The Big Empty - Press Archive - Feeling blue: Steve Anderson left Las Vegas and came back with The Big Empty

Source: Las Vegas City Life
20 November 2003

 

Feeling blue: Steve Anderson left Las Vegas and came back with The Big

Empty

 

By Matt Kelemen

The idea for a noirish comedy about an actor, a blue suitcase and UFOs first

came to Steve Anderson as the New York native was leaving Las Vegas on

his way to Los Angeles. "Basically I just drove straight across the country.

I didn't even stay in any hotels or motels along the way; I'd just sleep in my

car. I remember that I'd stayed overnight in Las Vegas. I had pulled in behind

some casino among some trucks that were parked there and woke up early

the next morning."

 

Anderson's head was filled with pre-programmed, California-associated

expectations as he hit the border: Hollywood, Beverly Hills, Ventura Highway.

"It's like this big moment, but of course you right in the middle of the

Mojave, so the first town you see is Baker. I like Baker, but it immediately

helped lower expectations."

 

Baker became the destination for the protagonist of The Big Empty, Anderson's

first feature. The finished film comes in for a landing Thursday, Nov. 20, when

the Hard Rock hotel-casino rolls out the red carpet for its premiere.

 

Usually an indie film with a limited release will appear here weeks, if not

months (or at all), after its New York/L.A. debut. The Big Empty arrives with

no critical buzz, a rookie director and an absurdist plot about a down-on-his-luck

actor who is hired to drive a locked blue suitcase to Baker, where he gets

wrapped up with the space-alien minded locals before delivering it to "Cowboy."

 

But Anderson has some odds working in his favor. Jon Favreau - white-hot right

now as the director of the No. 1 movie in the country, Elf - signed on to play

John Person, an aspiring actor who works as a courier to make ends meet. Bud

Cort (Harold and Maude) plays the crazed neighbor who offers him $27,000, the

exact amount he is in debt, to deliver the suitcase. Sean Bean (Lord of the Rings)

is the mysterious Cowboy, whose ultimate goal is hidden from Person, and

whose ultimate purpose is hidden from the audience. Daryl Hannah, Rachel

Leigh Cook and Kelsey Grammar round out the cast.

 

Anderson has spent plenty of time behind the camera. He has shot seven

documentaries for PBS, trotted around the globe on assignment for CNN and

was on hand to capture the L.A. riots. "I was intent on writing and eventually

directing a film, but I got caught up in the cameraworld. But I never considered

it my career. I was still writing every day."

 

Inspired by a screening of the low-budget film Blood, Guts, Bullets and Octane

at Sundance, he decided to write a screenplay that might be affordable to

make. " I had a few rules: There wasn't anything in the script that I didn't own

or could afford to rent, and I wanted to set it some place where we wouldn't

have to worry about permits. The desert was perfect."

 

Once Favreau read the script and liked it enough to star in it, the rest of the

cast fell in to place. Then Echo Lake Productions, who had backed previous

critical successes such as Allison Anders' excellent Things Behind the Sun and

Jill Sprecher's Thirteen Conversation About One Thing, picked up the film.

With a $1.9 million budget, Anderson was on his way.

 

The primary reason for premiering in Las Vegas is to benefit the Lili Claire

Foundation, a charity for children with neurogenetic disorders such as autism

and Down Syndrome, and Anderson expects most of the main cast to attend.

But he also figures since he shot the film in this city's "backyard," it made

sense to open it here. "We shot the whole movie in Baker, which is a stone's

throw from Vegas, and on weekends off, we made the mistake of thinking, 'Hey,

we got two days off, let's go rest in Vegas.' You're up for 48 hours and then

you come back more tired than before. But it was still fun."

 

The Big Empty premieres at the Hard Rock on Nov. 20. Tickets are $10,

and $25 for premiere seating with meet and greet.

 

x

Return to The Big Empty Press Archive Return to The Big Empty Main Page Return to The Compleat Sean Bean