No Ray Wise?

Moderators: Brad D, Annie, Jonah, BookhouseBoyBob, Ross, Jerry Horne

bosguy1981
Great Northern Member
Posts: 608
Joined: Fri Mar 11, 2011 3:03 pm

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by bosguy1981 »

Soolsma wrote:Wasn't it recently suggested on this board that it was Frost imagining Cooper waking up in Vegas which got things going in the first place? I think Frost has always been very much in favor of increasing the scope of things, both historically and geographically. Just look at TSHOTP.
Frost gave an interview shortly after the series wrapped and he said that his primary focus on brainstorming the new season with Lynch was to "get out of the sleepy, creepy little town" and expand the story to other places.

And Lynch revealed that when Frost approached him with the initial idea, Frost envisioned Cooper somehow materializing inside an abandoned home in an abandoned neighborhood in Las Vegas. So that seemed to be the starting point provided by Frost.
User avatar
mtwentz
Lodge Member
Posts: 2185
Joined: Sun Oct 04, 2015 10:02 am

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by mtwentz »

Audrey Horne wrote:Baffled to me meaning when they sat down and were compelled to revisit their hit show by their train of thought with it. Like how did they start with their past product and remembering when it was in its glory and come up with things like take hit character Cooper and make him not Cooper for 90% of the show. Like if Friends came back and they made Rachel an astronaut in space, and the five others in Monica’s apartment were placed by other actors. Not saying whether or not I like the direction Lynch and Frost went in, just baffled at their desire of revisiting the show in the manner they did and how that talk even began.

I’m thinking something along the lines of Lynch saying let’s do Peaks again, and Frost says yes! Frost getting ready with his notes of what the greatest hits were that made their show top for that brief moment... Cooper and his coffee, Audrey and her cherry stem, the dancing dwarf in a red room, hot girls in diner uniforms, the girl in plastic all in the strange soap opera town, etc. “okay, David what are you thinking? Cooper fights to become himself again. Audrey, Bobby, Shelly are grown up and we can bring in some younger hip actors as their kids...”. Lynch: “234 actors and Vegas, Mark! Vegas!!” Frost throws all previous notes away.
Love your input Audrey Horne, and I definitely see why a lot of folks were disappointed in the final product, and I personally think it's the lack of traditional narrative suspense that is really deep down made it a hard work to digest, but here's how I break it down:

The Series Twin Peaks is about The Town. Major Theme: Hidden lives of seemingly normal people

FWWM is about Laura. Major Theme: Sexual Abuse

TPTR is about Cooper. Major Theme (s): Aging, nostalgia, dying and coming to terms with one's own life.

You have the same world, but you tackle from different perspectives. Also, the series, the movie and The Return have radically different formats from each other, so there are natural differences not even related to the story Lynch and Frost wanted to tell.

And I feel that though people pined for the 'old Coop', that was definitely not in the cards. Ultimately, 'Richard' was how Lynch and Frost envisioned what Cooper would become after 25 years. In some sense, Mr. C and Dougie are just glimpses of aspects of his personality, but 'Richard' Coop is the vision of a man beaten down by life and by time.

Having the old bouncy, Boy Scout-y Coop for 2 episodes is just there for contrast, IMHO, and the superimposed face of Richard comes in right at the moment when Cooper is being a Boy Scout, and I believe it's to show the contrast between what he once was to what he ultimately became.

But that's just my opinon :-)
F*&^ you Gene Kelly
vicksvapor77
Great Northern Member
Posts: 584
Joined: Wed Dec 07, 2011 11:51 pm

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by vicksvapor77 »

I saw people blaming David for not including Leland so I wanted to add my two cents. I met Ray Wise at a recent con and he had some very clear feelings on Mark Frost, especially his books. Let's just say... he's not a fan. I made a comment that I wish he was in it more and I'm pretty sure he more or less blamed Mark for it. I have a video my friend took of me talking to him that I definitely don't want to share publicly. I'll review it though.
User avatar
mtwentz
Lodge Member
Posts: 2185
Joined: Sun Oct 04, 2015 10:02 am

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by mtwentz »

vicksvapor77 wrote:I saw people blaming David for not including Leland so I wanted to add my two cents. I met Ray Wise at a recent con and he had some very clear feelings on Mark Frost, especially his books. Let's just say... he's not a fan. I made a comment that I wish he was in it more and I'm pretty sure he more or less blamed Mark for it. I have a video my friend took of me talking to him that I definitely don't want to share publicly. I'll review it though.
It's reminiscent of MJA saying Frost is really Lynch's handler. Sometimes I get the feeling the actors believe Lynch can do no wrong, that anything good is Lynch, anything bad is Frost.

