The Man Behind the Throne Page #5

Mm-hm.

By this human machine.

- Mm-hm.

- And then she can dance.

Lars seemed to rewrite the movie

based on his observations

of how we all interacted.

I really love Lars.

His desire to allow imperfection

to surface in the film

really inspired me.

Lars wanted to shoot

the dance sequences

with a hundred small DV cameras.

So I would walk him

through the locations

and he would say, "OK, well,

let's put a camera up there."

And I would say,

"Let's put a camera over there,

by where the sheep are standing."

"OK, but we can't have

any moving cameras anywhere."

And I said,

"Well, what if something was moving

"and the camera was on

part of that?"

And he was, like, "OK, well, that

doesn't really break the rules."

I think we put, like, one

on the back of a sheep.

You've seen it all

and all, you have seen

The light and the dark,

the big and the small

After we shot I've Seen It All

for two days,

using, actually,

more than 150 cameras,

I rode home with Lars

in his camper.

Lars is at the wheel!

I remember he said to me,

"Wincent, I hate to say this, but

I think we've created a classic."

I remember being on the plane

back to LA

and I kept thinking

about Lars and Bjork

and how they both seemed

to live on the edge of madness.

I think genius lives

on the rim of reality

and it teeters

between the human world

and the nether regions of madness.

I wish I could be like that

with my work,

but me, I'm usually just

too damn conscientious.

I guess I'm jealous

of their artistic insanity.

9/11 had just happened

and Vincent had been asked

to choreograph

for the choreography awards

that year.

And he was like,

"Nah, I don't wanna do it."

And I'm, like,

"Oh, Vincent, I just have to dance.

"Please, let's just dance.

"Let's just learn the choreography

"and, you know, even if

we don't do anything,

"at least we'll have danced today."

'Cause it was...

we were pretty upset after...

...you know, 9/11.

It was, like, the week after.

So we did this piece

and... it was magic.

We were at the very end

of the first act.

Lights go up, and Tony -

a friend of ours,

close friends with Vincent -

sees Pytka in the audience, crying.

So Tony goes, "Joe, hi."

And he goes,

"Hey! Who choreographed that?"

And Tony goes, "Well, you know him.

Vincent did."

He goes...

"That f***ing f***!

"Bring me to him!"

No joke, he says to me,

"What the f*** do you...

"Look at... look at my f***ing face!

Look at my f***ing face.

"Look at this! I've got f***ing

tears rolling down my f***ing face.

"What the f*** did you do

something like that to me for, man?

"What are you doing with this thing?

"What are you doing

with this f***ing thing?"

"Joe, I'm not doing

anything with it."

"What do you mean, you're not doing

anything with it? What do you mean?

"What are you talking about? You've

gotta do something with this thing."

I said, "Well, I don't know.

"I just did it for this one event -

that was it."

He goes, "No, no, no, no, no.

No! Uh-uh, no.

"We're shooting this.

We're putting this down on film.

"You're directing it

and I'm shooting it."

It was amazing.

We had the best dancers

from all of the tours -

Madonna, Michael Jackson -

all those dancers were free.

You would never have

these dancers together - ever!

But everybody had to dance,

because all the planes were landed

and all the tours were stopped.

I never was an idle man.

I always worked.

But 9/11 had happened,

and the economy, especially in terms

of the entertainment industry,

had sort of gone downhill.

After things had gone

so well for so long,

I... wasn't... no-one was hiring me.

Nothing happened for me.

Nothing happened.

And... I...

I guess it was like withdrawal

with a junkie, you know?

Like, you stop shooting up heroin

and you start to, you know,

go a little mad.

And in a way,

I suppose that's what happened.

I kept thinking,

"That's it. That's the end.

"Nobody wants me,

and that's all it's about."

So it didn't matter.

Carl didn't matter, my family

didn't matter - nothing mattered.

I got a gun

and I drove up to Santa Barbara

and I went into a hotel

and I loaded the gun

and I put the gun in my mouth.

I was going to shoot it,

and the telephone rang.

A woman said,

"Do you want ice in your room?"

All of a sudden, I was like...

Whoo! Like, sucked me back,

you know?

And from that point, I sort of took

a different perspective of things.

"Las Vegas, February 21.

"To my lovelies

in my journal-reading world,

"We're almost done here in Vegas,

and I'll be home soon."

One says 'lamp'

and one says 'reading'.

The 'reading' is overhead.

I put that on.

The 'lamp'

is what I've been hitting.

- Oh, and 'goodnight'.

- No, that's when everything closes.

Some little man had to come up with

us and show us what everything does.

"Carl, as usual, has been

my guardian angel through this.

"He's faithfully been coming up

every weekend to be sure I'm loved,

"to cook delicious food,

to provide some laughs."

Of course.

Who else would I talk about?

"I've been working toward

incorporating the producers' notes

"as best I can.

"I changed song order,

I created new set concepts,

"cut entire sections

out of the show,

"restructured whole sections

of the show."

"Time magazine review

by Richard Corliss -

"'Viva Viva Elvis!

"'In 2006, Cirque pulled off

a Beatles homage, Love,

"'but that was sedate stuff

"'next to this audiovisual,

balletic, acrobatic explosion

"'from director Vincent Paterson.

"'He's concocted an experience

that's both symphonic

"'and in every way fantastic.'"

We're very excited.

I mean, Elvis is back.

He's here. He's back in Vegas,

where he belongs.

To see him here now,

in a way that's bigger

than we've ever presented him,

is very special to all of us.

"This is it for now.

"Sending you all love.

"Did I actually

once mention retiring?

"What the hell was I thinking?"

I can't believe it.

We used to do, like,

performance art.

We did a piece where I was Jesus,

with a crown of thorns,

and I carried a huge cross

all the way down this street

and I hung up here on a cross

for three hours.

I spent my life in here.

So cool.

Once you get out of here

and you get out into the real world,

a HUGE percentage of what you do

is politics.

You want to be an artist and you

live your life to be an artist,

and then you get into

whatever it is -

whether it's a play or a film

or a commercial or whatever -

and you realise that

it's all about the politics.

And you have to realise

what your place is and pay attention

to learn how to weasel your way in

to get your voice heard,

your art seen.

And it never stops, you know?

It never stops.

Madonna. Next topic.

She's very tough.

And I had the guys lift her up

in a big lift,

and she said, "I don't want to be

lifted like some GIRL."

Well, when you work with Madonna,

you learn that you have to be

father, brother, mother, boyfriend,

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