Official site & Media Files Maninthechair-themovie.com official site, Trailer 1 Trailer 2 UK trailer Trailer 3 previous trailer Trailer 4 Visual montage trailer NBC - Reel Talk review KRON - Jan Wahl review TV & radio interviews: YouTube - BBC Breakfast interview Jan. 14, 2008 Guardian Unlimited Film Weekly (mp3 file interview at approx. 22:00) Jan. 2008 NBC - Reel Talk interview Dec. 22, 2007 WNYC radio Dec 7, 2007 National Public Radio Nov. 20, 2007 KLUV Dallas Nov. 8, 2007 Links IMDB: Man in the Chair Man in the Chair Film Festival blog Outsider Pictures North Am. distributor Transmedia UK distributor Shorline Entertainment IMDB external reviews Rotten Tomatoes reviews Metacritic reviews MRQE reviews Michael Angarano - official site Robert Wagner - news blog Methodfest - video from the awards The New Beverly Cinema

We are posting only selected reviews on this site.
For more reviews, see RT; IMDB external reviews; MRQE; Metacritic. More reviews will appear as the movie opens in more cities.

1. •• Photos
2. •• Early screenings & Film Festivals 2007
3. •• Dec. 18, 2007, Backstage, 'Chair'Man of the Boards interview
4. •• Dec. 15, 2007, Cinematical, Review: Man in the Chair review
5. •• Dec. 14, 2007, Los Angeles Times, Nod to blue-collar Hollywood review
6. •• Dec. 10, 2007, Filmstew, Turning His Back on the Man
7. •• Dec. 7, 2007, San Francisco Chronicle, Review: Cranky old drunk steals the show in 'Man in the Chair' review
8. •• Dec. 7, 2007, New York Times, A Devotion to Film Binds Two Loners review
9. •• Dec. 5, 2007, Hosokinema.com, Man in the Chair interview
10. •• Dec. 1‚ 2007, Harvey Karten's reviews, Man in the Chair review
11. •• Nov. 30, 2007, Beyond Chron, The Man in the Chair – A Rarity, Captivating review
12. •• Nov. 30, 2007, San Francisco Chronicle, Plummer plays drunk with heart of gold in 'Man in the Chair' interview
13. •• Nov. 28, 2007, Hollywood Reporter, 'Man' could bring Plummer first Oscar nom Oscar buzz
14. •• Nov. 27, 2007, New York Observer, by Rex Reed,
    Crack Plummer review

Oscar Ads Awards • Santa Barbara International Film Festival American Spirit Award -  Best American independent film • MethodFest Life Achievement Award: Christopher Plummer Best Ensemble Cast Award Festival Director's Award (Michael Schroeder) Nominations for Best Picture, Actor (Christopher Plummer), Supporting Actor (M . Emmet Walsh), Director (Michael Schroeder), Screenplay (Michael Schroeder). • Palm Beach Film Fest Best Actor - Christopher Plummer • Kent Film Festival Best Feature Film • Stony Brook Film Festival Audience Choice Award - Best Feature • Heartland Film Festival     Crystal Heart Award;     Audience Choice Award - dramatic Feature

Stony Brook Film Festival 7.23.07

Indiewire 7.24.07

LA Times 3.28.07

Posters

Awards - Click here for a list of film festival & other awards

• Directors Guild of America screening Jan. 14, 2007 (Digitalvision)
• Santa Barbara International Film Festival, CA Jan. 25 – Feb. 4, 2007
• Berlin International Film Festival, Germany Feb 8–18, 2007 Generation Section out of competition
• AFI Dallas Film Festival, Texas Mar 22 - Apr 1 2007
• Method Fest - Calabasis, CA Mar 29-Apr 5, 2007
• Kent, Connecticut April 1, 2007
• Sarasota, FL April 15, 16, 2007
• Palm Beach Film Festival, FL Apr 20, 23, 2007
• Cinema &/è Lavoro Film Festival, Italy April 17-22, 2007
• Cannes Film Market, France May 16, 20, 2007
• Fine Arts Theater, Beverly Hills, CA Special Advance Screening May 19, 2007
• Troia Intl Film Fest, Portugal June 7-9, 2007
• Seattle Film Festival, WA June 2, 4, 2007
• Declaration of Indpendence - London, UK June 1-7, 2007
• Nantucket, RI June 13-17, 2007
• Seoul International Youth Film Festival, Korea July 19-24, 2007 Opening Film
• Stony Brook Film Festival, New York July 23, 2007
• Melbourne, Australia July 25-Aug 12, 2007
• JHA - Los Angeles Jewish Home for the Aging benefit screening Aug. 29, 2007
• Desert Film Society, Palm Springs, CA August 16, 2007
• Malibu Celebration of Film, CA Sept. 28, 2007 Opening Film
• Mill Valley Film Festival, CA Oct. 11, 2007 Centerpiece Film
• Phuket Film Fest, Thailand Oct 10-21, 2007
• Heartland Film Festival, Indianapolis, Indiana Oct. 19-25, 2007
• BAFTA/LA screening Oct 25, 2007
• SAG Film Society screening Nov. 28, 2007
• DGA Monthly Screenings NY Dec. 8 / LA Dec. 14
• Academy Monthly screening Dec. 9, 2007

From the Nov. 28, 2007 THR article, M. Schroeder comments: "It's about screenings," he replied. "We screen almost every night in L.A. and New York. We have been for the past two or three weeks and we will continue through December. And then it's about screeners, the DVDs. We're sending out almost 10,000 to SAG, Academy members and the Hollywood Foreign Press. Our U.K. distributor, Transmedia (headed by) Simon Caplan, loves the film and he at his own cost burned 6,000 DVD screeners for BAFTA and they are already in their homes right now. The picture's going to open (in the U.K.), I think, Jan. 23. It has to be released before Jan. 31 to qualify (for BAFTA consideration).

A broken-down man sits in a screening room, watching Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell in His Girl Friday. He takes a careless swig from a bottle of bourbon, dribbling plenty down his chin. Is it possible the man is being played by the same elegant actor who once played Henry II in Becket in London; Lear, Henry Drummond, and John Barrymore on Broadway? Who played the kindly capable psychiatrist in A Beautiful Mind? The multifarious banker in Inside Man? All right, we'll mention it: Captain von Trapp in The Sound of Music?

Indeed, all are the selfsame brilliant, chameleonic actor. Chat with him and expect to hear about his great memories of his life in the theatre and in iconic screen roles. But don't expect him to tell tales of suffering and starvation. Christopher Plummer says he has had a lucky, joyous, rewarding life — and he shows no signs of stopping.

Currently he is earning the highest praise for his work as that rundown film fan — formerly a gaffer who worked on Citizen Kane — in Man in the Chair, written and directed by Michael Schroeder. In Plummer's performance each moment is brilliant: a perpetual cycle of watching classic films, getting drunk, railing against life, and impatiently waiting for buses, until he meets a high school filmmaker (Michael Angarano) and is persuaded to serve as director — the man in the chair. The two journey on an odd-couple road trip, by bus and bicycle, that takes them to the local "Motion Picture Residence for the Elderly." There the pair engages now-forgotten actors and crew members (played by a who's who of veteran actors, from M. Emmet Walsh and George Murdock through Ellen Geer and Robert Wagner) to assist on the film.

On Thanksgiving weekend Back Stage spoke with Plummer by phone.

Back Stage: Tell us about your start in acting.

Christopher Plummer: It was way back in the Dark Ages. I started being a professional actor when I was about 17. I was going to be a pianist. But I decided it was a rather lonely life, as opposed to the acting life, which is a series of communications with the audience and your fellow players.

Back Stage: Were you formally trained in acting?

Plummer: Not really. When I was doing the odd play for amateur companies, I would take some voice lessons. But that's about all. Then I quickly went into this repertory company in Ottawa, Canada. We did a play every two weeks, so it was massively quick; we had to be ready. I suppose I did, in a couple of years, about at least 150 plays, of all different sizes and shapes. I learned how to be bad, how to ad lib because I didn't know my lines. I had to learn how to get things done as quickly as I could in preparation for the audience. And of course that's the best training of all: the audience. If they don't laugh, you'll learn. They shame you into knowing how to get a laugh. So I went in, really, as an instinctive actor, with no method in sight. Soon, in that particular company, I began to play a lot of the leading roles. And I always played older than I was, because I was used to that. The family I grew up with were my aunts and my mother and their friends, so I was influenced by older people and how they behaved. And so I quickly caught on, and they gave me leading parts — or character parts. It was a wonderful mélange of a variety of roles.

Back Stage: How did you segue into other areas?

Plummer: From there I went into radio, which at that time was the medium of the moment. God, it was great, too. We did such extraordinary stuff. We did RRR [public radio] programs with full orchestra — of Shakespeare, all the Greeks, modern plays. Radio was a marvelous medium. I miss it today, actually. Although it still carries on, it doesn't do all the big stuff it used to do. We had tons of [it] in those days. Once radio died, in a sense, and television reared its ugly head, I left Canada for New York. From then on I didn't look back, all through the '50s — which, in my view, was the last of the golden years of Broadway. How lucky I was to be there, a young actor, growing up in an age where the theatre was still respected as the top of the art.

Back Stage: Did you audition for these roles?

Plummer: No. I was incredibly lucky. I got my first Broadway part [at age 24, in 1954], which I did not read for. I think it was with Eva Le Gallienne, The Starcross Story. It ran one night on Broadway. I thought, "Oh my God, what a short career I've just had!" Fortunately I went straight into another play, which did run: Home Is the Hero. And then Katharine Cornell and Guthrie McClintic — Katharine Cornell was the last of the great actress-managers. [She] took me under her wing and really sponsored me in a sense. I did two plays with them — The Constant Wife and The Dark Is Light Enough — and we toured the United States and parts of Canada in her private train.

Back Stage: When you watched them, were you able to look at technique or were you mesmerized by —

Plummer: I wasn't mesmerized. Don't forget, you have to have a certain arrogance. Even if you are very impressed with them, you can't show it. You must learn to never be overawed by anybody. I quickly learned how to protect myself against being overawed. For instance, Judith Anderson, with whom I played in Medea — we went to Paris and did that. I suppose she was the most frightening actress I'd ever worked with. But I still liked her, and I wouldn't let myself be overawed. I had to fight her; I had to be out there and compete. I had some great ladies of the theatre who taught me. Actually the ladies were more powerful than the men were in those days, in the theatre.

Back Stage: And were you able to just watch their technique?

Plummer: Well, you know, technique is something that you also acquire by repetition, by doing things, by knowing what style of play you're in. If you have any instinct or gift for mimicry, which I had, then you can absorb it quicker and better. Of course you watch people's technique. I watched all the great French actors of the time, because I grew up in French Canada, and we got all the great French movies that came over and all the great French theatre that came over. So I watched great actors like Louis Jouvet and young Gérard Philipe, who was so exciting in those days. And then of course the Oliviers and Richardsons and all the great English actors who then came upon the scene, and I was lucky enough to see them in action, on the stage — and then lucky enough to act with them later. There was a wealth of stuff going on — not quite so much today in the theatres.

Back Stage: Well, L.A. surprisingly has so much —

Plummer: Yes, yes! Very encouraging. When I did Barrymore in 1997-98, I was dreading playing L.A. I thought, "Oh my God, they're not going to — " And it was the best audience we'd had for ages. It was glorious. I thought, "What a savvy audience!"

