Checking in with Zach Braff

[Brian Damage]

Zach Braff phoned PopWatch earlier this week, during a lunch break on the Scrubs set... not to talk about which network the episode he's currently shooting will air on next season. "I don't want to get in trouble with giant corporations, because they're scary," he says. "No, I just know that the cast has been asked not to talk about it, so I'm officially not talking about it." (But he did quickly plug NBC's May 8 season finale, an epic homage to The Princess Bride that he directed.) Instead, Braff wanted to chat about the music video that he's directing for former Jump Little Children frontman Jay Clifford (pictured, right), "Know When to Walk Away." Braff's vision: People from all over the globe film themselves lip-syncing the track, in their own music video, and submit the footage on jaycliffordmusicvideo.com by May 30. He'll edit together the best scenes and include them in the official video, for which he's already shot Clifford "singing and doing some cool stuff on a rooftop." Why enlist the help of the masses? Besides the fact that he thinks Clifford is an artist people should know about, Braff says, "I've been really active on MySpace, just because I enjoy that sort of discourse with people who like, or don't like, what I'm doing. And something that I always get is, 'I want to get into filmmaking," or 'Hey, I make videos.' I had this daydream about finding a way to collaborate with people that I've never met. Then I was listening to the song in the car one day, after I'd just woken up, and it just all came together: Why don't I try to set up a thing where everyone can submit their own version of the music video, and then I'll cut them together? It'll be a way to collaborate with people from all over the world, because I get email on MySpace from people from Africa, Europe, South America, and the most random places you would ever think would even know who I am or have Internet access."

Yes, he knows there's a famous Nickelback video that features random people and celebrities lip-syncing, but his goal is different. "It's about regular people making their own version of the video, with a concept of their own that highlights something about themselves, who they are and where they live," he says. "'Know When to Walk Away,' you could make it about a job, about a bad situation in your life, about anything. I already said on the site, I don't want people submitting video of them getting kicked in the balls — save that for YouTube. This if for people who have an interest in making videos or films. It doesn't have to be fancy, and you don't have to spend money, but it should be thought out and original enough to stand out amongst what we hope are gonna be hundreds and hundreds of entries."

Waiting to see if your project is one of the chosen ones is something that Braff can relate to, by the way. He's hoping Fox picks up the pilot, Night Life, that he just directed (and would serve as an exec producer on, if it went to series). Written by his brother Adam, it follows "a regular suburban guy who gives up his day job because he's just feeling so uninspired, and decides to become an EMT in the inner city of Baltimore," Zach says. "The only shift they have is the night shift. So he's experiencing all this craziness at night in the inner city, but during the day, trying to maintain his life as a suburban father. It's got a lot of action and drama in it, but also a really dry humor to it, hopefully in the spirit of the Coen Brothers. That's what we sort of aimed at."

Good luck to everyone.

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