After stepping in as director on Now You See Me: Now You Don‘t, the third installment in the magician heist franchise from Lionsgate, Ruben Fleischer is ready to get his own franchise to a threequel — with Zombieland 3, two decades on from the first Zombieland, in 2029.
Launching his career with the horror comedy, starring Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin, which was a huge hit for a debut filmmaker at a worldwide gross exceeding $102 million, Fleischer earlier this week looked back at the film for the first time since hatching Zombieland: Double Tap, the sequel released in 2019, which did over $122 global.
The revelation of his sincere ambition to make a third film in the series was one of many coming from a career retrospective on Wednesday at the Los Feliz 3, arranged by the American Cinematheque, where he talked, among other things, about his desire to tackle something much more grounded than the studio tentpoles for which he’s known — Gangster Squad, Venom and Uncharted, among them.
In our conversation, Fleischer discusses getting his start in the industry as a PA, by way of The White Lotus’ Mike White, on projects like Dawson’s Creek and the Sundance hit Chuck & Buck. He also talks about early work on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and Between Two Ferns, going from $47,000 in debt as a director of music videos and commercials to the talk of the town with his first feature, and how he wound up turning down a Mission: Impossible movie as his sophomore feature.
For all the details on the other A-listers who almost played Bill Murray’s role in Zombieland, a frustrating (but ultimately valuable) note that the filmmaker took from working with Sony’s Tom Rothman, and more, read on.
DEADLINE: Can you talk about how you came to commit to filmmaking as a career? I know that for you, this came after college — after studying history at Wesleyan University, and working for a period as a freelance HTML programmer in San Francisco…
RUBEN FLEISCHER: I moved out to L.A. not exactly knowing what I wanted to do. I was working on this website thing: about three months after I moved down here, it folded, so I was broke and needed a job. I knew Mike White, who plays the gas station attendant in [Zombieland], through a Wesleyan connection…
DEADLINE: Well before Mike White hit the peak of his fame with The White Lotus…
FLEISCHER: This was Dawson’s Creek-era Mike White, so he got me a job as a PA in the writer’s office of Dawson’s Creek. This was pre-email, so I had to copy the scripts, and then I would drive them around to distribute every new draft, whether it was to the studio in Culver City or to Warner Bros. Then, at night, I would have to drive around with a Thomas Guide to all the executives’ houses to deliver the scripts and get lunches and that kind of fun stuff. But then at the end of that season, Mike went and made this movie called Chuck & Buck, and I got a job as the assistant to the director, who was Miguel Arteta, working on this $200,000 feature film, which was shot on a video camera. And I did pretty much everything. I was the guy who claps the clapper thing; I helped scout locations; I got him coffee; I literally did his laundry at a laundromat. I did anything and everything, but I was like a pig in sh*t because I was just so happy I was on a film set.
I had no direct ambition to be a director, but I just was so excited to watch something being made, even though it was shot in four weeks for no money. But that was kind of the best film school I could have had because it just made it seem like anything was possible. The tools were all available — it was just a video camera, and the crew was incredibly small.
So then my big aspiration was to be a television executive, and so I went and worked at DreamWorks TV for a year as an assistant. And I quickly realized I did not want to be a television executive. Then, Miguel and Mike went to make this movie called The Good Girl, and I got a job being Miguel’s assistant again. They had unions on that movie, so I wasn’t allowed to touch stuff or do as much as I did before. But I got to really watch Miguel make the movie, and he was such a great mentor. He incorporated me into the process, and it just seemed like the coolest job you could possibly have, and so it was after that, that I set my sights on making short films and a bunch of music videos, and just shooting and teaching myself how to direct.
DEADLINE: Were there specific lessons you took from your time with Mike and Miguel?
FLEISCHER: I think it was more the spirit of collaboration and the creative process that I took away from that. Miguel was just really inclusive, and there was this network of people that worked together on those films. I think I learned that if you surround yourself with really talented people and everyone’s committed to the same vision, that you can make something pretty cool.
DEADLINE: What were the big cinematic inspirations for you growing up? How did you conceptualize early on who you wanted to be as a filmmaker?
