Director Paul Schrader and writer Bret Easton Ellis attempt to make a film with Lindsay Lohan and porn star James Deen—with a budget of $250,000:
“Lohan sits down, smiles and skips the small talk.
“‘Hi, how are you? I won’t play Cynthia. I want to play Tara, the lead.’ Braxton Pope and Paul Schrader nod happily. They’d been tipped off by her agent that this was how it was going to go. They tell her that sounds like a great idea.
“Schrader thinks she’s perfect for the role. Not everyone agrees. Schrader wrote ‘Raging Bull’ and ‘Taxi Driver’ and has directed 17 films. Still, some fear Lohan will end him. There have been house arrests, car crashes and ingested white powders. His own daughter begs him not to use her. A casting-director friend stops their conversation whenever he mentions her name. And then there’s the film’s explicit subject matter. Full nudity and lots of sex. Definitely NC-17. His wife, the actress Mary Beth Hurt, didn’t even finish the script, dismissing it as pornography after 50 pages. She couldn’t understand why he wanted it so badly.
“But Schrader was running out of chances.”
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