I don’t know what’s more surprising. That Joe Eszterhas became a Christian or that a mainstream media paper did such a good job of telling the story of his conversion.
Joe Eszterhas wrote Basic Instinct, a movie I accidentally watched with my mother when it came out. We were in the mountains of Colorado and had already seen the other movie showing at the theater (Fried Green Tomatoes), so we decided to check out the one on the other screen. Let’s just say it was a memorable experience. My mom, reading over my shoulder here, thinks I shouldn’t mention this and opines that it was a “horrible and eye-opening” experience.
Anywho, Toledo Blade religion editor David Yonke has the story:
Joe Eszterhas’ latest book is a shocker, but not the kind that made him rich and famous.
The upcoming release from the man who penned dark thrillers such as Basic Instinct and Jagged Edge tells the story of his spiritual conversion and his newfound devotion to God and family.
Crossbearer: A Memoir of Faith, will be published Sept. 2 by St. Martin’s Press. It tells the story of his conversion. Yonke sets the stage, describing Eszterhas’ diagnosis with throat cancer, tracheotomy, and direction to stop drinking and smoking immediately. Struggling with his urge for alcohol and cigarettes, he prayed for the first time since he was a child:
“I couldn’t believe I’d said it. I didn’t know why I’d said it. I’d never said it before,” he wrote.
But he felt an overwhelming peace. His heart stopped pounding. His hands stopped twitching. He saw a “shimmering, dazzling, nearly blinding brightness that made me cover my eyes with my hands.”
Like Saul on the road to Damascus, Mr. Eszterhas had been blinded by God. He stood up, wiped his eyes, and walked back home a new man.
In a phone interview this week, Mr. Eszterhas said it was “an absolutely overwhelming experience.”
He went from doubting if he could make it through life without tobacco and alcohol, to knowing that he could “defeat myself and win.”
He and Naomi have been faithfully attending Catholic Mass on Sundays ever since, and as the book title states, Joe carries the cross down the aisle. He asserts his nonconformity, however, by wearing jeans and Rolling Stones T-shirts when he does it. Despite the rebel attire, he says he carries the cross with more reverence than most.
It seems like most times I read a conversion story, it fails to tell the details of the actual conversion experience. There’s a reason why the word “story” tends to follow the word “conversion.”
This story went through lots of details about Eszterhas’ disgust for priests who are pedophiles and “boring and pointless” homilies. It’s a terribly interesting read.
Take this intriguing detail, something that most religion reporters wouldn’t even know how to handle:
When Mr. Eszterhas visited a nondenominational megachurch, he heard a sensational sermon. But he felt empty afterward, missing Holy Communion and the Catholic liturgy… .
“The Eucharist and the presence of the body and blood of Christ is, in my mind, an overwhelming experience for me. I find that Communion for me is empowering. It’s almost a feeling of a kind of high.”
And then the writer of that other memorable film, Showgirls, talks about how out of touch Hollywood is with most Americans:
“I find it mind boggling that with nearly 70 percent of Americans describing themselves as Christians, and witnessing the success of The Passion of The Christ and The Chronicles of Narnia, that Hollywood still doesn’t do the kinds of faith-based and family-value entertainment that people are desperate to see,” Mr. Eszterhas said.
He has turned down hefty offers to write scripts for movies with sinister plots and dark themes like the 16 other ones he wrote that made it to the screen- some paying as much as $3 million a script.
Mr. Eszterhas said he spent too much of his life exploring the dark side of humanity and does not want to go there anymore.
It’s not just an interesting hook, it’s a very interesting story.