Back Stage: So, Man in the Chair. Not a big-studio film. How did these crazy kids come to you and ask you to star in their film?

Plummer: It was so charming and disarming. And I liked the part so much; I thought it was so rich. Who could turn that down? I thought, "My God, I'd do it in a snap." And they rustled up enough money to make it at least semiattractive. And they got a wonderful cast together of old actors, some of whom I'd known before. And my old pal R.J. Wagner was in it. And that kid, Michael Angarano, who is so talented and so funny, he has such a wonderful comedic flair. I had a marvelous time. I thought Michael [Schroeder] and his little gang have been so courageous in trying to push this movie ahead.

Back Stage: What did you most admire about Schroeder's filmmaking process?

Plummer: First of all, I thought the script was good. It told a story, and it didn't veer from it. I thought his best work was his writing. I thought he directed it very well, and we all pitched in there together — a concerted effort. But he's a talented writer, and he has a great comic sense — a lovely sense of humor. That's what I most admired. And indeed his feeling for — I always teased him, I said, "You shoved in every cause known to man, selling your soul like that!" And he laughed. "The dogs, the homeless. Don't squeeze any more in." But I loved his respect for that, and his impatience with the lack of help given to animals, particularly in Los Angeles.

Back Stage: Other things you noticed on the set that worked well?

Plummer: He's a good student of film. Although I'd not known him before, he was certainly a pro and knew his film techniques very well. I thought he was as instinctive as we all were. When you're working like that, you work together, so you don't notice; you feel that you're one. He and I worked so well together that it was like you're part of the same body. But that's always the way with a good director who has written a script that is something you want to do; you of course feel that you're like brothers. If you don't, God help you.

Back Stage: Not naming names, but mistakes you've seen directors make that you'd like them to stop making?

Plummer: I don't know. I've always been very lucky with directors I've personally worked with. I won't work with somebody who just has a television mind — by that I mean a very ordinary television mind, not an extraordinary television mind. People who just try to get it in and shoot 3,000 feet of film for absolutely no reason at all, simply because they don't know what they want — there's an awful lot of that around. I have little patience for that. Someone who doesn't come on the set and know pretty well what he's going to cut and where is not for me.

Back Stage: You worked with Elia Kazan. Any stories that you'd like to tell actors about him?

Plummer: On stage particularly, he was a marvelous director for tragedy, and for contemporary and astutely written political plays, there was no one better than Kazan. The thing that surprised me about him was that he wasn't a rigid Method follower at all. He had as much technique as anyone else who has a great deal of technique, and he relied heavily on it, and he wouldn't stand for any indulgent Method nonsense. He used it only when — which is the proper way to use the Method — one is slightly in trouble. You go back to those moments of sense memory that will help you solve the problem, which is really what it's for. But all of us who — which I learned from Kazan — have an instinct work that way anyway, without even thinking about it. The stories about Kazan I've saved for my book, which is coming out in October 2008.

Back Stage: Nothing left on the cutting-room floor for us?

[Plummer laughs.]

Back Stage: Any role that got away from you?

Plummer: Yes, only one actually, and I don't really gnash my teeth at it. I preface it by saying no one could have been luckier than me. Particularly on stage, I've played all the great roles. How can I possibly be unhappy about that? In London in '61 I did Becket, by Jean Anouilh; I played King Henry II. It was a big hit, and we won all the prizes. I think, probably, Henry II was one of the best things I've done on stage. I didn't get the movie. Well, that's all right, because Peter O'Toole — who's a friend and whom I admire greatly — got the movie. And why the hell not? He was hotter at the time than I was, and he had just done Lawrence of Arabia, for God's sake. I'm crazy about Peter. He's one of the funniest, wittiest men around. And he deserved to play it. But I could have killed him for about five minutes. Otherwise, no regrets.

Back Stage: What is something you look at on screen and say, "That was a well-acted moment"?

Plummer: I don't talk about my performances that way. I can't. I much prefer watching other people on the screen, thank you very much. That's not my style anyway. A "movie star," in quotes, is somebody who is always the same, no matter what part he plays. I'm always trying to be different in each thing I do, whether it's subtle or big. If I succeed in that, I'm happy. But I don't go around saying, "God, I was wonderful." If I was talking to a young actor who asked my advice about something, I would show him another actor's performance that I admire tremendously on the screen and say, "Watch that closely, and you'll learn a lot from that."

I could tell them to watch 10 minutes from [Marcel Pagnol's 1938 film] La Femme du Boulanger or [the 1940 film] La Fille du Puisatier, and watch Raimu and Fernandel do a 10-minute scene in front of the camera, which doesn't move, because they are so superb. That's a lesson in how to control things. And I would do a similar thing in English. I would say go and watch Marlon [Brando] for a second, and watch what he is thinking on the screen. You can see what he's thinking; it makes it so clear, by doing absolutely nothing. But never about myself, good God! How can you be satisfied with what you are doing? It's not possible.

Back Stage: Can you recall a technically challenging scene, an acting hurdle you had to overcome?

Plummer: No, because on the overall picture, if I don't have fun with what I'm doing, I don't do it, or I want to leave.

Back Stage: But a puzzle can be fun.

Plummer: That's what I mean. Of course. And all the challenges that one faces, particularly when one plays unchallengeable roles, like the classic roles, which nobody has really challenged — there's no definitive greatest performance ever of those parts. So the field is open. And of course there's a huge amount of work and tension and emotional strain that has to go in to reaching those heights. But all that is terribly exciting, and therefore fun.

Back Stage: Do you have a particular way of approaching Shakespeare? How do you work with verse?

Plummer: I grew up with a family who, fortunately, were very well read, and they loved poetry. So I learned about poetry when I was a kid. And I'm very grateful to them for making me aware of the great writers. So from a child, I was very used to quoting lots of Shakespeare and Wordsworth and Milton and whoever. That was a rich part of my life. So it comes very naturally to me to do Shakespeare. I find Shakespeare a lot simpler to do than an awful lot of modern plays that are filled with problems — and some very bad writing. Shakespeare is a snap, sometimes, because the rhythm of his verse is like music. If you go with it, you'll be there.

Back Stage: Do you have any superstitions?

Plummer: Hmm. No, I don't think so. I'm glad I gave up drinking just before the show. I used to do that a lot. When I was a kid, I'd have some wine. I gave that up. That was not a good idea. No, it's different things one does in each job. Depends on the job. I sort of go with the character I'm playing: What would he do if he was waiting to go on? It just happens instinctively — again, I use that word.

All these little problems don't mean a thing to me. [Interviewers] always are haunting actors for problems. I never had problems acting. And if I did have, I treated them with a lot of humor and got rid of the problem very quickly. I do not suffer for my art. Thank God. How boring would that be? I watch young actors who are so talented and who overanalyze and overindulge themselves because they feel that unless they're suffering they're not going to be any good, and this is the most stupid assumption to make. Have fun, for Christ's sake, when you're doing something! And if you have fun doing what you're doing, the audience is going to have fun. You have to obsessively enjoy what you're doing, in our profession particularly because it's a real tough one. And I say "tough" because it's tough to survive in it. Unless you are obsessed by it and have great joy and love of it, get the hell out. Do something else.

Man in the Chair is playing in select theatres in New York and opens Dec. 14 in Los Angeles.

Christopher Plummer gives a black hole of a performance in Man in the Chair, which opened in New York last week and in Los Angeles this weekend. Every time he appears, he inexorably sucks attention away from anyone else on screen. Eventually, everything revolves in orbit around him, even when he's not present. Somehow, though, even as Plummer merges his soul with his character at the molecular level, he does so in a modest manner. The seams between actor and role are not readily apparent. It's a pity that the film as a whole doesn't rise to level of his magnificent performance, but he elevates the material by his grizzled presence.

Plummer plays Flash Madden, a retired gaffer with a permanent scowl etched on his face. We meet him in a darkened cinema, muttering to himself, talking back to Orson Welles in Touch of Evil, and flashing back to his moment of glory when he was fired, then instantly rehired, on the set of Citizen Kane. He's a moviegoer's worst nightmare, the annoying old guy who keeps up a running commentary while you're trying to enjoy a classic, so our sympathies run toward the man who asks him to shut up. Flash tells the man off, which amuses Cameron Kincaid (a wisely subdued Michael Angarano, who also served as associate producer), a high school senior who wants to win a film school scholarship contest.

Flash puts on a great show of being irascible and irritable, but doesn't seem to mind very much when Cameron begins stalking him. Having overhead that Flash used to work in the movies, Cameron seizes on the thought that the old guy might be able to help him make his student film. From the movie posters hanging in his room and snatches of conversation with his only friend, we get the message that Cameron loves movies. (When he decides to steal a car for a joyride, he insists that it be the same make and model as the titular automotive character in John Carpenter's Christine.) Apparently in common with many young filmmakers today, Cameron wants to make his own movies but doesn't really have anything to say.

Inspiration finally strikes after Flash dismisses Cameron's vague story ideas and introduces him to Mickey Hopkins (M. Emmet Walsh, playing even more bedraggled than usual), an unhappily discarded Hollywood writer living miserably in a deplorable nursing home (that, oddly enough, looks all the world like a run-down apartment). Cameron decides to make a 10-minute docudrama exploring the abusive conditions found in nursing homes. Mickey's crummy surroundings are contrasted with the well-manicured Motion Picture Retirement Home, where Flash recruits a motley group of fellow residents to come out of retirement to help Cameron make his film.

Cameron lives with his mother (Mimi Kennedy) and stepfather (Mitch Pileggi) in a modest suburban home. He is ragingly unhappy with his stern stepdad and constantly gets in trouble with the law. His association with Flash and the focus of making a movie appears to stabilize him, yet he remains an ambiguous character. He attends a high school where he is taunted by a wealthier boy whose father is in the film industry, which serves to provide occasional conflict that is too convenient by half. Otherwise, he remains stubbornly undefined.

In part, that's a result of the short time frame of the film. Nearly all the events take place during the school's three-week winter break, which lends a degree of urgency that's not really needed while telescoping the development of the relationship between Cameron and Flash. Cameron may be entirely sincere in his growing appreciation of Flash but, again, it feels too convenient to ring entirely true. It would have been more satisfying to see Cameron come to conclusions on his own rather than suspect that it's his desire to get his film made that is the driving force. It's one aspect of their friendship that Flash doesn't really want to explore.

Writer/director Michael Schroeder's heart is in the right place: he fashions an entertaining story that calls attention to nursing home abuse and clothes it with a deep love of cinema. Some of the notes are hit with too heavy a hand, though, while others are simply abandoned. As an example, we don't get enough insight into the dynamics of Cameron's family to appreciate why he's so unhappy and constantly acting out. His stepfather is certainly not supportive, but neither is he outwardly abusive, and his mother seems genuinely kind and loving. Perhaps the idea is that his parents need to be more actively involved?

The same goes for Flash. He talks fondly in generalities about fellow "below the line" crew members, but we're left wishing we could hear more stories about films he worked on and the workmates he evidently loved.

