Cinematographer John Toll, ASC
Some of the things we discussed.
The Rookies, The first show John worked on after joining the union.
Dr. Pepper Dancing On The Ceiling Commercial (you can see John behind the camera strapped in)
Wind Trailer (John’s first feature as a DP)
The Vanishing Breed book that John gave to Ed Zwick
John Clothier, John Tolls operator on Legends of the Fall and Braveheart.
A note John sent after we recorded the podcast regarding that first job he did with Otto Nemenz.
One interesting story I forgot to mention concerned Otto Nemenz. When I worked on staff at Wolper/ Metromedia as a PA, (my first job in the Biz) I was still in college. One show they did was a documentary about Olympic skiing champ Jean-Claude Killy. It was during the summer, so I was available and worked on the shoot full time as a PA to the camera assistant, Otto Nemenz.
After the shoot I had to deliver something to Otto at his home in Pacific Palisades. When I was there Otto said he had something to show me. He opened a hallway closet and there was a pebbled aluminum camera case inside (I didn’t know that it was an Arri camera case). He opened it. Inside was an Arri 35mm 2C, the first one Otto ever purchased.
I had only known Otto as a camera assistant and asked what he was going to do with it. In my experience I had never known or heard of a camera assistant owning camera equip as all camera gear was rented from rental houses like Mark Armistead or Birns and Sawyer.
To be polite, I told Otto what a great idea he had, but on the drive back to Metromedia in Hollywood I was thinking what a bad idea it was that he, as a camera assistant, would be able to own and rent a camera. I was sure he was going to lose all the money he had paid to buy the camera which in1969 must have been a couple of thousand dollars (a lot of money back then).
Poor guy! I hadn’t had the heart to tell him what a mistake it was!!