FLEISCHER: I think I’m still trying to figure that one out. But as far as the touchstones, I love all the ’80s classics, whether it’s Star Wars, Back to the Future. I really loved Tim Burton’s Batman, but I also liked more indie films; the Coen Brothers were among my favorites, and Jim Jarmusch, and the classic ’90s independent films. The birth of Alexander Payne, Spike Jonze, David O. Russell, Tarantino obviously, and people like at. So it was a mix of mainstream Hollywood blockbusters, which was really what I was trained on, and then this more indie affinity, as well.
DEADLINE: Talk about your early experiences in commercials and music videos. Was there one project in particular that you remember as the first you were artistically satisfied with?
FLEISCHER: Pretty much all my music videos, I was really artistically satisfied. I find commercials a lot harder to get artistically satisfied from. But music videos, I really love the medium. I was a real student of them — Spike Jonze and Michel Gondry and Mark Romanek and Chris Cunningham and all those people. I was a student of music videos, and I was truly obsessed with them. I started making them for literally $50 for friends ‘ bands, and built my reel by just making these little videos, and then they’d get passed around. Because I did have a background of making websites and this was before YouTube, I was able to build a website and put my videos out so I could just email links to people. And that’s kind of how I grew. People would see it and [say], “Oh, you should do a video for my friend’s band,” and it just evolved like that.
DEADLINE: What were some of the big setbacks for you as a young filmmaker?
FLEISCHER: There were so many setbacks. But financial pressure was the hardest thing because I wasn’t making any money doing the videos. Any budget that I had, I put into the video, and it wasn’t much to begin with anyway, because they were like $3,000 or $5,000 videos. So there wasn’t much left over when it was all said and done. I was like $47,000 in debt, just transferring balances from credit card to credit card, a year and a half to two years into my dream of being a director, and I was really despondent and not sure if this was a good choice that I had made. Because I was just really nervous about everything.
Then, I did this one video that went viral kind of before that was a thing. It got seen all over the world, and I got offered by these production companies in London to actually be signed to direct music videos and commercials more officially. And that really was the big change, was getting to a place where I could actually get paid to try to make stuff.
DEADLINE: What was that viral video?
FLEISCHER: It was “We Know Something You Don’t Know” by a group called DJ Format. It was like a weird British rapper guy. It had two guys from Jurassic Park on it, but they weren’t available to be in the video, so I had to make a rap video without the rappers. So I was dating this girl that was a costumer: she introduced me to Western Costume, where they have all kinds of crazy outfits, and so I rented a bunch of mascot uniforms. There was like a turtle and a shark and a tiger outfit, and so I found a bunch of breakdancers on Craigslist and then I put them in those animal costumes and we basically had a rap video starring people in animal costumes. And that was kind of why it went viral. Just because it was fun to watch breakdancing turtles.
DEADLINE: Near the start of your career, you did some directing work for Jimmy Kimmel Live!. What was that experience like for you?
FLEISCHER: I did it for almost three years actually, on and off. I was directing first-act bits with Uncle Frank and Guillermo, and it was very early in Jimmy’s run; I think I started during the second season, and for me, I grew up as a huge fan of Letterman. So being able to watch how a late-night television show was being made…And I was a fan of Jimmy’s from The Man Show and other stuff, so it was just really exciting to be there and get to be a part of a network late-night TV show. And I learned a ton working on that, as well.
DEADLINE: You also worked on a couple of projects with Zach Galifianakis, including his now-iconic digital talk show Between Two Ferns…
FLEISCHER: Zach had a late-night TV show for VH1 called Late World with Zach, which was very short-lived, but that was the very first thing I ever directed for real TV before Kimmel. And then later, I did this pilot with Scott Aukerman, who does Comedy Bang! Bang! and is really immersed in the comedy scene, and for that pilot, Between Two Ferns was a bit that we did. And then the pilot didn’t go, but we put Between Two Ferns online on Funny or Die, and it kind of blew up. So I did the first one with Michael Cera, and then I did the second one with Jimmy Kimmel, and then they kind of took it to what it became.
DEADLINE: That must have been incredibly fun.
FLEISCHER: Oh, yeah. When I first moved to L.A., I would go to comedy four or five nights a week. I was broke and you could see comedy at Largo for five bucks every Monday night. But there was also just open mic nights everywhere and they were free. I was broke, and so it was just fun to go see comedy. But I was obsessed with Zach. He was the funniest to me, so getting to work with him on a show, and then getting to do Between Two Ferns was such a cool opportunity for me at that time.
