Matthew Toffolo Blog Entry Martch 3rd
Anyone who has seen my film work sees that I have this overall theme about loneliness. There’s always a character, usually the main character, who is dealing with isolation and confusion of some sort of actually being who they are and not knowing who they want to be. It’s kind of what I’ve dealt with my whole life and probably so many other people have too. But the thing is now that I’m not lonely anymore. I don’t feel that isolation that I’ve felt for the last 30 years of my life. I feel alive and free. Free to be who I am because I’m doing exactly what I should be doing. And free because I have the right people in my life around me for the first time ever in my entire life. Matthew Toffolo talks about Friendship I’ve had some good friends in my life. I’ve been pretty lucky. I grew up with a large posse of friends as we all were the same age, lived in the same area and liked to play sports. We were your suburban kids without a care in the world. The world was a stress free place and we just assumed that everyone was so lucky. When puberty hit and we all were set to hit High School, a lot of us scattered and I was personally the only one left alone. I think I saw the world differently than my friends did because we just didn’t have much in common anymore. It was funny how that happened. They were good to hang around with my first 13 years, but it was time to move on. Unfortunately I then spent the next three years pretty much having myself as my only friend. Sure I had the lunch table where I mingled with people at school, my sports teammates and occasionally a guy to talk with during classes. But I really didn’t hang out with anyone after school or had someone to really talk to. And yes I was pretty sad and lonely. This High School world was a strange place in my eyes. It really didn’t make sense to me and it still to this day doesn’t. Matthew Toffolo talks about Teachers My teachers were pretty retarded as I couldn’t understand why they actually thought they were special. They were teachers for god’s sake! Only in the title because most of them didn’t seem to have any sense of reality and the gifts the people had around them. A lot of them would have tried to tell Michael Jordan how to do slam dunks. I always think that good educators are the ones who see the strengths and weaknesses from their students and work from there. Improve their strengths (which is 9 times out of 10 are the things they like the most) and guide them in life to use those strengths. And work on their weaknesses but make sure they don’t venture into areas where those weaknesses are exposed. This High School world of incompetence caused me to be even more lonely and depressed because I didn’t have anyone to talk to about my problems. It’s not like I was going to talk to them. (I don’t want people to think this is what I feel about all teachers. I’ve met some very good ones. I just got some bad teacher cards) Matthew Toffolo talks about being Alone My parents weren’t those people you talk to about anything. Their both type-A people (just like I am now) obsessed with their own worlds to really notice what was happening around them. Type-A people usually don’t make for good parents which makes me very reluctant to ever have children myself. I don’t think I would be a very good parent and I don’t want anyone to go through what I did. I also had two older sisters who were both going through their own issues. I studied them a lot and realized that being a girl growing into a woman is one tough thing to handle in our vanity obsessed society. The problems I have didn’t compare with what they were going through. So I really couldn’t talk to them because I felt too guilty about it. Matthew Toffolo gains happiness in a grocery store I started working in a grocery store in 11th grade and I finally met my true family for the moment. I formed a lot of close relationships with people there and they truly helped me grow into a man. I just went back home last week to see the last friend of that generation get married off and it was good to see a lot of those faces again. We were reminded of a lot of good times and also reminded how far all of us have come through the years. Going back to reunions like this shows me how much I’ve grown. I barely remember myself I am such a different person now. A lot of those guys still hang out with each other. And a lot of my friends from grade school still hang out with each other too. But I’ve had to move forward from their posses because I was on a mission to achieve the things I demanded myself to achieve. It’s sad really because I truly miss those guys and girls, but I had to do what I had to do. Some of my old friends understand that and some of them don’t. You need friends in life. The people you can talk things through you emotions and feelings and vice/versa. The people you don’t judge you and believe in you no matter what while at the same time are honest with you when you’ve gone off your rocker. Matthew Toffolo gets into the bad crowd The downside of my Grocery Store experience was that I was introduced to some addictions. And some of those addictions almost ruined my life. I started smoking when I worked there because everyone else was smoking. I dabbled into drinking too at a very early age and then when that got boring, drugs came into the picture. Long story short: I was drunk and/or high my entire final year of high school, 3 years of College and 2 years after. During that time I found myself becoming a Dairy Manager while also going to school full-time, graduated from school, moved to New York City for more school, bummed around Europe for a bit, moved to Toronto, got married and almost died of a drug overdose. I basically was high on drugs for 6 solid years of my life and I was basically asleep as my brain was not fully functioning during those times. Two things amaze me during that time: #1- I can’t believe I’m still alive, and #2 - How did I accomplish all of these things? It told me that a monkey could probably graduate from College. I woke up a pained person. Regret is a terrible thing. I was a dick to a lot of people during that time and I messed up a lot of women as I was a horrible boyfriend. But Karma has a funny way of catching up to you because I found myself MARRIED to a woman that I was so not suited for me and me for her. The trauma I had to go through in this relationship I think was my