If you open my cell phone you’ll find a picture of Werner Herzog when he was 40 years old, directing Peruvian natives to pull his 340-ton steamboat over a mountain for his 1982 film Fitzcarraldo. When I found out that this same behemoth of renegade cinema, Werner Herzog, was opening the first ever Rogue Film School, I knew that this was the academic experience I had skipped grad school for.
The school’s website confirmed it. Herzog is quoted on the homepage:
The Rogue Film School is not for the faint-hearted; it is for those who have traveled on foot, who have worked as bouncers in sex clubs or wardens in a lunatic asylum, for those who are willing to learn about lock picking or forging shooting permits in countries not favoring their projects…
Well, I had never done any of those things, but I understood his point and figured we were on the same page. Earlier in the year, I had produced and directed my first feature film that I shot in Brooklyn with small donations from 150 friends and family members, a credit card, and a volunteer crew of thirty dedicated souls. It was a gruesome shoot, and imagining Werner’s steamboat is what often got me over the proverbial hill. So I submitted an old short film, wrote the hell out of a 250-word application essay, paid my $25 fee, and got accepted three weeks later.
Next came the challenging part. Although I had gotten in, I soon learned that this would not be the twelve-student atelier that I had envisioned, but rather a fifty-person lecture. The weekend seminar would cost a whopping $1,450 that I didn’t have, and after raising money for my feature I had no stomach to roll out another campaign.
At this point I asked myself: What would Werner Herzog do?
Well, not only does the Rogue Film School’s syllabus include forging shooting permits, but I also heard Herzog once say he stole a 35mm camera from the Munich Film School because he “had a natural right to take it.” It seemed like he was telling me to forge my way into his film school.
I was lucky in that, upon acceptance, the administrator sent out the exact location and schedule for the class. My first thought was to confuse them during the Friday meet-and-greet and claim that I had paid. If they argued, I would produce a counterfeit Paypal receipt and the seminar would be over by the time they cleared it.
Then I had a better idea — and one less punishable. I should just sneak in. They couldn’t possibly check everyone’s ID all the time, and there must be a backdoor to the conference room through which I could slip.
I showed up at the Wilshire Plaza Hotel’s lobby bar to find forty or fifty young filmmakers milling about, with Werner Herzog himself at the center. He was engaging his students, actively trying to meet each one individually. Ages ranged from eighteen to forty, and each bright-eyed apprentice had a grey lanyard around his or her neck with a rectangular badge hanging from it. These were the credentials that would get each student into the seminar.
I needed a closer look. I perched myself near the bar as a pair of credentialed young ladies eagerly introduced themselves to me, assuming I was in the program and worth meeting. When they saw my missing badge, they excused themselves, and then hesitated for fear of rudeness. I seized the opportunity.
“What is this thing you’re all here for anyway?” I asked. They were excited to tell me about it.
“That man over there, Werner Herzog, is, well, our favorite film director, and —”
“What does this badge say?”
I grabbed the badge. They enjoyed my curiosity, admiring their new prizes along with me. We studied each letter together.
I felt like a secret agent. I used my fingers to measure the border design, using my pinky finger to approximate the width of the top margin and my thumb for the left. When we were done, I walked back to a booth and jotted down my notes on a napkin.
On my way home, I stopped at my cellist friend’s apartment to peruse her collection of backstage passes, and found a white lanyard and accompanying plastic ID holder that were the approximate size and shape. I spent two hours coloring the lanyard grey with marker and manufacturing the ID in Photoshop.
Everything was set. No element of my fake credentials was perfect, so I threw on a scarf and blazer to obscure it and readied myself to be the pretentious film guy whom no one could talk to.
I walked past the stooge at the door with a nod and a smile. He smiled back. I was in.
The school was what you’d expect. He got lock picking out of the way at the outset and quickly moved on to forgeries. He spoke of the World Trade Center antics of Phillipe Petit of Man on Wire fame, and recounted temporarily halting his shoot on the Peruvian Amazon only after getting shot at by a teenaged border guard. Two days later Herzog returned from Lima with a “beautiful” four-page forgery adorned with three large signatures and an official-looking German stamp that translated: “If you want the rights to this photograph, contact the owner of the copyright.”
We went over practicalities like releases (which he stressed) and final cut (which he de-emphasized). He moderated discourse over boundaries for the grotesque, and showed clips from both his films and students’ films to illustrate good versus bad camera movement, respectively.
