Super Cops Screening at New Beverly Cinema

I had intended on posting this immediately after the screening as I'd written it up for a Dark Shadows fan board but never got around to it. After Lorenzo Semple Jr's passing I remembered I hadn't shared this awesome night with other fans on the Super Cops imdb board so here it is! The screening was at The New Beverly theater in Los Angeles in January of 2011. Enjoy!

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Well ladies and gents I hope I can do justice to the night because it was unbelievable. And just a word of warning this is going to be a LONG post...can't help it there's just too much good stuff to share.

This was the first time ever going to the New Beverly. I had looked online and read about the history of the place and that Quentin Tarantino had saved the theater. It's been renovated, and while it still has that old nostalgic one screen feel to it, the seats and atmosphere were great. I've been to some revival places and you are packed in there like sardines. This place had cup holders and plenty of foot room. So I'm talking to my sister and she says "I think Tarantino will show up". I asked her why thinking there's no way that he'd be there the night we were but she said well it's his theater. Lo and behold 15-20 minutes before they start he comes walking in casually like everyone else in a hoodie and jeans. It was then that I knew we'd be in for a really long night because QT can talk movies.

So it turns out the first feature of the night "Dirty Harry" is one of QT's favorite films. I could write a whole post just on that and the talk afterwards but then I' d be here all night typing. In any case QT brought some classic 70's and 80's trailers from his personal collection to watch before the films. Really fun stuff from stars like Burt Reynolds, Chuck Norris, James Caan, and Charles Bronson. We see the movie and then Edgar Wright and QT talk about the whole history and political implications of Dirty Harry, serial killer movies etc etc.

Then Edgar, before the bathroom break announces the special guests, Lorenzo Semple Jr and David Selby will be joining us and QT is going to stick around to see Super Cops because he's never seen it!

Now here's where I thought I might be able to at least say hello to David but unfortunately after I returned from the bathroom I still hadn't seen him anywhere. We all get back from the break and somehow David and his wife are already sitting in the front row. I didn't notice this until it was too late to say anything before introductions.

So Edgar introduces Mr Semple and David Selby. There are ALOT of Semple fans because of his connections with Batman. I got the feeling that I was one of the few in the audience that went to this just because I was a fan of the film and David - I was right as Edgar asked how many people had seen Super Cops and it had to be less than 10 of us. Most of the audience that came to see Dirty Harry stayed so it was still an almost packed house.

So the plan was that Mr Semple would talk first and then watch the movie but he probably wouldn't stay for the whole thing. He's an adorable older gentleman who walks with a cane. Very unassuming. You'd never think this was a man who was a writer for the Batman tv show. It was kind of hard to hear everything he said. He spoke in short and succinct sentences but he did go off on tangents a little bit so you had to keep up. He said that he wrote Super Cops because it was the assignment given to him. He didn't believe he got the job because of his previous connection to Batman, it was just a coincidence. He loved Gordon Parks Sr. He went through a little of Parks' career history as well. He said his script had to go through the person at the studio who was specifically in charge of approving scripts with black characters. He also said that he thought Gordon Parks was hired specifically because he was black and that it would help when filming out on location in the poor neighborhoods but David couldn't confirm this. Semple had no influence on the casting or anything else in regards to the movie, he just wrote it. He is a writer and has a need to write. He is very modest about his accomplishments.

The Edgar asked David about the film and his first comments were a doozie. David jokingly said that he was from West Virginia and he was prime NYC cop material. He had guards while he filmed and during one scene a stranger almost knifed him. I think he said he had a 6 inch blade. His security got to him just as the man did and from that point on he was very close to them. They were about to continue talking but then they decided to continue the discussion after the film.

The print they had was great. It was still dirty in parts but much better, especially the audio quality, than the bootleg that was sold on Amazon for a while. It came from England and we got to see it was approved with a AA rating from whatever film board was in charge of handing out approval.

The audience really enjoyed the film. It holds up but more than that seeing it again on the big screen really showed off the comedic timing and fun of the movie. It turns out Mr Semple stayed through the whole thing and as he left he got a big round of applause.

So Edgar Wright and David sat on the stage and basically David reminisced with some prodding from Edgar. Edgar commented about how fantastic David's speaking voice was without a mic. David's first reaction was "Have you ever seen a more innocent cop". It got a big laugh. He said the last time he saw it was probably when it came out but he doesn't remember if there was a screening or not because in those days they didn't have all that. He was fiddling with his jacket trying to get it on with one of the sleeves stuck inside out and that got a laugh because we just saw this guy as one of the Super Cops and he couldn't get his jacket on!

He said it was tough, going into the neighborhoods. The time, it was the 70's in NYC and he was told you don't want to be wearing a uniform when you're in these places. There was a lot of turmoil on the set. This was a studio film but it was low budget and there was upheaval with the executives. The crew didn't like the catering that was provided by the local church. David said it was soul food and the union guys didn't like it so the studio had to fork out for double catering. IN the middle of filming he was called late at night and asked to drop out of the film by one of the producers. He said never in his career had that happened. Tarantino asked why and David said he never found out. David said he told them he said he wouldn't quit and then when he went on set the next day they were told "You have two days left to shoot. We're being shut down". Then he said a few months later they went and filmed some stuff on a studio backlot in LA but he couldn't remember what scenes those were. it was tough because they had to recreate all the sound of being in the real NYC. They filmed a lot under the L and that was tough to have to redo.

