The Table (7/10)

December 11th, 2011

Every day, people flock to Hollywood in the hope of becoming the next big thing. They seldom achieve their goal, which is why Southern California has the most attractive waitresses and bell-hops in the world. Only the most determined keep at it, taking every rejection letter as nothing more than a mere blip in the master plan, and once a week for nearly twenty years these single-minded people have met at Marc Zicree’s Round Table to discuss and compare.

Zicree was, and still is, a science-fiction writer who had what you or I would think of as medium success in the industry. His name appeared on a fair few episodes of Star Trek, for example, back in the eighties and nineties, as well as other sci-fi TV shows that I never saw. IMDb has thirty-eight entries for him as a writer and six as a producer, including this film. I’d never heard of him before watching The Table, but compared to nine-tenths of the Hollywood fraternity he’s a rip-roaring success. Despite an exhaustive contact list of famous names he’s gathered over the years, and despite his previous successes as an author, no agent wishes to take him on. He needs someone to help him, and no one’s answering his calls.

Back in the early nineties Zicree realised that he wasn’t alone, and he had an idea. Together with his wife Elaine, he formed the Round Table, a gathering place for all members of the moviemaking fraternity to meet up once a week over food and a beer to discuss their goals and obstacles. Over time, the Table grew larger. Not just actors, but directors, cameramen, costume designers... you name it, they come to the co-operative table to offer help, support and professional services at knock-down prices. One member, photographer Jim Metropole, will do you a head shot for a martini. Bargain.

Documentary filmmaker Ana Barredo, herself a Table member of sorts, thought she could kill two birds with one stone by filming one year in the life of the Table. The co-operative would help her along the way with stories of the way the Real Hollywood works (and dispelling the belief many of us have about the shallowness of the normal Hollywood type) but her documentary can also double as an advertisement for the Table itself. Zicree tells us that it has roughly a thousand members now, so big that it needs a second location, but there are many more that could benefit from the group’s help and Zicree’s tireless work.

Despite having hundreds of potential interviewees to feature Barrado continually returns to Zipree, safe in the knowledge that if you point a documentary camera at a subject for long enough you’ll eventually get to see what the speaker intended to keep hidden. Zipree is a charming character, all-smiling and determined on the outside, but when his guard is dropped he displays the self-doubt and concern of a worried man that hasn’t had a regular income for a decade. He’s worried for himself and worried for other Table members, but charmingly he seems most concerned that the documentary he now features in should have a climactic, happy ending.

The Table is a documentary for people interested in the business of movie making, the nuts and bolts that hold it all together; if you’re the kind of person that has movie books strewn about the house then this will be a valuable addition to your collection. It’s all too easy to forget about the might-bes and coulda-beens that exist in Los Angeles, but they all have more talent than you or I and could be utilised more. Marc Zicree’s initiative is a good one, and the characters interviewed are generally honest and open about their successes. Of these people, I’m sad to report I only recognised Armin Shimerman (the evil principal in TVs Buffy), but that’s only because I’m afraid I never quite got round to watching Highway to Heaven, which featured quadriplegic actor Jim Troesh who is interviewed here. A charming character (‘hey, that’s Bryan Cranston!’), I discovered with sadness that he passed away a month ago.

One of the main reasons I started this site was to promote smaller movies and lesser-known talents. Last year I championed the charming, ultra-rude Fruit Fly, for example, with its tiny budget and guerrilla camerawork, and this year I’ve drawn attention to films like The Point of Regret, a film that cost £500 to produce. With The Table, Barredo has done her level best to achieve the same thing. Her documentary, and more importantly the continued community support admirably chaired by Zicree, is essential to struggling actors everywhere. Now if only we could get the top 1 percenters of Hollywood to chip in a little to help with running costs...