The How NOT To Make A Movie Podcast

There are movie producers and then there’s Joel Silver. Hollywood’s famous for its larger-than-life personalities. Joel is larger than larger-than-life. Working for Joel can be challenging. Rewarding, too, but challenging especially. There’s not much margin for error but plenty for terror. In Season One, we told lots of great Joel stories. We’ll re-tell some of them here but with a different context. We’ll tell some new ones too. There’s the story of Joel directing an episode of “Tales From The Crypt” in between fighting with Gil Adler, the show’s producer because Joel wouldn’t put his cell phone away. And what […]

You might not know the name Elliot Silverstein but you should. He directed a couple of very big movies (Cat Ballou and A Man Called Horse). He also helped invent TV directing back in the 1950’s and 1960’s (directing Naked City, Have Gun Will Travel and The Twilight Zone. Elliot was always an artist’s rights guy. The reason directors have a “director’s cut” or “final cut” is because Elliot fought for it. It’s not hyperbole to say that Elliot Silverstein really is the director’s director. We first met Elliot back during our Tales From The Crypt days. Elliot directed four […]

For it’s last season, HBO sent “Tales From The Crypt” to London. It was an amazing adventure. How could it not be? But (if we’re honest – and that is our stock in trade here) the Crypt team didn’t go to London strictly to refresh the franchise (which needed it, frankly). Crossing the pond helped for sure! But – as with Bordello Of Blood (which we were editing at the time) – the Crypt team left Los Angeles mostly because our executive producer Joel Silver was at war with the union representing our crew. HBO didn’t oppose the idea at […]

One of the great things about doing “Tales From The Crypt” was the actors we got to work with. Kirk Douglass, Tom Hanks, Whoopi Goldberg, Michael J Fox, Isabella Rossellini, Daniel Craig among many, many others. We also got to work with an actor named Sherrie Rose. Hell, we liked working with Sherrie so much at Crypt that we hired her three times. Only William Sadler can compete. Bill also appeared in two Crypt episodes; he also appears in both Crypt feature films. Sherrie caught our attention early on. She also caught director William Friedkin’s attention. In fact (as Sherrie […]

There’s no data to back this up, but most of the people making horror movies – like horror movie fans – are some of the nicest people on the planet. Our friend Tobe Hooper (along with his writing partner Kim Henkel) created one of the most iconic horror characters of all time: Leatherface from The […]

Sam Egan’s been writing TV shows (and the occasional feature film) for fifty plus years. His first big break was writing and producing the show “Quincy ME” with Jack Klugman. TV was very different back then. How we watched it was different. Strange but true: there used to be only three broadcast networks putting out […]

This episode/post is a continuation of S2E23 – Bordello of Blood: The Whole Schmear. I guess that makes this “the rest of the schmear”. Spoiler alert: this story has a happy ending. At its core, our podcast is the story of a creative relationship. How making a dumb horror movie destroyed that relationship. And how […]

Spoiler alert: this story has a happy ending. At its core, our podcast is the story of a creative relationship. How making a dumb horror movie destroyed that relationship. And how doing a podcast about making that dumb horror movie healed the wounds and reignited the relationship. That’s after not speaking to each other for […]

Ross Emery is both a director of photography and a cinematographer (we’ll discuss the differences). He and Gil worked together on two features – “Superman Returns” and “Valkyrie“. – both times as second unit director of photography. That’s another difference we’ll discuss during the podcast – the one between a “first unit” and a “second […]

Welcome to a special, bonus episode of the How Not To Make A Movie Podcast: Alan & Jason visit the CreepIE-Con horror convention! This past weekend was the Creepie-con horror convention in Ontario just outside Los Angeles. It's not one of the big horror conventions, but being as it's here in Southern California, it still […]

If you've ever seen an episode of Tales From The Crypt, you've enjoyed the work of artist and comic book creator Mike Vosburg. When you sit and talk to Mike – aka Voz – you can't help thinking “Wow, what a terrific person!” And then you look at his comic book art and you can't […]

