It’s good to know that no matter how bad things might be at your job, somewhere out there things are going even worse for Terry Gilliam at his. The infamously unlucky director has started work again on his now near legendary Don Quixote movie. The last time he tried to get this movie done, it went so badly that someone made an entire documentary about what a disaster it was. It would be foolish to expect a smooth road to the theater this second time around, and indeed a new Robert Duvall interview on Movieline seems to confirm that, yep, they’re already having trouble.

Duvall is supposed to play the titular Don Quixote in Gilliam’s film and in the interview he explains what’s holding things up. For starters, even Duvall says he doesn’t really understand the script. Apparently it contains a lot of dwarfs. But the really big holdup is that they can’t find a Sancho Panza.

In the previous failed incarnation of Gilliam’s Don Quixote, the role of Quixote’s sidekick Panza was played by Johnny Depp. This time they’re stuck looking for someone else and so far haven’t found the right one. Duvall says, “He’s been through quite a few people. The Irish guy who was in Crazy Heart turned him down, which kind of bugged him.” That Irish guy was Colin Farrell.

The way Duvall tells it Gilliam just isn’t getting things done. He says, “He’s going after two people now, but he doesn’t want to say who they are until after he gets them. But it’s been six months he’s been after people. And it’s a bigger budget than his others. And he doesn’t stick to a budget, they say. He goes on and on.”

Here’s the thing about Gilliam: People think he’s unlucky. Personally I think he’s just a terrible filmmaker. He has brilliant ideas, but he’s terrible when it comes to executing them. He fails when it comes down to making the big decisions. It’s not bad luck which torpedoes his movies, it’s bad management from Gilliam. With his track record, is it really any surprise people are turning Terry down? It’s kind of amazing that even Duvall agreed to do it. So far, it doesn’t sound like this Don Quixote is off to much of a better start than the last one. Cue the flood…