Camp artist Lloyd Kaufman comes to Yale

Over the past 25 years, filmmaker Lloyd Kaufman, ES '69, has remained a fiercely independent and irreverent artist. The dozens of campy, original, B-grade films made by his production company, Troma, have achieved cult status. His blend of sex, gore and cheesy effects started a trend followed by filmmakers such as Quentin Tarantino, Peter Jackson and Kevin Smith. On Sat., Nov. 15, courtesy of the Yale Film Society, Kaufman returns to his alma mater to present two of Troma's films: the breakthrough 1985 film The Toxic Avenger, and Tromeo and Juliet, a modern and disturbing reworking of the Bard's romance, released last year to great critical acclaim.

"I can't say I had fun," Kaufman said of his experience at Yale. "If I had not gone to Yale, I would have done something valuable with my life." His eventual involvement in film was an accident. "I was in a tiny room in Vanderbilt Hall and I slept head-to-foot with this Godard-smelling film maniac." In that setting, Kaufman caught the movie bug. Tired of studying the western tradition, Kaufman decided to major in Chinese studies and also became interested in Africa. He took a year off after his freshman year to go to Chad, where he taught in a small village. Kaufman left college at the same time as another famous Yalie--a friend of his since the second grade. "Oliver Stone went to Vietnam. I went to Chad," Kaufman said. According to Kaufman, his experience in Africa profoundly influenced his filmmaking "We raised our own animals over there and I filmed the slaughtering of a pig, with all the blood and guts," he explained. "I brought it back home but nobody wanted to see it."

Kaufman shot two films during his remaining time at Yale. Then, with Michael Herz, ES '71, Kaufman decided to create the Troma Universe. To get the company off the ground, Kaufman worked on productions like Rocky and Saturday Night Fever. The Hollywood machine, however, was never for him. "There were problems. I always wanted to do things my own way and my employers wanted me to do things the correct way," he said.

Kaufman's independent sensibility was molded by the other fringe filmmakers of the 1970s. "Warhol, Cassevettes, and Stan Brakage, who is the greatest living visual artist, all deeply influenced me. I worked with all of them," he said, adding that "in today's corporate environment, these eccentric geniuses could not rise to the surface."

Kaufman believes in the existence of a conspiracy of labor, business, and government elites created in the 1960s: "My generation has created this unbelievablely powerful, wealthy elite symbolized by the Clinton generation. The current generation is smothered and true emotion is frowned upon." According to the filmmaker, this political commentary finds its way into all of Troma's films; the key is to look beyond the gore and cheesy effects for this recurrent theme.

In The Toxic Avenger (a film Kaufman claims is autobiographical), a health club mop boy, Toxie, is transformed into a disgusting creature of unreal size and strength. "Toxie is one of us--an outcast, an oddball, a rebel, a member of the great throng of underdogs," Kaufman said of the lead character. Toxie attains heroic status by rising up to help the little people of Tromaville, New Jersey. "Because of the current sour political and bureaucratic mood, the Toxic Avenger is even more at home in the '90s that he was in the '80s," Kaufman noted.

Shot for $350,000, Tromeo and Juliet continues Troma's tradition of low-budget, stomach-churning filmmaking. Set in New York City, the film centers around the classic familial battle between Cappy Capulet and Monty Que. Of course this version of Shakespeare's romance has its share of sex, severed heads, rodents, wife-beatings, and nipple-piercings for the younger generation. However, the director has injected a dose of class consciousness into this film by placing the Capulets in a Fifth Avenue townhouse, while the working-class Ques congregate around a downtown tattoo parlor. "It is my take on why young people are hanging themselves, doing drugs, watching pornos," Kaufman explained. "The '60s generation, my generation, fucked up the love thing. Tromeo and Juliet are striving for true emotion." In Kaufman's vision, Tromeo (Will Keenan) masturbates to X-rated CD-ROMS while Juliet (Jane Jensen) has an affair with her nurse and calls a 1-900 number to achieve sexual satisfaction in the absence of her lover.

Lloyd Kaufman is one of the few major filmmakers who has managed to maintain a prolonged career in film completely outside the studio system. "The battlefield is littered with the bodies of dead independent filmmakers," Kaufman remarked. "I go with my heart." Although many might not be able to follow Lloyd Kaufman's heart into the surreal, cheesy, and grotesque, his films continually test limits which no other filmmakers dare to approach.

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