Today’s guest is screenwriter Jeremy Pikser, best known as the co-writer of Warren Beatty’s political satire BULWORTH for which they got both an Academy Award and a Golden Globe nomination. In BULWORTH, a senator decides to end his life and spend his last few days telling the truth wherever he goes during his re-election campaign – which, naturally, completely disrupts the world of politics. Jeremy talks about the genesis of the movie, which came out in 1998, during Bill Clinton’s 2nd term, about the difficult writing process with Warren Beatty, about truth in politics, about the often-discussed ending of the movie, about Aaron Sorkin’s contributions to the screenplay, and about the idea of a Bulworth figure in today’s political landscape.
We also talk about some of the other projects Jeremy’s been involved in. His career started as a contributor to Warren Beatty’s REDS, a film about the life of communist activist John Reed, he wrote the Diane Keaton movie THE LEMON SISTERS, and more recently, he was the co-writer of another political satire, WAR, INC., starring John Cusack.
The interview was conducted in connection with our German-language companion podcast Lichtspielplatz. If you speak German, you’ll find an in-depth discussion of BULWORTH in episode #45.
So here’s Talking Pictures with Jeremy Pikser!
The mp3 file can be downloaded HERE.
Pikser’s photo was taken from the website of Johns Hopkins University.
Special thanks to Dr. Wily, my Lichtspielplatz podcasting partner for audio editing. The music was created by Clark Kent.