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Comments (21) |
August 27, 2008, at 4:12 am
Take this intriguing detail, something that most religion reporters wouldn’t even know how to handle:
[Eszterhas’s quote regarding the emptiness he felt without the presence of Catholic liturgy]
I’m sorry, Mollie, but you’re being extraordinarily glib, vague, and ultimately unfair with your assertion that “most” religion reporters couldn’t “handle” explaining Eszterhas’s reaction to the nondenominational (i.e., non-Catholic) service. I think the reporter in this story handled it just fine by refraining from commenting on why a purported Catholic convert wouldn’t take to a nondenominational service that lacked the usual Catholic rites. The reporter did his job correctly by refusing to make asides. If Mr. Eszterhas wanted to elaborate on his “emptiness,” he would have done so; it’s not the job of the reporter to fill in the blanks.
I’ll also add that Mr. Eszterhas’s story is of interest only to the extent that it provides yet another example of a mediocre Hollywood writer finding religion when confronted by the fact of his mediocrity.
August 27, 2008, at 6:45 am
Trivia note: Paul Verhoeven, director of Basic Instinct, is a member of John Dominic Crossan’s Jesus Seminar.
August 27, 2008, at 8:13 am
Thanks, Mollie, for pointing us to Yonke’s excellent story.
For all of us, Joe. For all of us.
August 27, 2008, at 8:21 am
I know the story is about Mr. Eszterhaus - and I would have found it interesting even if it had been about a skid row alcoholic who one day discovered the hound of heaven during one of his/her hangovers. God does have mercy on us all and it is wonderful to read how he works in the lives of even “a mediocre Hollywood writer finding religion when confronted by the fact of his mediocrity”. The story, rarely told, that would interest me even more is Naomi’s story - her love for her husband and what role she played in Joe’s conversion. About that we are left to speculate.
August 27, 2008, at 9:01 am
[…] Two conversion stories, one of a (somewhat) famous individual, the other is here. […]
August 27, 2008, at 9:12 am
The Blade, generally, is actually fairly good on religion. There are exceptions, of course … I think they’re a little unfair in their reporting on Bishop Blair, for example.
But, all in all, I’ve been very impressed with The Blade’s religion coverage.
August 27, 2008, at 12:40 pm
Mollie,
Thanks for bringing this story to my attention. It’s a classic.
August 27, 2008, at 2:29 pm
If all it takes is mediocreity to triger religious conversion in Hollywood, then the churches in that town must be very full.
August 27, 2008, at 2:42 pm
Huzzah! for this reporter. I read the story yesterday and was blown away by all the details included. Some of the sentences were clunky, but heck, its a news paper, not great literature.
August 27, 2008, at 2:59 pm
As Mollie notes, there’s a part of the story that goes into where he disagrees with the church, and has concerns about leaving his boys with priests.
Then there’s the “D-word” - Devout. As in Devout Catholic:
Well, I suppose nothing here contradicts being “devout” unless he went into doctrinal issues, but I suppose if he had mentioned areas of disagreement, the reporter surely would have mentioned them, for the sake of being controversial.
The “boring and pointless” homilies line is interesting. Are Catholic priests THAT BAD at preaching? Or is it isolated to his church? I had heard from some people that this was a kind of truism that Protestants were trained better as preachers back in the old days, about 30-40 years ago, but is it true NOW? That would be a good stand-alone piece.
August 27, 2008, at 3:19 pm
This seems like as good a story as you’d expect in the MSM, even though there are religious angles you’d include in the religious press (like CT or one of the Catholic publications).
Still, even for a lay audience it seems like there’s something missing: the R word (as in Repent). This story ran (and the book will sell) because of the incongruous juxtaposition of his former career and his current faith. So the story really begs the question: is there anything that he would admit was wrong and do differently?
As I understand Catholic doctrine, if you confess your sins and repent, all is forgiven. If you deviate from church doctrine and are unrepentant, then you’re Nancy Pelosi or Joe Biden or John Kerry and are not supposed to get communion. I realize that making graphic soft-porn movies is not the same as being an abortionist (or funding them), but somehow if his conversion were real — as his comment about Christian moviegoers implies — he wouldn’t make those movies today.
August 27, 2008, at 3:33 pm
Stephen A, as you said, I don’t think anything from paragraphs you quoted directly contracts Catholic doctrine.
