[By Guiseppe Aurelio, as read to The Atlantic before his Walk of Fame Dedication, Vine Avenue, Hollywood District of Los Angeles County].

Between early Summer 2001 and the dog days of August 2002 we shot an ad lib, non-scripted one-hour-long movie on video tape with a camcorder. A tripod purchased from a garage sale, and a wardrobe pulled directly from a series of thrift stores – mostly Village Discount in Chicago Heights. We’ve all been sued and jailed multiple times with direct ties to the making of this Magnum Opus.

Clancy Witherspoon with his directorial debut-turned-swansong. He never even got to see the finished product before his mysterious murder/suicide. ⁽¹⁾ It should have been Clancy’s name up there on that marquee. He was the star. [pause for Double Diamond drag] He was the one who was supposed to make it.

Kosher is the story of Vic Furious, Ace Hatchet, Sid DeLucka, Joey “Thug Life” Lambert, and Tommy Fazoli. The New Canaan faction of The Jewish Mafia.

Based on the HG Pennypacker novella of the same name, we didn’t attempt to do it justice. Many have stated that the film is one hundred times better than the book itself. Quite a rarity in the realm of the media, and Clancy gets all the credit.

Having just a rough outline from the book, and the reckless combination of nothing but idle time and zero accountability, we took liberties with Pennypacker. He has stated that he hates this film. It’s okay. We all hated his novel.

We ran into him at our screening at Sundance, and he wouldn’t so much as look in our direction. The snub did devolve into an intense shouting match between his ensemble and David Augustine who was per usual, high as a god damn kite. His most prized concoction of a speedball dissolved in a stein of whiskey was designed that legendary night. Grant Berg’s beret was snatched and frisbeed across the theatre. The awkward instance is still on the Sundance Wikipedia page, I believe.

Having no real script other than a rough outline of the short story and coming up with new plot lines on the fly lent itself to having to reshoot literally most of the scenes, sometimes three times. We sought profound perfection in twenty-four frames per second. According to the reviews and praise, and all the plaques – we obtained it. A trophy case to rival Aaron Comprehend.

We had roughly half of Jonathan William Stawicki’s scenes in the can before he fell into that vat of lime and sulfuric acid in the back of that factory where he was working nights. Poor bastard. Clancy scrapped what he had and proceeded in a reshooting of everything after his ghastly mutation in order to have it make sense, you know, continuity-wise.

The character of Handsome Lou really came in to focus after his horrible disfiguration, as we manipulated his awful accident into a forced work situation. I mean, he signed the contract. What did he expect? Either way he became a landmark staple of what we now know as this classic film. From what I’ve read he spent all of his nest egg on Double Diamonds and some skin magazines. He then ended up being spit out the bottom of the adult entertainment industry after portraying Sloth in the gay porn version of Goonies.

The bulk of the Kosher footage was originally edited in-camera. This and other things caused many hiccups in the process.

“This one guy just isn’t acting well enough. Let’s go back out at midnight and reshoot this entire scene with some other guy playing the same role.” This happened twicedue to our apparent standards in procuring the proper thespians.

“You know, Mr. Rattin, it says on your resume you studied at Julliard.”

Anyway, Rattin, although completely cut from his critical interrogation scenes, does make a brief cameo as the midnight jogger and he was paid scale. No matter what they tell you, and no matter what he claims. Just like Bob Zemekis removing Eric Stolz from Back to the Future, it had to be done. Kosher wouldn’t have been the same film if Rattin was left in the scenes from “the hole”.

Notable features included a little known at the time, Brett “Mouse” Wiggins (if you can believe it! Seriously, check his IMDB), as well as famed platinum selling, legendary R&B superstar Ol’ Dirty Russel, before his embarrassing sex cult scandal.

We hired this one guy off the back alley while he was grifting for aluminum cans and copper wire. We never got his real name, so he was known only as “Rico” since that was who Pennypacker penned as the penultimate loser of modern society encapsulated in one singular man. Mark Spoonmire paid Rico in vials of embalming fluid and gas station bath salts. The fucker seemed content with that, so we never suggested any other compensation. The last I heard Rico was working odd jobs as a crime scene cleaner.

