Spike Jonze narrowly avoided jail while shooting an Al-Qaeda documentary in Yemen by bribing authorities with $8,000 (£5,330).
The filmmaker recently travelled to the Arabic country with Vice magazine founder Shane Smith to shoot a new series for MTV about their search for the terrorist group.
But they found themselves in trouble with the law on one occasion and only managed to wrangle their way out of the legal mess by handing over the cash in exchange for their freedom.
Smith tells the New York Post's Page Six gossip column, "Most of these places you can bribe your way out for a couple hundred bucks."
The series, titled The Vice Guide to Everything, is set to premiere in the U.S. on 6 December (10).
Tagged in Spike Jonze