Tom Waits: The Movie

KN: I was talking to Tom about this movie that nobody wants me to make. It's a musical called 'M', starring Siamese twins connected by the lips.
TW: Connected by the lips? That's...
KN: I figured out how to do that too. You see, I have this dentist friend, a very religious guy. In fact he believes in the laying on of hands. He really would touch your tooth, and they'd get better. That's why I go to him, I can't stand pain.
TW: Right! Hehehe...
KN: But I'm getting off the track. He has a... you know, I think he'd go along. He could be in the movie, okay? I think he should be in the movie.
TW: All right. Does he have any acting experience?
KN: No no no.
TW: No?
KN: He'd be a re-actor.
TW: Ah! Ah!
KN: He has this yellow mask that he wears.
TW: Yeah.
KN: And yellow gloves. He's afraid, you know... he's very nervous.
TW: Oh.
KN: But I'd get the camera on him, wide-angled camera, and I'd ask him if he could make a double mouth piece.
TW: Mhm.
KN: What I'm thinking of, you've seen these things that they use in the circus, where the girl bites into this mouth piece and they pull her up to...
TW: Ah yeah, yeah. They suspend her by it, and she's biting on to some kind of a stick or something.
KN: Up to the top of the tent.
TW: Yeah, right.
KN: Well, he'd make a double thing with a little rubber holding it together. And then we'd audition these identical twins, and that would hold them together, so it would seem... you know, it would look like what I'm talking about.
TW: Right. Hmm.
KN: Maybe we should have a boy and girl. Are there boy and girl identical twins?
TW: I'd rather not... I wouldn't call them identical if they were boy and girl.
KN: Maybe they could be. And then they could get separated in the film. See, the idea is not just that though. That's just part of it. There's another guy in the film that I try to help. Cause I thought of calling the movie 'The Devout Catalyst'. There's the title. And there's another guy who is a tattoo artist, and... but he's avant-garde, he wants to do something very special.
TW: Something new... in a way.
KN: Yeah, so we go to this chemist that I know, and he makes a slippery ink, so the tattoo, you know, it just doesn't sit there. It moves slowly across the surface of the skin towards the nearest opening. You see, there's... how many openings are there?
TW: Oh, you mean orifice? Uh... how many actual...?
KN: One two three...
TW: Two three four five uh... six
KN: Whichever one it's closest to, it goes in there, and then it moves inside your body through the Endothelium, and... Say it was an eagle. It gets inside of you and it gets digested. Maybe it gets stuck behind your right knee cap.
TW: Right, yeah!
KN: You rub it, it gets lose and when it comes out it looks like a Klee, or maybe a Rouault or, you know... or Thurber. You know...
TW: That's wild. Oh yeah, I got a little money laying around that... I've been... you know...
KN: What we have to have with that is... Well, that's a special effect. We'll have to get some kind of decal slide across this... But the trouble is when I tell anyone about this, they laugh and...
TW: Hehe...
KN: So what I figured I'd do is put my own money in it.
TW: Yeah! There! There you go, yeah...
KN: In the movie, the kids, my three kids, and my wife wanna have me committed. That's the plot. If you really do what you wanna do, they'll commit you!
TW: Yeah... Wow...
KN: It'd be a great movie.
TW: Well, are you gonna direct...?
KN: Well, if we can get Jerry to do the music track...
TW: The music, yeah.
KN: And you could, you know...
TW: Yeah, I could play a part.
KN: Well, you could be the guy I'm talking to you about.
TW: Yeah.
KN: Get a far-out bar and sit there and... star!
TW: Yeah.
KN: Yeah. In a musical called 'M'.
TW: Well, I'm looking to diversify my investment portfolio, and I've been looking to get into something strange, you know, so...
KN: Hey! What we could do is, we could have you in it, you take out your wallet, and moths fly out.
TW: Yeah...
KN: That's a special effect too.
TW: Hehehehe. You get a bug guy for that. They have bug guys in Hollywood. All they do is, they work in the insect world. You're gonna have a lot of medical footage in this too, I guess?
KN: Yeah, I could put that thing in about the January flies too, in our bedroom.
TW: January flies, what...?
KN: That was insane.
TW: What are January flies?
KN: Well, we don't have them in Chicago, but in the middle of January, you went to the bedroom and there were twenty of these... almost as big as horse flies, on the pink walls, and...
TW: That's annoying.
KN: Oh, it's terrible. And they were sluggish, cause it was January.
TW: They were a little slow.
KN: And I couldn't hit them with the paper, cause they'd splat.
TW: Yeah.
KN: And I couldn't spray them... you know...
TW: You're going to sleep, you don't want that in the room.
KN: No, I'd kill myself that way. So I got the bright idea to get the vacuum cleaner and, with the long hose, we sucked them into the vacuum cleaner. And then they were all gone.
TW: Well, but they were in the vacuum cleaner really.
KN: Yeah, and still alive too. Cause that's like a wind tunnel. They went down there... so we... I put some, you know, tissue paper at the end so that they wouldn't get out. But they'd come back! The next night there were twenty or thirty more. So... well, what I did then, I called the chimney sweep.
TW: Chimney sweep?
KN: Yeah, there's a girl by the name of Debbie Dove.
TW: She's a chimney sweep?
KN: Yeah, from Vermont.
TW: Ah!
KN: And she said, let me check your chimney!
TW: Yeah yeah, that's a good place to start. I mean, if you have a fly problem, a lot of people will look at the chimney first.
KN: And she took the barricade that I had so that nobody could come in through the chimney. There were two dead squirrels inside there, you know. That's the... sad end.
TW: Aaawww...
KN: The flies belonged to the squirrels.
TW: All right, yeah...
KN: Yeah. She sold us three squirrel traps for the chimney and... we're safe now!
TW: Yeah, no more flies!
KN: Do you think we could get her in the film?
TW: Gee, I don't know. We could write a part for her.
KN: Yeah, we should!
TW: Does she have any film experience?
KN: Guess we'd have to get two dead squirrels in the film too.
TW: Yeah well, you get an animal guy for that.
KN: Yeah. Gee, I'm so glad that you're interested in this, really!
TW: Yeah, I think... I'm ready to go into production, so you just let me know.
KN: Ah, great. We'll call it 'The Devout Catalyst'.
TW: I love it!
KN: Yeah, good title.
TW: A lot of action in the film too, I guess?
KN: Oh yeah yeah yeah. I have one thing. I have this picture window ant colony, that I'll have for the titles.
TW: So the ants will actually spell out the title of the film, and the credits?
KN: Well, they'll actually pull little tissue paper credits through it.
TW: Nice.
KN: Yeah. Or a fly with a little trailer, with the title of the film on, flying around the bed.
TW: Nice, nice...
KN: Well, Tom, you've made me feel a lot better. Thanks, I... seriously, I thought no one cared, but... thanks!
TW: I'm there for you, Ken!
KN: You're a pal.
TW: Thanks.