I never introduced myself to Werner, as he had a habit of knowing every student and their films, and no trickster likes to be tricked. And on the last day, two hours before the seminar wrapped, one of the administrators tapped me quietly on the shoulder and asked me my name. I watched her double back to the desk, confer with her counterpart, and pick up her cell phone. As I bolted down the stairs and out of the hotel, one piece of advice Werner gave us rang in my ears: “When Klaus Kinski is foaming at the mouth, raging at you for two hours and a half… you must dazzle him by biting into the last piece of chocolate that you have.”
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33 Responses
you are my hero.
You probably got more out of it for free than you would have at full price.
Nice work.
Goddamn you, man! In the most loving way! I totally did the “What Would Herzog Do” question and decided obviously he wouldn’t pay either but I didn’t have the balls to risk pissing him off by applying and then sneaking in or saying I couldn’t attend because I couldn’t afford it. I pondered it, but you executed it. I just decided to use the money for my next film. Serious Kudos to you. Well played sir. You are a man among men.
ah-may-zing. bravo.
‘when I look into the eyes of the bear…’
sweet!
The student has become the master. You get the chocolate factory, my friend.
Balls of Steel.
It’s believable up to the part where the woman taps him on his shoulder and asks his name. That would never happen.
I paid.
I loved it.
It was worth every penny.
I’d do it again in a minute!
good piece, but it could be a real great one. why spending most of yr article on how you got in, instead of what you have really learned in there? frustrating
You don’t have balls, you’re just an asshole.
gimicky and snarky
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call me.
has he approved?? he must be laughing reading this!!
I see! The old fake pass trick! Brilliant!
love it…bad ass gets bad assed!
I’m a fan of Herzog, but the seminar was way overpriced. Glad to hear you found a way to do what most Herzog fans, I’m sure, were thinking of doing when they heard about this.
Oh yeah cool guy stole 35mm camera from Munich film school with self-important sense of entitlement and must be worshipped just like his boring stolen ideas ‘films’.The Emperor has no clothes people.
a. Getting stuff for free is cool.
b. Very few people are so moral that they truly don’t agree with a., and don’t want to get stuff for free themselves.
c. The haters are envious.
d. jeff
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that’s pretty awesome.
You did it. And did it with style.
Congrats on getting whatever it is you got out of scamming your way into Herzog’s seminar. So Rogue of you to ruin the possibility of ever getting a second chance with him. I het it would have been awesome to have the opportunity to screen your Brooklyn feature for him. Perhaps even meet a producer through a generous introduction. So Rogue of you to think you tricked a trickster. Those of us who saved, earned, raised or stole the money to pay the meager fee; I salute you. Those of you that made the trip from all corners of the globe, I salute you. Of course, the cell responsible for cracking their way into a hotel room for a free night. You win. But to the little scoundrel film buff that thinks he’s pulled the wool over everyone’s eyes. Keep working on your skillset. We’re watching you.
Apparently, Herzog doesn’t respect the property rights of others but you’d better respect his. (Though, in fairness, and more accurately, it’s the property rights of those putting on the seminar you’d better respect. I suspect if Herzog knew about this, he’d heartily approve.)
I think Fitzcarraldo is just jealous because he did what everyone else would have done while this guy did what the master would have. I think it is creativity in things such as this that make the difference between becoming a master filmmaker or merely staying an amateur one.
If you are not willing to take the risks Fitzcarraldo, you are in the wrong profession. Get out now while you can, since creativity and risks are what define good films.
Fitzcarraldo, you are a hypocrite of the highest order. You should be violated and destroyed, just as your lack of understanding will do to every piece of celluloid you touch. You get what you pay for in life, but money can’t buy everything.
The curse you have made for yourself is to always be outside in the artificial warmth, never actually knowing what it means to be chilled.
Now we are watching YOU.
The initial question was superfluous, as WH could never, on principle, allow himself to be extorted, hence non-payment was the only honest option.
The actual balls-of-steel test point arrived with the tap on the shoulder — WWWHD in THAT situation? Scuttle sideways for a silent exit … Verflammte Scheisse, das ist undenkbar … no, he would arise and modestly claim credit for the stroke successfully pulled.
Maybe next time you will be ready, meantime, keep trying “;0))
WalkEda talkEda Gab aWay..what did those who went learn? I just finished Herzog on Herzog – would it be like the book, only with the flesh and blood master for eye contact? It would cost me double – admission plus airfare plus+++ to fly from west coast to the east for the next session. What did you learn? Was he seeking gems from among the participants,? Perhaps a future assistant of some kind? Is there a gem in this mine?
Many of us who paid noticed you the first day. You were no secret agent.
Check out the new Herzog promo for Rogue Film School – New Jersey.
http://vimeo.com/10184446
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