Hader's aspirations of becoming a filmmaker eventually led him to drop out of college and move to Los Angeles in 1999. His parents supported his decision, and let him use the money they had saved for his education for his living expenses. He found work as a production assistant (PA) while scouring the back pages of The Hollywood Reporter, and hoped to become an assistant director. He spent much of his life as a young man "lonely and underemployed" and large amounts of his time watching movies. He regularly worked 18-hour days as a PA, leaving little time to pursue his creative ambitions. He was a PA on the documentary Empire of Dreams: The Story of the Star Wars Trilogy (2004) and the feature films James Dean (2001), Spider-Man (2002) and Collateral Damage (2002). He was also a post-production assistant on the VH1 reality show The Surreal Life (2003–2006). He was briefly a PA and stage manager on Playboy TV's sexual fantasy show Night Calls, but soon quit as he feared it would disappoint his parents. He eventually quit being a PA altogether after a bad experience while shooting The Scorpion King (2002).