DEADLINE: Take us back to the moment when you booked your first studio feature in Zombieland. What was your process and mentality in figuring out how to apply your strengths from short-form work to the project that would wind up being a calling card for the rest of your career?
FLEISCHER: I think one of my greatest strengths or talents is that I don’t really think too much about things. I just kind of barrel ahead blindly, and so that was my approach to this movie, was just true enthusiasm and excitement and just pouring everything in that I had learned. From when I first said “I want to be a director” and made a short film, it was eight years of being broke, and then commercials, music videos, and then finally in 2009, I got to make this. And I think I just was so excited. But also, another strength I have is that I think that a lot of young directors feel like they have to show that they know everything. And I was very happy to say, “I don’t know, and I need help.” So when I was watching [Zombieland] tonight, I was remembering, I had never done anything with action in it before this; I’d never done anything with a gun or anything. The short that got me this job was like a $15,000 short with a comedian named Nick Thune and a lobster, and that was it. So how I got this, I don’t know; I had no right to direct it. But I think that everybody appreciated that I just was like, “I don’t know how to do this.”
My 1st AD, the DP, Woody [Harrelson] even, just were all very patient and helped me out, and that was the cool thing. The role of the director, I think, is really just to point people in the direction, and then they’re there to support you in all the different departments. And this wasn’t a very expensive movie. It was like $21 million I think, which granted, it was a while ago, but it’s not a ton of money. But when you look at the production value, like when they break up that Indian trading post, or all the graphics at the theme park, all the lighting in there…Like, I remember the production designer saying they put in seven miles of string lights throughout that whole park.
The crazy thing, too, I was remembering tonight, is we had to shoot the end first, so the very first thing I ever shot of a movie was that whole action sequence at the end. I had a second unit director named George Aguilar who was also very experienced, and I remember we were a tag team: I’d be working with the actors in one section of the park, and then he’d be over on the roller coaster, shooting with zombies. Then, he’d be like, “I need Woody,” and Woody would go over there. It was three weeks and it was all nights, and [Jesse Eisenberg and Emma Stone] did their kiss before they did any of the previous scenes to set it up. So it just was crazy…
Actually, the very first thing I shot was the scene in the apartment with Amber Heard. That was the first two days of filming, and then we went straight into the whole end bit. And yeah, I was way out of my depth. But somehow it all came together. Just even watching it tonight, this sounds arrogant, but I’m pretty impressed. It came off pretty good, and I truly had no idea what I was doing.
DEADLINE: In your career, you’ve worked with some of the greatest actors alive. You’ve wound up working the most with Jesse Eisenberg and Woody Harrelson, who have effortless comedic chemistry together, and star in your new film Now You See Me: Now You Don’t, out this week. Are there stories you can tell from your time on Zombieland that speak to the nature of your dynamic with them?
FLEISCHER: Woody, in the casting process, I had to get him attached first, and when I did, he had four criteria for doing the movie. He said, “You have to have an environmentally conscious set.” Like, you have use biodiesel in the generators and recycle the cups and stuff. There was a DP that he really wanted me to consider, but he wasn’t the person that ended up shooting the movie. He said he really wanted input into whoever was cast opposite him, and then the fourth thing was that he said I had to be vegan for a week.
But I remember the chemistry reads that we did with Woody. There was three actors that came in and met with him, and it just was so apparent to everybody in the room that Jesse was the guy. Jesse had been in Squid and the Whale and Roger Dodger, but certainly never a studio-type movie, and Woody [had been] in No Country for Old Men. He has a small part, and I think watching that, I was like, “Oh yeah, he’d be really good for that role.” So the dynamic just was so clear, and they are their characters, kind of. Woody is this kind of freewheeling, very free spirit, and Jesse is a very neurotic New York Jewish person, and the dynamic between the two of them, off camera, is not dissimilar from what it is on camera. So it just was, I guess, typecasting. But they delight in each other. I think they have tons of respect for each other. Woody is one of the most knowledgeable about theater and plays of anybody, and Jesse loves plays and has written plays. And so they really have an artistic connection. But then they also just make each other laugh a lot. So I feel really lucky that Now You See Me is the fourth time that I’ve worked with both of them — to have that kind of collaboration with two such extraordinary and talented people.
