Confessions of a Dangerous Mind is a 2002 American biographical spy film depicting the fictional life of game show host and producer Chuck Barris. The film was George Clooney's directorial debut, was written by Charlie Kaufman and starred Sam Rockwell as Barris, as well as Julia Roberts, Drew Barrymore, and Clooney. It is based on Barris's 1984 "unauthorized autobiography" of the same name, in which he claimed to have been an assassin for the CIA in addition to his show business career. These allegations have been denied by the CIA, while Barris throughout his life generally refused to say whether the claim was true or not. The film had a long development process. Columbia Pictures briefly planned to produce a film adaptation in the late 1980s, to be directed by Jim McBride. The film rights were purchased in 1997 by producer Andrew Lazar, who hired Kaufman to write a screenplay; the project then quickly attracted a string of well-known directors, including David Fincher, Brian De Palma and Bryan Singer, and lead actors, including Mike Myers, Ben Stiller and Johnny Depp. When Clooney was hired to direct, he brought on Barris to consult on the project in order to provide additional authenticity. This in turn led to (uncredited) rewrites on the script, which Kaufman was unhappy with, including the removal of a drug addiction subplot. Clooney also championed the casting of Rockwell, who at that point was mostly unknown. To accommodate the $30 million budget, Clooney convinced Barrymore and Roberts to lower their salaries. The film was released to favorable reviews from critics and was modestly successful at the box office. Rockwell, in particular, was praised for his acting and won the Silver Bear for Best Actor at the 2003 Berlin International Film Festival. Plot Tired of being rejected by the beautiful women he lusts after, Chuck Barris moves to Manhattan to become an NBC page with dreams of becoming famous in television but is eventually fired. He moves back to Philadelphia and becomes Dick Clark's personal assistant on American Bandstand in 1961. He writes the successful song "Palisades Park" and becomes romantically involved with a woman named Penny Pacino. Chuck is given permission to pitch the concept for The Dating Game at ABC. He is given $7,500 to create a television pilot, but ABC abandons the idea in favor of Hootenanny. One night after Barris is kicked out of a