Why Zach Braff turned to Kickstarter
In the hit TV show, "Scrubs, Zach Braff proved himself to be a true CROWD PLEASER. So much so that many of his fans were willing to invest money in his new film. Tracy Smith now with this Sunday Profile:
In the new musical "Bullets Over Broadway," Zach Braff is the nerdy playwright trying to get his show up and running. Trouble is, the play's financial backers are forcing him to make a few changes.
"I'ma whore! I'm a prostitute who's selling out!" his character exclaims.
The show, based on the 1994 Woody Allen movie of the same name, is pure Broadway fantasy. But the basic story about a little guy fighting for his art is something Braff knows all too well.
A dozen years ago, Braff was a first-time director, shopping around a script he'd written for a deeply personal film called "Garden State." Everyone passed.
"Everyone in Hollywood who has a phone and a desk passed," he said.
Eventually, he got lucky, and found a businessman named Gary Gilbert willing to write him a very big check.
"And he said, 'Forget them. Is there a scenario where you make this movie for $2.5 million, and if so, I'll pay for the whole thing right now.'"
And Braff's response? "Give us a moment . . . "
Braff went on to make "Garden State" exactly the way he wanted. It was a huge hit.
"My investor doubled his money overnight," Braff said. "Yeah, he made a good bet on me."
It wasn't the first time someone took a chance on Braff and won.
Born in the Garden State -- New Jersey -- in 1975, Zachary Israel Braff seemed to inherit his love of theatre from his dad, who was an attorney by day, and a sometime community theatre performer at night.
Young Zach shied away from sports, and found his true calling in theatre camp.
"It was utopia," he said.
"So you could be yourself?" Smith asked.
"I was myself, and I was the lead. I was the quarterback of the football team because I was good at it at a young age."
"That must have been an incredible feeling."
"I never wanna leave. I said to someone, it was like when they lift Baby Simba up in 'The Lion King.' I never wanted to leave. I would weep when it was time to come home. I couldn't believe that there was this place on Earth where I felt for the first time I belonged."
By his late teens Braff was an accomplished actor, and caught Woody Allen's eye for a role as his son in 1993's "Manhattan Murder Mystery."
Braff said, "If you look at my face, whenever I see the scene, I look like a terrified person who can't believe he's in a scene with Woody Allen, Diane Keaton and Angelica Huston, ''cause I grew up with these three people as my heroes. And there I am all of the sudden.
"Woody Allen said to me that day -- I was 18 years old -- 'We're probably not gonna say any of the lines that are in the script. So try and keep up.'"
His real big break came on the small screen: "Scrubs" ran for nine quirky seasons.
It also led to one of the great bro-mance stories of our time: Braff and fellow "Scrubs" star Donald Faison are best friends off-screen as well.
"We couldn't be more different people," Braff said. "He's a black guy. I'm a white guy. What overlaps is our sense of humor, perfectly."
And they're together again in Braff's latest vehicle. In his new film. "Wish I Was Here," Braff is a father who teaches his two kids things they'd never learn at school.
This time around, studios were willing to put up the money, but only if Braff would make the movie their way, including whom to cast.
"I don't even know if actors know this," Braff told Smith. "But you'll get a piece of paper that's sort of top secret. And it'll have different numbers and codes next to celebrities' names. And so they'll want the biggest star possible. The biggest star possible is either not going to do your tiny little movie, is wrong for the part, or oftentimes will take two or three months to respond. So you're stuck in this limbo waiting for Leonardo DiCaprio to decide if he's going to play an old Jewish rabbi. I'm exaggerating slightly. Slightly.
"Yeah, I'm giving you the scoop, CBS! This is '60 Minutes' worthy."
In the end, Braff found a way around it all: He made a video appeal to his fans explaining why THEY, not the money men, should help finance his movie.
Kickstarter.com is a website designed to match projects with people willing to help pay for them.
"I know how ludicrous and hard film financing is even if you're a known name," said Braff. "John Q. Angry Citizen doesn't know that I can't get a film financed. They think, 'Dude, you were on "Scrubs." You had a hit with "Garden State." You can get a film financed.'"
"And that's what they said to you? 'Come on, dude'?"
"Of course. And I say, 'Fellow dude, I've been trying to make movies since "Garden State." The truth is I can't because I want to make the movie the way I want to make it.'"
Legally he wasn't allowed to offer people a share of the actual movie, but almost everything else was fair game. "I did wedding proposals. I did outgoing messages. I must have signed my name on anything and everything that is sign-able."
And it worked.
"We were looking for $2 million in a month; it hit $2 million in 48 hours."
Now he's traveling the country trying to meet and personally thank as many of his backers as possible, such as at an event in Chicago.
His old pal Donald Faison was with him every step of the way.
"When the studio said the script isn't what we want to make, he said, 'Well, I'll find a way to make it,' and he did," said Faison. "There are very few people out there that can do that. It's really inspiring to have a buddy like that."
Braff will find out next week if his crowd-funded film will draw crowds to the box office. But on the night it opens, he'll be back on Broadway, in the make-believe world where only the money men run the show.
To watch a trailer for "Wish I Was Here," click on the video player below.
For more info:
- "Wish I Was Here" - Official site (Focus Features)
- "Wish I Was Here" on Twitter (@WIWHFilm) and Facebook
- "Bullets Over Broadway"
- Follow Zach Braff on Twitter and Facebook
- Follow Tracy Smith on Twitter (@ThatTracySmith)