Still, it all comes back to Christopher Plummer and the magic with which he imbues Flash. Nearing 80, Plummer remains dashing, debonair, handsome and powerful. (Witness his recent turns in Syriana, The New World and Inside Man). From appearances alone, he's not believable as a washed-up and bitter man. The careless dress and grooming helps, though ultimately it's the expressions in Plummer's face and the dead spaces in his eyes that convey years of sadness and regret. How he does it, I have no idea, but I'm very glad he can be so convincing, and he makes it essential to seek out Man in the Chair.

Check out the official site to view photos and the trailer and read more about the film.

Plenty of films pay tribute to Old Hollywood; "Man in the Chair" sets itself apart with a tip of the fedora not to glamour and scandal but to cinema's working-class brethren. As the bellicose onetime gaffer at the center of the story, Christopher Plummer sheds his usual on-screen elegance and breathes life into crotchety-old-codger clichés. For all its scruffiness and clumsy charm, though, this independent feature travels a formulaic path toward a predictably heart-tugging conclusion.

Plummer's Glen "Flash" Madden worked on "Citizen Kane," but he's now a ghost in the city, wandering its desolate corners with a bottle of Wild Turkey. A regular haunt is the Beverly Cinema, where his scathing, booze-fueled taunts to Charlton Heston in "Touch of Evil" catch the appreciative attention of a teenage film geek, Cameron Kincaid (Michael Angarano).

In by-the-numbers fashion, Cameron breaks through Flash's armor and enlists his help in making a short film for a scholarship competition. The boy's vague notion of a skateboard story morphs into something far weightier after Flash introduces him to Mickey Hopkins, a former A-list screenwriter who's living in nursing-home squalor. Played with heartbreaking gentleness by M. Emmet Walsh, Mickey dusts off his manual typewriter to script the galvanized Cameron's docudrama about elder abuse and neglect. Robert Wagner makes a brief but memorable appearance as the tennis-sweater-debonair producer who bankrolls the project.

Though they can't transcend writer-director Michael Schroeder's pointed contrivances, the actors tap into something achingly true in this valentine to Hollywood's below-the-line crafts people and society's castoffs.
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"Man in the Chair." MPAA rating: PG-13 for language and thematic elements. Running time: 1 hour, 43 minutes. At the Laemmle Music Hall, 9036 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills, (310) 274-6869; Laemmle One Colorado, 42 Miller Alley, Pasadena, (626) 744-1224; Laemmle Town Center, 17200 Ventura Blvd., Encino, (818) 981-9811; Regency Theatres Paseo Camarillo, 390 N. Lantana St., Camarillo, (805) 383-2267.

This season’s most deserving candidate for sleeper hit status, Man in the Chair, is the result of a very bold career move by its writer-director Michael Schroeder. Monday, December 10, 2007 at 12:00 PM

Back in the mid-1990’s, Los Angeles based writer-director Michael Schroeder may not have been a household name, but he was making a comfortable living cranking out genre films like Cyborg 2 (one of Angelina Jolie’s very first films), Cyborg 3 and The Glass Cage. However, when Universal subsequently pulled its funding from production company The Bubble Factory and took with it Schroeder’s green lit project Shimane (an anagram for ‘His Name’), he decided it was time to make a move.

“I had a nice house, a couple of cars,” Schroeder recalls during a recent telephone interview with FilmStew. “But I had that epiphany, that Jerry Maguire moment, where you know you can do more with your life.”

“My children were all raised, and so I told myself, ‘You know, I’m going to go for this,’” he continues. “I sold everything – my house, my cars – and I holed up over in a tiny little apartment on Detroit Street [in the mid-Wilshire area of Los Angeles]. I got a single there and started to write… I wrote Man in the Chair and three other scripts.”

Man in the Chair tells the story of a wayward L.A. high school teen (Michael Angarano) whose Christmas moviemaking project leads him to the unlikely personage of “Flash” (Christopher Plummer), a cantankerous whiskey loving retiree who once was a key grip on classic films such as Citizen Kane. The two form an unlikely friendship and, with help and inspiration along the way from a few more surprising sources - including some of the other Hollywood veterans living with Flash in a motion picture retirement home, make a short film about a very serious subject. The idea for Man in the Chair was actually planted years ago by comedian Jonathan Winters who, while making the comedy The Long Shot in 1985, told Assistant Director Schroeder over lunch about the motion picture retirement home in Calabasas, CA. When Winters suggested that ‘you could crew a movie out of there,’ it stuck with Schroeder and formed the basis of what has turned out to be his first directorial effort in 11 years.

“It started out as the kid (Angarano) wanting actors from the home, but then it became crew because I thought it was better to use the blue collar angle,” Schroeder reveals. “Those people don’t get the chance to work anymore, and so many of them are forgotten. You remember Humphrey Bogart in Treasure of the Sierra Madre, but you don’t remember the guys who made him look good.” “I thought there was a source of wisdom and guidance and experience there that is virtually ignored,” he continues. “It’s not just filmmaking, it’s the lack of mentoring we do as a society with our old people on all fronts. People don’t talk to old people and ask them about our lives. So, as I was writing the script, it was a fun little comedy that became more layered with serious overtones about the elderly, and I’m really happy with how it turned out.”

Man in the Chair has racked up an impressive number of Audience Awards on the film festival circuit in advance of its limited opening in New York this past Friday and Los Angeles this coming Friday, December 14th. Today in fact, Schroeder is en route to the United Kingdom to do publicity rounds for the January 21st opening there with Plummer, who happens to be on location in England shooting a Terry Gilliam movie with Heath Ledger. After participating with Plummer in a special BAFTA screening and Q&A this Friday, December 14th, Schroeder will hop on a plane and return to Los Angeles for a 9:30 p.m. PST screening of Man in the Chair the same day at the Directors Guild of America.

“Chris and I talked on the phone early during pre-production,” Schroeder recalls. “He really loved the dialogue and he loved his character, so he had a really good handle on it from the get go. We talked about what he should wear, his hat and how he should walk.”

“Then what we did is we sort of trimmed some of the scenes, because the genius of Plummer is that he can say in four lines what I wrote in six lines,” he adds. “So it was more of an experience of trimming off the last line or two, because I didn’t need it. There weren’t very many ad libs; it’s pretty true to the text. And I tell you, Chris would come to work and we would rehearse, and he knew every line so perfect. When he was on the set, the bar was set really high; every actor worked harder.”

“He’d start walking around, stumbling along and say one of my lines, like, ‘I was talking out of my ass,’ then I’d yell cut and he’d say, ‘How was that my dear boy?’ He was just so much fun to work with.”

There has been even more excitement about Man in the Chair overseas, with the topic of Hollywood’s glory days often proving to be more resonant with audiences from afar. Simon Kaplan of Transmedia International Releasing, the company that is distributing the movie in England, decided on his own to mint 6,000 DVDs of the movie for distribution to BAFTA members as well, so convinced is he of the film – and Plummer’s appeal – to their older skewing membership.

“I remember at the Berlin Film Festival, we screened as part of “Generation 14,” the youth sidebar,” Schroeder recalls. “Our movie was without subtitles, because all the teenagers in Germany speak English pretty well. Those four screenings rank among four of the very best we’ve had; people were really moved by it.”

The story of how rising young actor Angarano (Lords of Dogtown, Will & Grace, Black Irish) came to the project is an equally interesting one, another Internet success story. After downloading Man in the Chair script sides from Gary Marsh’s BreakdownServices.com website, Angarano became so convinced he was right for the part that he had his agent arrange for an immediate audition. Within five minutes, says Schroeder, he knew Angarano was the kid.

Separately, Schroeder got a special deferred film festival rate with regards to licensing clips from old movies such as Touch of Evil for Man in the Chair. But now that the film is headed into worldwide release, it’s time to pay that piper.

Dealing on the day of his interview with FilmStew with the licensing accounting, Schroeder says he feels both fortunate and satisfied that his Jerry Maguire moment has led him closer to the realm of Jerry Maguire movies. He has since married script supervisor Sharon Cingle (Secretary, Miss Congeniality 2 and Man on the Chair), moved to a larger apartment on nearby Cloverdale Avenue and welcomed the birth of son Milo this past October.

“I catch myself just about every day now,” Schroeder confesses. “I’m walking around with a huge smile on my face. The timing was right. I had made so many films for the DGA and was pulling in enough regular residual checks… I knew if I got my monthly nut down and did the odd commercial, I wouldn’t have to compromise my talents and actually be able to do something that I thought I would be good at. Life is good.”

Man in the Chair: Starring Christopher Plummer, M. Emmet Walsh, Michael Angarano. Directed by Michael Schroeder. (Not rated. PG-13. 107 minutes. At the Kabuki and Smith Rafael Film Center.)

For its first 45 minutes or so, and intermittently thereafter, Michael Schroeder's "Man in the Chair" feels, annoyingly, like a film school project. But even in its most self-indulgent moments, it has something that holds our attention: a beautifully detailed performance by Christopher Plummer, who, working at times with film-school-project dialogue, plays a cranky old drunk named Flash Madden who was given his nickname by Orson Welles when he worked as a crew member on "Citizen Kane."

Cameron Kincaid (Michael Angarano) is a troubled high school kid who loves classic movies and wants to be a filmmaker. He meets Flash in a mostly empty movie theater during a screening of Welles' "Touch of Evil" and bribes him with the promise of Cuban cigars and Wild Turkey to help him make a short film for a school project. In turn, Flash introduces him to retired screenwriter Mickey Hopkins (M. Emmet Walsh), who is living in a squalid senior citizens' complex, and a number of other former film industry figures who are living at the motion picture retirement home along with Flash.

At first, the kid wants to make some kind of skateboard, motorcycle movie, but seeing how Mickey lives, he decides instead to make a movie about the plight of old people who are left to die in substandard retirement homes.

At that point, the film almost becomes one of those things on the Hallmark Channel, where a cranky old guy helps a young kid learn about life and, in turn, recaptures a part of his lost humanity. What keeps the film from that fate are Plummer's brilliant performance, and, on the other end of the scale, gimmick-laden herky-jerky camera work and Schroeder's script, which isn't good enough for basic cable.

Flash has a backstory, with a minimum of credibility, but it isn't really necessary when Plummer is playing the part of a broken man turning to cheap liquor to mute his bitterness at life. From the way he makes even trite dialogue ring heartbreakingly true, to the exquisite detail of inflecting his speech with just a hint of a New York accent, Plummer dominates the film even when he's not onscreen.

Plummer would stand out even more obviously in this sore thumb of a movie were it not for a great cast of veteran character actors in supporting roles, including Walsh, of course, as well as Mitch Pileggi, Mimi Kennedy as Cameron's mom and Ellen Geer, among others. Angarano isn't bad most of the time. He isn't one of those pretty-boy kids who couldn't exist outside a studio casting list, but his performance is occasionally hampered by weak writing. Robert Wagner has a cameo role as a big-shot producer. He smokes cigars convincingly.

In the end, Schroeder goes for tears and obviousness. We react on cue, but it feels unearned. Well, it would, were it not for Christopher Plummer.

-- Advisory: Some crude language and a virtually unwatchable scene of dogs being euthanized at the pound.

E-mail David Wiegand at dwiegand@sfchronicle.com.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/12/07/DD7GTFC07.DTL

In “Man in the Chair” Christopher Plummer, an actor typecast nowadays as a suave, smiling cobra slithering through the corridors of power, sheds his scales to play a tippling old curmudgeon raging against the dying of the light. His fierce portrayal of Flash Madden, a long-retired Hollywood studio gaffer, is the knot that ties together this sentimental intergenerational drama.

