Flix: Clips from a Filmmaker's Odyssey

By Mick Benderoth

Flix features a series of short, semi-autobiographical stories based on Mick Benderoth’s life in, out, and around the movie business. With names and a few details changed to protect the innocent, Mick tells it like it is filled with the agony and ecstasy of his travails on his tough ride to Hollywood.

We’re given a camera’s eye view into moments in the life of a man as he grows from childhood up through his teen and adult years, as he experiences professional success, setbacks and love, and comes to terms with loss.

Mick hopes these tales will inspire young filmmakers to pursue their dreams, reveling in every moment, going wherever it takes them in the realms of cinema and life.

He hopes you enjoy Flix and maybe learn a trick or two for avoiding the potholes on your own odyssey.

Bon Chance!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mick Benderoth
• Release date: Apr 27, 2023
• ISBN: 9798987572351

Mick Benderoth

Mick Benderoth is a New York filmmaker, TV commercial director, Hollywood screenwriter, and rock & roll musician. He spent twenty years in Hollywood as a screenwriter before returning to New York to start a television commercial production company. His wife Nancy produced while Mick directed. The company grew exponentially, becoming one of the most successful TV commercial boutiques in the city.After ten years, they sold the company and moved to their house in East Hampton where Mick jumped into a new field, the theater. He wrote plays while Nancy returned to her first love, oil painting. Mick’s play, “Brotherhood,” was performed in regional theaters.He produced and edited the Warner Bros. documentary, Malcolm X, which was nominated for an Academy Award, later becoming Spike Lee’s acclaimed dramatic film Malcom X starring Denzel Washington.A veteran rock & roller from the 50’s, Mick is still writing tunes and jamming with his grandson Griffin. His band Silverback’s music is available for purchase on Amazon and iTunes.His early short films Abraxas, https://youtu.be/GAQ1dFFU5Kk and A Beautiful Day for A Picnic, https://youtu.be/q8gWPtFmdS0 won awards at The Atlanta, Maryland, and Philadelphia film festivals.Mick now resides in Manhattan, writing and publishing fictional prose in all genres.For more information, visit https://MickBenderoth.com

Book preview

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to my astounding editor Woody Gimbel, my good friend, alpha reader Art Lasky, and Thad Rutkowski, whose writer’s workshops, Telling Great Stories, started me on the path to writing prose. A special thank you to Krystine Kercher for working with me on formatting and layout of the interior of the book as well as for the cover, and for her assistance in publishing this book.

Mick Benderoth, 2023, NYC

Epigraph

"Sometimes reality is too complex. Stories give it form."

Jean-Luc Godard

Contents

Dedication

Acknowledgments

Epigraph

She Was

Gift

Icebox

Thumb

Home Run

Icehouse

Callinectes sapidus

Gone Fishing

Jazz

Gem

Jimi Hendrix

Progeny

Living War Dead

Promise

Shilly

European Customs

Hunt

Jimi Jam

Songbird

Spider Guy

Dream Job

Hubris

Chutzpah

Taormina

Kick The Cane

String Bean

Popie

Brotherhood

What’s in a Name?

Writing on the Wall

Advice

Bliss

Tres J’s

Sunshine

Epilogue

About The Author

She Was

A poem for my beloved wife Nancy

She was

She was

She was

A girl by chance I knew

who walked so sure not slow

A woman on her way

Far places she did go

So fast I could not see

a side I did not know

a secret kept so well

one she dares not show

a muse to men she drew

and women they could be

so like her as she flew

passed them sure and free

she was

she was

she was

not being what she saw

bringing things so new

changing all the rules

a wild wind when it blew

a strong defiant view

timeless out of time

she loved me if I grew

so I could make her mine

she took me far away

then brought me home again

to witness a new way

to put the thought to pen

she was

she was

she was

travails along her path

not hold her back for long

made her stronger still

so I could write and sing her song

she danced above the fray,

to catch her was to win the prize

one that lasts not long

for even perfect life must die

she fought so hard so long

yet never showed her pain

she called my name out loud

so to her side I came

to watch her light grow faint,

then flicker, and was gone

eternal like the stars,

a glitter that goes on and on

alone I face a life

to build it day by day

her spirit guides me on

the pain will go away

she was

she was

she was

memories she left

seem like she is near

flashes of her past

still are fresh and clear

there may never be

one so filled with life

will I ever see again

someone to fill her space

alone I face a life

to build it day by day

her spirit guides me on

the pain will go away

she was

she was

she was

memory will not die

then becomes a myth

like a breathless sigh

with a final kiss

she is

she is

she is

Gift

"It’s alive!!! it’s alive!!" Victor Frankenstein’s crazed rant as he leans over the sheet-covered creature he had made from severed arms, legs, head, brain, of various corpses stolen by his crippled grave robber, Igor. My younger brother Steve and I sat in awe, our eyes riveted to the black and white images on the movie screen.

