I Blame Dennis Hopper (37 page)

I want to thank and give a big hug to my attorney, William Soble, for his everlasting faith in me. Thank you for your counsel, your constant composure, and your sense of humor—you need it representing me. A big thank you to Jason Allen Ashlock and Alan Goldsher, who got the ball rolling, and to Adam Chromy of Movable Type Management for having seen it through.

Thanks to Brentwood Management for their invaluable service and to the late, great Patti Dennis. I never could have accomplished what we accomplished on
Easy to Assemble
without Patti, and I miss her every day. Thank you to Julia Buchwald and Matt Luber for understanding every time I said, “I can't; I'm writing today.”

Thank you to Paul Young and Maggie Haskins of Principato-Young Entertainment. Thanks to all the folks at IKEA for the opportunities you gave me.

Thanks so much to my TCM Family. We all love movies, and I love you. Robert Osborne, Ben Mankiewicz, Charles Tabesh, Jennifer Dorian, Sean Cameron, Gary Freedman, Genevieve McGillicuddy, and most of all, the doll of dolls, Darcy Heitrich. Your support has been invaluable. Thanks for the hours of talks and laughter and camaraderie. And to my special friend I.A.U.

I want to thank my #TCMParty gang for your support and friendship. Thanks for loving movies and for loving my comments about movies. Big thanks to Hadrian Belove and Cinefamily, the best revival house in L.A., home to many memorable moviegoing hours in the dark. Phil and Monica Rosenthal and the Sunday night movie gang: thanks for keeping me going with pizza and wine after long weekends of writing! Thank you to Ryan O'Neal/Sleeping at Last, who provided the background music I listened to most days when I was writing and needed that extra cinematic fuel of inspiration. Thanks to the best listener of them all, Father Michael Cooper.

I am indebted to all of the friends and colleagues who have advised, helped, and encouraged:

Peter Avellino, Jeannie Berlin, Candi Cazau, Wayne Federman, Lee Kernis, Bryan Lourd, Ben Mankiewicz, Kliph Nesteroff, Patton Oswalt, Greg Poehler, and Carole Shashona.

Finally, a deep bow and tip of the hat to those who have given me opportunities to learn:

Allison Anders, Hal Ashby, Ingmar Bergman, Peter Bogdanovich, Marlon Brando, Albert Brooks, Glenn Gordon Caron, Robert De Niro, Brian De Palma, Matt Dillon, Richard Dreyfuss, John Frankenheimer, Jeff Goldblum, David Greene, Ethan Hawke, Buck Henry, Dennis Hopper, Olivia Hussey, Nastassja Kinski, Jerry Lewis, Joseph L. Mankiewicz, Frank Marshall, Lee Marvin, Elaine May, Paul Mazursky, Liza Minnelli, Roddy McDowall, Mike Nichols, Richard Pinter, Vanessa Redgrave, Steven Rogers, Martin Scorsese, Peter Sellers, Garry Shandling, John Patrick Shanley, Peggy Siegal, Sharon Stone, Jennifer Tilly, Gus Van Sant, Rudy Vallée, and James Woods.

If I have failed to remember everyone or give proper credit, it is not intentional and is based only on the author's growing forgetfulness. I'm sure I will wake up in six months and hurt myself.

Find me at @Illeanarama on Twitter
Colin … Can I rest now?

 

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Contents

Title Page

Copyright Notice

Dedication

Prologue

  
1.
I Blame Dennis Hopper

  
2.
They Came from Within: Love and Romance at the Drive-In

  
3.
Camelot

  
4.
In the Key of Liza

  
5.
Chance Encounters

  
6.
Me Doing Dreyfuss Doing Tracy

  
7.
Screaming for Marty

  
8.
What's It Like to Work with Robert De Niro?

  
9.
Happy Just to Be Alive

10.
Uncle Roddy

11.
A Director To Die For

12.
A Woman's Picture

13.
You're a Tuning Fork

14.
The Roulette Wheel of Insanity

15.
Easy to Assemble

Epilogue

Photographic Section

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Copyright

 

A
UTHOR'S
N
OTE:
The details of certain situations and locations have been changed, as have the names of some individuals, to protect their privacy. All photos in this book except those listed below with specific credit lines are courtesy of the author's personal collection. Any failure to credit the appropriate photographer is unintentional.

Photograph, chapter eight opener:
Illeana Douglas with Robert De Niro © Phillip V. Caruso

Photographic Section:
Illeana Douglas with Liza Minnelli: 2012 TCM Classic Film Festival Opening Night © Getty Images, Jordan Strauss; Illeana Douglas on the set of
Search and Destroy
© NBCUniversal; Illeana Douglas on the set of
Picture Perfect
© 20th Century Fox

I BLAME DENNIS HOPPER.
Copyright © 2015 by Illeana Douglas. All rights reserved. For information, address Flatiron Books, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.flatironbooks.com

Cover design by Henry Sene Yee

Cover photographs courtesy of Illeana Douglas and Joanne Savio

The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition of this book as follows:

Douglas, Illeana.

    I blame Dennis Hopper: and other stories from a life lived in and out of the movies / Illeana Douglas.—First edition.

        pages cm

    ISBN 978-1-250-05291-9 (hardback)

    ISBN 978-1-250-05387-9 (e-book)

    1. Douglas, Illeana, 1965–   2. Douglas, Illeana, 1965—Anecdotes.   3. Actresses—United States—Biography.   4. Actresses—United States—Anecdotes.   I. Title.

    PN2287.D5245A6 2015

    792.02'8092—dc23

    [B]

                2015022208

e-ISBN 978125053879

Our e-books may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at (800) 221-7945, extension 5442, or by e-mail at
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First Edition: November 2015