NORITH

Norith Soth did not change his name. That shit is real. Norith has watched more films than an entire nuclear family. He has written more scripts than any 5, ok, let’s not exaggerate, make it 3.5, creepy, plaid shirted Caucasians at Starbucks (that’s a lot of scripts). He always believes his next film will be the “Citizen Kane” of that genre. He aims high. That’s why he falls hard. But aiming high is all he knows.

It was a great meeting we had yesterday. Im excited and looking very forward to doing big things with you in this industry.

This is the email you want from a person with power. You dream about this shit. Working your ass off in this hall of mirrors industry. Bullshit meeting after bullshit meeting. Producers who pretend they have balls. Rich motherfuckers who take you to dinner just to hear your jokes. Fuck these people. Finally, I meet a rich guy with balls. Literally. He plays with balls. He is a professional ball player. That produces movies.

I sat in Elton Brand’s office on 9000 Sunset Boulevard in disbelief. The Clippers had just finished their greatest season, losing to the Suns in the 2nd round of the playoffs because James Singleton was guarding Raja Bell, who was left wide open for a 3 pt. Dagger. I was actually rooting for the Suns, but I didn’t tell him that.

ELTON BRAND
It’s strange how you meet people,
I met my wife at Duke. She shared
a Subway sandwhich with me. Next
thing I know, we got married.

Shit, I’m thinking, that $5 investment she made on a Subway sandwhich paid huge dividends. They should do a Subway commercial about this shit.

Anyway, dude was comparing meeting his wife with meeting me. And I never offered to share my Subway sandwhich with him. Brand was using the isolation tanks next door to my office. For months. To get in touch with his inner self. Eventually, during bathroom breaks, I ran into his inner self enough times that we said “hi”. Eventually, he gave me tickets to go see a game on my birthday. Eventually, there was a Variety Review about “Rescue Dawn”, the film Brand produced starring Christian “Batman” Bale. Eventually, I was in his office, pitching projects that had absolutely nothing to do with black people getting shot. The type of shit people usually pitched him. I only had Oscar caliber shit. He liked that. And I had a small movie I wanted to direct, “The Sibling” I hadn’t yet written. I only needed…

ELTON BRAND
$150,0000? That’s nothing.

The meeting ended with Elton saying, ”I want to do all of it”. He meant the five projects I pitched him. I’m not the star fucking type. But I couldn’t help it. I was shaking. Vibrating. I could masturbate without moving my hands (but I didn’t).

My friend Taka who I share an office with joked that I would eventually have to suck Elton Brand’s dick. He also told me to not get excited unless there’s a signed agreement between Elton and myself.

Wassup Brother, Hope all is well. I had a great meeting today about what we are doing and things went pretty well. I got your phone message today but was ballin. I know your just as excited as I am about the possibilities. Ill give you a call Monday to catch you up on everything. Thanks, Elton Brand.

But how can I NOT get excited. How could I not star fuck this guy. It’s Elton fucking Brand. He was inviting me to where he practiced. He invited me to a club where all the Clippers were hanging out. Cuttino Mobley. Sam Cassell (he looks even more like E.T. in real life). Other really tall black dudes who probably played ball or were someone’s bodyguard. I met everyone he knew. I even brought over a friend of mine to make sure I wasn’t delusional. Mikal was helping me write “The Sibling”, the movie we were now definitely making.

ME
Mikal, am I being delusional? Is
this guy really taking me seriously.

MIKAL
No, no, you’re not… he really likes,
really respects you.

Okay, good enough. I can never say I was being delusional. After all, it’s not like I met Elton Brand on the streets and he said to come up to his office. The courtship took time.

Besides, when we were sitting in his office at 9000 Sunset Blvd, I asked him, why are you helping me out? I asked this because dude hadn’t read any of my stuff. That’s because it was instinct. He was successful and could see I was success-bound? Some Indian dude once told me I had an incredible third eye. Similar situation, right?

ELTON BRAND
I’m helping you because you’re a good guy.

Fair enough. I am a good guy. I’m not evil. I hadn’t intentionally committed an evil act since I was 5 or 6. I am always looking for a way to help people with whatever I have. Translation: I feel a lot of guilt. Sean Deanevy of Yahoo! Sports just wrote an article entitled “Everybody Loves Elton”. Talked about how the guy bought his mother a library. That’s good guy stuff. Takes one to know one. I’d buy my mom a library. If she read. She’d probably prefer a restaurant. With a buffet. I’d probably visit her more if she had a buffet.

Wassup boi boi. Ill be back Sunday. untill the 17th. Im waiting for you like Im waiting for the season.haha Yea if Im on the road email is cool. But since its the scary one, I might not want to hex my computer. Im not a hater but the more bad movies out the better for our good ones. Im bout to lay it done lets touch base tomorrow, Big Dog. Peace

The scary one was “The Sibling”. Mikal and I wrote it very quickly. Taka, who handled business transactions for me, wrote up two contracts, one to produce “The Sibling” and one for the other literary projects Brand wanted to produce with me.

Wassup Big dog. Just got back from SB.
YOUR DONE with Sibling. NO get outta here
I need the pdf, Ill be on the road
tomorrow and must read it. Im ready to do this send that shit!haha

I sent Brand a 150k budget for “The Sibling”.

Ill look at the budget and read the script. I’m ready big dog

The 2006-07 season started. The Clippers were trying to follow up on their best season ever. Brand was busy. I heard from Brand less than before but that’s because he was playing ball. Earning his $10 mil a year or whatever it was.

Contracts were drawn up. A script was written. “The Sibling” shoot was being planned. Budgets. We started talking August and it was now November.

