rolled snake eyes every time. As of this writing my only film credit remains “Kid Who Runs into Church Alongside Anthony Rapp” in School Ties.
There was ONE film I got an actual callback for. In the fall of ’92 there was an Alec Baldwin/Nicole Kidman thriller called Damages filming in the state. Someone from the casting agency called me at home late one Friday evening. “We are mostly looking for college aged extras but we can use you for some backgrounds. Can you be in Northampton at 5 AM Monday morning?” he said. “Damn skippy!” I said, hoping that Northampton was somehow close to Worcester (it isn’t). “Wait, you’re in SAG, right?” Definitely (not). “Make sure you bring your SAG card Monday morning,” he said. I ran into our living room and told my mom that I needed a SAG card and a ride to Northampton and that I needed both of these things before 3:30 AM Monday morning. What happened next was that I did not end up working as an extra on the film Damages. When the flick was released in late 1993 it had been retitled Malice, so as not to be confused with a smutty Louis Malle film called Damage. It was poorly received, probably because a lot of people went in thinking they were about to see a film about the obscure 80’s metal band Malice and had to spend two hours watching Alec Baldwin chew scenery until his friggin’ jaw fell off instead. I remember thinking that it sucked when I saw it back in the day...but I wasn’t sure if my reaction was colored by my lingering hurt feelings or if the movie actually did suck. I decided to check it out again and the answer is....yes? I always remembered this film (if I remembered it at all) as some low rent potboiler. But as I’m watching the opening credits I’m seeing some NAMES! There’s the cast. We’ll get to them in good time. But look....the cinematographer is Gordon Willis of The Godfather fame! And holy smokes! It was written by Aaron Sorkin of The West Wing fame....and Scott Frank of...the Frank family! (actually, Frank wrote Get Shorty and Logan so he’s a bit of a legend too). There might be some bits to enjoy here after all! Unless you are a woman or a service industry worker. This film is seething with contempt for women and waiters and bartenders.
What happens is this: we open with an extended montage of a young female college student peddling her bike through the Dan Tebo-less streets of Northampton. When she arrives at home she thinks there might be an intruder in the house but it’s just her cat. OPE! Save those “phew’s!” There’s a cat AND an intruder. He assaults her mercilessly. She is rushed to the OR, where the attending surgeon, Dr Jed, is new on the job, but also, disgustingly overconfident. The reason for this is that Dr Jed is played by young Alec Baldwin and young Alec Baldwin is ALL THAT IS MAN!! Glinty-eyed...hirsute...and with a head of hair so finely coiffed it looks like you could simply detach it from his skull and put it on display at the Smithsonian next to Archie Bunker’schair. Dr Jed is slicing and dicing but Dr Doubting Thomas, played by the man who is one letter shy of having the coolest name ever David Bowe, is all “we’re losing her!” Dr Jed ties the victim’s liver together with dental floss cuz dude is a phenom. Later, in the locker room, after showing Dr Thomas the animal pelt that lives where his chest should be, Dr Jed tells Dr Thomas that if he ever second guesses him during surgery again he’s going to “tear out (his) fucking lungs with an ice cream scoop.” Jesus Christ, man! Way to make pals at your new gig! Also--would having your lungs ripped out with an ice cream scoop hurt more than having your lung ripped out by, say, literally anything else? I feel like that’s a valid question.
Out in the lobby, Andy Greeklastname (Billy Pullman) the Associate Dean of Students from Whatever Whatever Fictional University, has arrived to check the status of the assaulted student. Apparently she’s just the latest victim in a series of sexual assaults that have rocked the campus. We know this because a hard-nosed detective played by the lady who played Lilith on Cheers (Bebe Neuwirth) tells us so. Despite having spent 7 seasons acting in the most quintessentially Boston show of all time, Neuwirth puts on the most mangled Boston accent since Kevin Costner in every movie where Kevin Costner attempts a Boston accent. “You expect me to catch an attackahhh? I can’t even break up a keggahhh??” Andy goes to see Dr Jed to inquire about the status of his student. Since HIPAA wasn’t signed into law until 3 years after this movie came out, he tells him: she’ll live. Andy asks Dr Jed if he remembers him from high school and he totally doesn’t...‘cuz he’s a schlumpy associate dean and Dr Jed is a swinging dick surgeon. Andy IS married to Nicole Kidman (Tracy), who somehow looks older here than she does now, some 27 years later. Being married to Tom Cruise will put some serious stress lines on ya face! Andy and Tracy live in a huge Victorian on the outskirts of town but it’s all janky and needs a five-figure bathroom upgrade. Andy can’t afford it, even though they own an actual Degas sculpture! Folks, put that shit on eBay and then move to Guam! Tracy seems displeased with life in general. She’s always grabbing her stomach and doubling over in pain and staying out late with Peter Gallagher when she’s supposed to be home wifing. Andy is like “why are you hanging out with Peter Gallagher?? That motherfucker is always up to no good!” But then Tracy calms Andy down by sexily feeding him Chinese food in bed. I don’t know about y’all but nothing gets me going like General Tso’s Chicken stains on my pillowcase! Tracy removes all of her clothing and signals that it is time to ball. Andy is not unopposed but requests that the lights be turned off as there is a 10 year-old child across the street sitting in the darkness, staring directly into their bedroom window. Tracy says “ahh, let him watch...he’s just lonely.” So that’s a how the scene ends: a silhouette of a small perverted child watching Nicole Kidman ride Bill Pullman. Totally normal stuff.
