Reiser battles ageism via film

by Brian McKim & Traci Skene on September 20th, 2005

Delicious tales of studio head stupidity in the Yahoo! Entertainment account of the making of Paul Reiser‘s “The Thing About My Folks,” his movie starring him and Peter Falk.

After he wrote the script, Reiser took it to every studio in town. Several executives asked him to rewrite it for a younger audience. One said that if Reiser would play the father and make the son an 8-year-old, the studio might fund it.

“Somebody said, ‘What if they find a suitcase and there’s drug money in it.’ I said: ‘When does that happen? That doesn’t happen in real life. That happens in a bad movie, and by the way, you’ve got plenty of those on your shelf.'”

Falk laughed. Reiser, who told the story, did not.

In fact, Reiser finally decided to make the movie his way. He found backers, hired actors, a crew and a director.

D.I.Y., the new mantra in Hollywood. Embraced by standup comics with a vengeance. Comics are ornery. Many don’t like waiting around for other people to do things for them, especially when they don’t seem to “get it.”

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