We were movie freaks since we were old enough to walk to the greatest place on earth, The Waverly Movie Theater in Baltimore. The theater was a rundown, chipped, weather-stained brick building. A landmark, its marque blazing the venue in giant red letters, Frankenstein, The Wolfman! Dracula! War of the Worlds! Classic horror and sci-fi flicks.

Every Saturday our folks gave each of us a quarter to pay the eighteen-cents admission, with enough left over for a box of candy. Steve, Goober’s Raisinets. Me, a box of Good and Plenty.

Every Saturday we walked to Waverly to catch the latest double feature plus a serial. Always a cliffhanger that left the heroine near death to be rescued by the hero in next week’s episode. When we viewed the Universal Classic, The Wolfman, Steve was so terrified when the cursed man, Larry Talbot transformed into a monstrous, snarling werewolf, he bolted from his seat, dashed up the aisle to hide in the back of the theater. I did notice that he kept turning his head back to catch the action. A love-hate moment for sure.

We left the Waverly imagining the movies we would make someday. Not why they were made, but how. A man turns into a werewolf, an Indian’s arrow thrust into a cowboy’s bleeding chest, a switch blade knife thrown sticking into a gangster’s back, The Rocket Man, soaring through the clouds, King Kong the infamous, humongous ape, swinging from The Empire State Building, Fay Ray grasped in the giant ape’s hand screaming for dear life as bi-wing airplanes machine gunned Kong to death.

All fodder for the masterpieces we would create not if, no ifs about it, but…WHEN! we got to Hollywood. Land of silver screen dreams.

Christmas Eve, 1954 The night before Christmas. I was ten, Steve eight. So overexcited as we place a plate of home baked sugar cookies, plus a tall glass of milk on the coffee table, for…you know who. We were still sort of believers and wanted to be and could hardly get to sleep, then woke up way too early. My parents wisely started a ritual of putting our budging Christmas Stockings on our foot bed posts to allow them a few hours of sleep. We dive in. Wrapping paper confetti airborne.

Stockings ransacked, we’d pounce onto our mom and dad’s double bed, chanting, Can we go down now? Please! Please! Please! Bleary eyed, they robed and slippered, leading us down the pine garland wrapped stairway banister, into our living room. The piney smell of evergreen fills the air.

Look, Steve, I point. Gone were the cookies! Milk glass empty! Santa had been here!

We drift into a Christmas Wonderland that appeared overnight. A massive floor to ceiling Scotch pine tree, decorated to the ninety nines. fancy-wrapped presents, large, small, oblong, and round, piled high beneath, spilling onto the living room rug. Hardly a space to walk. We’d been good boys. Santa was good back.

Steve’s first present, Elvis Presley’s first single "That’s all right." Mine, Bill Haley and the Comets Rock around the Clock. Rock and roll classics that would soon reveal a musical path we would later follow playing in myriads of rock bands on our way to Hollywood. Movies first. Music follows.

All presents opened, our dad brought in a huge box wrapped in silver foil. What could it be...something so humongous? We dove into it to find a tiny box wrapped in the same paper. In the box, a note Search for the next box. Steve and I looked everywhere, with Mom and Dad hinting, Cold, colder, warm, warmer, hot... hotter... ON FIRE!

We stood in front of the kitchen cabinet usually filled with canned goods. Inside was another silver-wrapped, medium- sized box. We began peeling off the paper. We screamed in unison when we saw the word Kodak. Hearts pounding, we ripped off the rest of the paper. Holy mackerel!!! Our greatest gift, a Kodak Brownie 8mm Home Movie Camera. It was a simple box with a lens and a spring motor...but it made movies. We were on our way.

