What you are looking at here is a real live behind-the-scenes shot of Matt Dillon with J Mascis and Lou Barlow on the set of the new Dinosaur Jr video for their song “Been There All the Time.” Dillon, who rocked a brief appearance as a boorish cop in the 1987 video for the Pogues “Fairytale of New York”, is directing the clip. We trust that it will be awesome.

Because we think Matt Dillon is the coolest (check out Erik Hedegaard’s intriguing feature on the actor, which we published last summer) we wish we could say he’s the first actor to get with the actor-turned-video-director trend, but it’s not the case. He’s just the latest in which seems to be an ever-growing list.

Sean Penn made the typically baffling choice to direct both Shania Twain’s video for “Dance With the One That Brought You” back in 1993 as well as Peter Gabriel’s video for “The Barry Williams Show” in 2002. More recently, benefactor to lo-fi rockers everywhere and resident Hollywood hipster Zach Braff directed the video for Gavin DeGraw’s song “Chariot” and brooding romantic Joaquin Phoenix directed People in Planes’ video for their song “If You Talk Too Much (My Head Will Explode).”

Is this a thing now? If so we have some suggestions. Here are our dream collaborations, who would you like to see merge Hollywood with the rock world?

• Johnny Depp directs the Black Lips: The Lips’ unabashedly debauched ways will remind Johnny of the good old days, thereby soothing the pain he feels at never having made good on that whole rock stardom thing. He will also get back together with Winona.
• Jack Nicholson directs Bob Dylan: Why not, right? Scarlett Johansson can star, inspiring crazy muse-impressing effort by both legends.
• Ryan Gosling directs The Hold Steady: This Oscar nominee doesn’t want to be seen as too slick too fast. The Hold Steady will reinforce his intellectual-but-not-dorky cool, and Gosling will bring the less lame starlets the band’s way.
• Maggie Gyllenhaal directs … anybody she wants: Everything Maggie does is cool.