DEADLINE: You achieved the dream scenario with your first movie, grossing over $100M worldwide, and with an original story, no less. I’m sure everyone was clammering to work with you in the aftermath. But did you get in your head about things? Reportedly, you were offered a Mission: Impossible movie but turned it down in favor of 30 Minutes or Less, another modestly budgeted action comedy starring Eisenberg, just because you didn’t want to bite off more than you could chew too quickly.
FLEISCHER: This was a crazy experience that I honestly have yet to replicate, but it was both critically acclaimed and commercially successful, and so when my first movie came out, I was like, “This sh*t’s easy. I’ve got this.” But then, yeah. I did get pursued by a bunch of people. I literally got a call saying Tom Cruise would like to meet me, and I met with him in a room in CAA. He was telling me, “I hope someday I’m lucky enough to work with you,” and I was like, “I am for sure being punked.” It was surreal. And then I met with him and J.J. [Abrams], and I just was like, “This is too much.” Like, if I didn’t know what I was doing [on Zombieland], imagine going and dealing with Tom Cruise all day.
It just was way more than I was ready for, and so I went and made 30 Minutes or Less with Jesse again. And it really was a movie that I just was like, “Oh, I just love the script.” I was obsessed with Danny McBride; it was almost as if it was written for him, and so I said, “If I can get Danny to be in this movie, I’d love to make it.” Luckily, Danny signed up for it, and I learned very quickly that moviemaking is a lot harder than I originally thought. Because that movie was both a failure in the box office and it got reamed by critics. So it was a very different experience. But I think it was good because I learned a lot through the process. Then, the next movie was Gangster Squad, which was a much bigger movie with a much more significant cast and I don’t even know if I was quite ready for that at the time, either. I definitely had bit off a lot and learned a lot through that process, and there’s things I really like about that movie, but there’s some things that were definitely flawed, as well.
DEADLINE: I imagine you’ve just had to look at these instances of failure as learning lessons…
FLEISCHER: I mean, I think there’s no other way to do it because they’re done. We can’t go back and change it. But I think what’s so successful about Zombieland is the tone, and I think that in Gangster Squad, the tone was a lot more confused. So I guess my takeaway is, if you really know what the movie you’re setting out to make is tonally, then everything kind of coalesces around that. For example, this new Now You See Me movie, I knew all it had to be was fun. That was my North Star, so if you guys see the movie, hopefully that’ll be your takeaway.
DEADLINE: It’s the best reviewed installment in the franchise so far…
FLEISCHER: Well, not all the reviews are in yet, but we’ll see. But no. I mean, it’s really fun. I’ll say that.
DEADLINE: Turning back to Gangster Squad, talk more about the process of figuring out how to carry a movie like that. From that moment on, you’re mainly doing huge studio movies — Venom, Uncharted, and the like.
FLEISCHER: Luckily, there was a slight learning curve because the first two movies were pretty small. Then, Gangster Squad, definitely in terms of a period movie with that crazy cast and lots of action, I learned a lot on it. But I think the funny thing about filmmaking is that [since] my very first short film, it’s all the same things. You’ve got to find a location, you’ve got to have a script, you’ve got to cast it, and then all the things are the exact same challenges, but it’s just a function of scale. I think as long as you can communicate what your intention is and surround yourself with really talented filmmaking partners, as long as you have the confidence and the clarity to communicate what you’re trying to achieve and inspire people and earn their trust to go on that journey with you, then I think if they believe in you and believe in your vision, collectively, everybody works together to execute it. And that’s my absolute favorite thing about filmmaking, is that collaboration.
I feel especially lucky as the director because if you think about a movie, the actors, they’re not there for pre-production. There’s 12 weeks prior to them getting there where I’ve been working with the production designer and the stunt coordinator and all the different people to plan it all out, and then they come, and then there’s all the people that are involved with the filming of it. And then everyone leaves, and I go to a whole ‘nother world of post-production, and that’s a whole different set of collaborators who bring their talents and their perspective to it. And that carries on all the way to the finish line. But me and the producer are the only people that were there through the whole process. So the rest of the people contributing, they never meet, you know what I mean? For example, at the premiere on Monday night of Now You See Me, I introduced the actors to the editor. She’s looked at their faces every day for 10 months and shaped the movie as much as the DP or anybody else on set, but they’d never even met. So I feel so lucky that I get to be the throughline, I guess, from beginning to end.