The movie, written and directed by Michael Schroeder, wants to confront hard truths about old age in what one character disgustedly labels a throwaway society. But it also insists on applying a thick sugar coating to this very bitter pill. Mr. Plummer’s Flash, who swings between extremes of fury and weepiness, keeps “Man in the Chair” reasonably honest despite itself, though the film is so concerned that Flash’s anger will be unpalatable to audiences that it throws in a mawkish, unconvincing subplot about animal protection to persuade us that in his heart of hearts he’s a softie.

Flash is so obsessed with saving stray dogs from being rounded up and killed that he leads an after-hours raid on an animal shelter to liberate them. The metaphor of the old man as an old dog may be apt, but the comparison is so heavy-handed it feels like pandering. And the raid itself is a perfunctory bit of business.

The movie also has a ludicrous flashback to the young Flash being given his nickname by Orson Welles on the set of “Citizen Kane.” It throws in gratuitously dizzying camera effects to demonstrate its integrity as an independent film.

Flash is first seen in a nearly empty Los Angeles revival house glaring at the screen and hurling abuse during a showing of another Welles film, “Touch of Evil.” “You never could act in pants, Chuckles,” he shouts at a mustachioed Charlton Heston playing a Mexican policeman. Observing this skid-row-worthy heckler is Cameron Kincaid (Michael Angarano), a nervous 17-year-old student who is preparing to make a short movie for a high school competition.

Cameron is as alienated in his way as Flash. Bullied at school and treated contemptuously by his stepfather (Mitch Pileggi), he dwells in a cocoon of old movie lore. Sensing a kindred spirit in the loudmouth crank, Cameron considers Flash as a possible subject for his project and trails him to the grounds of the Motion Picture Home where Flash lives with other retired movie business employees. Flash may have physical comfort, but he spends his days wandering around Los Angeles, perching on park benches and overpasses and swigging out of a pint of bourbon.

After some harsh rebuffs Cameron pries the details of Flash’s career out of him then begs him to help with the film. Flash finally agrees after Cameron bribes him with a promise of a continuing supply of Cuban cigars and Wild Turkey.

After dismissing Cameron’s terrible ideas for the movie, Flash introduces Cameron to Mickey (M. Emmet Walsh), an Oscar-winning former screenwriter who now lives miserably in a nursing home. The movie mentions that Flash’s union affiliation enables him to live in comfort, whereas Mickey, for whatever unspecified reason, has no such cushion.

Cameron now decides he should make an exposé of nursing home conditions and shows the slightly gaga screenwriter, wonderfully played by Mr. Walsh, how to research the topic on Google. Mickey hauls a battered old typewriter out of the closet and, as he begins to peck at the keys, re-engages with life. To get the $5,000 to finance the film, Flash visits a wealthy film producer (Robert Wagner) who stole his wife years earlier and shames him into lending the money.

“Man in the Chair” has few surprises. Once its machinery is humming, it settles into a soothing fable of a last hurrah.

“Man in the Chair” is rated PG-13 (Parents strongly cautioned). It includes profanity.

MAN IN THE CHAIR

Opens today in Manhattan.

Written and directed by Michael Schroeder; director of photography, Dana Gonzales; edited by Terry Cafaro; music by Laura Karpman; production designer, Carol Strober; produced by Mr. Schroeder, Randy Turrow and Sarah Schroeder; released by Outsider Pictures and Elbow Grease Pictures. At the AMC Empire 25, 234 West 42nd Street, Manhattan. Running time: 1 hour 47 minutes.

WITH: Christopher Plummer (Flash Madden), Michael Angarano (Cameron Kincaid), M. Emmet Walsh (Mickey Hopkins), Robert Wagner (Taylor Moss), Tracey Walter (Mr. Klein), Mitch Pileggi (Floyd) and Joshua Boyd (Murphy White).

- Michael, were there tough challenges for you directing him?

(Michael Schroeder) Absolutely not. Christopher and I were always on the same page about this character. When he first called me from Connecticut, he had ideas about Flash's walk, and how he had a hump to his back etc. And then I had always seen Flash as a man wearing a hat, and so we had a good discussion about that because Christopher wanted to wear a hat too. So, we agreed on this little pork pie hat, which the crew used to wear all the time in the old days. I think if anything, Chris brought some of my scenes that maybe were a line or two too long and helped me trim those off. Because when I was writing it, I didn't have the pleasure of seeing the nuance of Christopher Plummer or his look or what he could do. I had a lot of fun writing that role, and his dialogue. And then, when I would watch these scenes on my monitor, what I call, quite frankly, the genius of Plummer, the magic would just happen. You go mad.

- You said you had this idea for a film in the mid nineties, but what took you so long to actually finalize it?

I sort of got hung up for about a decade directing action movies and thriller films and was very busy making a living. And, at the same time I was fighting against my own resume because I wanted to do movies like "Man in the Chair" and I was doing movies like "Cyborg 2" and "Cyborg 3." Then I had this sort of epiphany that I wanted to do more with my life, so I sold my house and my cars and got a little single apartment on Detroit Street, and I started to write.

- It makes it sound like he was terribly wealthy doesn't it?

(Michael Schroeder) No, I wasn't wealthy. The bank owned my house, not me. I just wanted to get away from the mortgage. But, to answer your question, when I got ready to write and wanted to do something different, I remembered about the motion picture home [a retirement home set up by the Motion Picture & Television Fund for those involved or previously involved in the entertainment industry]. Johnson Winters had told me about this place and mentioned that you could actually crew up a movie out of there. And I thought, well there's an untapped source. I wanted to write something fresh because everything's been written. So I thought, why don't I tap that source, bring a boy into it. At first the person that lived in the motion picture home was a retired actor, but then, again, I thought it would be more interesting if he was a blue collar, below the line guy because there are so many of them that don't get to work anymore in the business. And, as I started writing, it just started to grow. It became a more layered script about ageism. Then I started doing the research on the nursing home and was blown away by the neglect problem. It sort of evolved into a sobering subject but told in a humorous, entertaining way so you weren't so blown away by the subject matter, but instead, were actually moved by it.

- It was great that you took on the whole subject of mentorship and the passing on of knowledge.

(Michael Schroeder) Yeah. That is something that is lacking tremendously in this country.

- Have you mentored anyone yourself Chris?

(Christopher Plummer) Oh, no. Not consciously. I wouldn't know how to do that.

- Well, you have younger friends that listen to you don't you? That's mentoring.

(Christopher Plummer) I suppose so, yes, if they do listen.

- Mike, how did you bring Chris into the project? Was he your first choice to play the role?

(Michael Schroeder) Absolutely. When we finally had real money, a real flashing green light if you will, Chris was right there with who I wanted. And, thank goodness the agent liked the script and passed it onto Chris because sometimes they don't. I mean we did have to make an offer. We had to be legitimate. I didn't ask Chris to read the script for free, and say "Hey, do you want to come join me at film camp?" No. I said, "This is a job and this is a role," and thank god he responded to it. That was a great day when Carter Cohen from ICM called me and said "Christopher Plummer loves your script. Let's make a deal."

- Chris, I know that this is a unique script and a unique experience, but are you finding other scripts out there with roles that are fun and important in the same way?

(Christopher Plummer) Yes. More and more I'm finding them on screen, but there are not that many written, certainly not the sort of star character roles like this one. There are some interesting character roles in films that are much briefer in length, but this one carries the movie, along with that devil of a scene-stealer Michael Angarano [plays Cameron in the film]. That child should be jailed just for being a scene-stealer. I hate him. No, actually, I love working with him. He's very funny. Funny kid.

- Well, isn't that mentoring? He must have gotten something out of working with you.

(Christopher Plummer) He mentored me! He was just barely 18 when he made it, and I said, "How many films have you made?" And he said, without batting an eye, "Twenty five features already."

- Speaking of mentoring, you've worked with giants like Elia Kazan and Jean Cocteau.

(Christopher Plummer) Yes. I've had many mentors such as Kazan and even Kama Savitski, who I was lucky enough to work under when I was 18, and those are extraordinary giants of the theatre.

And in movies too, John Houston, Orsen Wells, whom I've never been directed by, but whom I've known well and worked with several times on the screen. God, I love him. I was hoping to do a film with him because we were going to produce, yet again, Julius Cesar in brown shirt instead of black shirt. He said "I want you to play Marc Antony and come in as a producer with me." I thought, "Well, I would do anything. I would pay to work with Orsen because he's such a funny, witty man." Of course, the thing never got off the ground, as was always his way.

I always loved him because he never had a front man to charm the backers. He had to do it himself, and then he got so sick of charming them that he would call them a bunch of philistines and then leave the room and of course had no money. He was so shattered by these dreadful people that he had been charming.

(Michael Schroeder)Chris has "mentees" [people he has mentored] all over the place, he just doesn't know about them. There was an impromptu birthday party thrown for Christopher during our filming, and there were a bunch of elite actors there, Al Pacino being one of them. And Al Pacino pulled me aside and told me "Chris Plummer is the man. He is the best actor in the world." I got from Al that his insider experience on the film where Christopher played Mike Wallace was a great experience for Al Pacino. Now this is Al Pacino. This isn't some acting coach or some student. This is a guy that I really admire as an actor praising this guy [motions to Chris].

- So do you find yourself more compelled to do theatre than as opposed to film because you are saying there haven't been as exciting films or parts?

(Christopher Plummer) Well, there never is a great part on the screen. There is only one every 20 years compared to the theatre where you can pull them out of a hat. The two mediums are totally different. The great roles on the screen are the ones that don't talk while the great roles in the theatre are the ones that talk and talk beautifully. So, if you love words, which I do, than you are attracted, of course, always to the theatre where you can do the great classics and hopefully the good new plays that come along.

- Do you have any stage work planned for the future?

(Christopher Plummer) Yes, I do. I take a year to do movies and the next year I do theatre. I've always done that. It's just very unfortunate because, when you do the theatre, the movie world thinks you're dead, and when you do the movies, the theatre world thinks you're dead. So it's a difficult thing to mix, but I think it's terribly important.

It keeps you in tune with your craft, and variety is the spice of life. I would hate to be in one medium. To do nothing but movies as an actor would be desperately boring.

- Well, it's the lack of having the feedback of a live audience.

(Christopher Plummer) You've got to have that because the crew isn't going to love you.

- It's interesting that the majority of the actors in "The Man in a Chair" were stage trained actors. I think they bring a certain light to it, a certain validation to their roles from their stage training. A lot of these young guys should go out and do a play and feel that pressure and feel that crowd.

(Christopher Plummer) Acting in the theatre also teaches you how to color something on the screen. Out of these so-called movie stars we watch, some are very good, and others have a monotony to them because they don't know what happened in the last scene. They don't know how to orchestrate their performances or the script that they're doing. You read a play and you know where the climaxes are and where the coda is, and that's very important to know, and you really learn that in the theatre.

- When you're working on a film that is not shot in sequence and you are going into a scene, do you prepare to do that scene by working on the scene prior to that on your own, in your own technique?

(Christopher Plummer) Yes. You do that secretly at home. I learned not to talk about that in front of everybody else like a lot of people in our business do.

