We’re starting to tuck into a reel given to us by Nelson. He told us that he made a carbon copy the day before leaving Give Me Head HQ. He also told us it’s of varying quality, “but there’s some good shit if you can clean it up”. It was actually from the second reel made in the early days when Cassidy was throwing his money into a pig mincer. We have to disagree that it’s of varying quality though; all of it is top notch! Fortunately we didn’t have to go on another trip to Damien’s although we hope to visit his store again before we leave for the freezing cold north of England.
“The man was never happy about anything,” Nelson told us. “It wasn’t the snow Cassidy was addicted to; it was inflating his own ego. It was like perfection never existed to him which is why that British guy yelped how there was nothing wrong with it. Cassidy just wanted to destroy things. In his own little world he thought he was Spielberg or Kubrick, and for a short while I believed it. I thought this man is so driven that the end result is going to be some visionary shit. I’m sure some of those folks are still under his spell.”
I said to Nelson that Cassidy sounded like a cult leader. Nelson chuckled and said he was more like a “voodoo wizard”.
“Motherfucker had at least a hundred people working for him for nothing in one of the wealthiest places in the world. Their salary was drink and drugs and endless taco deliveries and shitty accommodation. At the beginning people just seemed to accept that everything in the workplace was totally normal when just a few blocks away you had people rolling in the millions. It wasn’t employment: it was a non-stop class A party orchestrated by a mad man spending money on new clothes if you know the reference. But one by one most people managed to remove the spell. And like I’ve said before, once you realise that you’ve been taken for a fool, it’s a gut punch and, boy, do you want to kill him. I know one fella who still wants his head on a stick. And I don’t need to tell you his name.”
We love Nelson’s insights! And, yeah, we know who he’s referring to. Keep clicking if you haven’t already come across him…
Commentary for Blooper #1
To work out what was going on in this scene, we searched out some scripts which we’d come across about a year ago. We know that this was shot early June time and this is what we believe to be happening:
Brad is working with Pooch to take out a CEO working for a Megacorp yet to be confirmed. Who the hell is Pooch? Exactly! If you haven’t yet come across Pooch then it’s no big surprise. He’s a character who was “considered” and a few days later his photo was tossed on to a bonfire. This detail alone renders the whole scene as utterly useless. But then you also have Brad who, according to his collectors’ card, was supposed to be a reformed cyberpig; not a mercenary fighting the megacorps.
“You know what’s the most sickening about this,” Nelson said to us, shaking his head. “That two minutes of horseshit probably cost two grand, maybe three with the camera repair. And that’s two grand in the 80s. You could’ve purchased a Unix workstation for that amount and still cover your bills for a month.”
We asked about the English fella who was in the slanging match as we had only come across one other Engishman working for Give Me Head. Nelson said he can only remember people calling him old chap which is another word for…
“After that palaver we never saw him again,” Nelson said. “Poor motherfucker was probably put off camerawork for life. One week of Cassidy’s madness and his dream was gone. That’s Cyberia in a nutshell.”
And on that note blooper #2 is coming just as soon as we’ve found it.
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