David talked about Gordon Parks Sr. He loved him. He said that Gordon told him on set one day that he had a fight with a studio guy. He said "There was a coffee table between me and the guy. But I got him". Parks had punched him in the meeting. David really stressed how much tension there was on the set because of the neighborhoods they were in and the studio problems. He couldn't remember if Gordon was also having some other problems and then he and QT were trying to figure out if that's around the time his son was killed or not. Then QT got into this discussion with David about American black cinema that saved studios...Shaft, David mentioned Superfly. They made these films with no budget and made huge profits.

Some other things...David hasn't seen Ron Leibman in a long time but if he did he'd give him a hug. He said he saw him Richard III but that was another lifetime ago. He also said Leibman's ex-wife Linda Lavin is doing a play in NY that will go down as one of the best of this time. He didn't mention the name. Edagr said he really liked the chemistry between him and Ron and David said that he really like Martin and Lewis and when he sees those big eyes Ron gives the camera it reminds him of Jerry Lewis. He also said sometimes they would pick up Ron at his therapists office before going to the set.

They movie was really gorilla film making. The location manager would literally go out with brown bags of cash into the neighborhoods and ask people if they could use their apartments. Nothing was blocked or seriously planned out. They'd find kids and ask them if they wanted to be in a scene in a movie. The script for the most part though was not improvised. David said alot of the physicality of the characters was made up and carried through the movie. Like the food bit where Hantz is always eating. That became kind of a running gag. He wasn't sure if the mix of comedy or drama was right on but I think the audience and Edgar really liked it more as a comedy. David said there was no training or soul-searching for the role. They did not hang out with police before filming. A lot of the real NYPD did not like Greenberg and Hantz anyway so they weren't impressed that there was this movie being made. The real Greenberg and Hantz were nice quiet guys according to David but did not hang out on the set unless they were there to film. The funny thing is the last credit is given to the two guys as technical advisors so I always assumed they played a bigger role. David had no idea what the guys thought about the finished film. Edgar said that the real Greenberg was caught in some insurance scandal and David's character Hantz got found with 6 joints on him. That got a laugh. David's makeup artist was on pot the entire time. He told him that's how he was going to get through filming the movie.

They had no stunt guys. Everything they did was on the fly and Edgar remarked that's why when they jump out of the refrigerator boxes they practically fall down. The baby carriage down the stairs scene was done once. David said there was no take 26, most things were done once. They found a real building that was being torn down. That was really them riding down the wrecking ball. David really wanted to do the jumping through the window scene when they confront the Hayes brothers. David jumped through the window but the top seal part was not a breakaway window (the kinds they use in movies). Ron goes in after him and the thing falls down on him and he had to go to the hospital and they lost a day of shooting. He was given a pair of black shoes that look more like a cops and they were uncomfortable and didn't fit do he wore his own sneakers. Edgar commented that one the things that really stayed with him wasn't so much the plot but the comedy and the way the two of them ran around the city. Edgar tried to do an imitation which was very funny.

No one on the panel knew how well the film did when it was released. David mentioned that maybe the film was not on DVD because of Batman copyright but QT disagreed and said it was just one of those films that because of the time period it was released and the studio problems got buried and lost. Then I think they started talking about superheros and David mentioned the new Green Hornet movie and how there was a radio show he liked when he was a kid called the Green Hornet

I can't remember exactly why but David mentioned that he was on Dark Shadows. He asked if anybody had seen it. Adorable. A few of us screamed out that we had and he said he got letters from fans saying I named our baby after Quentin Collins but he knew that wasn't the case with QT's parents. QT then jumped in and said it was so great to finally meet David because growing up in Tennessee no one had the name Quentin. You'd go into a drugstore and flip through trinkets and things with kid's names on it and there'd never be a Quentin. He watched Romper Room every week and there'd never be a shoutout to Quentin. But then....this man came along, so handsome, he played a freakin werewolf, all my babysitters were so into him, and then it was great to have the name Quentin It got a huge round of applause.

At that point it was already past 1 in the morning. David had to add in a few more things. He said as a film nerd he thought these screenings were so special and a real treat. He also said that he has a project he wanted to talk to Edgar Wright about but wouldn't give us any details. In passing David said he had mentioned something to either Mr Semple or Edgar previously so I think the group hung out before the event and really liked each other. Who knows. I'd love to see David in one of Tarantino's films.

So the night ended, it was 1:30 am and the thought passed as I got out of my seat that maybe I could say hello to David but at that point I was so blown away by it all I don't think I could have put two sentences together. We were all tired and I'm sure David was and probably people closer to the front row would have gotten to him first. So we left. I didn't take any pictures or video but this was a night I'll never forget. I thought the surrealness of it all would have ended there but it didn't. We had parked pretty far down on a residential side street so it took us a while to get back to the car. To save time I decided to make a 3 point turn and go back exactly the way we came. Who do we see but David and his wife getting into their car across the street from the theater. I continued to drive past and all my sister could say after we spotted them was they have the same color car as we do!

I don't think it could have gotten any more crazy that night. I got home totally wired and went to sleep thinking it almost didn't seem real. The first celebrities I see in Los Angeles are David Selby, a man I have admired and had a crush on since the 80's and Quentin Tarantino! They were both everything you could have imagined.