You've got to know what happens before. I mean when we shot Hamlet many years ago in Denmark, we didn't have much time, and of course the second scene was the death scene. That was on the call sheet, "Hamlet's Death. Tomorrow." Please. I haven't begun to live yet how do I know how to die?

- When you're working in front of a camera vs. on a stage, what's the difference in your consciousness of what you are projecting and your physicality?

(Christopher Plummer) Well, there really isn't any difference at all except that on the screen you must pick out silent moments that you can't necessarily do on the stage. If you do too many silent moments on the stage, the audience will leave. On the screen, you have to fight for your moment in front of the camera and make sure you know exactly when to make that particular look that tells the audience what is inside you even if the lines that you speak may be totally different.

Something has to come through behind the lines. That's really the only difference, but it's a big major difference. I learned that after many, many attempts at acting in films, but it does come eventually.

- Do you feel that there is a different kind of reflection that occurs for an audience in the theatre or in film?

(Christopher Plummer) Yes

- And what would that be?

(Christopher Plummer) Well, first of all, the audience in the theatre pays more for their seats, so they are more likely to shut up and listen. At the same time, they don't have much time to reflect because things are happening so fast. They reflect afterwards.

The audience in a film is rather soothed by the fact that it's all visual, by the scenery, no matter where it is or no matter what emotional act is going on in front of them. Everything's slowed down.

You'll notice if you only go to see a musical on the stage, and then you see that same musical on film, particularly if it's in color, it slows down on the screen. It's much faster on stage.

- In light of that, I thought that your cast was interesting. I kept thinking that I knew all those faces there that were in the old-folks home.?Christopher, it must have been interesting for you get a chance to revisit people that you haven't worked with before or haven't worked with in a long time and for you to get to work with a whole crew of people that are of the generation that brings a sort of quality of acting to this movie that might not have been there if you had worked with another type of cast. How was that for you?

(Christopher Plummer) It was just great, and I think it was beautifully cast. I actually knew some of the people at the home, who aren't there now anymore because they're dead, but Rowdy McDowell was an old pal of mine and he did a lot for the Motion Picture Home. One time he asked me if I wanted to go with him up there to visit Mary Astor. I couldn't believe that she ended up in the motion picture home, that great sort of beautiful star of the 20's and 30's. I didn't go because I thought it was rather gruesome, and I'm afraid I was a coward. But now, after my having seen it, and how comfortable and quite attractive it could be, my mind changed.

- Now Michael, how was it for you to cast?

(Michael Schroeder) First of all, they were so anxious to work. They never get a work call anymore. They hardly even talk to their agents. So, they were really appreciative of the part even though they were paid virtually nothing. They just wanted to work again. My casting director would just bring me people that wanted to do it, and I chose faces. I specifically didn't choose faces like Mickey Roonie or Dick Van Dyke for those smaller roles. Those are legendary actors, and I wouldn't put Christopher Plummer in the role of Speed either, it just wouldn't work. I didn't want those people to be personified by a star quality, so I chose people that made you think "Why do I know him? Oh that's Mickey Rooney." We did that on purpose because these are such great actors. One thing I learned from Christopher Plummer is that he loves to hide within a character, and you lose Christopher in that guy. You see Flash, and for 107 minutes that's another persona, and so the other actors did that same thing. Ellen Geere is really talented that way. They were so good, and they just loved what the script said to them.

- Chris, did you stay in character even when the cameras weren't rolling to keep that character alive?

(Christopher Plummer) Well, there was hardly a pause in the filming of this movie where I could drop it, but I don't do that, no. I quickly get out of the character.

?Michael Schroeder? I say action right, and he starts walking and he says "I was talking out of my ass," and then I'll say cut and he'll go, "How was that dear boy?"

(Christopher Plummer) Yeah, I hate hanging onto a character.

- Can you talk a little bit about the casting of Robert Wagner. I thought he was the perfect choice for the movie.

(Michael Schroeder) Again, I got lucky. He did not want to do a film before Christmas. He had promised his family he was not going to work, but his manager said, "You ought to read the script; it's a pretty good script." So he read it on the way to a funeral in Washington DC, and as soon as he landed in DC he said, "I'm in," and he was great.

He was one of the guys that had to float. He'd work a day here and then we'd bring him in five days later and he'd work a day here, and he was really great about it where some people would say "Look, you got me one day."

There was an alternate ending where Taylor Moss came to the theatre and brought in a legendary director, and we just could never get that thing hooked up. I'm so glad we didn't because it's not a good ending. But Robert said, "I'm your designated hitter. Whenever you need me, I'll come and do that scene."

- Had you ever worked with him before?

(Christopher Plummer) No, but I knew him very well because I knew Natalie, and they were constantly getting remarried all the time.

??Can you tell us about the title of the film?

(Christopher Plummer) Well, it's got a double meaning. The man in the chair is the director on a film. In the old days it was called a director's chair because it was only the director who had a chair. Now everyone has a chair. Third makeup has a chair.

And also, when I saw this character, Flash, at the beginning, I saw him as a man in a chair who was always sitting under this tree. So I had the title also as a description of him.

But as we worked it out, that chair became a bench because we wanted the boy there with him and some other stuff, so he's really like the man in the bench. That just doesn't roll off the tongue very well, so we left it man in the chair. It's more about the reference to the job.

- Could you talk about the kid actor Michael Angarano? He was just fantastic. It seems like he was like a sponge and absorbed a lot of the material from you and Christopher.

(Michael Schroeder) He's really natural. He'll just take the dialogue and get through it, but you believe his lines.

(Christopher Plummer) He's got a little magic, Michael, he really does. He's a natural. He's totally instinctive. He doesn't have to worry about taking anytime to get into character, he already is. And he has an incredible sense of humor, which not a lot of young actors do.

(Michael Schroeder) And sense of mimicry right?

(Christopher Plummer) Yes. He can mimic.

- Did he imitate you?

(Christopher Plummer) I'm sure he did. Not in front of me, but I'm sure he did.

(Michael Schroeder) He did all the time. That kid is going to blow up.

(Christopher Plummer) Yes. He's going to be something. He just needs to work on his diction a little bit.

(Michael Schroeder)I think he's like a young Matthew Broderick. He has that magic. He can be funny or he can be serious. He just finished the 70 million dollar film with Jet Li and Jackie Chan. The first time they've ever been in the same film.

- Can we go back to your flash character Christopher? He seems a lot different from your demeanor. Where did he come from? Who did you base him off of?

(Christopher Plummer) Well, a lot of old bums that I've known over the years, including some very good friends, and myself too. I went through a big drinking period. The people you meet in those bars year after year are some incredible characters, so it wasn't tough to draw on a few of them and make one out of them. And the voice is sort of a New York self-deprecating, bitter voice, very cynical.

- Your daughter is also a very talented actress. Is there any similarity in you having mentored her in some way?

(Christopher Plummer) When I saw Amanda first on the stage in "Agnes of God," which she was absolutely extraordinary in, just frightening, I had no sort of feeling that she was part of my genes or my family.

It was another kind of talent all together. It had nothing to do with her mother or me. She suffered on her own, and consequently, it was a very unnerving and frightening experience but also marvelous because she was so frenzied and extraordinary in that role. How she did it every night I really don't know, but she did.

- Have you two worked together much?

(Christopher Plummer) No, we never have. At first it was on purpose because we didn't want it to look like a family outing, but now I'm thinking it's the time to do it before I croak.

- Do you have something in mind that you'd like to do with her?

(Christopher Plummer) Yes I do. I mean we have been offered plays together, which either we were not free to do or we decided "No," but I think "Major Barbara." I think she'd be marvelous as Barbara. She would give it a real eccentric kind of force, and I would like to do Underschaft, so maybe we could do that.

- You get remembered for specific films, but do you feel there are films that you've done that people forget about or overlook that you want people to see you in?

(Christopher Plummer) Oh sure.

- What are some of those?

(Christopher Plummer) Well, there are several little things that you wouldn't know because hardly anybody ever saw them. That's the sadness of little gems that nobody gets behind and pushes.

- So which ones do you think we should go find that people have not seen enough of? Could you tell us?

(Christopher Plummer) It's hard. It's very hard. I'd much rather talk about other people's movies than the ones I've been in. I have very little affection for a lot of the ones I've done. They're not embarrassing, but I'm not balled over by them. I think I enjoyed doing Mike Wallace in "The Insider" because that was a very well made movie.

- Have you seen Mike Wallace?

(Christopher Plummer) Yes. I know Mike Wallace, and although I was terrified that he would hate my performance, he evidently liked it. He didn't like the script because CBS got it in the neck, and they couldn't deny it because it was true.

- And what were some of the other films you were saying? (Christopher Plummer) You know I've made over 100 films, I don't know. Well, I guess "The Man Who Would be King," but everybody saw that. There are little films, English films like "Aces High." That's a sweet movie, and you know it, so there's nothing that you don't know.

- No, but we want to know a list from you.

(Christopher Plummer) Well I liked that movie, "Aces High," and I liked being in it. I wasn't particularly standing out in it, but I loved being in it. I thought it was a sensitively done film.

?Michael Schroeder?You're giving the Robert Weiss answer because films are like girlfriends. You like the one you're with the best.

- Well Michael, what are your favorites of his films?

(Michael Schroeder) Definitely "Man Who Would Be King," and, "Man in the Chair." That is my favorite Christopher Plummer film. He gets a lot of screen time, and I can't get enough of him. I've actually moved scenes in the film to get him back on the screen sooner because the film is alive when he's there. I also love "Insider." Those would be my big three.

- Are there any films that had a particular effect on you that made you change your perspective or informed your work?

(Michael Schroeder)"It's a Wonderful Life" had a major effect on me. The first film I saw was at a drive in. I remember it was called "The Guns in Navarone," and we were in a Plymouth station wagon. My mom had eight kids, four at the time, and I was the oldest. We were right next to the speaker and I was just mesmerized by Gregory Pack and that whole movie. Then I saw "Greatest Show on Earth" which I was blown away by. And then when I really started to get involved in film I was really affected by the "Raging Bull." I went to a matinee screening. I saw it with about five people and the power of that film had an enormous effect on me.

- And for yourself Christopher?

(Christopher Plummer) Well, I grew up miles before he did, so I grew up on pictures. I also grew up in the province of Quebec, so I saw all the French films from France, and they became my favorites instead of the English movies, which I love because they were making that wonderful group of comedies in those days.

But the French were at their best in the 40's. They had all the great actors playing on screen that were in the theatre. Their performances were so rich and extraordinary that nobody got bored. Those films were magic. And the German films were wonderful too.

So they were a big influence on me screen wise. And I suppose, "The Third Man" was one of the best films ever made. What was the name of that wonderful director, who, to me, was the best English director that there was? Carole Reed! Oh, and another was that Irish movie with all the Abbey players, "Odd Man Out." So there are thousands of movies I love that I wasn't in. I wasn't out there to ruin them.

- Besides this guy being your favorite director of the moment (motions to MS), are there any other favorite directors you think of from over the years?

