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FINANCIER-from page 41

Gary Gilbert in front of the Camelot
Pictures office in Tribeca: "You can
save about 25-30 percent by filming in
Canada, but I would rather stay here
and help the U.S. economy."

and selling it to Miramax. and Fox
for $5 million, plus 15 percent of
the gross receipts.
"The 15 percent was sort of
unprecedented, but it really made
me happy," said Gilbert. "People tell
me I'll be spoiled by such a success
with my first movie experience, and
not to expect that all the time. It's
really important for large studios to
take over and release a film because
they have the apparatus to make it a
box office success — the distribution
system, advertising and publicity,
and so forth."
Gilbert is listed in the credits as
one of the producers, and he even has
a small role in the film, as a restau-
rant patron with one line. "But it
took seven takes to do the scene," he
admitted.
"I watched the entire filming of the
movie, for 12 hours a day over 27
days. It was a lot of fun, sort of like
going to camp as a kid. You were sad
when it ended," he added.
For Gilbert, 39, camp meant spend-
ing summers at Walden and Tamakwa
while growing up in Southfield and

attending Southfield-Lathrup High
School. He is the son of Shirley and
Sam Gilbert, now of West Bloomfield.
Gilbert split his college education
between Michigan State University
and the University of Michigan, earn-
ing a business degree at the latter. In
his senior year, he worked as a loan
rep for an Ann Arbor realtor, then
tried law school — for two nights.
"But we had just started Rock
Financial and I just couldn't keep up
with school at the same time," he said.
Dan and Gary Gilbert and Lindsay
Gross of West Bloomfield founded Rock
Financial in 1985 in a shared office suite
in Southfield, and Gary stayed with the
company until 1997. "You can only
work for your older brother for so long,
then you have to try and make it on
your own," he said. "Dan's a great broth-
er and an excellent businessman, but I
felt it was time to 'leave the family nest'
and be my own boss."
Gilbert operated a loan business in
Chicago for two years, "but then I
realized I just couldn't spend all day in
an office; I wanted to get around more
and do something more exciting."

c

Who Needs `Friends'?

Make friends with "Garden State's" Zach Braff and the zany "Scrubs" crew.

KARLA PETERSON
Copley News Service

Marbielike of
Southeast Michigan

5/ 7
2004

44

is finally over — the Friends frenzy that culminat-
ed in the 10-year-old sitcom's May 6 finale.
I
My advice is to forget about the lame ducks of
Central Perk and head for Sacred Heart Hospital,
where the daffy cast of NBC's Scrubs will pump you so
full of pharmaceutical-grade humor, the Friends gang will
slip sweetly and quietly away.
Neither a rating's phenom nor a riveting flop, Scrubs
— currently airing Tuesdays at 9:30 p.m. — has never
had much buzz to speak of, and maybe that's just as
well. Like a mutant shade-dwelling plant, the 3-year-
old comedy has flourished in the zeitgeist darkness,
blossoming into something weird and twisted and
delightfully unlike anything else on television.
Because Scrubs takes place in a hospital where smarty-
pants doctors crack wise about death, sex and bodily
functions, it is often compared to the late, great
M*A*S*H. But where M*A*S*H aimed for edifying black
humor and barbed gravitas, the Scrubs folks just want to
make you laugh until stuff comes out of your nose. And
when you're too incapacitated to notice, they'll slip an
epiphany directly into your brain.
Scrubs revolves around the personal and professional

lives of J.D. Dorian (Zach Braff, the multitalented
writer/actor/director of Garden State), Chris Turk
(Donald Faison) and Elliot Reid (Sarah Chalke), three
frazzled medical residents who cope with the harsh
demands of their jobs by having as little contact with
reality as possible.
Here's Turk in surgery, talking to the organ he's about
to remove.
"Hell000 Mr. Gallbladder. Don't get too comfortable
next to Mr. Liver, because here comes Dr. Turk's robot
laser."
There's Elliot, dancing to the sound of her beeper,
which plays KC and the Sunshine Band's "That's the
Way (I Like It)." And here's our wide-eyed hero J.D.,
escaping into fantasy sequences, fueling his pirate fixa-
tion, and deflecting the daily insult from caustic super-
vising physician Perry Cox (John C. McGinley) with his
usual warped elan.
"If you want to use the appearance angle to knock
down my self-esteem," he says happily, "best do it on a
day when my hair doesn't look awesome."
Unlike the men and women of M"A*S*II, who were
war-torn, cynical and old for their years, the Scrubs does
have the dizzy optimism that comes from youth, ideal-
ism and lack of sleep. J.D. and the gang are as buoyant
as punching-bag clowns, and they give the show a