Instead of the usual home movies of family gatherings, vacations, and parties, Steve and I made real movies, monster flicks, action flicks, comedy larks. We invited friends and family to view the latest M&S (Mick and Steve) Production.

Years passed, movie camera technology advanced, and we took the next step into 16m, the format for TV news and documentaries. Ever self-encouraged, M & S brainstormed our next epic. Then...Dead stop! Graver concerns. Harsh reality, turning eighteen, getting unwanted birthday gifts. Notices to sign up with the governments Selective Service to be eligible for the draft into the army. Shivers down my spine, as I imagined the consequences.

Fortunately, instead of being listed 1-A, sound and fit for duty, we got 2S deferments, both headed for college. Knowing after graduation we would again be the dreaded, 1-A. Unfazed, we actively protested the war. The spark for our next M&S Production came from TV News, announcing The March on The Pentagon, October 21, 1967. The first ever national demonstration protesting an American War. Our next film, a no brainer, a documentary, The March! Against the war in Vietnam.

We drove the six plus hours from Baltimore to Washington, bumper to bumper traffic. Busses, cars jam-packed, headed to the protest. Parking a half mile away. Donned with fake Press Passes, dressed in suits and ties, unlike the hippie dress of most protestors, we began the trek. Protesters, with anti-war signs and banners appeared everywhere, marching to the objective... the nerve center of the American Military, The Pentagon.

We were caught in the throng. I held out the camera and forged ahead, coming face-to face with cold reality, a phalanx of armed soldiers, forming a seemingly impenetrable wall, several hundred feet from our objective. We flashed our fake passes, the troops, stone-faced, did not budge, We’re the Press!, we screamed. They did not flinch. The protest stopped dead-for a moment, but the frenzied crowd was relentless. A human wave plowed through the troops, knocking many to the ground. The troops were overwhelmed, powerless, trampled. The marchers pressed on. No stopping now.

Filming everything in sight, passing the camera back and forth, Steve and I were propelled onward, then there it was...The Pentagon, surrounded by even more troops. This did not slow the protestors. Engulfed by wave upon wave of bodies, we were literally carried by the crowd, camera running. Nothing could stop the onslaught, until something did. A small, metal can rolled into the masses, then exploded! Tear gas! Our eyes burned, our throats, raked with acrid air. We could not breathe. The first time America’s youth were tear gassed by America’s youth. Young US soldiers against American civilian protestors. One wearing military uniforms, the other, jeans and flowered shirts. The most vehement protestors braved the gas, we were right with them.

Filming The Pentagon through the choking haze of gas was horrifying and exciting, and we achieved what we came for, we got The Shot, a long hair bearded youth bursting through the line of armed soldiers waving a charred American flag, used in our short Maryland Film Festival, Silver in Atlanta and Philadelphia Festivals. Abraxas was soon followed by another festival winner, our anti-war drama, A Beautiful Day For A Picnic.

We beat the draft. Me, getting a deferment teaching science at Baltimore suburban High School, Steve, a letter from a left-wing family doctor who prescribed Steve had flat feet.

Steve left Baltimore for NYC, starting his quest for his musical bliss. I soon followed beginning my journey to Hollywood. All because of the greatest gift, our Kodak Brownie 8mm Home Movie Camera. Still sitting scratched, dented, fifty years later, on my office bookcase.

My youthful odyssey began.

Icebox

Memory. Icebox. I’m six. Nineteen fifty-one. Icebox. Ubiquitous, rectangular, white slab against the kitchen wall. Two doors. Top. Bottom. I love ice day. The iceman cometh. A massive block of ice between rusty tongs rests on his shoulder. Grandma opens the top door. The iceman slides the block in. Cold food for a week. I follow him out to the alley, his truck stacked with ice. He icepicks me off a chunk, smiles, I smile back. Yum.

Later that summer, a big day. Our first refrigerator. The movers put the icebox on the back porch for the junk man. We all stand in awe in front of this big, white machine. Dad plugs it in. When it gets cold, food goes in. No more iceman. No more ice blocks. No more ice chips to slurp. Now, ice cubes. It makes me sad.

Out on the porch playing, I stop, stand at the ancient icebox, waiting to be picked up by the junkman. Get a bad idea. I open the bottom door, just big enough. I slide in, close it. Thunk! It’s dark. Too dark. Quiet. Too quiet. Had enough. I want out. Feel around for