DEADLINE: Tell me about your process in dealing with studio notes. How do you preserve what you’re excited about in a movie in scenarios where there are a lot of cooks in the kitchen?
FLEISCHER: It’s a challenge, and I don’t think there’s any right answer to that question. Each case is its own thing, and I’ve had versions where the studio is super heavy-handed and micromanaging, and I’ve had other versions where they’re like, “Let us know when you’re done.” And there’s benefits to both, to be honest. I really love test screenings, showing it as a work-in-progress so that you can get the feedback, see where jokes land and see what’s confusing, work on pace, those kinds of things. I think ultimately, I, as a filmmaker, make movies for audiences, and so if we’re all in service of the audience and the most crowd-pleasing version, of course there’s subjectivity and things that are important to me that I want to achieve, and I’m sure there’s things that the studio feels strongly about. But ultimately, I like to work in a way where the audience is the deciding vote on anything that’s perhaps up for consideration.
DEADLINE: You mentioned that Zombieland was your first action-heavy project. In the years since, what philosophy or approach have you come around to, when it comes to directing action- or spectacle-filled productions?
FLEISCHER:I think the key is trying to keep them original, and I took that lesson actually from Tom Rothman at Sony. It would drive me crazy, but when I’d show him previs or storyboards or anything, he’d be like, “It’s just kicking and punching, kicking and punching! What distinguishes this from every other movie where people have kicked and punched each other?” At the time, it was so annoying, but on this last movie, Now You See Me, I remember the stunt guy showed me a thing and I was like, “It’s just kicking and punching.” And I actually emailed Tom and found myself being like, “I’m so sorry.”
But yeah, I think it’s just keeping it fresh and original — surprising audiences, and not just regurgitating the same old thing. And it’s hard to do that, obviously, because there’s been a million car chases and a million fight scenes. So I really do admire and respect when people are raising the bar. I think everybody’s watching where things are at, and what are the new tricks and tools that we can employ to make it even more exciting or satisfying for audiences.
But I’m actually pretty stoked watching the action in [Zombieland]. And I was remembering, the writers had written some action to take place in that amusement park, but it was all hypothetical. I remember me and George, the stunt guy, we just walked around the park and were like, “What would be fun to stage? Oh, we could put him on the roller coaster, and he could be hanging off there and shooting them.” Or, there was that thing where he’s spinning, and he grabs on, and he’s got the machine gun. So we just literally custom-wrote all the action to that environment, and that pendulum-swinging thing, that wasn’t in the script. That was just like, “Oh, this would be cool, if that wiped out some zombies or whatever.” I think they did have [Emma and Abigail] as the damsels in distress at the top of that thing; I think it was called The Blast Off, but I can’t remember.
DEADLINE: What motivates you now, compared to when you were starting out in your career?
FLEISCHER: I guess just finding fun stories to tell with people that I want to work with and that are inspiring to me. I like challenging myself with different genres. Actually, my big desire, and I don’t know how soon it will happen, is the guy who produced this movie, the line producer, is this guy called Ezra Swerdlow. He passed away, but he was a really great guy who came from New York, and he produced a lot of movies in the ’70s and ’80s for Woody Allen and a lot of New York filmmakers. I remember on set, he’d be like, “I don’t know zombies. I know two Jews in a room, two Jews on a couch.” And I keep saying, “All I want to do is make my two-Jews-in-a-room movie.” I just want to make a movie that’s people talking, that’s much smaller and indie. But those great scripts are harder to come by and my big Achilles heel is that I’m not a writer, and so I’m beholden to the material that comes my way. At this point, it seems like action-comedy type stuff is the main thing that comes my way, and I’m not at all complaining about that. I feel so lucky to have made all the movies that I’ve made. But I think my great aspiration is to do something more contained and small that’s more personal. So hopefully at some point, I’ll get a chance to do that.
