All About Tommy Wiseau And His Cult Film The Room

If we talk about some of the unique artists then Tommy Wiseau’s name certainly comes at the top. He is one of those actors, who have worked with utmost dedication and earned a certain repute.

He is the mind behind the movie 'The Room', in which he is also acting like a star. Initially, Wiseau tried to sell this love story in the form of a book having nearly 500 pages. He projected it in the form of a drama in the year 2003 and it flopped totally.

Later, it made a miraculous comeback and became a favorite cult movie. In this article, you will find All About Tommy Wiseau And His Cult Film The Room.

Tommy Wiseau is a director, producer, writer, and star. It is well known that he keeps his private life to himself and does not like discussing it publicly. He gained fame, quite late, after releasing his film ‘The Room’. And startlingly several movie critics have labeled his production as one of the worst movies ever made.

If we talk about his personal life then it can be said that little information can be collected from his various interviews. According to Wiseau, he used to live in France but grew up in Louisiana where his family lives. It has been estimated that he was born in the late 60s between 1967 and 1969. But according to the US immigration papers of Wiseau, it has been construed that he was born in one of the Soviet Bloc countries around 1950. So his real age is quite different from what he describes. 

Rick Harper, who has done extensive work on Wiseau’s background, has put forward a claim that he is actually from Poznan and a Polish. Later, Wiseau also confirmed in an interview in 2017 that he was originally from Europe. He has stated that he is a proud American. Wiseau also claims that he has obtained a degree from Laney Community college in the field of psychology. 

After spending some time in Louisiana, he moved to California. He earned his living by selling toys in the streets around Fisherman’s Wharf where he earned the handle ‘the birdman’. Apart from selling toys in the streets, he has been working as a hospital worker and a restaurant busboy.

Later, he gathered some money to run his business of denim jeans that he sold at heavily discounted prices. He carried this business forward and made himself financially independent. Isn’t it amazing what people, who want to become successful, try and risk everything for their dreams to come true?

According to Wiseau, he was involved in a deadly car accident in California, which changed his life altogether. After remaining hospitalized for a long period, he decided to become a director and an actor. He stated that it was his dream, which he had neglected in the course of becoming financially stable. 

The Room was made at the cost of $6 million and was released in the year 2003. Many people are still puzzled about how the production cost of this movie was managed. As said earlier, this movie is based on a novel published by Wiseau. It didn't gain much popularity during its release but a few years later it started running regularly in different theaters late at night.

Okay now let's have a look at the movie. It is a romantic drama that has been directed, produced and written by Tommy Wiseau. The Room has a love triangle plot between Danielle, Sestero, and Wiseau.

Observing closely it can be said that this film has an inconsistent structure,as there are different unrelated and unresolved subplots consisting also of a supporting character. Another thing has also been noticed and that is, The Room has a semi-autobiographical nature. Wiseaudescribes the title of this movie in a manner that demonstrates good and bad events taking place at the same place and for that the room is an ideal choice.

According to the movie critics The Room has some serious technical, narrative and storytelling flaws that are accompanied by its bizarre flow. But Tommy Wiseau has justified that ‘The Room’ is a type of black comedy.  

Now let’s have a look at the most interesting facts of this movie and its producer.

There were certain scenes of the movie, which were edited later due to their eerie context. The actual movie is a tamed version of the otherwise crazy script. According to a reporter, to whom the original script was, he described it to be total nonsense and a compilation of broken English. 

In spite of having a poor script, Wiseau managed to gather $6 million for its production. It is still a mystery for many that how a person selling toys, discounted jeans and fake leather jackets could gather such a huge sum.  To date, Wiseau hasn't explained how he managed to collect money for filming The Room. Apart from the movie, Wiseau also paid $5000 monthly for a billboard meant for advertising The Room. His close aide Greg Sestero says that he might be linked with some mob.

Well believe it or not, but Wiseau was certainly a perfectionist. The entire crew of the movie was replaced thrice. It happened because they didn't approve of the vision projected by him.  In short, anyone who said that the script or the act was not appropriate had to leave. He chose unique and inexperienced actors. Well, it was a crazy ride after all and maybe that was what Wiseau was after.

Yes, in the end, Wiseau wanted to add something spectacular by declaring that Johnny would be a vampire. Even the director of photography was amazed at this idea.

The Room’s premiere was quite a show. But the weirdest event was described as; a crowd of people quite evidently hired by Wiseau to take autographs from him and the cast. Even the actors guessed them and described it to be a bizarre situation.

As it was panned and planned, most of the critics said that viewers would not watch the movie for more than 30 minutes. It screened for 14 days and collected only $1800 out of $6 million. Wow, what a setback. But that didn't seem to bother Wiseau at all.

Like other celebrities, Wiseau has also opened different businesses to stay in the limelight. He has his underwear brand and he designs the underwear's himself. Theroomdating.com is his website, which has nothing to do with the movie at all. Though, it has some unique features that are linked with ‘The Room’. In several scenarios, one has no explanation for what Tommy Wiseau is all about.

In different instances, he has said that he is a fan of cinematic giants like Alfred Hitchcock, Elizabeth Taylor, Orson Welles, Marlon Brando, and James Dean.

According to different sources, it is believed that his real surname is Wieczor, which later was corrupted into Wiseau. In his early days, he was also known as Pierre. Quite a mystery man isn't he?

I suppose that the crew and cast of this movie were always wishing for a quick wrap up. But it took nearly 6 months to complete this movie. Some even describe it as a beautiful pile of garbage that took double the time of any decent movie to be filmed. We can now understand that it was a completely wild ride.

In February 2019, Wiseau showed a trailer of the movie The Shark – his second effort. In the teaser, we can see Isaiah LaBorde, Sestero, and Wiseau along with a big shark. Tommy Wiseau stated that the film was planned to be premiered in September of the same year but could not make it on time. 

You must have had gathered interest in this cult movie till now. What we know till now is that Tommy Wiseau is certainly a unique personality and he has some hidden secrets too. Well if you want to, just go and enjoy the movie?