Is Zach Braff Selling Out Kickstarter?

Zach Braff was once an up and coming indie filmaker, who directed and starred in 2004’s hit that nobody saw coming, Garden State. Every studio shark in LA turned down that script, and were it not for a lone angel investor (who happened to be an overzealous Scrubs fan), it would still be  in Hollywood purgatory.

 Ten years later, Braff is looking to finance a “sequel in tone” titled Wish I was Here. This time, Scrubs is a nationally and internationally syndicated show, his bank account is loaded, and he’s got a name that gets invited to all the right parties. Funding should be easier to accrue this time around, right? So why is he on Kickstarter, a crowd-funding platform resourced by starving artists with t-shirts to offer, who operate out of garages and basements, and use hockey sticks for boom poles?  The short answer would be because it only took him two days to reach his goal of two million dollars. But we can’t end it there, not when the internet makes it so easy to criticize.

 Critics, like Emmy-award winning screenwriter Ken Levine, have opened the floodgates of hate,  accusing Braff of typical Hollywood exploitation. Levine writes on his blog.

“The idea – and it’s a great one – is that Kickstarter allows filmmakers who otherwise would have NO access to Hollywood and NO access to serious investors to scrounge up enough money to make their movies. Zach Braff has contacts. Zach Braff has a name. Zach Braff has a track record. Zach Braff has residuals.  He can get in a room with money people. He is represented by a major talent agency. But the poor schmoe in Mobile, Alabama or Walla Walla, Washington has none of those advantages. ”

Braff plays some lockdown defense against his critics (here) and (here). He points out that if it were about making money, he’d go back to doing television, where he made millions.

“This isn’t a money-making endeavor … Making a tiny art film is not where people go to make money. This is a passion project,” he says. “I’m making this movie for you and, ostensibly, with you. You’re coming along on the ride, you’re going to be a little GoPro camera on my shoulder experiencing how an independent movie is made … I owe [the fans] everything.”

Levine  fails to recognize that Braff isn’t holding anyone at gunpoint here. Just because he’s a celebrity with a Kickstarter campaign doesn’t mean people lose their autonomy to CHOOSE where they donate their money. These people want what he’s selling. In fact, Braff (who has over a million followers on Twitter) attracted over eighteen thousand first-time investors to Kickstarter. Many will stick around, peruse through other campaigns, and donate accordingly, so in essence, Braff’s celebrity endorsement will trickle down to the more obscure artists and entrepreneurs.

He’ also putting an “ass-ton” of his own money into the project, so the Kickstarter funds would only supplement the film’s budget. It’s not fair to ostracize him for doing what every other entrepreneur does: find ways to avoid spending his own money. Even billionaires get other rich people to fund their projects.

Braff also points out that his “fame” doesn’t necessarily translate to easy funding, particularly because his tenure on Scrubs, doesn’t get factored into the algorithms investors use to predict overseas success. In fact, he’s still at the mercy of the same barriers that confronted him years ago, and then some (such as the time that his “star” bailed on him because his wife didn’t want him working in the summer). Accepting money from the usual suspects would require him to make casting and plot sacrifices that could undermine his vision.  Isn’t it worth celebrating that, in an age of remakes and recycled narrative formulas, there are still people in Hollywood who genuinely want to tell the best story they can without compromising their artistic integrity to the hand that feeds?

Who is anyone to impose limits on what crowd funding should be? Kickstarter’s own mission welcomes projects “big and small.” It’s an organic, pliable platform. Saying it should be reserved for the pauper is no different than saying only rich people should play golf.