But also, there there’s this Western vampire movie that I’m really excited about, that’s like a classic Western with a vampire at the center of it. Like Unforgiven, if Clint Eastwood was a vampire. I’m really hoping to make that. I feel like the two genres that I dreamed of making were a gangster movie and then a Western. So I’m hoping that I’ll get the chance to make a Western.
I’m hoping that we’ll do a Zombieland 3 in 2029. We’re starting to talk about that because [the first] one was 2009, and then we did the second one in 2019, and we kind of left that one all saying, “We’ll see you in 10 years.” That’s coming up now, and so we’re starting to figure that out, so I’m hoping that’ll come together. Then, I’ve got a few things that are raring to go, so we’ll see which one comes first.
DEADLINE: A couple more Zombieland questions before we wrap up — what were your big zombie influences going into the first film?
FLEISCHER: What’s so funny is that I really didn’t grow up as a big zombie fan, and in fact, the first time I read the script, I passed. And my agent was like, “You’re a f*cking idiot. You need to do this movie.” But I thought of it like, basically, National Lampoon’s Vacation with zombies. That was my way into it, because I love road trip movies, and that’s about a family going on a road trip to an amusement park. So it was very much an inspiration for this. But then I went and watched every single zombie movie. 28 Days Later was a huge sea change in the world of zombies because prior to that, they were always slow and lumbering, and 28 Days Later was the first movie where they ran. I think it must’ve come out like right before this because I remember it was always intended to be slow-moving zombies, and then we were like, “Oh, we can make them run because they just did it in this other movie!” And so that was a big thing, that they ran. Even when we were planning it, in my memory, they weren’t intended to run.
DEADLINE: Famously, Bill Murray wasn’t the first choice for his role. Can you tell the whole story of how he came to be in the movie and who you’d been eyeing previously?
FLEISCHER: So when I read the first draft of the script, it was originally Patrick Swayze, and it was the greatest sequence ever. They go into the mansion, there’s the pottery wheel. Jesse goes and sits at the pottery wheel, and then two zombie hands come around the back, and he looks over, and it’s Patrick Swayze Zombie. Then, he ends up running all throughout the mansion, and Swayze Zombie’s about to get Jesse. [Woody Harrelson’s] Tallahassee is across the room and he’s like, “Yo, Swayze!” And then Swayze Zombie charges him and leaps, and then Woody catches him like the lift from Dirty Dancing. It was the greatest thing, and then sadly, Swayze had pancreatic cancer and so it wasn’t a possibility. So we wrote a version for Sylvester Stallone that was like Rambo and Rocky references throughout, and I think there was a Joe Pesci version, and then we got to Mark Hamill, and everyone passed. No one wanted to do it.
Then, we actually were making the movie. We were prepping the movie, we had that mansion, and we were trying to get celebrities. We couldn’t get anyone, so we cast these two old stunt people to play Bubby and Peepaw, and the joke was that it was this beautiful mansion, and look at these cute old people, and then we would have old zombies. That was the gag. This was in the middle of shooting, and we actually had the old stunt people there. They were getting makeup tests and Woody was just like, “This is such a shame. My favorite thing about the script was the Patrick Swayze of it all. We’ve got to try.” He had heard that Bill Murray was shooting in Atlanta. So he said, “I’ll call Bill Murray” — because they worked on Kingpin together. So he called and Bill Murray was like, “Oh, I just left.” Then, Woody described it to him and he said, “Well, that actually sounds cool, but if I’m going to do it, I’m not going to be a zombie. I need to have lines.” Because prior to that, it was just zombie versions of themselves. So in hindsight, I can understand why everybody passed.
So it was Bill Murray’s idea that he would dress as a zombie, and that was his survival mechanism. And it literally was like a week before we ended up shooting it that he agreed to do it. Sony FedExed us those Ghostbusters outfits, and the art department made some Bill Murray Warhol paintings and stuff. He came in on a Thursday in the middle of the day, and we shot a couple of things that afternoon, and then we shot all day Friday. The last scene that we shot was a version where they were playing ping pong, kind of like beer pong, but with margaritas, and he was making margaritas. And then we ended up just drinking all night at that mansion till like three in the morning. And then I never saw Bill Murray again.
It was like I had a fever dream that I got to make a movie with Bill Murray, and I didn’t see him again till the sequel 10 years later. I’ve only seen him twice in my life.