What would I do if I were one of America’s greatest film directors?
The thought occurred to me sometimes as I was dawdling through film school, admiring the work of men and women whose talent I knew I lacked. With little hope of ever joining the pantheon myself, I daydreamed about what it must be like to be, say, Paul Thomas Anderson.
Suppose I were him? Having delivered three of the finest cinematic masterpieces in recent history—Boogie Nights (1997), Magnolia (1999), and There Will Be Blood (2007)—to be later followed up with a handful of looser and more intimate works like Licorice Pizza (2021), what would I do for an encore?
In my hazier moments, I began to hatch out a fantasy. A genius of Anderson’s magnitude, I reasoned, is surely looking around him and feeling nothing but revulsion for what has become of Hollywood. An industry that now mandates diversity and inclusion standards in order to be considered for its highest honor—better find some way to work a host of BIPOC actors into that Leif Eriksson biopic you’re working on, bub—is no place for anyone committed to art for art’s sake. What’s a true auteur to do to state his or her disdain for the petty politruks ravaging popular entertainment?
And then it hit me: If I were Paul Thomas Anderson, I’d pull off the greatest prank in Hollywood history.