punishment. I first had to remember how I got married and when this happened. She was an exceptional person, smart as a whip, who basically saved my life. But she was also a bit controlling and sort of used me as her Frankenstein’s monster. I was out of it when she met me and took me in to recreate her dream man. Of course you can see that this relationship didn’t work out. I WOKE UP and this was not something she was expecting to happen. Matthew Toffolo begins his life Film was what I wanted to get into and do and this would be my new mission in life. I first had to come up with a plan, but I knew that a good plan requires study. A lot of study. I told her I wanted to work as a security guard working midnights all by myself so I can make some money for us (albeit very little) while I have time to study this film thing. That was exactly 5 years ago. I studied this business for a solid year, reading, writing, watching movies, talking to people in the industry, figuring out what exact trade I needed to concentrate on. I become an obsessed man. Film study was what I was married to and my wife knew it and hated me for it. I didn’t want to talk to anybody either. My parents, any old friends, co-workers, anyone I knew from my old life. I needed to figure out who I actually was and anything to do with the past would never be me again. Matthew Toffolo studies a lot It took a year to truly understand and formalize my master plan to get what I want from this industry. Right now I’m into year 4 of it and things are going well. During year 2, I hit a snag because I concentrated on saving my marriage which was doomed from the start. Only after we broke it off did I begin to take off again. During this time where I met 100's of people from actors, producers, writers, directors, editors, DOP’s etc..., I never really could consider any of them my true friend. Most of my interactions had to do with business and/or a project or event I was running. So while I was meeting all these people and having a blast as I ventured into this business, I was still fighting my loneliness feelings, which is why these feelings translated into my films. Funny things have happened in the last year. I’ve tried to become friends with people again. I finally had the guts to do it. I made some bad choices at the beginning choosing the wrong people, but I’m now really beginning to understand this whole friendship thing. First and foremost I knew that my partner and girlfriend, if I was ever going to be so lucky to find someone, had to be my best friend first and foremost. I got pretty lucky with that and things have gotten a whole lot better since finding my rock. Matthew Toffolo and his back from the past friend And something really great happened in the last few months too. This guy I went to high school with, came back into my life. He was one of those guys I talked about. The type of person who you said “Hi” to in the hallway but never really knew much more. You liked him but that was it. This guy was different because I knew he aspired to be in the arts like me and I felt even then that we were destined to meet again. A couple of years after high school I saw him at a nightclub during one of my “crazy nights” and while we took a piss, we talked and planned to catch up. We became pretty good friends during our post-secondary school years and talked a lot about storytelling, went to a ton of movies and of course partied and picked up girls together a lot too. We were close and I really liked him. I thought he had the makings of a pretty successful life. After the fun of school ended and the real world began, we hit a major snag. I wanted to help him but of course was destroying my own life, so what right did I have to help anyone? He was making some poor choices I thought but of course he didn’t listen. We grew apart and soon were left on non-speaking terms. Shortly after was when I crashed, woke up and began my life again and he became sort of a phase that was apart of my really fuzzy past. But now he’s back and we’re beginning our friendship. He’s married to an extremely talented actress and has a young boy. I hope to have his son (and probably 1-2 more kids) and his wife in my life for the rest of my days. We’re both mature enough to have a friendship now. It’s tough for me because I don’t think I ever had a “real” friendship before. And I won’t settle for anything less. We’re both alike in many ways and demand things to be genuine. So much so it’s both of our major strengths and major faults and it ruined our relationship before. Matthew Toffolo and what friendship is to him Relationships are an interesting thing. It’s not like there’s a course in school about it (but you wonder why there isn’t). We all deal with people everyday. From the guy at the newsstand to people in the elevator (I’m obsessed with elevator/people relationships), to your employer, employee, parent, sibling, bowling teammate, friend’s friends, friend’s girlfriend, wife, husband, son, daughter, whatever it is, we all have many relationships. But who do we consider a friend? Right now I have two friends. My girlfriend and my new back from the past friend. These are the only two people I am truly myself with and totally comfortable with. They are not my employees, not people I need things from or negotiating with or working on a project with. Sometimes they will be those things too, but first and foremost they are my friends and my girlfriend of course being much more than that. I hope to have many more, but I think it’s a good start. And I’ve learned that friendship is contagious. Friendship usually starts with common interests and baseball is my #1 interest (film is 1a and baseball is 1b). I couldn’t for the life of me find one person living in Toronto who’s in the film industry and a baseball fan for 4 years. In the span of 2 months, I’ve found 4 of them. And some of those people are starting to jump into that friendship area. The power of numbers is an amazing thing. My DOP was over at our place tonight. A man I have an interesting relationship with. When we’re talking about a project, we’re magic together. But when the project is over, our relationship stops. We’re both beginning to open up more with each other and exposing ourselves to one another. We too are becoming friends. And the critics already like our work! I can’t wait until people see the work I do with a group of FRIENDS. We’re going to make magic happen.
|
