For those who haven’t seen Tommy Wiseau’s awful 2003 film The Room, it has to be viewed with a crowd. Watched by itself or even with a few friends, it’s bad, but unremarkably so. It’s silly, inept, and its cult status feels undeserved until you watch it with that cult. That’s when it becomes a true joy as the crowd screams at Denny to shut the door or starts throwing spoons at the screen. The pleasure of watching The Room comes from the crowd’s reaction to the film rather than the film itself.
And yet the fascination with the film won’t go away. As we reported in February 2014, James Franco is set to direct The Disaster Artist, which is based on Greg Sestero, who co-starred in The Room, and Tom Bissell’s 2013 non-fiction book of the name. The book chronicles the making of the film from the inexperienced Wiseau, and I’m curious to see if Franco views the material as comic or if it has elements of tragedy with Wiseau thinking that he was making a genuinely good movie that’s now revered, but not in the way the director intended (there's also some controversy at how Wiseau's approached the gross sex scenes during filming).
According to THR, filming is approaching quickly with Dave Franco on board to play Sestero, and Seth Rogen, “who is also producing through Point Grey Pictures along with Evan Goldberg, Vince Jolivette and Franco, also in talks to star.” THR adds that they’ve set December 7th as their start date for filming now that New Line Cinema is on board to distribute the film.
In case you’re completely unfamiliar with The Room, you can watch the trailer below, but again, if you’ve never seen it, I recommend watching it with a crowd. The more people there are to laugh at Wiseau’s incompetent movie, the funnier it is.
