Title: All the Doors to Hollywood and How to Open Them
Author: Anne M. Strick
Pub. Date: Aug. 20, 2011
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A first-ever career guide to unknown, high-paying jobs in film and television.
~From the Author~
Yep, that’s Sting – menacing me, on the set of DUNE, with actor-villains Kenneth McMillan on the left and Paul Smith on the right. I felt as silly as I look – but the actors, of course, stayed in character. And were great sports to go along with the joke.
The photo was the idea of the renowned Time Magazine photographer, Dirck Halstead, with whom I’d worked on several films before, and whom it amused to throw me into gag shots with the principals at the end of a day’s stills assignment.
Dirck and I were buddies by now. We’d braved the rain forest of Cameroon on the movie GREYSTOKE, I’d helped carry his equipment through the steaming, muddy jungle and we’d shared many dinners and hairy rides down dicey African roads. We’d go on to doTAI-PAN together in China.
We filmed DUNE at Churubusco Studios in Mexico City, over an eleven-month period – a very long shoot. I was the Unit Publicist– later, as the film took two years to finish at Universal in Los Angeles, named Project Coordinator. Unusually again, the producer, Raffaella Laurentiis, was also filming CONAN THE DESTROYER at Churubusco the same time. And had asked me to work on both. Very efficient. Efficient also was the fact that I got not two salaries – but one and a half. And saved the production the cost of housing, and feeding, an additional employee.
DUNE was the most enjoyable of any of the films I did – although also the hardest, since I was also doing CONAN. (I’m not sure that’s ever been tried before). Both cast and crew – mostly English and Italian – were a delight to work with.
Sting, who began as a schoolteacher, was smart and courteous and helpful and interesting. An admirable man. Similarly simpatico were Max Von Sydow, Pattrick Stewart, Sian Phillips, Sean Young, Kyle McLachlen, Francesca Annis, the cinematographer Freddie Francis, the production designer Rony Masters, and many, many others. David Lynch, the director, was an intriguing – and enormously engaging- character. There were many dinners together, and many Sunday parties. I remember the experience and the people with much pleasure.
And my Spanish improved – a bit.
~Book Trailer~
~About the Author~
Anne M.Strick has spent over twenty years in the movie industry. She has worked for Universal, Warners, Paramount and EMI, as a Unit Publicist, Project Coordinator and National Publicity Director, and with such Hollywood legends as Jack Nicholson, James Earl Jones, Sean Penn, Arnold Schwarzenegger, David Lynch and Dino De Laurentiis, among many others.
She has been a Congressional speech writer, published articles, theater reviews, short stories, two non-fiction books (one an international best-seller), two novels, and the highly praised (“remarkable”) critique of our adversary legal system, Injustice For All. Born in Philadelphia, educated at Bennington College and UCLA, she lives in Los Angeles.
She got to hang out with Sting?! What a lucky lady! Did you guys watch the video? What do you guys think?
Thank you, Ms. Strick for hanging out here today!