The next day Andy is in his office reaming out one of his students for being a lazy student and HOLY SHIT! The lazy student is totally Gwyneth Paltrow! She offers him a candle that smells like her orgasm to set things straight but the Dean ain’t having it. He puts her on double secret probation and says he’s gonna give her a personal wake up call so she won’t miss her next exam....’cuz that’s not creepy or anything! As she’s leaving the office we get a quick glimpse at the janitor and it’s friggin’ Jigsaw from those Saw movies! I wonder if he’s the serial rapist?? (Note: he is). Andy and Tracy decide to let Dr Jed rent a spare bedroom in their house to scare up some extra cheddar. He moves in and proceeds to spend his first night fuuuuucking. Like....for three hours straight. He lays there like a hairy beast blasting Bryan Ferry and drinking champagne straight from the bottle while he is fellated every which way. He also declares himself to be impervious to the effects of alcohol. Unable to sleep, Tracy stares up at the ceiling looking super annoyed slash turned on. Despite his Korbel fueled fuck-a-thon, the doc is up at the crack for a six mile run. He tells his landlords that six miles a day will keep the doctor away. Might want to call 2020 Alec Baldwin and tell him the same thing. I’m not sure how many calories you burn breaking stranger’s jaws over parking spaces...but it’s probably not that many.
Andy arrives at work to find that Gwyneth Paltrow did not show up for her Primitive Cultures exam. He drives over to her apartment where he finds her under the bushes, having had the shit murdered out of her. Looks like our serial rapist has graduated to serial killer! Either that or he just has a huge problem with those jade vagina eggs. Andy heads out to meet Dr Jed at the same bar where I sent back my brunch steak and eggs in 2012 (it was WAY over cooked). Andy vents his spleen about his wife’s cramps and his dead student epidemic but the doc is more interested in joining a dart game with two comely college students who are day drinking whiskey. Andy peaces out but Dr Jed joins the ladies and they slam shots while listen to the friggin’ Spin Doctors. Threefer—in the bag.
Andy’s already not very good day takes another craptacular turn when Detective Lilith shows up with some more bad news: “we found dirt from ya yahhhhd at all of the crime scenes.” The Dean is suspect numero uno! She says he can clean things up if he agrees to submit a sperm sample on the spot. Dude, call your lawyer! While Andy is headed to the john with a Dixie cup and a Hustler, Tracy is somewhere collapsing from her...what have you. She’s rushed to the hospital. Dr Jed’s beeper goes off and, even though he’s 10 Knob Creek’s deep, he drunk drives straight to the hospital and prepares to get his hands gory. He sees that the patient is his new landlady and that she’s pregnant and has a busted ovary....so he’s gotta 86 all of that stuff. But first he falls real silent like. The attendants are all like “doctor?....doctor??” Man, this motherfucker is cocked! Prolly passed out! He eventually comes around and asks for a scalpel. Even though he smells like Shane MacGowan at Xmas they give it to him. They take out the bad ovary but then there’s some evidence that the other sucker is jacked up too. Dr Jed requests some equipment to perform an elaborate procedure. The other doctor is like “umm...yeah this is Western Mass. Good if you are looking for antiques or Dinosaur Jr...bad if you’re grievously ill. We have only scalpels and an x-ray machine.” Dr Jed leaves Tracy open on the operating table to have a little chat with Andy, who has ALREADY been seminally eliminated from the serial killer lineup. Jed says he can take out the other ovary but if she is down to zero ovaries she won’t be able to have children. Thank you, Doctor Obvious! Andy thinks about fatherhood...but then also thinks of a dank bathroom with a jacuzzi tub and a heated floor and gives the doc the green light. The other doctors are adamantly opposed to the ovary removal, but the threat of an ice cream scoop lung removal is still fresh, so away it goes!