I just have a hard time believing this was really Frost's film, not Lynch's.
F*&^ you Gene Kelly
User avatar
Mr. Reindeer
Lodge Member
Posts: 3680
Joined: Mon Jan 26, 2015 4:09 pm

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by Mr. Reindeer »

Frost has said that he and Lynch had equal veto power in the scripting process. I.e., Frost could shut down Lynch ideas that he really hated, and vice versa. So I’m sure there were some things each of them wanted which the other prevented from happening. That said, I sincerely doubt that the actors have any insight into the writing process. Lynch doesn’t tell tales out of school, and in any event, if he really wanted to give Wise more to do, he would have scripted more material during filming, where both Lynch and Frost have acknowledged he was steering the ship. I would venture to guess that Wise may have been basing his opinion on the fact that Lynch sorta-kinda implied that Leland would have a meatier role (Wise was the first person to publicly say Lynch had told him “you never know” in regards to the show returning and Wise being in it, in what it turns out was a very early point in the scripting process before any of the other actors had been approached; and Between Two Worlds seemed to imply more for the character; so he was probably as surprised as the rest of us when there was so little on the page). In any event, I don’t think there was any big conspiracy to exclude Wise/Leland on either side. I think they just couldn’t agree on a meaningful way to give this deceased character a larger role in the context of Cooper’s/the season’s larger story.

Interesting to hear he feels that way about the books (I’m surprised he even read them). Did he have any specific objection? I don’t recall Leland featuring much in either.
Last edited by Mr. Reindeer on Tue Feb 12, 2019 9:13 am, edited 2 times in total.
LateReg
Bookhouse Member
Posts: 1435
Joined: Sun May 10, 2015 5:19 pm

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by LateReg »

mtwentz wrote:
Audrey Horne wrote:Baffled to me meaning when they sat down and were compelled to revisit their hit show by their train of thought with it. Like how did they start with their past product and remembering when it was in its glory and come up with things like take hit character Cooper and make him not Cooper for 90% of the show. Like if Friends came back and they made Rachel an astronaut in space, and the five others in Monica’s apartment were placed by other actors. Not saying whether or not I like the direction Lynch and Frost went in, just baffled at their desire of revisiting the show in the manner they did and how that talk even began.

I’m thinking something along the lines of Lynch saying let’s do Peaks again, and Frost says yes! Frost getting ready with his notes of what the greatest hits were that made their show top for that brief moment... Cooper and his coffee, Audrey and her cherry stem, the dancing dwarf in a red room, hot girls in diner uniforms, the girl in plastic all in the strange soap opera town, etc. “okay, David what are you thinking? Cooper fights to become himself again. Audrey, Bobby, Shelly are grown up and we can bring in some younger hip actors as their kids...”. Lynch: “234 actors and Vegas, Mark! Vegas!!” Frost throws all previous notes away.
Love your input Audrey Horne, and I definitely see why a lot of folks were disappointed in the final product, and I personally think it's the lack of traditional narrative suspense that is really deep down made it a hard work to digest, but here's how I break it down:

The Series Twin Peaks is about The Town. Major Theme: Hidden lives of seemingly normal people

FWWM is about Laura. Major Theme: Sexual Abuse

TPTR is about Cooper. Major Theme (s): Aging, nostalgia, dying and coming to terms with one's own life.

You have the same world, but you tackle from different perspectives. Also, the series, the movie and The Return have radically different formats from each other, so there are natural differences not even related to the story Lynch and Frost wanted to tell.

And I feel that though people pined for the 'old Coop', that was definitely not in the cards. Ultimately, 'Richard' was how Lynch and Frost envisioned what Cooper would become after 25 years. In some sense, Mr. C and Dougie are just glimpses of aspects of his personality, but 'Richard' Coop is the vision of a man beaten down by life and by time.

Having the old bouncy, Boy Scout-y Coop for 2 episodes is just there for contrast, IMHO, and the superimposed face of Richard comes in right at the moment when Cooper is being a Boy Scout, and I believe it's to show the contrast between what he once was to what he ultimately became.

But that's just my opinon :-)
I think everything that MT is saying in the last couple posts makes sense.

Here's the thing. I admit that the directions that Lynch/Frost took were undeniably surprising and subversive on a level that could not have been anticipated. So, I do understand Audrey Horne's point. And this is just semantics that may not make sense to some people, but I wouldn't use the word "baffled" because once you process the whole thing all of their creative decisions make perfect sense given that they're older/wiser; that they're thinking about viewer expectations - needs vs. wants - and avoiding the typical safety net of most revivals; that they're thinking in terms of a set of themes that include those referenced by MT above, of the difficulty if not downright futility of attempting to return to what once was. When you think of it in this light, sure, the decisions are still surprising and one's mileage may vary with each one, but I don't think they can be called baffling.
User avatar
mtwentz
Lodge Member
Posts: 2185
Joined: Sun Oct 04, 2015 10:02 am

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by mtwentz »

I think some of the different views frankly is how we were introduced to it. As an original viewer, I watched the pilot, then lost interest and missed most of Season 1, except for the last episode, and only really got into the show as a full Peaks Freak with the Season 2 premiere.

