If you know anything about filmmaker/photographer Larry Clark, the director behind “Kids,” “Bully” and the still-banned/unreleased “Ken Park” — infamous for a scene where actor James Ransone masturbates to release on screen — you know the provocative artist behind these controversial films has zero filter. And now 70 years old, Clark perhaps is even less concerned with his public image than ever, and more than ever willing to fly in the face of a culture that has moved on considerably in terms of how we deal with social issues since his heyday. So on the Bret Easton Ellis podcast, while the director retold some entertaining, often insane stories, he also went full-on sexist, misogynist and downright creepy. Locker-room talk? Hot mic? Arguably worse?
While centered mostly on his 2001 film “Bully,” starring Nick Stahl, Brad Renfro and Bijou Phillips — though only because Bret Easton Ellis admitted he couldn’t focus his stream-of-consciousness thoughts — Clark makes many outrageous and offensive remarks throughout this discussion. The filmmaker’s comments would probably be a career killer today or at least land him in director’s jail for a spell, but it sort of feels like that’s where Clark already is, as he has been operating in his own micro-budgeted, frequently undistributed sphere far, far away from the studio system — or even the regular indie film industry, for that matter — for quite some time. In any case, the stories he tells are one thing, but the way he tells them are another, and if you’d rather not go through the frequently queasy process of listening to the podcast, here, with all due trigger warnings, are some high-/lowlights.
Clark explains what he was doing between the release of his book “Tulsa” in 1974, and his debut feature “Kids” in 1995: “Living the outlaw life.”
Clark said by the time he was 18 he had already been shooting amphetamines for three years (“I hadn’t slept in three years”). What did he do for the rest of the ’70s and ’80s? Lots and lots of drugs (methedrine, cocaine, booze, all kinds of amphetamines), saying a prostitute girlfriend helped him score speed by hooking up with doctors and getting them to write prescriptions. Then he spent time in jail for shooting a man in the arm after the man had refused to pay the money on a poker game he lost and pulled out a gun on Clark, who left, returned with his own gun and shot the guy.
“I just thought that’s what you did. It was a normal thing to do,” he said. “When he snitched on me and the police got me, I was shocked that he would snitch on me. I thought this was normal.”
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While Brad Renfro won the lead role in “Bully,” Clark wanted to cast Jake Gyllenhaal.
“So Jake is a teenager so he’s not a name yet. I wanted to cast [him], so I said to Jake, ‘I want you to have the role,’ and he came to my loft and hung out with me…Jake’s great to this day. They wouldn’t cast him and Brad Renfro’s name came up and I saw the movie ‘Apt Pupil’ and I say, ‘Wow, this is great.’ So they say no to Jake and yes to Brad and so I told Jake and he said, ‘Goddammit, I lose every role to Brad Renfro,’ ” Clark shared.
He also said Ashton Kutcher also auditioned for the role, and while the director liked him, he said he was all “wrong” for the part.
Brad Renfro was a mess during the making of “Bully,” for which Clark essentially “kidnapped” him.
To get ready, Clark told Renfro to get in shape, and then drove to his house and picked him up the day after his 18th birthday, when the actor would legally be allowed to take the role. The idea was that the filmmaker would drive him back to Florida himself to shoot the film, and they’d discuss the movie and do further prep work on this multiple-day road trip.
“He walks out of the house without his shirt on, with…blood running down each arm, and he’s bloated up and looks terrible,” Clark said. “He looked like he was 40 years old. He’s been shooting coke and I stay down there with him in Knoxville for four days and he’s shooting coke constantly.”
Clark says he photographed the actor constantly during this time with his consent (“Renfro didn’t mind”). Clark, assuming his film was over, was despondent, but suddenly he thought, “I can’t be stopped.” On the fifth day, he tricked Renfro into going into town to get a fancy cup of coffee, but Clark had a different plan.
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“I jumped in the car with him and I gunned it,” Clark said. “I gunned it straight to Florida, I kidnapped the sonofabitch, and he’s saying, ‘Let me out! Let me out!’ And so on the drive down, he’s kicking coke and he’s having epileptic seizures and he passes out for hours and hours.”
Clark went to visit his sister on the way and spent four or five hours in her home. “Brad’s passed out, drooling, [when I leave house later] Brad is still like that. So we get to Florida and he’s kicked the coke — it only takes, like, three days to kick coke. It’s easy to get out of your system.
“I get him presentable enough for the film, get him in a trainer, which he did half-heartedly,” Clark said, revealing that during the shoot they had people watching Renfro around the clock. But it didn’t always work, Clark said.
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Halfway through the production, Renfro escaped and “got all fucked up…He sees this big yacht and decides he want to go for a cruise. He hotwires [the yacht], revs it up and guns it and takes off as fast as he can, but forgets to untie the rope.” The boat was partially destroyed and the police threw him in jail. Clark said he lost two days of shooting and bailed him out for three or four thousand with money that “I had in my sock.”
[Renfro would pass away seven years later in 2008 from an accidental heroin overdose at the age of 25.]
Page two has some really offensive and creepy talk about his actresses, so be forewarned.