(Christopher Plummer) Well Kazan, Tyrone Guthrie, without question. One of the greatest directors ever. Kazan, the greatest for contemporary tragedy. He was marvelous at his time. I wish he'd gone into the classics because I think he could have done some of them and done some very interesting things with, particularly "Othello." In fact, when I was working with him he said, "I may do Othello. Do you want to play Iago?" And I said "With you? Yes." And he was going to get Sidney Poitier to play Othello, but then, it was very strange. Sidney, he was very smart. He said no because, it was in 1958, and he felt that Othello couldn't be thought of as a duke. Being a black actor at that time, he said, "I'd love to, but I think it's not the right time." It's such a delicate situation. He's right and he's wrong, but my god I'd like to have been in that production, but it never happened.

- And what was it about Sir Tyrone that you particularly liked?

(Christopher Plummer) It was his enormous panache. How he dealt with people on the stage. How armies would cross the stage in a second. And he also was enormously witty and funny and no problems. It was just enormous fun. Ands that's what so many people in our business I find, sadly, don't have.

- Did you work with Kazan both on stage and film?

(Christopher Plummer) No, just on stage.

-?Have you worked with any director both on stage and film?

(Christopher Plummer) Yes. Sidney Lumet. He did "Stagestruck," which was my first movie. He gave me my first movie job, and then I did a terrible play called "Night of the Auk." A very pretentious play that only ran two weeks.

- How did Lumet's dealing with you as an actor differ on film vs stage?

(Christopher Plummer) It was the same. Same exactly. He was excellent on the stage. He started on the stage. I wish he'd done more. It wasn't because of him that the play failed. It was the words.

- So what's next for both of you?

(Christopher Plummer) Well, Michael seems to be dedicated to pushing this film of his. He's a terrible pusher, but thank god somebody's pushing this movie. And I'm going to go with Terry Gilliam and do his next movie, which is called "The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus." I am playing the doctor. Big chance for me. I have to wait until I'm nearly 80 to get a nice, big screen role.

MAN IN THE CHAIR
Outsider Pictures
Reviewed for CompuServe by Harvey Karten
Grade: B+
Directed by: Michael Schroeder
Written By: Michael Schroeder
Cast: Christopher Plummer, Michael Angarano, M. Emmet Walsh, Robert Wagner, Joshua Boyd, Mimi Kennedy, Mitch Pileggi, Tracey Walter, Taber Schroeder, Jody Ashworth, John Rezig
Screened at: Review 2, NYC, 11/26/07
Opens: December 7, 2007

With Oscar talk centering now on possible thesp honors for Daniel Day-Lewis in “There Will Be Blood,” “Johnny Depp in “Sweeney Todd,” George Clooney in “Michael Clayton,” Viggo Mortensen in “Eastern Promises” and at least a dozen others in a fine year for cinema, let’s not forget that some top notch performances can come out of small indies. And let’s hope that if not enough members of the Academy see these superlative indies, at least prize-giving organizations of professional critics are privy to works like “Man in the Chair,” where Christopher Plummer turns out a tour-de-force, alternately sentimental and gruff interpretation of an octogenarian gaffer (electrician) in the film industry now long retired.

Thematically the picture is of major importance. Just scan the nasty comments that some of the adolescent fanboys make on the Rotten Tomatoes movie database at http://rottentomatoes.com. While they’ll never dare to criticize a reviewer’s racial or ethnic background, these kids will not hesitate to mock a writer’s age: “That critic is old: forgot about anything he says.” That’s putting it mildly. “Man in the Chair,” for all its frothy entertainment value, is a raging attack not only against ageism but against our throwaway society: the way Americans, perhaps more than any other people, not only discard those who no longer have any use, dumping the aged, the infirm, the destitute into “homes” that are more like storage bins, but given its fifty percent divorce rate throw away unwanted spouses, even toss onto the road and euthanize tens of thousands of unwanted, healthy dogs annually.

To dramatize the theme, Michael Angarano in the role of Cameron Kincaid is a high-school junior bullied by Brett (Taber Schroeder), a rich kid who tells him and his only friend Murphy (Joshua Boyd) that they both do not matter. When Cameron runs into Flash Madden (Christopher Plummer), seventy years his senior, a man told for quite a bit longer that he does not matter, they bond, but their friendship takes time. Flash is fond of cigars, Wild Turkey, and his space, and has little use for teenagers or most others, even if they do share a liking for Los Angeles’ only retro cinema where they watch Orson Welles’ “Touch of Evil” where Flash talks back to the screen. Cameron explains that he wants to enter film school when he graduate: that he has no money and needs a scholarship, which he can get if he makes the best film in a contest.

When the bond between the two men is secure, the friendship is made in heaven. Each figuratively saves each other’s life and the lives of others, as Mickey Hopkins (M. Emmet Walsh), a once-famous screenwriter now living in filth and obscurity, is given his first job in thirty-five years, and others in Flash’s Motion Picture Home are given a task: to kick in their talents to make a movie that will win Cameron a scholarship and get him into film school.

Writer-director Michael Schroeder pulls no punches in excoriating the conditions in which some of America’s old are living, all while giving us in the audience the spoonful of comedic sugar that makes the medicine go down. People in their eighties and nineties are languishing in wheelchairs, immobile, heads down, not even involved in games of cards or bingo or even watching television. This becomes the subject of Cameron’s small documentary, the subject in which the high-school junior becomes involved once he chucks the more likely adolescent interest of skateboarding or motorcycling. Flash has not only taught Cameron how to be the man in the chair (while an old friend of Flash, Taylor Moss, played by Robert Wagner, acts as producer who supplies by $5,000 in funding for the doc): he has instilled in the young man the difference between a passing, superficial fancy and an important, political subject. The greater good, however, is accomplished by the young man is revitalizing the spirits and unused talents of the AARP members in the home.

While few people of Mr. Angarano’s age would be anything but scared witless to play next to the monumental Christopher Plummer, the twenty-year-old performer (“Lords of Dogtown”) acquits himself well in the envious role while Mr. Plummer, veteran of over one hundred films, just might be awards material—particularly given that “Man in the Chair” took Best Film at film festivals in Santa Barbara, Palm Beach and Stony Brook.

Rated PG-13. 109 minutes. © 2007 by Harvey Karten Member: NY Film Critics Online

THE MAN IN THE CHAIR – LOADS OF FUN

The story revolves around a high school kid who loves old Black and White movies. He knows everything about them and spends endless hours in movie theaters watching them. He wants to enter a contest at school to earn a scholarship to film school. He accidentally meets up with a legendary Hollywood old Gaffer who drinks way too much. And is mad at the World and smokes cigars. The young man approaches the old-fart when he follows him one day to the home for Older Show Biz people.

“Flash” as he is called is not easy to approach. You have to walk on eggs when you’re around him. Eventually he softens to the kid and agrees to help him make a movie. “You’re going to have to have a script”-- he tells Cameron the Kid. “And I know just the person you need to talk to.” “Flash” takes the Kid to see Mickey Hopkins (M. Emmet Walsh) who is now a broken down living legend writer who lives in squalid conditions in a retirement home. He is dirty and filthy and can hardly move his fingers. But, later the Kid inspires him so much that he finally gets himself together long enough to whack out a script on his manual typewriter.

Originally the Kid wanted to make a film about skateboarding. Then, when he saw and read articles about how hundreds of ‘Rest Homes’ abuse and give little care to their ‘guests” – he changed direction and decided to do a documentary about that.

With the help of “Flash” and his contacts he is able to put the movie together. There are several issues going on in the movie. There is an age issue. There is ‘Stepfather’ issue. Cameron doesn’t like him and the Step Dad doesn’t like the Kid. Then there is the Animal Rights issue. The Old Guy Flash loves Animals. It breaks his heart when he watches the San Fernando Valley Animal Control truck drive up with Dogs every day they take inside to kill them. One day with the help of Cameron and a friend – they Boost the Animal Control Truck and release all the Dogs in a Sanctuary for unwanted Animals. The Kids tell him that Animal Control will probably take the dogs back the next day. Flash says: “I know, but at least they have this one happy day.”

This movie runs the gamut of emotions. You enjoy some great laughs. The lines are terrific. However, you will also need some Kleenex to dry your tears, and it will bring back to memory some of your own experiences. Any age can relate to this film.

‘The Man in The Chair’ just brims over with terrific music, Intense acting and fabulous Character acting. The Brilliant Cast members are: Christopher Plummer (Flash Madden) who gives a multi-layered heartbreaking performance. Michael Angarano (Cameron Kincaid) comes across as a real kid. Not as a Kid trying to play a kid. M. Emmet Walsh (Mickey Hopkins the writer) is totally fascinating. Carlene Moore plays a still beautiful has-been actress, who misses the days was she was someone. If her performance doesn’t break your heart, then you don’t have one. And in a small token role is Robert Wagner as a Billionaire who finances the movie. Wagner looked better than I’ve seen him in years and he fit perfectly in this part.

While not perfect, ‘The Man’ is good entertainment. The Film Photography was a little too jumpy at times with excessive strobe effects. But those are minor complaints. I would still recommend that you see this Flicker, especially if you are interested in character acting, Hollywood, old movies, human rights and animal rights.

RATING: THREE BOXES OF POPCORN!!! –trademarked-

If you have any good feelings for the golden days of Hollywood, you'll probably be moved by "Man in the Chair," particularly by its lead character, played by veteran Christopher Plummer.

After classic theater training in his native Canada, Plummer played many important stage roles - he was a member of Britain's National Theatre, under Laurence Olivier, and of the Royal Shakespeare Company during the Peter Hall years. His "King Lear" earned plaudits in New York in 1994. He's won two Tonys and numerous nominations.

He's also been in scores of movies, first striking gold in "The Sound of Music," which is anything but his favorite picture (see below). His remarkably varied film career had something of a resurgence starting in 1999, when he played Mike Wallace in "The Insider." Since then, he has also appeared in "Syriana" and Terrence Malick's "The New World."

"Man in the Chair," written and directed by Michael Schroeder, doesn't try to hide its sentimental streak. Plummer plays Flash Madden, a cantankerous, heavy-drinking former movie gaffer who lives at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital. Flash is definitely not going gentle into that good night - Plummer has called the character "King Lear with a Bronx accent."

Flash visits the local movie rep house (actually the New Beverly in Beverly Hills) and, with a flask of bourbon in hand, bellows his uncensored and sarcastic thoughts at the screen - often at the very movies he worked on during the glory days, with stars such as Orson Welles and Charlton Heston. During a screening of "Touch of Evil," he howls at Welles to "take the marbles out of your mouth" and refers to Heston as "Chuckles."

Cameron (Michael Angarano of "Almost Famous"), a student who's competing for a film scholarship, approaches Flash for help. Flash rejects the request in no uncertain terms, but you know he'll eventually come around.

When he does, he enlists the help of other movie-industry retirees. He also lands the services of a once-famous screenwriter (M. Emmet Walsh) who is enduring lousy conditions in an old folks' residence. The writer's plight gives Cameron the subject for the short film he needs to make: the awful state of the nation's nursing homes. Also among the veterans who pitch in to help is a wealthy producer (Robert Wagner) who long ago seduced Flash's wife.

It's great to see old hands Walsh and Wagner. But "Man in the Chair" is Plummer's show. The actor spoke by phone from New York.

Q: Did you ever work with Orson Welles or Charlton Heston?