If you were fully engaged in Season 1 from the beginning, it is the gold standard you measure everything else by, and as that as the measure, everything since has probably been a disappointment. Twin Peaks has been less and less about narrative and suspense, and increasingly like an abstract moving painting.

In the musical theater world, there is the book musical and the concept musical. Twin Peaks started out as a 'book' show and is now largely a 'concept' show/movie.

I fault no one for being disappointed with the results, because frankly there are times I am not in the mood for abstract surreaslism and I just want to get into a good linear story. But why I personally like The Return is that it has so many launching points for discussion and thought; it's not a show that will ever cease to have a different angle from which it can be viewed, a different theory that can be gleaned.
F*&^ you Gene Kelly
User avatar
Mordeen
Great Northern Member
Posts: 895
Joined: Tue Sep 22, 2015 7:03 am
Location: Near Mr. Gerard's Cabin in Kalispell, MT

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by Mordeen »

kitty666cats wrote:
N. Needleman wrote:I've never seen or heard anything legit indicating those roles were cut down from what was originally intended. And I heard a lot I didn't talk about.
How the heck did Mordeen and you hear all this secret stuff? Friends with crew members of S3 or something? At least you're not as cryptic as Mordeen, sometimes I think they're bullshitting and just yanking our tails for fun :lol:
My own experience with having access to spoilers and other behind the scenes info stems from a range of sources,. Some were deeply knowledgeable, others were looky-loos or friends of looky-loos who colored the information with their interpretations of what they saw, and thus were not reliable.

For example, someone in the area during the New Fat Trout scenes made a claim that there was a shot of a bank of mailboxes and they all read "Chalfont." That was totally bogus but gained a lot of traction on the rumor mill. On the other hand, someone actually involved in those scenes revealed how Lynch changed dialogue on the spot during at least one of those scenes and it was verified.

I talked about a lot of stuff when I was given permission to share it, and I always asked for permission first. And, much like N. Needleman has stated, there's stuff I won't tell, primarily because it can be traced directly to the individual who shared it and cause that person or persons a great deal of legal and financial liability.

I also know that many of us with inside info were intentionally given false or conflicting info in an attempt to weed out who the leakers were on the inside. Thankfully nobody got outed, but it got dicey for a while, evidenced by the direction this board took for a while.

I've been challenged, called a liar, attacked for revealing spoilers, harassed all number of things during this process, but don't regret a damned thing because people wanted info and I had permission to share it. I wish I could share the few other things in my secret box, trust me.

- Mordeen
Moving Through Time. . .
User avatar
Audrey Horne
Lodge Member
Posts: 2030
Joined: Sat Apr 14, 2007 9:20 pm
Location: The Great Northern

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by Audrey Horne »

Yes, that’s exactly right. My posts were rambling (and this one might be too) in making my point. I just used Frost and Lynch’s as variables in a hypothetical conversation in a business meeting for a product. It has no bearing on my opinion on the actual Return. Basically something like Lynch and Frost made Coca Cola and then retired it. Years later they want to bring it back but they put it in the red bottle but decide to make it orange juice. (I’ll probably try to fix my analogy in another post... my writing skills have grown lazy).

Again, only meaning baffled from a business approach for their product and after years of the two reflecting on how their show got away from them in the second season when they went in separate directions. They certainly didn’t play it safe that’s for sure.

The three Entertainment Weekly covers depict how to sell and revisit the show on a business level with the iconic characters and classic elements that seems to be the way to approach the show to make it a potential hit again. “Again” meaning when the two sat down years ago to revisit returning. So even if they envisioned a swelling new national landscape for the story, that they then sidelined their iconic characters. And it wasn’t because they thought we can get young, hot, hip actors for new parts. (The casting was refreshingly middle-aged).

I guess I just mean from a strictly business level plan, it was a head scratcher for me.

Getting back to Ray Wise... I was shocked he was in it as little as he was. And not because I love that man. I guess it ties back to the original Coca Cola analogy. FWWM and the Palmers have become such a success over the years coupled with Lynch’s love for that part of the story. So I was surprised he wasn’t worked in a lot more.

It’s hard for me to be objective since like others I had a pretty good idea of what to expect in terms of actors screen time and knowledge of the locations (especially how much Vegas). I knew a lot of new characters were going to take center stage. But in the end, I was pleasantly surprised by how much weight characters like Audrey, Sarah, Bobby and Ben carried and resonated. Ultimately the new characters came off cold to me and I didn’t care emotionally for them at all.

