The Job

They're filming a Shem Betterman stage-to-screen black comedy down by the Leland today (is the City Club still there? it's been years). According to the assistant we talked to, it was slated to be filmed in Kansas, but better incentives brought the film to Detroit. At one point she had to get a woman's attention who was crossing the street, so she ran crouched over toward her, sure to line herself up behind a tree as if she were avoiding a sniper even though the filming was across the street and half a block away. Turns out they have to be careful about reflections in the window behind the actors. I suppose that's a great selling point for a city like Detroit as opposed to Vancouver, LA, NY, or pretty much anywhere else: we've got the architecture of the big cities with almost none of the traffic, so probably less cost for the production company. She also mentioned that there's an Eastwood (maybe Dirty Harry) movie coming to town soon, too - Gran Torino - the name alone makes me think catching some of that filming may be pretty cool.

A blog mentions the actors in The Job (Ron Perlman, Joe Panoliano...) and a couple of the comments made a great visual connection: Perlman, Will Ferrell, and Tom Waits look like brothers. Perlman and Waits are the same age, and Ferrell could be the little brother who's almost an only child due to the 18 year age difference, spazzing out for any attention he could get.

UPDATE: Big day downtown - my brother in law mentioned that Bill Clinton is having lunch at Opus One today.