Deconstructing Roger

Who would have thought? Roger Corman being an academic tight ass.

Austin Chronicle: Those early Corman years were an amazingly fruitful time for so many young filmmakers who are now some of the most respected and influential artists of our time. What was it about Roger Corman that drew so many young maverick directors to him?

Monte Hellman: Well, I think it wasn't just directors. Roger was (and is) an extremely bright guy, he's a Rhodes scholar, he was an engineering student at Stanford University, he's just absolutely one of the brightest people I've known in my life. Like a lot of bright people -- not all, but a lot of bright people -- he wanted to surround himself with other bright people. Roger wouldn't even consider anybody for his personal assistant or secretary unless they had a Phi Beta Kappa key. He had these kind of prejudices in favor of intelligence, and so he hired a lot of bright people to work for him in every department including filmmakers.