I wrote to Brand:

hey man,

hope you’re doing good; it’s great to see you guys crash out of the gate, establish dominance

I’ve been working really hard, rewriting Sibling, as well as other stuff; my eyes hurt, I’ve been writing so much; maybe I’ll try to call later in the week, during the break; keep health and spirit in one piece

big dog

The Clippers were doing really well and I was happy for him. He was my partner now. That’s what he called himself. There was no reason to think this guy was saying all this shit just to fuck with me. What would a $10 million a year All Star Forward gain from that?

I did recall one thing that disturbed me. When I left 9000 Sunset Blvd. I shook hands with him (one of his hands is the size of a human baby). I ask him, oh, can you validate my parking?

ELTON BRAND
You know better than to park here.
Park in the streets.

Yea, he’s right. Why didn’t I park in the streets? I’m from poverty just like this guy. He knows parking in a structure is one of those bullshit rich people things. Probably asks all his boys to park on the streets. Yea, right? That should have been a red flag right there. When Christina Bale comes over, do they ask him to park on the streets? Werner Herzog? Well, Herzog probably fucking walked over there from Silver Lake. Barefoot. But anybody else? It’s industry standard even for your worse fucking enemy. You validate their parking if they drove to your office to meet you.

hey, I read in the paper that you have flu-like symptoms. I hope you’re feeling better. I know I’ve probably been a little eager trying to get our stuff started, but really, whenever it’s good for you is fine with me.

Brand did not reply to this email either. The other red flag should have been that he wanted to help me out because I was good guy. That’s no reason to do business with anyone. I mean, that’s a plus when someone has proven that they’re talented and they’re a nice person.

I’ve never had a meeting with anyone because I was nice. I’ve had meetings where people told me, “we love your script but we can’t make this movie”. In fact, that pretty much wraps up the majority of my meetings, but the basis of the encounter was always that I could write some sick shit and someone wanted to meet the fucked person that wrote it. Elton Brand never actually read any of the script I brought to his office that day.

In December, I ran into him one last time. I knew he was coming because he was going to the isolation tank. I waited for him like a fucking stalker. It would be my only chance to actually see him. He saw me and insisted, “I’ll have my business people call you on Monday, are you busy on Monday, when’s the best time?”

Guess what happens a week later? My friend who runs the isolation tank business said Brand asked him to build him a tank in his house (so he wouldn’t have to come over anymore). That was it.

Eventually, I wrote him a nasty email, telling him he wasn’t a man and wasted my time. Blah, blah, blah. Probably didn’t read that either.

We did not shoot “The Sibling” as planned that year. The Clippers were headed for the playoffs and I couldn’t watch a single game on TV because it made sick to my stomach to hear his name. And then something strange happened.

The Clippers missed the playoffs by one game. Don Nelson’s Golden State Warriors snuck from behind and stole the last spot. I had great pleasure reading Brand’s quote, “it hurts, it burns”. Pretty poetic way to describe pain, Elton. I read this many times over, feeling bad for the guy but feeling vengeance well served. Even though I had nothing to do with it.

The Warriors did a lot of with their moment in the playoffs, beating the top seeded Mavericks for one of the greatest upsets in NBA history. They deserved to be there. Elton Brand had nothing to do with this.

A year goes by, “The Sibling”, the ambitious horror project that was going to mind fuck movie audiences in a way they had never dreamed or nightmared was on hiatus. Mikal stopped working on it. I kept rewriting it on and off and continued to talk about it like it was going to one day be made. No one in my circle believed me anymore.

The 2007-08 campaign worsened for the Clippers. Brand even got hurt. But he was about to sign the biggest contract of his career for The Clippers. Make $15, 16 mil a year. Big Dog wasn’t doing badly. He even talked his friend Baron Davis into signing with the Clips. They were going to have an amazing team for years to come. Then guess what happens? After talking his own friend into joining the team? After giving his word to Mike Dunleavy, the Coach/GM of the Clippers that he was re-singing? Brand signs with another team. The Philadelphia 76ers. Hung his own team to dry.

Dunleavy was livid, said something like if Brand had come to him as a man and had told him this was the best thing for his family, etc, he would have accepted that, but he assured Dunleavy that he was re-signing with the Clips, not to worry. When told what Dunleavy said, Brand replied,”he’ll be fine, he’s a good guy.” Sound familiar?

The 2008-09 Campaign was a miserable one for Brand. He was a terrible fit with the 76ers. He is a great half court forward, but he’s castrated in full court. He eventually got a shoulder injury and missed most of the year. The 2009-10 campaign wasn’t much better. I don’t have to elaborate on the other bad shit that happened to this guy, but if you Google “Elton Brand” and “disappointment”, you’ll get 12,300 results.

I recently shot “The Sibling”. Mikal said we should put “fuck Elton Brand” on the credits. I told Mikal, the guy is already fucked. I’ll give him a special thanks for the valuable lesson he taught me.

My biggest theory about the Elton Brand treament is “guilt”. He makes a shitload of money, he’s famous (or was famous) and needs guilt releases. He wanted to tell me we were going to make movies to see the smile on my face. He thought, I’m helping out this poor Cambodian kid (even though I’m older than him). I was like an NBA Cares subject. He met me. Shook my hand. Felt less guilty. Got a few of those during the offseason and felt good. What happened after that didn’t really matter. He got rid of some guilt. Taka still thinks I should have sucked his dick. Either that or I shouldn’t have rooted for the Suns.

Wassup Brother,
Hope all is well. I had a great meeting today about what we are doing and things went pretty well. I got your phone message today but was ballin. I know your just as excited as I am about the possibilities. HAHA anyway have a great weekend and Ill give you a call Monday to catch you up on everything. Thanks

Elton Brand