The Misfits

In person, Murphy borders on physically intimidating -- 6-foot-2, an Irish brawler with an asymmetrical haircut who speaks so fast it often requires an aural double take. At his most manic, he seems like a cross between Richie Rich and Godzilla -- a precocious 12-year-old irradiated into city-crushing leviathan. But close your eyes and listen, and the result is even more incongruous: With his halting rapid-fire delivery, slight lisp and overrefined sense of justice, he‘s a dead ringer for Rudy Giuliani. (Hamsher’s nickname for him in Killer Instinct, her tell-all of the Natural Born Killers roller-coaster ride, is “hyperanxiety boy.”)

The son of a well-to-do Long Island ad man, Murphy spent his undergraduate career at Georgetown University as film critic for the student paper and head of the campus film program. At the last second, he dodged the bullet of Georgetown Law School and entered the USC graduate film program, where Singer cut sound on Murphy‘s student feature film. There, Murphy also met future partner Hamsher, a sardonic ex-punk editrix (San Francisco’s Damage fanzine), and their faith in a stray script by the undiscovered Quentin Tarantino led them to Oliver Stone, who not only committed to direct the Tarantino-scripted Natural Born Killers with a $35 million budget, but installed them as on-set producers -- the equivalent of a crash course in filmmaking. “We wouldn‘t be where we are if not for Oliver,” Murphy says. “He had every opportunity to fuck me on multiple occasions, and he didn’t.”

Another byproduct of the Hamsher book is that Tarantino, stung by criticism, spotted Murphy dining at Ago on Melrose in October 1997 and -- looking for headlines, revenge or maybe just the cheap thrill of the sucker punch -- began pounding Murphy in the side of the head, forcing Miramax chief Harvey Weinstein, of all people, to act as a mediator and pull them apart. The story became a Tarantino staple on talk shows, and there was talk of a lawsuit before the inevitable reconciliation. “Quentin and I are absolutely fine,” states Murphy for the record. “I wish him nothing but the best.”

But somewhere along the way, Murphy‘s reputation as a hothead and loose cannon was codified. Once JD (for Jane and Don) Productions had disbanded, he settled on the shingle Angry Films.

“That’s a joke,” says Murphy, defending the moniker. “The stationery has a really angry smiley face. I know what my reputation is in town -- difficult, great taste, gets movies made. To me, that‘s fine. I’m not trying to win a popularity contest. You don‘t get movies made by being friendly. You get movies made by saying you have to make this movie. There are so many people involved in making a movie, there’s so much petty bullshit and egos and personalities that get involved that at a certain point you realize the only way is to just put your head down and ram. It‘s not really about being liked. They like you if you make a movie that makes $200 million. They like you a lot.

”Anyway, I have mellowed somewhat as I’ve gotten older. But at the end of the day, I‘m from New York. I don’t have kids, I don‘t have dogs, I don’t have a big huge house with a pool -- and there are easier ways to make money. I just want to make movies. So don‘t get in my way, and I’ll be your best friend. But if you get in my way, don‘t be surprised if I smash this ashtray into your head. Maybe that makes me a colorful personality.“

And yet filmmaker Larry Clark (Bully), not noted for his affinity for producers (he once punched Another Day in Paradise producer Stephen Chin onstage at the Venice Film Festival), is borderline-ecstatic in his praise: ”I can’t say enough about Don Murphy. I think he‘s a great producer and a really good guy. I like him a lot. I think Don and I are probably cut from the same cloth. We’re determined to get it done. Nothing‘s going to stop us.“

”He certainly wants to make good movies,“ says screenwriter David Goyer, ”but I think he’s trying to appeal to his own sense of what‘s good and what’s not, and he really doesn‘t give a shit what other people think. Sometimes it makes him reckless, and sometimes it makes him his own worst enemy, but he really fights for this, and he doesn’t care about the politics. The funny thing is, he‘s actually a huge softie.“

Maybe so. But according to screenwriter Scott Rosenberg, who co-wrote a project called The Book of Skulls with his brother Phil for Murphy at Universal, ”Don’s a throwback to the old days of the bombastic, bellicose, belligerent producer. Takes no shit from anybody. Does not suffer fools gladly. But at the same time, he has this incredible taste for the most out-there, insane stuff. There‘s not a whole hell of a lot of mavericks in this day and age -- no Sam Peckinpahs, no Richard Brookses. Or even actors -- there are no Lee Marvins, no Robert Mitchums. Every now and then, though, you get an Oliver Stone or a Mike De Luca or a Don Murphy, and it’s refreshing.“