A: Oh yes, I knew Welles well, and we worked several times together. Indeed, we were going to produce together at one point. That didn't happen because Orson always either got disinterested in a project or there was no money. ... But I was crazy about him, and we got on like a house on fire. He was a terribly funny man. Many people don't realize how witty and amusing he was. And what a terrific mimic he was. We had a marvelous time together. Heston I knew a little bit. I don't think an awful lot of people knew Heston. He was slightly remote. He was always nice to me, gentlemanly nice. Jason Robards Jr. used to call him "Chuckles" because of his teeth. "Chuckles Heston" was an affectionate nomenclature. So I put that in the film.

Q: Were your lines scripted?

A: They were mostly scripted, Michael (Schroeder) wrote a very good character. He gave him all his proper humor and his bitter, cynical edge. And I didn't have to do very much ad-libbing at all. No, no, just an occasional thing we worked out together. It was the role that he'd written that made me want to do the film.

Q: Do you feel any personal resonance with Flash's anger and bitterness? Is there any of you in the character?

A: Just the booze part. (Laughs.) No, I was a good heavy drinker in my time, and that resonates very heavily with me. I love all the old drunks who scream out against the world and have a heart of gold underneath it all. I love (Flash's) sense of humor about his failure. It's something that doesn't exist much anymore - particularly in New York, which used to have a wonderful, self-deprecating kind of humor, particularly about failure. Nobody wants to laugh at failure anymore. They're too scared. So I miss that. ... Bitterness? No. (Unlike Flash) I'm not bitter. I count myself an extremely lucky human being, extremely lucky to have done all the wonderful roles I've managed to play in the theater and on the screen. So I'm pretty much a rather boring old happy camper.

Q: The theme of ageism is obvious in this movie. Do you think this is more of a problem in the acting profession than in other fields?

A: Women have a tough time. They always have had - the ones who don't want to or don't know how to become character actresses, or are too proud to think they're growing old, who always have their face-lifts because they've got to look eternally young. If they realized, if they're good at all, how real and believable they would be as character actresses, their careers could go on. But then, most of them out there have not been trained in the theater, so they don't have that background to give them the confidence to go on. ... A lot of ladies I knew ended up in the (Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital), like Mary Astor, who was a great star who ended her days there.

Q: The director told a film festival audience that you will be receiving a major Oscar push.

A: (Laughs.) Oh, I don't talk about those things.

Q: Is it a fact that in an incredible career you've never had an Oscar nomination, though you've won Tonys?

A: Oh yes, I've got every other award known to man. (Laughs.) Except the Oscar. That's all right. I don't mind.

Q: How can it be that you've never had an Oscar nomination?

A: Unless I have more enemies than I thought I had. (Laughs.) That's one way of looking at it. I have made more than 100 movies. You'd think one might have given me (a nomination). (Laughs.) ... But it doesn't matter, honestly. Awards are nice to get, but they're not what it's all about. They're too trumped up now. They've been made to be too important. Don't forget, Charlie Chaplin didn't get (an Oscar) until he was in his 80s. (Chaplin did receive an honorary Oscar in 1929).

Q: Did you really refer to "The Sound of Music" as "The Sound of Mucus"?

A: I think everybody did. Yes, of course.

Q: You have an autobiography coming out next year. Will it address your feelings about "The Sound of Music"? I seem to detect you have something like disdain for the movie.

A: Oh no, no, no. It's not my favorite cup of tea. Of course it isn't. I'm very grateful for it. It helped put me on the map with a segment of the audience that would never come to the theater. That's fine. And I love Julie (Andrews) as a person, and I made a lot of very good friends out of it. It's not my favorite role in the world, God knows. We used to joke about it because it verged on the sentimental to such an extent that it was funny. I'm not going to deal very much with it in my book. I tell so many other stories. It's just one.

Q: You once said, "I don't suffer for my art. I have a ball doing it." I take it you're not a big fan of Method acting.

A: The Method is very valuable to actors who are in trouble, who are trying to find an emotional line and they can't. They go to the Method and use sense memory or something that happened to them or to a friend, and it'll stir up an emotion and that will supply the missing feeling. That's what the Method is for. But acting is an instinctive art. It's not run by any rules. It's a highly technical art as well. ... The point is, a lot of people have used (the Method) in a way that says, "If I don't suffer, then I can't be good." That's bull-, which is so appalling! (Laughs.) You've got to have fun. If you don't have fun, the audience sure isn't going to have fun.

MAN IN THE CHAIR (PG-13) opens Friday in the Bay Area.

E-mail Walter Addiego at waddiego@sfchronicle.com.

Plummer performance: It's a tough year for anyone hoping to land a best actor Oscar nomination since the field's packed with high-profile contenders and strong performances.

There's already a lively buzz going for Denzel Washington ("American Gangster"), Philip Seymour Hoffman ("Before the Devil Knows You're Dead"), Josh Brolin ("No Country For Old Men"), James McAvoy ("Atonement"), Daniel Day Lewis ("There Will Be Blood") and Tom Hanks ("Charlie Wilson's War"). And there's also talk about George Clooney ("Michael Clayton"), Ryan Gosling ("Lars and the Real Girl"), Johnny Depp ("Sweeney Todd"), Christian Bale ("3:10 To Yuma"), Frank Langella ("Starting Out in the Evening") and Emile Hirsch ("Into the Wild").

Is there room for one more? Well, I hope so having just seen Christopher Plummer's performance in Michael Schroeder's "Man in the Chair." Plummer's movie career goes way back to Sidney Lumet's 1958 drama "Stage Struck" starring Henry Fonda and Susan Strasberg. Over the years, Plummer's worked with other top directors and starred in such films as Robert Wise's "The Sound of Music," Michael Mann's "The Insider," Ron Howard's "A Beautiful Mind," Atom Egoyan's "Ararat," Stephen Gaghan's "Syriana" and Spike Lee's "Inside Man." Believe it or not, not only has he never won an Oscar, he's never even been nominated for one!

Academy members now have an opportunity to honor Plummer for his work in "Man." It's a film they're likely to enjoy, by the way, if they take the time to see it. "Man" revolves around a high school kid (Michael Angarano, who played the young Red Pollard in "Seabiscuit") who comes up with the smart idea of enlisting a group of long forgotten Hollywood veterans living at the Motion Picture Country Home or in dismal apartments around L.A. to help him make a student film about nursing home abuse that he hopes will win him a scholarship.

Needless to say, they may be old-timers who are no longer employable in today's ageist Hollywood, but they definitely know how to do their jobs and after some plot twists and turns they show they've still got what it takes. Plummer's character, Flash Madden, is an electrician who we're told worked on "Citizen Kane" and got his nickname from Orson Welles after an exploding light ruined a take. The first person Flash turns to for help on this student film project is screenwriter Mickey Hopkins (M. Emmet Walsh, whose many credits include "Blade Runner" and "Ordinary People").

"Man," which is being released domestically by Outsider Pictures, is written and directed by Michael Schroeder, who produced it with Randy Turrow and Sarah Schroeder. It was executive produced by Peter Samuelson and Steve Matzkin. Starring are Christopher Plummer, Michael Angarano, M. Emmet Walsh, Robert Wagner, Tracey Walter, Joshua Boyd, Mimi Kennedy, Mitch Pileggi and Taber Schroeder.

After enjoying an early look at "Man," I took the opportunity to focus with Michael Schroeder on how it got made and how he's trying to bring it to the attention of Academy members and other awards givers. "It's about screenings," he replied. "We screen almost every night in L.A. and New York. We have been for the past two or three weeks and we will continue through December. And then it's about screeners, the DVDs. We're sending out almost 10,000 to SAG, Academy members and the Hollywood Foreign Press. Our U.K. distributor, Transmedia (headed by) Simon Caplan, loves the film and he at his own cost burned 6,000 DVD screeners for BAFTA and they are already in their homes right now. The picture's going to open (in the U.K.), I think, Jan. 23. It has to be released before Jan. 31 to qualify (for BAFTA consideration).

"We're going to open in New York and San Francisco on Dec. 7. We're opening in Los Angeles on Dec. 14 and opening in Chicago and Montreal on Dec. 21 and going wider to various other communities after the beginning of '08. So we're doing everything we can. We're trying to place ads in the trades and do what we can. We can't compete (in terms of spending) with Fox Searchlight and Lionsgate, but we believe in our film. We certainly believe in Christopher's performance. Michael Angarano is great in the film and so is Emmet Walsh. Those three just really hit it out of the park, in my opinion."

Asked how the film came to be, he explained, "A few years ago I'd directed eight films in eight years and I had a nice little house and a couple cars. I was doing all right, but I wasn't really feeling fulfilled in my life and what I could do in my career. I'd done some action movies and genre movies and thrillers. I discovered Angelina Jolie in 1992 and put her in a movie called 'Cyborg 2.' I just became disenchanted with what I was being offered so I had that Jerry Maguire epiphany moment where you know you can do more with your life. I sold my house and my cars and everything and I got a little single over on Detroit Street in the Miracle Mile area (of L.A.) and I started writing. I wrote four scripts and one was 'Man in the Chair.' Before I became a director I was a first A.D. I did 25 features and one of (them) was a little picture called 'The Long Shot.' Jonathan Winters was a day player on it. Jonathan told me he'd gone over to the Motion Picture Home and made 'em laugh and feel better."

Schroeder didn't know anything about the Motion Picture Home. "I'd been in the DGA for four years," he said, "and hadn't even heard of this place even though part of my pay goes to it. (Winters explained,) 'For lack of a better term, it's a rest home out in Calabasas where retired crew members and actors live. In fact, you could crew up a whole movie out of there.' I smiled when I heard that and I said, 'What a great idea for a film.' Since I was looking for this change-my-life moment, I wanted to write something that wasn't a cyborg movie or an action movie. I thought I'd write this sort of coming-of-age kid story about a boy who casts (a movie project with) an unlikely source and an often ignored source in our world -- the elderly. As I started to write it, it became more serious. All the research you saw on the Internet in the film is the same research I saw when I was getting ready to write this script. I realized the nursing home neglect problem was epidemic. It was worse than I ever imagined.

"So then my script started to take on a little more of a somber tone and it became more layered about a lot of things. Every time the movie started to get too sentimental or too serious or started to bum you out, we'd shift into some humor. We'd move on to another scene and we'd style it up a little bit because I didn't want the film to be overly depressing. I wanted it to be entertaining, but I wanted somehow (for) the message, for lack of a better term, to get through -- not necessarily to reform nursing homes. I think that's a huge undertaking that a small-time director like me is not going to change overnight. But I basically wanted people to leave the theater and go home and call their grandparents (that) they hadn't talked to in six months. To call 'em up and invite them over and ask them about their lives and ask for their advice in your life because they're there to help and they've been down the path. It's just that, like Flash says, we live in a throwaway society and we're moving so fast we often forget those who came before us."

I asked Schroeder to share some insights about Flash: "I liked the name Flash for some reason and I had to design some kind of device for him to get that name. I thought it'd be interesting if he was an electrician and he flashed an arc or something. Then I played on the 'Citizen Kane' thing. I wanted to establish him as being in the film business a long time. He was in a group of New Yorkers -- stagehands who moved out here in the '30s to become grips and electricians. Also, I love 'Citizen Kane' and I love the whole paranoia that Orson Welles had while he was making the film (and) how he had extra security and all that. He was always afraid the film was going to be taken over or shut down.

