Peter who find themselves “not fitting in at Taft.” For him, there was Donald Oscarson ’47 and his “Jumpers” program. “I was in the very first group,” Berg proudly admits. “Don Oscarson saved me.” Headmaster Willy MacMullen ’78 was a corridor monitor on Berg’s floor; indeed, Berg remembers that they lived next door to one another. Often “confused” while a student at Taft, Berg now sees his high school experience as having offered him important opportunities, resources, and challenges. In fact, he can imagine sending Emmett, his “awesome” five-year-old son “who goes with me everywhere—and I do mean everywhere,”—to Taft. That would be a Hollywood ending, perhaps, to Berg’s own narrative. Sara Beasley teaches English at Taft. An avid film buff, she is teaching her “Elements of Film” elective for the eighth consecutive year to 16 senior movie-lovers, and counts several active filmmakers among past students.
of Peter Berg Actor
book with great sensitivity. Like his cousin, who had moved to Odessa for a period of years in order to research the great football dynasty of the Permian Panthers, VINCE BUCCI/GETTY IMAGES Berg spent seven months in West Texas, studying the landscape, attending football games, and making friends. As he explained to me, we at Taft can barely imagine the notion of 20,000 people at a high-school football game. He immersed himself in West Texas football culture, though, and made many friends there. His film does a beautiful job of painting that gritty scene, using stark, washed-out visuals, and just the right number of establishing shots, each of which is of just the right duration. The lonely vistas are unbroken but for the bobbing pumps of oil derricks. Something in that loneliness evokes the particular pain of high school. Berg says now that he is most interested in those Peter Berg explains the finer points of basketball to son Emmett at the Lakers home opener this season.
22 Taft Bulletin Spring 2005
• Collateral (2004) • Corky Romano (2001) • Very Bad Things (1998) • Cop Land (1997) • The Great White Hype (1996) • The Last Seduction (1994) • Across the Moon (1994) • A Case for Murder (1993) • Fire in the Sky (1993) • Aspen Extreme (1992) • A Midnight Clear (1992) • Crooked Hearts (1991) • Genuine Risk (1991) • Late for Dinner (1991) • Tale of Two Sisters (1990) • Never on Tuesday (1989) • Race for Glory (1989) • Shocker (1989)
Director
• Friday Night Lights (2004) • The Rundown (2003) • Very Bad Things (1998)
Screenwriter
• Friday Night Lights (2004) • Very Bad Things (1998)