Clancy wrote Popcorn’s character out of the film as quickly as he could. In a murder scene with his bloody body being flung off the side of a bridge, he became the iconic Christ figure in a llama coat. We all knew that his time outside of prison barbed wire was always short lived. We all knew if we didn’t kill him off, we’d have to reshoot all of his scenes. It was a gamble we were willing to take, and in the end his lucky rat tail proved a worthy charm.

Walking the streets of Kankakee at night rocking disco era suits and wigs with fake guns (and an actual gun) in an immediate post-9/11 September 2001 – we got bothered by the police. For sure. Multiple times. I was out there with the Blublocker Viper shades on, as Tommy. Not able to see anything but completely committed to the character. We secretly filmed Kankakee’s finest in a nighttime line up frisking that took place, and that footage appears in the movie.

“Oh, jeez the camera is rolling? I better light up a cigarette. No more Black n Milds? Better pretend this pretzel is a cigarillo.” Look, this was guerilla filmmaking and the accolades of being front and center in this unironic, timeless process never end.

Just using the restroom at Bada Bing the other day, some guy acknowledges: “Hey Tommy, where you goin’? I thought we were gonna play swords.”

Knowingly, I politely smile as I zip up my fly. I head on my way.

…

Using an abandoned house with equally reckless abandon, we broke and entered to trash and spray it with fake blood during the final grand finale death scene. A homeless guy was definitely crashing there based on the analysis of piles of spent lotto tickets and crushed Bud Lite cans.

Breaking glassware, with Sid Delucka slashing holes in drywall with a hay sickle. The aftermath looked like a Manson style mass murder in chrominance with neon pink hue saturations of blood in a final grave of the Jewish Mafia. A dead Handsome Lou – a now headless henchman. The house mysteriously burned down post hoc, after a lawsuit by one Frank Gonski for us thoughtlessly desecrating his grandfather’s home.

We spent one literal full night in 2003 in an analogue editing bay after sneaking into Illinois State University, linearly cutting all the footage into an artful masterpiece that would come to stand the test of time. Scenes came to life on granulated beta tape in a perfect blend of glitch and stolen intellectual property. Mostly Radiohead and 1980s pop balladry. We’ve all been able to escape the royalties lawsuit other than having our SAG cards pulled eons ago.

The slow burn profundity of this film is not only inescapable, but it is now embraced by generations of cult followers. One actor from the movie, who left the profession to take a role as Senior Director of the UN still has the original Kosher movie trailer embedded as his LinkedIn profile tag. Costumes of a breakdancing Ace Hatchet and a raspy Vic Furious are main stays every Halloween as kids beg for treats and threaten the wrath of tricks under the guise of Circumcised Gangsters.

Midnight screenings across the country take place, as fans show up in berets with burning menorahs, but we as a collective, mostly for legal reasons, refuse to do any further Q&A sessions. Other than a documentary that was shot in 2004 – which will never see the light of day.

Regardless, there is nothing left to be said. Kosher is an oft-quoted standalone piece of art.

The twists and the seemingly large plot holes are now guise for conversation worldwide. The Avante Gard meaning is left to the viewers interpretation. It’s been up to the movie-going populus over the decades to keep Kosher on the mantle as the greatest display to ever ubiquitously flow through camera aperture.

The masses have spoken and as all five of us receive these brass and terrazzo stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame this week, I lend to you this letter. This approximation of appreciation from a band of undesirable ne’er-do-wells and remittance men who have come to say one thing:

Damn, Vic, I don’t know.

…

1. It is well-documented that Clancy Witherspoon’s name is noted as director of later films like The Messengers as well as Harvest of Fallacy, etc. The truth is that he did fake his own suicide, and he took asylum in Cuba after the murders of Craig Campbell and Richard J. Sippel. He directed his future endeavors, after his escape via handwritten letter from a tropical beach. His vow is to never lay eyes on any of his own works until he has successfully gained asylum in the Papplewick Shoreline. Or… Killybegs… Killybegs.