"He was very paranoid about people trying any kind of sabotage (during) his production. So here's an opportunity for my lead guy to get his name from Orson Welles, which is pretty cool. And then I also wanted to show that he was a learned guy, that he knew how to read, that he quoted Winston Churchill and sort of busted Orson Welles when Orson Welles was poaching on (a Churchill) quote. But, again, everything is layered into the screenplay to support something else. If I worked on 'Citizen Kane,' I'd probably be telling everybody. I'd probably have a T-shirt that said, 'I worked on Citizen Kane,' but he didn't tell the boy that initially. Even when the boy asks, 'How'd you get a name like Flash?' he goes, 'None of your God damn business.' So he's not going to peel that layer yet."

When Welles mistakenly decides the light that flashed was intended to interrupt production, Schroeder continued, "they tried to fire (Flash) and he goes, 'Why would I try to lose my job? I love it.' And then Orson Welles sort of poached on that quote from Winston Churchill saying, 'If you love your job, you'll never work a day in your life.' And Flash sort of busted him on it (by saying), 'Yeah, right -- Winston Churchill.' And he walked away. And that's when (Welles) calls him back and realizes, 'Maybe I misjudged this electrician. Maybe he doesn't have an agenda to sabotage my film -- and I appreciate the fact that he knew that quote came from Winston Churchill.'

"He keeps his job and he finishes the film and he became a very good electrician and eventually a gaffer. But it's implied in the script that his wife was taken away by a producer (played by Robert Wagner) and that drinking and bitterness basically took over his life and he never did (reach the sort of heights) Welles thought he might. Welles was wrong about that."

Getting back to when he was writing "Man," Schroeder noted, "I felt that I was working (and) taking modest budget features and genre material just to pay for my mortgage and just to keep going. But I had come to a time in my life where my children were raised and I was sort of on my own and I thought, 'You know, I can do this.' I was collecting checks from residuals on several films that I'd (worked on). I'd been in the DGA since '81 so I'd made a lot of movies and was already vested in the union. It's not like taking early retirement. I can't do that (because) I'm too young. But I basically got my 'nut' way down so I could live off the residuals and direct or A.D. an occasional commercial just to keep my insurance going. But it was more about getting the 'nut' down so I could spend my time writing and not trying to pay for my house."

How did it wind up getting made? "The screenplay really touched a lot of people," he replied. "Then I ran into another hindrance -- they didn't want to make small movies. Everything had become remakes and TV spectacles. The studios changed in the eight years that I had this transitional period and even the independents wanted big movies. So now I found myself with a pretty good script and no way to fund it. So I went out of state. I started contacting some of my friends. I went back to Idaho. My sister, Sarah Schroeder, is a very successful mortgage broker (there). I was sort of complaining to her one day that I have this movie that could work and now I can't get anyone to do it and it's so disheartening. She goes, 'Well, how much money do you need?' I said, 'Well, I need about $2.5 million.' And she goes, 'I think I could get that.' She called around and within two years she was able to raise that money.

"When we were all funded we went right to the front door at ICM for Christopher Plummer and we went right to all the unions. We're DGA. We're SAG. We're Teamsters. We're IA. We did everything we're supposed to. I said, 'Look, I don't want to take this to Vancouver. I can't. I need Hollywood Boulevard. I need the Sepulveda Dam. I need the Motion Picture Home. So we went on all the low budget arrangements with every union. They all have them now, which is great, and we were able to hire (everyone) and stay here and shoot this in 25 days."

Schroeder also benefited from people liking his project: "Bob Harvey at Panavision really responded to it and he gave me the equipment at a really discounted rate. My camera package should have cost $25,000 a week. It cost $6,000 a week. And just people responding to the material and what we were trying to say (was a big help). (Cinematographer) Dana Gonzales, who had shot 'Crash' and was an operator on 'Swordfish' and 'Man on Fire' and a whole bunch of stuff, and his crew was so amazing. Peter Bankins, my prop guy, did 'Erin Brockovich.' These are people I probably couldn't afford, but they felt something from the script that made them say, 'I'm not going to get paid much on this movie, but I still want to do it.'"

Shooting began in November 2005, he said, "and wrapped just before Christmas. We had Thanksgiving during our shoot two years ago. This picture was shot on Super 35mm film, but I put it in a digital intermediate to finish it. We did that at IO Film, who had done 'Crash.' When 'Crash' won Best Picture, IO got a lot of business so they moved from North Hollywood to Hollywood, but that move -- moving all the computers and the scanners and the film printers and everything -- took a month. So we were down a good part of '06 and then we finally finished it at the end of '06. We had our cast and crew (screening) at the Directors Guild on Jan. 14, 2007. I went to Santa Barbara the next day. We won Best Picture there. And then a week later I was in Berlin. I've been on the road with 17 festivals that we've done in the last 10 months. We won seven of them."

Encouraged by "Man's" festival showings, Schroeder anticipates a good response from awards voters who see the film: "You know, when 'Venus' came out, it opened in 12 theaters and Peter O'Toole got the (best actor Oscar) nomination. It went to 165 theaters the next week. We're hoping that SAG and the Academy will recognize Christopher for this (performance). He's made 88 films and has never been nominated for an Academy Award. He's been nominated for Golden Globes and SAG Awards and things like that and Emmys, but the Oscar has eluded him -- even the nomination.

"And you think about 'The Insider' where he played Mike Wallace (opposite Al Pacino and Russell Crowe and gave) a fantastic performance. And you think about (John Huston's) 'The Man Who Would Be King' (opposite Sean Connery and Michael Caine) and you think of 'Sound of Music' (opposite Julie Andrews). So maybe 'Man in the Chair' will be the one for him because he carries this movie. He does all the heavy lifting in 'Man in the Chair.'"

Looking back at the challenges of production, Schroeder recalled, "I had a real ambitious shot list because I wanted to make a complex, really quality film. I didn't want it to look like a low budget movie. Sometimes you go into a theater or you watch a DVD (and you think), 'Oh yeah, these guys had no money.' We squeezed about a 40 day shoot into that 25 days and that's from just being very organized from the production end. The shot lists were done months before we ever shot. It wasn't an experience where we were out there trying to figure out where to put the camera. We decided that a long time ago. We'd already decided on the movie we were going to make and (when we started shooting it was) let's just execute that vision.

"What I found was that the actors were so good -- Angarano and especially Plummer -- (that) I rarely printed a third or a fourth take because the first two were awesome. And then I had my camera crew. Glenn Brown was my first A.C. He did 'Collateral' and 'Ali.' This is Michael Mann's first assistant cameraman. This guy does not miss focus marks! Everything was really great technically and (with) the acting so we were able to within just a few takes get the scene and then move on to another angle or move on to more work. I had really good department heads that just stayed ahead of us. The challenge was that we were dealing with elderly cast (members). Just walking (one of them) from the honey wagon to the set takes 20 minutes. You can't give a five-minute warning to bring the actors in, you have to give them like a 25-minute warning. Christopher Plummer worked 20 of the 25 days. He worked like a champion and he was so prepared and (was) there every morning.

"I guess the challenge was to not miss the opportunity because we had a great cast and we worked so hard. We had this hand cranked camera effect that you see in the film. We would shoot the movie normal and then we'd bring in the hand crank, which was the Panaflex camera that we'd stripped the motor out of and put a little hand turning crank on it. That added more of a poetic feel to some of these scenes. So that was just more shooting we had to do. But I love how that camera makes you feel. I believe that cinematography should have its own emotional through-line just like your script or your characters. I really believe, like Wong Kar-wai (director of 'My Blueberry Nights') does, in style as content not style over content. I really wanted this to be an unforgettable film (and) that when you watched this imagery it would sort of seduce you (and) maybe get you through the rough spots so when you're dealing with a very sobering subject emotionally you're still connecting with it and you're not overwhelmed by it and at the end you walk out and go, 'That's not a movie you see every day.' I wanted it to always sort of be a poem, if you will, a really special film."

Filmmaker flashbacks: From April 11, 1990's column:

[Omitted]

Martin Grove hosts movie coverage on the broadband television channel www.UpdateHollywood.com.

MAN IN THE CHAIR
Running Time 109 minutes
Written and directed by Michael Schroeder
Starring Christopher Plummer, Michael Angarano and Robert Wagner

Before you get crushed in the avalanche of big, bloated, expensive and overhyped year-end movies, seek out Man in the Chair, one of the smaller accomplishments that deserves special attention. A modest but intelligent feel-good movie with a spectacular performance by Christopher Plummer and some wise and deeply affecting writing and direction by Michael Schroeder, it’s about Cameron (Michael Angarano), a rebellious 17-year-old high-school geek and borderline juvenile delinquent obsessed with classic movies, who escapes from boredom, neighborhood bullies and an unhappy home life with a mean-spirited stepfather by cutting classes to haunt revival houses. One day, while studying the camera arcs in Orson Welles’ Touch of Evil, he overhears an amusing critique of Charlton Heston as a Mexican cop (“You never could act in pants, Chuckles,” heckles a scruffy old bum) that annoys the audience and empties the room. Intrigued enough to follow the old man to observe what might be an interesting character study for an upcoming student film competition, Cameron is shocked out of his Reeboks when the hostile, foul-mouthed old reprobate turns out to be Flash Madden, a former Hollywood studio gaffer and the last surviving crew member of Citizen Kane, living out his last days in a motion picture retirement hospital. Enduring insults and rejection, the kid won’t give up. I mean, this old fart worked for Capra, Welles and Howard Hughes! What a movie he would make. For a bunch of cigars and a bottle of Wild Turkey, Flash reluctantly agrees to help the kid with his film by teaching him everything he knows about the movies: how to make them, watch them and be “the man in the chair,” an old-timer’s phrase for “director.” He also introduces Cameron to his elderly pals—a group of lost, forgotten Hollywood veterans, including a legendary Oscar-winning writer (M. Emmet Walsh), who all live in varying degrees of penury in a nursing home. The more he looks into the lonely, marginalized has-beens of a throwaway industry that has no memory, the more expansive Cameron’s theme grows, into an important exposé of nursing home violations as well as a shocking study of the physical abuse and bureaucratic neglect suffered by the old in an American society that has no respect for growing old with dignity. Combining the stamina of youth with the wisdom of the elderly, Cameron forms his crew, while Flash swallows his ego and shames a $5,000 budget out of the successful producer (Robert Wagner, in his best role in years) who stole his wife and destroyed his marriage in younger days. In the course of shooting, a troubled kid with ambition finds a future, the drunken old coot who gave up on life regains his sense of value by doing what he still does best and all of the discarded and disenfranchised members of the crew learn how to face the time they’ve got left with hope and pride. The actors are all splendid, but it is impossible to describe the full impact of Christopher Plummer’s power, summoning decades of experience and craft to turn the role of a barnacled bum into a three-dimensional study of age fueled by despair, rage and endearment.

Working for only a pittance of his usual salary in a film with a $3 million budget raised by the director’s sister, a mortgage broker in Idaho, Mr. Plummer gives one of the most colorful and mesmerizing performances of 2007. He is living proof that true artistry has no price tag when you honestly believe in something. Everyone involved should be saluted. At a time when most films wallow in mankind’s basest instincts, Man in the Chair is a rare, once-in-a-blue-moon kind of movie that celebrates the best qualities in people and makes you applaud the human race.