If you don't know Charlie Flesicher's name, you know his voice. He's the voice of Roger Rabbit. He's appeared – in human form – on TV and in movies since the 70's. We worked with Charlie on “Demon Knight” – the first “Tales From The Crypt” branded horror movie. He plays Wally Enfield. It's been […]

Nobody should ever die on a film or TV set. No one should ever get injured either but physical things happen (stunts, for instance). Injuries should should be rare. Death should be a complete stranger. With hundreds of hours of produced film and TV content under our belts, Gil Adler and I had the exact […]

Film sets are a fascinating place to work. They definitely reflect the nature of the people working on them – especially at the top. But who's really in charge of any set? Who’s the boss? Most sets are like bee hives. And, while everyone thinks the director is queen bee, on the set itself, it's […]

The movie biz attracts all kinds. The horror biz attracts the most unusual among the movie biz. And those who succeed in the horror biz? They’re a truly special breed. The House On Haunted Hill… The Tingler… 13 Ghosts… These were all competently made horror movies. What made them noteworthy and keeps them noteworthy is […]

Welcome to our first new episode of 2023! We’re dropping a Joel Silver story we’ve been threatening to tell since we started this podcast last year. The Car Ride To Hell! How do we know it ended up in Hell? Well, for starters, Donald Trump makes an appearance – two actually! Here’s the setting. As […]

For a lot of people, 2022 was an outright annus horribilus. One to forget. That wasn't the case for us here at the How NOT To Make A Movie Podcast. For starters, we came into being this year. That was a good thing (all things considered). We found a growing audience – that's been even […]

Tis the season to ask this essential question: Is "Die Hard" a Christmas movie?

The body’s on the slab now. Let’s do the post mortem. This past Saturday, our little Podcast held a benefit for the Motion Picture Home – the MPTF. They’re a great organization that takes care of film folk in need. We performed a live table read of “Dead Easy“. That’s the “Crypt” film we never […]

Peter Iliff‘s passion for movies started with James Bond. He was six and his dad took him to see “Goldfinger” on the day it opened. They watched it twice. Now, it may seem strange – a dad taking his six year old to see a Bond film – but, strangely, something happened there in that […]

A great Hollywood assistant is someone who knows where all the bodies are buried because THEY helped bury em.

Doing this podcast has been the ultimate unexpected journey. It all started when when the Dads From The Crypt interviewed me for an episode of their podcast. The moment Jason Stein – one of the dads – told me the group’s franchise – reviewing Crypt episodes and giving parenting advice – they had me. And […]

Pull up a chair (if you're not already sitting)! Gil & Alan are sitting down for a hang out!

The short answer is YES! You absolutely can believe Taye Diggs and that’s the whole point of this episode! We ask the question “What makes an actor ‘believable’?” And, the actor we’re using for demonstration purposes in this episode is the terrific Taye Diggs who, it just so happens, Gil (Adler) has cast twice. The […]

This conversation feels like a pair of comfortable slippers. It's that warm and familiar.

If you really want to know what's happening on any film or TV set, the last people you should ask are the executives. We know nothing of value. We may have a pretty good fix on where the budget is, but we have no idea who's sleeping with whom. Film and TV sets are emotionally […]

Welcome to our Halloween podcast – How NOT To Make A (Monster) Movie. One of the masters of movie make up special effects is our very good friend Todd Masters. We’re sure you remember Todd vividly from Season One of The How NOT To Make A Movie Podcast. Todd became Tales From The Crypt’s permanent […]

This episode picks up where E4 left off. And then it gets even more epic. This is a big episode in more ways than one.

