Charlie Kaufman remembers the ‘completely unanticipated’ response to ‘Being John Malkovich’

Charlie Kaufman’s first film was unlike anything else when it arrived in theaters on this day in 1999.

Despite having a star-studded cast (John Cusack, Cameron Diaz, Catherine Keener, and yes, John Malkovich), it had a wildly meta narrative that was not so much confusing as unbelievable.

Kaufman told Yahoo Entertainment “it obviously changed my life professionally” and the film would go on to earn three Academy Award nominations.

He added, “I owe a great debt to Spike [Jonze] and to John Malkovich for agreeing to be in it because I certainly wouldn’t be having this conversation … if it weren’t for that.”

Video Transcript

- Excuse me, sir, exactly what, uh, type of service does this company provide?

- You get to be John Malkovich for 15 minutes.

KEVIN POLOWYl: 21 years later, "Being John Malkovich" remains one of the boldest, most audacious film concepts of our time. I mean, after all was said and done with that project was there a part of you that was actually surprised that you pulled it off and the film got made?

CHARLIE KAUFMAN: Every step of the way with "Being John Malkovich" that somebody was interested in making it, that it got made, that it did what it did in terms of the response from audiences, was, yeah, it was completely unanticipated. I wasn't expecting anything like that. And it, obviously, it changed my life professionally, completely in a moment.

I feel a great debt to Spike and to John Malkovich for agreeing to be in it because I certainly wouldn't be having this conversation with you now, I don't imagine, if it weren't for that.

KEVIN POLOWYl: Well, I'll let you go now. I've got to show you my first piece of film swag.

CHARLIE KAUFMAN: Oh, my gosh. You have that. Yeah.

KEVIN POLOWYl: I was a college journalist. And this is my first piece of film swag I ever got was Russian [INAUDIBLE] dolls.

CHARLIE KAUFMAN: I really like the idea of that. And I was really disappointed in the way they did it. It's a really, sort of, cheap version of what I would have imagined it could have been. I mean, I understand the limitations. But when someone came up with that idea I was like, holy cow, that's so perfect.

KEVIN POLOWYl: I will still treasure this no matter what.

CHARLIE KAUFMAN: Yeah, no, absolutely. Yeah.

[LAUGHTER]

KEVIN POLOWYl: Thanks, Charlie. I much appreciate it.

CHARLIE KAUFMAN: Thank you.