Later that evening the head of all doctors informs Jed that he removed a perfectly good ovary. He offers to bury this info but Jed offers some Trumpian logic like “even my mistakes are not mistakes I will not be apologizing.” Because this hospital has no protocols regarding doctors visiting patients after catastrophically botching their surgeries, Dr Jed goes to visit Tracy, who is understandably apoplectic. She tells Jed that he’ll be hearing from her lawyer Peter Gallagher (shiver). She also decides that she’s going to leave Andy because he gave surgical consent, which seems way harsh. Andy is like “this is the day I celebrate my independence!” Just kidding....he’s wicked sad. Dr Jed, however, is girding for a fight. Tracy wants $30 million but my dude ain’t breaking a sweat. He suggests they call veteran actor George C Scott and see if he wants to do a one scene cameo as Jed’s Harvard Medical Professor. Luckily...he does. The lawyers and doctors square off in a conference room in a Boston high rise with sweeping views of the Harbor and what the fuck happened to the serial killer!?? He’s been out of the movie for a good 30 minutes now! Anyway, they begin to arbitrate and it’s BANANAS! Dr Jed is getting hammered (with negative testimony...not booze). George C Scott is supposed to be a character witness but he apparently wrote a memo where he said that Dr Jed has a God Complex. Jed hears this and throws an Alec Baldwin-in-Glengarry-Glen Ross-sized fit. After rattling off his bona fides and a list of the women that he’s slept with he looks into the camera and says “Do I think I have a God Complex? Let me tell you something: I AM GOD!” Oh ho ho now THAT is a line! That shit is gonna be on Alec Baldwin’s headstone...right next to a set of steak knives. The legal people are unimpressed. Jed loses and the hospital has to pay Tracy $20 million dollars. She sulks out of the room and says it isn’t really about the money. Suuuuure it isn’t.
Andy tries to bury himself in his work. Someone’s gotta do a piss poor job of keeping the students safe! First night back on campus Andy is up late grading some papers when the lights start to flicker. He heads down to the scary basement to look for a fuse box. There, he finds that Jigsaw has set up a makeshift bedroom. And next to the bed? A cigar box full of human hair! (The killer likes to collect his victim’s hair. I feel like I forgot to mention that. Ahh whatever). Jigsaw rolls up and Andy is like “dude, are you that serial killer from way earlier in the movie?” Jigsaw says that the hair belongs to his dead mother. Andy apologizes and they laugh it off. But then he tries to murder Andy because HE IS THE SERIAL KILLER (try not to faint). They tussle it up and Andy gets the upper hand cuz he’s part Lone Starr. So the killer is behind bars and the movie can end now, right? If only, folks. If only.
Lilith comes to take Andy out for a little congratulations on capturing a serial killer beverage. While they are toasting to Andy’s fortunate misfortune Lilith casually mentions that Tracy couldn’t have been pregnant as Andy has junk for spunk. Correction—she COULD be pregnant...just not with Andy’s child. So if we’re keeping score/still awake, the entire serial killer angle...which initially seemed like the main focus of the movie...was just a ridiculously elaborate plot device to help get a semen sample out of Bill Pullman. That is some z-grade screenwriting right there. So it’s looking like poor Andy got grifted. But how?? And more importantly--who cares?? He goes to see Peter Gallagher, who sends him to see Tracy’s Mom, who does not have it going on. She’s an alcoholic shut in living in a squalid apartment over in Charlestown. She is also Mel Brooks’ dearly departed wife Anne Bancroft, which is kinda cool. Andy brings her single malt scotch and she spills her goddam guts. Tells him that Tracy is just a rotten gold digger who has been trying to catch a whale ever since she was out of diapers. She also tells Andy that their Degas statue was purchased at Marshalls for $89.99, which is good to know! No one wants to go on Antiques Roadshow with some fugazi statue and get the shit embarrassed out of them! Andy tracks Tracy to a cape cottage on, um, the Cape. He sneaks inside so he can yell “surprise!” when she comes home. But when she enters she’s not alone. Dr Jed is with her (zzzzz). Oh man! I wonder if they are hooking up. Tracy asks Jed to take her upstairs and fuck her so...I guess that’s a yes! Somewhere in a screening room in 1993 Kim Basinger folds her arms and looks unimpressed. Andy is so upset he drives all the way back to Northampton (a three hour trip!) just to trash his own bedroom. After he clears off a dresser or two he discovers a syringe on the floor. Man, were those two partying as well??
