Jobs I Could Do: 92Y Tribeca Moderator

I had the privilege tonight of seeing director Wes Anderson and actor Jason Schwarzman converse onstage in Manhattan. It was fun being in the same room with them, and watching them interact with each other. I just wish that Anderson would have been asked better questions.

Dave Karger, an editor for Entertainment Weekly, began by asking Anderson and Schwarzman, who have known each other for over twelve years, about their initial impressions of one another. And so, the two men once again trotted out the now legendary story of Schwartzman showing up to the audition for Rushmore in a private school uniform that he made himself. After Anderson made an offhand reference to “Jason’s cousin Sofia,” Karger made a point of stopping the discussion to clarify to the audience that this was Sofia Coppola, and then making a joke about his own name-dropping. Perhaps noticing that both the guests and the audience were nonplussed, Karger mercifully bit his tongue when Schwartzman later said, in passing, “my mother, who is an actress,” referring to Talia Shire. Watching Anderson, a quick thinkinker and a genius of nuance, field a long series of softball questions, was like watching him get his head wrapped slowly in cotton candy.

I may be a bit bitter, because I actually had a chance to interview Anderson in the past, but I blew it. As a graduate film student, i had to write a paper about the producer’s role in a movie of my choice. I chose Wes Anderson, who was a producer (and writer, and director) on Rushmore. As part of the class, we were required to make a serious effort to contact our subjects and use them as a primary source. I sent a letter to Anderson’s production company, mainly so I could give a copy of it to my teacher. A couple weeks later, he left me a voice mail letting me know he was available to talk. I was so surprised, and so worried that I was going to ask him stupid questions he’s heard before a thousand times, that I took a few days of preparation/procrastination to return the call. Someone I spoke to (I think it was his mother) told me that “Wes and the boys have moved on,” and that was it.

Tonight, as part of the event, we saw a clip from Anderson’s new film, The Fantastic Mr. Fox, a scene in which a talking fox and a talking badger begin arguing with words, and then degrade into animal noises. Later, a child sitting in the front row asked what the fight was about. Anderson, perhaps relieved to be asked a question he hadn’t heard before, gave a long answer about attorneys, percentages, and property. He made no effort whatsoever to dumb down his vocabulary for the child. More importantly, he treated the question, not as the child’s failure to grasp a complex adult interaction, but as a profound inquiry into the nature of the characters’ relationship. The guy in front of me looked at his companion in disbelief, as if to say: Attorney? Percentages? Does this lunatic not realize that he’s talking to a kid? But the answer was perfect. Anderson takes precocious children seriously, as he should, and that kid went home tonight feeling like he asked the best question in the event. And, unfortunately, he’s right.