View of a Room

A few years back, I wrote about the impossible-to-rate movie The Room. It's a true contender for "Worst Movie Ever Made," and certainly rules the roost of "So Bad, It's Good." It's also become a Rocky Horror Picture Show for a new generation, being screened all around the country for rowdy midnight audiences who've been building up an interactive ritual for the experience.

This past weekend, I went to take part in such a screening. But not just any screening. The writer-producer-director-actor-freak himself, Tommy Wiseau, was in attendance. He and actor Greg Sestero (who plays his best friend, as the film itself will tell you numerous times) were there in person for a meet-and-greet and autograph signing.

Not that I would have guessed otherwise, but Tommy Wiseau is exactly as he appears to be in his movie. He's a strangely foreign personality you can't ascribe to any particular country as easily as you could to an alien attempting to masquerade as human. His brain will latch on to anything "shiny"; his Q&A effortlessly (and nonsensically) bobbed from him refusing to explain why he was wearing four belts, to showing off his forthcoming underwear line (of which he promised free samples to anyone who dressed up as him), to leading the crowd to chant "U.S.A.! U.S.A.!"

Greg Sestero, for his part, seems to have stopped struggling with his captor. The Wiseau-mad audience only lobbed one or two questions his way, which he answered with an ultra-dry gallows humor. And what else can he do? He's now going around the country making appearances with the man who ruined any chance of him having an acting career. Perhaps his forthcoming book chronicling the film will be a hit, and he'll be able to salvage a writing career out of it?

But the real jewel of the experience was watching the movie itself with hundreds of... fans?... of The Room. Each gag was more hilarious than the last, and the repetitive nature of the movie allowed you to get in on most of the fun. Whether it was criticizing everyone who "has to go now" when "you just got here!", cheering on the minute-long tracking shots across the Golden Gate Bridge, providing "foley" for the walk up the spiral staircase, screaming in shock at the creature trying to burst from Lisa's neck... the list goes on and on... it was hilarious. And I have never seen so many plastic spoons in my life. Whenever a curiously framed photo of a spoon appeared on screen, the crowd would roar "Spoooooooooooon!" like The Tick, and toss thousands of the things, practically blotting out the movie. I sure hope the theater recycles.

As amazing, hilarious, and jaw-dropping the experience of watching The Room for the first time was, watching it with the midnight crowd was even more so. I could easily see doing it again some time.

Just not any time soon. Man, that movie is TERRIBLE!