’13 Hours’: Can Michael Bay Pull Off a Gritty Movie About Benghazi?
They show him a clip of two other new characters, a mutant warthog and a mutant rhinoceros named Bebop and Rocksteady. “You gotta adjust that mass,” Bay says. “That mass is not too good yet.” He watches a few more times. “Is our rhino dude’s head big enough, do you think?”
“We could make it bigger,” Helman says. The ILM guys write it down.
Next is 13 Hours. Bay has seen these effects already, so he goes quickly: a shot of a charred photograph fluttering over an explosion; a squirt of blood from a leg. Then he sees an effect that didn’t need fixing. “Guys – come on! Who turned this shit over? It’s fine the way it is! Seriously, that’s just wasting money. That’s five grand we could have gone out to drinks or dinner with.” (“People don’t understand,” says Stoff, “but he’s one of the most fiscally responsible directors there is.”)
Finally, there’s Transformers. They show Bay an underwater rendering of a crash-landed alien spaceship, then a new dump-truck Transformer with a cloak. Neither are up to snuff. “Boy, I’ve got a lot of work to do,” Bay says, shaking his head. “I better finish this fucking 13 Hours movie.” He thanks ILM and kills the video link, then turns to me. “It’s not good when I’m not involved.”
“The movie industry has really changed,” Bay says, apropos of nothing. “The middle-[budget] movie is basically gone. They just want these big movies.” (The irony of this statement goes unremarked-upon.) “Transformers, I still have a great time. It’s fun to do a movie that 100 million people will see. But this is the last one. I have to pass the reins to someone else.”
I remind Bay that he said the same thing before each of the last two Transformers movies. “I know,” he says. “J.J. [Abrams] told me, ‘You’re the only guy that could do this.’ But it’s time to move on. One more.”
Bay has a few genres he’d like to try: a thriller, a quirky comedy, “maybe a historical thing.” (Not the Civil War, though: “I’ve never seen an interesting Civil War story.”) He’s producing a reality show about a modern-day treasure hunter, and he’s got another project in the works he’s very excited about. “We’re prepping an IMAX documentary on elephant poaching,” Bay says. “It’s disgusting what’s going on. At the current kill rate, elephants have about 10 years left.”
Bay walks me out to my car. “You saw bad stuff today,” he says. “Bad stuff. That Ninja Turtles stuff has a long way to go.” He’s quiet for a second. “But I guarantee you that that rhino’s head is too small.”
One afternoon a few days later, Bay walks into Soho Beach House, the Miami branch of the members-only club with outposts in Hollywood and London. Bay is a member, but he forgot his card, so he has to stop at the front desk for a pass. “And what’s your name?” asks the intimidatingly pretty receptionist, who wouldn’t look out of place being objectified in a Michael Bay film.
“It’s Michael Bay?” Bay says.
“And your last name?”
“Um, B-A-Y,” Bay mumbles.
Watching the scene unfold, I’m reminded of the second half of Megan Fox’s famous quote, which got much less attention than the first half. “When you get him away from set and he’s not in director mode, I kind of really enjoy his personality,” she said. “[He’s] so hopelessly awkward. He has no social skills at all. And it’s endearing to watch him. He’s vulnerable and fragile in real life.”
“I can sometimes be a shy guy,” agrees Bay when we’re seated. “At dinner I’m reserved, but when I’m on the set, I’m not. It’s weird.”