“People are very strange these days.” -Greg Sestero, The Room Throughout the process of listening to this audiobook with my family, I frequently wondered whether or not Sestero was an actually good author or if the story itself was just so good that even if he was a terrible author the book would still be enjoyable. The more I think about it, the more I realize he’s not a great author, but he IS a great storyteller. Of course, the facts and stories of The Room itself, Greg being a reluctant lead role, him telling about the constant calamities on set, these things are all entertaining. However, it’s the fact he’s good at just the pacing and timing of the story that makes it clear the book is not just good because it’s about an already interesting thing. The quips, the random fun facts about Tommy Wiseau (I’ve never stopped thinking about his Aladdin bathroom poster), the Wiseau quotes, even the rare emotional bits are really well paced and organized. The Room, without this context, is an infinitely rewatchable and uniquely bad movie, maybe the best bad movie ever. Trust me, I know a thing about horrible b-movies. Back in middle school, I was obsessed with these sorts of terrible films, my dad and I every other week would watch one: Clifford, Reuben and Ed, Cabin Boy, Problem Child. These movies were all laughably bad but in no way actually enjoyable in a way quite like The Room. With The Disaster Artist in mind, The Room is genuinely a fantastic work of “outsider film” as it were. Unlike movies like Problem Child, it’s not a stupid bonkers comedy movie made by some lame forty year olds to appeal to kids, instead it’s a dreamy, avant-garde masterpiece of an accidental black comedy made without even a wink of self awareness, hence why it’s better than the rest of these horrible movies. The Disaster Artist is a tribute to one of the greatest movies of all time, and is a pretty great book that really makes you think about all the other strange outsider films by wannabe actors who slipped through the cracks you’ve never heard of. In other words, good job Sestero and Bissell.