In this episode of “The How NOT To Make A Movie Podcast”, we sit down with a master storyteller: writer/director/producer Steve de Souza. You may not know Steve’s name, but you definitely know his work: 48 Hrs, Die Hard, Die Hard 2, Commando, Streetfighter, Judge Dredd, Beverly Hills Cop 2. Steve practically invented the modern […]

In this episode of “The How NOT To Make A Movie Podcast: Horror Stories From The Movie Making Trenches”, we sit down with one of the biggest casting directors in the business, Victoria Burrows. Or, as we prefer to put it, we go “Casting About With Victoria Burrows”. In season one of “The How NOT […]

Turns out, what's really funny is the paths we all took to show biz success.

First of all, it’s good to be back for a second season! Better still to be back with company. As we kick off Season Two of “The How NOT To Make A Movie Podcast”, we really do become a “we”. Former creative partners Alan Katz and Gil Adler are now current creative partners! One of […]

In season two, we expand the franchise. "Horror stories from across the movie-making trenches". More painful personal stories of movie-making craft turning into crap.

"The How NOT To Make A Movie Podcast" is an object lesson in what happens when you do things for all the wrong reasons. Spoiler alert: nothing good. It's the outrageous, true story about what happens when craft turns to crap.

I'll close season one as a solo act with a few remaining "horror stories from the show business trenches". I'll tell more of those stories in Season 2! In this episode: a makeup special effects near disaster with actor Tim Curry playing three parts; how to tell an Oscar-nominated composer (Michael Kamen) you're not happy with his work; how to talk to Superman; how to get a studio tent pole movie green-lit IN THE ROOM!

As you’ve probably gained from listening to this podcast, working for Joel Silver was an adventure. So, if you like stories about Joel, you’re gonna love this episode. The Joel Silver Fan Club In this one, we tell the story of the time our boss, Joel Silver, directed an episode of HBO’s “Tales From The […]

The classic Martini is simple. Elegant. Ice cold gin or vodka with a whisper of vermouth. It’s the perfect end of the day cocktail. This episode will feature another kind of cocktail – a lively conversation wherein the Dads From The Crypt will interview Tales From The Crypt. Dads From The Crypt First, let me […]

Get a bunch of people together who worked on a project and they’ll have stories. That’s what this one is – backstage stories from “Tales From The Crypt”. How to describe the experience of making “Tales From The Crypt“… It was unique, for starters! Back in the 1990’s when we made Crypt, the feature world […]

The Cutting Room Floor is legendary in Hollywood. Whole careers have happened there. In fact, there’s a whole weird history in Hollywood of scenes and actors who famously never made “the cut”. Kevin Costner, for instance, was entirely cut out of “The Big Chill“. He plays Alex – the guy who’s funeral all the other […]

As the production of “Bordello Of Blood” stumbled toward its climax, we knew we’d leave Vancouver with an unfinished movie in hand. That was ironic because our unfinished movie had finished one relationship (between Sly Stallone and Angie Everhart) and was on its way to finishing another – the decade-long creative one between Alan Katz […]

In a horror movie, makeup special effects are everything. Get them wrong and your audience will hate you. It’s just how the horror business is: no guts, no glory. If Freddy Krueger had looked like 1953’s “Robot Monster” (with a gorilla body and a deep sea diver helmet head – with antennas), the whole “Nightmare […]

This episode also could be called “Location, Location, Location!” Where you shoot your movie makes a huge difference. One surefire way to turn craftsmanship into crap is to shoot somewhere you have no organic reason to be. For “Bordello of Blood”, that location was Vancouver. Like the script for “Dead Easy”, “Bordello of Blood” took […]

In a horror movie, the lead's important but the villain is more important than anything.

"The How NOT To Make A Movie Podcast" is a jaw-droppingly absurd story of Hollywood excess. Outsized egos run amok while the movie's creative team slowly succumbing to the kind of madness only Hollywood can produce.

"Bordello Of Blood" - even 30 years after it's tortured making - stands as an object lesson in what happens when you do things for all the wrong reasons. Spoiler Alert: Nothing Good!