10 Things I Learned From Watching Me And Orson Welles

1. Orson Welles deserved every horrible thing that ever happened to him. God, what a lousy human being.

I'm looking at you, Wellesy.

2. Lousy human beings make the best actors. God, what a great actor.

And the guy playing him is no slouch either.

3. Clare Danes has the best agent ever. I mean really; I don't get it. She mugs. She mugs ALL THE TIME. And she always gets work. Plus she always gets work as the woman into whose pants everybody tries to get. Like everybody in this movie. And Steve Martin in Shopgirl, which was just creepy. What is it about this woman that people think is irresistible? Hmmm. Maybe I should call Billy Crudup.

You think you're so-o-o-o-o-o-o-o attractive.

4. There were no gay actors in the Mercury Theatre. None. Nada. Zip. Every one of them was a skirt-hound. How do I know this? Because in the entire course of the movie, not one guy makes a pass at Zac Efron. I mean, really -- the guy is gorgeous -- if he walked through a cemetery, he'd get come-hither looks from dead people. The only way a male who looks like this can spend a week with a bunch of New York actors and get nothing? Every single guy in the company would have to be straighter than a yardstick.

Uh-oh. We all know what a handshake means in a movie about actors. It means:

5. All actors are manipulators, cowards and liars.

Guess what the BS stands for.

6. The unattainable woman always screws the coming-of-age guy.

I'm going to screw you; you know that, right?

7. The unattainable woman always screws the coming-of-age guy.

You're going to get screwed; you know that, right?

8. Broken hearted and disillusioned is better than rich and famous. Sour grapes, anyone? Just once I'd like to see a Hollywood movie about acting that has somebody say what everyone in Hollywood believes: rich and famous is everything -- and if you can't make the grade, you're worthless. But no. All we'll ever get is the comforting lie that normal people live lives that are so rich and fulfilled that everyone in Hollywood envies them. Two words: My. Ass.

Let's share a fameless disillusioned life together.

9. The Mercury Theatre production of Julius Caesar did not have a curtain call.

This scene does not occur in the movie.

10. Coming-of-age stories only work when you care about the kid who's coming of age. So on that level, this movie didn't work for me. It's a lot like Jude Law's Hamlet -- as long as Christian McKay's Orson Welles is around, it's riveting. But when he's not there, you wind up doing what the actors in Julius Caesar do. You wind up waiting for Orson.

11. The New Yorker only publishes stories in which nothing happens. Oh wait -- I knew that already.