And in terms of the story, if this was the story they wanted to tell, in the end it didn’t really work for me. I think it needed to be tighter with a better sense of tension. It just felt meandering. The highs (especially the visual ones) were very high to me and successful. But the lows were plenty... me glancing away or bored impatience with a mundane scene that wasn’t playing with that impatient in the gleeful way (like the waiter or bank scenes).
God, I love this music. Isn't it too dreamy?
User avatar
Audrey Horne
Lodge Member
Posts: 2030
Joined: Sat Apr 14, 2007 9:20 pm
Location: The Great Northern

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by Audrey Horne »

Woah, new posts since I was writing....

Mordeen, harassed?! Yikes. This board and the fandom got a little out of control, especially with the growing intense tension of how long the project took to complete from announcement to airing. And I guess that would be true of any fandom coupled with its return and anticipation. And people get carried away.

Shake it off as best you can. There’s still some really great people here, and you’re tops in my book.
God, I love this music. Isn't it too dreamy?
User avatar
Mr. Reindeer
Lodge Member
Posts: 3680
Joined: Mon Jan 26, 2015 4:09 pm

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by Mr. Reindeer »

Neither of these guys has ever really been a commercial thinker, though. Pretty much everything Lynch has done has been revolutionary for its era...whether you liked it or not, you can’t call any of his projects safe commercial bets. Frost is a little bit more of an insider, but he seems to have intentionally squandered his early-‘90s post-TP industry caché, preferring to stick to personal passion projects rather than parlaying TP into broader mainstream success. And it definitely seems his storytelling has only grown more eccentric in the years since TP. In other words, I don’t think it was ever about commercial success for these two. They returned to this world on their own terms because it meant something personally and artistically at this stage in their lives/careers.
User avatar
Audrey Horne
Lodge Member
Posts: 2030
Joined: Sat Apr 14, 2007 9:20 pm
Location: The Great Northern

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by Audrey Horne »

Totally get that, and I agree. I think I was just surprised in terms of them not taking their initial ingredients and manipulating it into breaking a new structure.
God, I love this music. Isn't it too dreamy?
User avatar
Mordeen
Great Northern Member
Posts: 895
Joined: Tue Sep 22, 2015 7:03 am
Location: Near Mr. Gerard's Cabin in Kalispell, MT

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by Mordeen »

Audrey Horne wrote:Woah, new posts since I was writing....

Mordeen, harassed?! Yikes. This board and the fandom got a little out of control, especially with the growing intense tension of how long the project took to complete from announcement to airing. And I guess that would be true of any fandom coupled with its return and anticipation. And people get carried away.

Shake it off as best you can. There’s still some really great people here, and you’re tops in my book.
Well I appreciate the compliment. I really have no beef with anyone here. Some folks sent me snarky messages but that was silly stuff. The real drama was on Facebook, and then there was the harassing phone calls and emails, including one from a particular company alleging that my online persona was a front for me to bypass the NDA and when they found out who I was I'd be in deep trouble. I had to laugh at that one. I gave them my real name, phone number, home address and invited them to send their lawyers over for coffee and donuts lol. Never heard back.

I wasn't looking for sympathy in my comments, just trying to emphasize that I would gladly have spewed everything I knew and still know if I were allowed to or didn't have a sense of honor. Playing around in the spoiler network was fun, challenging and often hilarious. Hell, it's how The Woolhouse came to be, and that crowd has made me some dear friends and provides daily joy.

- Mordeen
Moving Through Time. . .
User avatar
Mr. Reindeer
Lodge Member
Posts: 3680
Joined: Mon Jan 26, 2015 4:09 pm

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by Mr. Reindeer »

The stories we’ve heard rumblings of regarding enforcement of the NDA make it seem like the show had a legal staff on par with Star Wars (or Harvey Weinstein's sleazy cleanup crew before he got brought down). Given what a relatively small production this was, sometimes it feels like half the budget went to clamping down on leaks.
User avatar
Mordeen
Great Northern Member
Posts: 895
Joined: Tue Sep 22, 2015 7:03 am
Location: Near Mr. Gerard's Cabin in Kalispell, MT

Re: No Ray Wise?

Post by Mordeen »

vicksvapor77 wrote:I saw people blaming David for not including Leland so I wanted to add my two cents. I met Ray Wise at a recent con and he had some very clear feelings on Mark Frost, especially his books. Let's just say... he's not a fan. I made a comment that I wish he was in it more and I'm pretty sure he more or less blamed Mark for it. I have a video my friend took of me talking to him that I definitely don't want to share publicly. I'll review it though.
You and I might want to compare notes.

- Mordeen
Moving Through Time. . .
Post Reply