Movie star Paul Newman described director Sidney Lumet as "Speedy Gonzales, the only man I know of who'll double-park in front of a brothel".
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Newman - who worked with Lumet on The Verdict - was joking, of course, but only about the brothel.
This story isn't in Lumet's memoir, Making Movies (1995), but there are plenty of others. Anyone interested in the actual process of making a movie, as distinct from the theory, should read this book - film student or general reader. Lumet takes the reader through the filmmaking process, from script to direction to acting to cinematography to shooting to postproduction.
Lumet, who died in 2011 at the age of 86, was not the best-known of filmmakers to the general public, but in a 50-year film career he directed many acclaimed movies across a range of genres. His distinguished first film was 12 Angry Men (1957) and among the other highlights were Dog Day Afternoon (1975), The Verdict (1982) and, finally, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007), a fine end to a brilliant, if uneven, career. He was also an occasional screenwriter.
His films received many Oscar nominations and several actors won Oscars under his direction: on Network (1976), Peter Finch and Faye Dunaway won for their leading performance and Beatrice Straight for best supporting actress and Ingrid Bergman won best supporting actress for Murder on the Orient Express (1974). Although Lumet never won a competitive Oscar himself, he was awarded an honorary Academy Award in 2005.
Lumet was a child actor and worked as a stage and television director before making the move to films. This broad experience served him well: he had a broad and deep technical knowledge and worked well with actors of all types, training and temperaments and many did some of their best work with him, such as Sean Connery.
He was known for being meticulously organised and prepared with a good reputation for bringing movies in on time and on budget, qualities which helped him maintain his career through its ups and downs. Lumet also insisted on having a rehearsal period - two or three weeks - to work on areas such as character and blocking to save time and money during production.
His opening question about a film is one that can be helpful in other forms of endeavour: what is the movie about? Not its plot, but its theme, its essence. For him, "the theme (the what of the movie) is going to determine the style (the how of the movie)" and thus affect all future decisions. He gives examples including The Pawnbroker - How and why we create our own prisons, and 12 Angry Men - Listen.
Lumet comes across in the book as no-nonsense (he is quite tart about the waste of money that often occurs in filmmaking) as well as surprisingly self-critical and unpretentious. While proud of his achievements, he has no truck with the auteur theory of filmmaking: while "I'm the guy on the set who says 'Print' and that's what determines what goes on the screen", he says he's dependent on too many things out of his control - weather, budget, egos, on and on - to be any more than the boss "up to a point". And he welcomes the give-and-take that's part of working with great talents and is willing to learn from them.
He writes he isn't willing to wait for "great" material. He says, bluntly, "I've done two movies because I needed the money. I've done three because I love to work and couldn't wait any more", but says he worked as hard on them as any (he doesn't name the films, but says, "Two of them turned out to be good and were hits".) He did one movie to learn how to work with colour and another, Murder on the Orient Express, to lighten his touch ("get this movie gay", he says, in the old-fashioned sense).
One difficult problem arose soon into the production of the boarding-school thriller Child's Play (1972). While it had been successful as a play on Broadway, he writes he just wasn't able to transfer what made it work to the screen, but had to keep quiet and do the best he could.
There are stories about working with actors, but they don't descend into gossip. He writes of Marlon Brando taking two and a half hours and 34 takes to nail a speech in The Fugitive Kind (1960) and of spending 45 minutes answering a question Ralph Richardson asked on Long Day's Journey Into Night ("I talk a lot," he concedes). Richardson paused and then said, "I see what you mean, dear boy: a little more cello, a lot less flute". Lumet cottoned on and from then on directed Richardson in musical terms - "A slower tempo", "a little more staccato".
He ends with thoughts on where the state of filmmaking in Hollywood is up to and what the future might be. While this is, inevitably, dated, his thoughts are always interesting and his passion for film clear.
Lumet, despite his faults, was a master director. Making Movies is both a learning experience and a pleasure.