The next morning Tracy and Dr Jed are taking a leisurely stroll on the beach, looking for clam cakes or whatever. Jed is his back to being his insufferably smug self...and why wouldn’t he be? The old sawbones is sitting on half of $20 million dollars! He berates Tracey for using improper grammar, which must make her horny because they sprint back to the cottage and get buck naked. Jed only gets in a single thrust before Tracy is pricked in the back by a misplaced syringe. They immediately suspect Andy because he is the other main character in this movie. Hey, the previous Air Bn’B’er could’ve been a diabetic. You don’t know! Tracy says that she’ll take care of Andy. She agrees to meet him at a restaurant, where she tells the waitress that she’d like a chardonnay “and some privacy!” Easy there, Mrs Urban! Tracy tries to give Andy an under the table foot job. He declines said foot job. Tracy is pissed...but not nearly as pissed as I am about the size of the wine pour! It’s MAYBE two ounces. Way to make an unbearably tense situation even more tense! Andy says that he has finally figured out the plot of the movie. Well that makes ONE of us, dude! I guess Tracy has been letting Jed inject her with overdoses of a fertility drug that causes her to develop cysts on her ovaries. No word at all about who the aborted kid belonged to (My money is on that George C Scott. He was looking particularly virile in his big scene). Their entire relationship was one obscenely long, nonsensical con. When Tracy hears that she’s been figured out she gets so angry she shatters her wine glass. The waitress appears and tries to dutifully clean up but Tracy screams at her. Asshole...I bet she left a crappy tip too. Andy says that he wants a cut of the 20 mil but Tracy is all “I ain’t giving you SHIT!” She makes some not so thinly veiled threats but Andy says that he has a witness that can back up the whole fertility plot: the peeping pervert child from across the street. So wait--they had this huge Victorian house..but Dr Jed was injecting Tracy with fertility drugs in front of the master bedroom window. Oh come onnnnn!!!! Was this movie really written by the same guy who won an Oscar for The Social Network?
Tracy rushes to tell Dr Jed that they’re in a bit of a pickle. Dude remains completely unruffled. He’s like “whatever, throw Andy some change. $6.5 million is still a lot of dough.” Not only does Tracy NOT want to do that...she wants to murder Andy AND the kid from across the way! “That fucking little troll deserves to die!” she screams. Hey lady--you had no problem letting him watch you screw like two hours ago! Jed hears this and cracks her one. She doesn't take being struck very well. At all. She pulls out a gun and shoots Jed, who friggin’ dies. I guess he’s not impervious to the effects of bullets, eh? Tracy drives back to Western Mass drunk on murder lust. This movie is so far off the rails at this point that all I can think about is how much she must have spent on tolls going back and forth across the Commonwealth. She breaks into the neighbor’s house and finds the little boy in his peeping chair and wraps a plastic bag over his head. Bill Pullman flips on the lights and Tracy looks down to see that she is suffocating a CPR doll. Fooled you!!! She starts beating the shit out of the doll, which looks just as fucking funny as it sounds. Tracy lunges at Andy and they crash through a railing and fall three stories down to the foyer like the Roses in War of the Roses. Unlike that flick, though, no one dies. Sorry if I just unnecessarily ruined War of the Roses for you. Lilith is waiting at the bottom to bring Tracy to jail for....a whole bunch of bad stuff, I guess.
As they are escorting a handcuffed Tracy out of the house, the real 10 year-old resident comes home and...wait for it....wait for it...he’s FUCKING BLIND!!! Bah hah hah if that isn’t the dumbest shit I have ever seen. A blind Peeping Tom! Maybe he could smell the sex from across the street? Whaddya lookin’ at, Feliciano?? Man alive! So offensive to blind folks. And children. And everyone else too, really. Lilith asks Andy if he'd like to grab a couple of whiskeys. He says yes. I know I could use about 20 whiskeys after watching this movie. I also know that, had I actually worked as an extra in Malice, I sure as shit wouldn’t have told anyone about it! The end.