Homilies in many places are THAT BAD, in others they’re not - your mileage will vary greatly from parish to parish. Judging from the phrase “boring and pointless” I’d guess that Eszterhas is referring to fluff homilies by priests more concerned with making everyone feel warm and fuzzy than giving substantive, truth-filled sermons. I don’t think this is the same as the stereotype you refer to of priests not having the skills to communicate their message effectively. In fact, I’d guess that today’s priests have more training in public speaking than they’ve ever had. What many lack is orthodoxy, or maybe the guts to speak the truth when they know it will result in incessant complaints from parishioners.
August 27, 2008, at 3:34 pm
Joe discussed the book and conversion with me last Saturday on “Catholic Radio 2.0!”. Hear here.
August 27, 2008, at 4:16 pm
Jay wrote:
I think the confusion may be the lay audience’s understanding of repentance. Repentance does not mean guilt or regret; it means a turning (or turning back) towards God. A sure sign of repentance is losing the desire to offend. Eszterhas has said that he doesn’t want to write the same type of “dark” screenplays. That’s a good example of repentance. The reporter could go into a theological exposition about repentance, but it would transform the piece from a personality sketch to something with a much narrower audience.
August 27, 2008, at 7:40 pm
The obsession with pedophilia and Catholic priests is interesting. Did the reporter steer the conversation, or does Esterhaz really think his kids are at special risk at church? Statistically, his boys are safer in a room full of priests than at a family reunion; if he had daughters, they would be much safer. It’s almost certain there is as much or more sexual abuse going on in that megachurch as at his Catholic parish. I could tell some stories on what has happened to kids in Walmart and the malls. And let’s not start on the public schools. Parent need to monitor their kids wherever they go; it’s part of their job description.And yes, Catholic priests can be remarkably poor preachers. I’ve been fortunate to know some really good ones.
August 27, 2008, at 9:43 pm
I wonder if he would redo any of his movies with a Christian viewpoint? Remember the Bible pictures people as they are, rarely as they should be.
August 27, 2008, at 11:49 pm
Dale,
I think Jay has a point, but he should connect confession to repentance more significantly. To confess something as sin, you have to believe it is sin. And if you believe something you did was sinful, and you want to repent from it, it’s safe to say you regret doing it.
Penitence may be what Jay was getting at, and I think it’s a good question. We’re left to assume that he does regret his past work, but have no indication as to whether that assumption is correct. It might have made a good followup to the statement about “faith-based and family-value entertainment”.
August 28, 2008, at 3:45 am
As I said, I’m not Catholic. My (Protestant) understanding of repentance I think would encompass both Dale and Charles’ point.
“Go and sin no more” means a) change behavior and b) an explicit acknowledgement that the behavior was a sin.
Not wanting to make “dark” movies seems to be the first without the second. If it’s not wrong, why change the behavior? Does he think we he did before was wrong? (Would it be a “sin” under Catholic teaching? You tell me).
Given the whole point of the story was the man-bites-dog nature of his changed perspective, this seems to be the major unasked question: did he think what he did before was wrong, and is this because of his newfound religious beliefs?
August 28, 2008, at 1:02 pm
Jay, when a Catholic goes to confession, it’s understood that the behavior was bad - he’s confessing it after all - and that he is sorry he did it. He’s also expected to intend amendment of life (i.e., he’s not going to do it again). Here’s a sample “Act of Contrition” the penitent can say:
August 29, 2008, at 12:21 am
FW Ken,
Ok, that seems like a fine definition. So my point stands — more accurately specified now that I have the jargon.
Is there any evidence of contrition by Joe Eszterhas over his previous career? Did anyone even ask?
September 2, 2008, at 8:58 pm
[…] Mollie at Get Religion critiques reporting of the fascinating conversion story of Joe Eszterhas, the Hollywood writer that brought us such raunchy films such as Basic Instinct and Showgirls. […]