Sliding Down the Learning Curve

As conscious beings, we’re all on a Learning Curve. Always.

A Learning Curve, according to an amalgam of sources, is defined as, “The amount of learning and the time it takes to learn it.”

Some people arrange their lives in such a way as to avoid having to learn new processes; new job skills, to start over—and do so from scratch. In a society where a Liberal Arts degree is the default for all those incapable of adding Column A to Column B and or retaining three characters in an HTML code, we were taught said degree would make us more marketable, demonstrate our malleability, making us more enticing as a potential employee. We were not forewarned our “versatility” would also render us terribly, terribly expendable in the job force, nor prepare us for a state of perpetual adaptation-tumble.

I know a handful of people who’ve gone back to school (not unlike myself) on the State’s dime each and every time they were laid off or downsized out of a job and have done so MULTIPLE TIMES. It’s a veritable revolving door of New Worker Training.

But that is their experience, and this is about mine…and, anyway, I digress.

In 2005 I quit my job at Northwest Education Loan Association. I went back to school to study Graphic Design, and, in doing so; I started up the new slope of a Learning Curve. And, like little Sisyphus, I now find myself tumbling from its steepest incline, into the gully, where I right myself, listen to my knees pop, my back creak, and start back up the slope.

Graphic Designers in Seattle are not quite a dime a dozen, but they’re damn close. Granted, their job opportunities are not as slim as for, say, an actor or would-be acting teacher, but it is a career found within that same realm of the Liberal Arts, and tailored to be just as flimsy as far as any kind of corporate viability is concerned.

Upon completing the graphic design program I was hungry and eager for work, and nervous as hell I was simply re-inventing the wheel I’d forged with my MFA in Theatre. Where does a graphic designer look for work? Do you seek out corporate or design firms? Well…not if you’re fresh from a community college you don’t—but the school and your advisors are not going to tell you that. So, you sign up with every design placement agency in town. You build a physical and an on-line portfolio, and you network like a Black Gnat in estrus.

You also do potentially risky, if not stupid, things like applying for jobs on sites like Craigslist.

Craigslist; that domain of “self-policing” classified ads that’s nothing short of the lost island of THE LORD OF THE FLIES. The only way to police that site is to avoid it all together.

Case in point: Financial anxiety and desperation upon leaving school inspired me to respond to a Craigslist posting; CARTOONIST WANTED FOR NEW BUSINESS. Or something…the entrepreneur had a chain of businesses and was in the process of developing a web site and newsletter and he wanted someone to design a series of single or triple-panel cartoons to be featured therein. He liked my designs and suggested we meet.

The business was a massage parlor just off I-405 in Renton. Not massage therapist’s, but a massage parlor complete with bubbling hot tubs and steam rooms and dainty women of various Asian persuasion running about in short robes and doing a great deal of giggling.

Maybe I am naïve or maybe I prefer to give some folks the benefit of the doubt…or maybe it was pretty clear this chain of establishments were dyed-in-the-wool rub-and-tuggers and I simply didn’t care because I needed cash—and let’s face it, where there is vice, there is cash.

I met with the owner (who’s name escapes me at present) and we—no—I--tossed some ideas around. I came up with the notion of patterning the strip after Max Cannon’s RED MEAT. I always loved the stock-image, static, ink-stamp look of the RED MEAT strip and thought the minimalist approach was quite brilliant because of the time one obviously saves on new illustrations.

The owner gave me less-than-very-little with which to work as far as content was concerned. All he would suggest would be punch lines pertaining to, “Ahhhh- MY happy place…”

w.t.f??

I did up a series of characters based on his suggestions: “Cute Asian Girls.”

I drew up at least one strip, did a cost breakdown and invoiced him and was promptly blown off for the next month and the month after and the month after that. No money paid, no phone calls returned. I gave up.

That was back in October of 2007. This August I decided to do a little research into the doings of Red Dragon Spa—see if they had a website, see if they had an online newsletter and comic strips—I mean, maybe the owner simply didn’t like my designs and was uncomfortable telling me as much.

Instead, I found this…

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/371436_massage19.html?source=mypi

I guess I shouldn’t have been too surprised.
But am I really so dim?
Maybe. But I have to admit this bit of information; “…a registered sex offender is believed to have helped get a business license for the Renton parlor. In a license application, the sex offender, who was convicted of child rape in King County and now living in Kirkland, is listed as one of three contacts for the business, police and court documents say,” REALLY unnerved me, and moved me from feeling as though I’d been played the fool to downright angry.

Yes, maybe I am naive, but the giggling Asian girls and steamy atmosphere of the place were not lost on me--you can be a bit of a perv and still be a good person, right? Just because you’re a perv, doesn’t mean you’re bound to skip on your bills, does it?

Am I rationalizing, or am I feeling the long-term after effects of the bald-faced acceptance of people—the Benefit of the Doubt-- bestowed on me through years of internalizing the teachings of Sesame Street, Sid And Marty Krofft, and the ABC After-School Special?

I do know for certain I’m out about $300.

I’ve had other gigs for which I’ve applied to through Craigslist (not to mention the pursuit of available single women…god…don’t get me started down that path…or up that curve as the case may be) that have not been so spectacularly abysmal, but disappointing nonetheless. There was the potential gig with Pacific Coast Monuments in Everett, WA. They were looking for illustrators to design and typeset custom cemetery memorials and headstones. And as a friend pointed out I may want to think twice about the job as, “You’ll be dealing with so many sad and angry people…”

Geez, it like a wasn’t a mortician’s gig…besides, the job would pay almost $30.00 an hour, a wage I’ve never had in my life. I did a sample design to the Creative Director’s specs, landed an interview, and afterwards was asked to design a second, more detailed, memorial stone. This took about 5-6 hours, as the illustrations were more complex than the first. I never heard back—no, “Thanks but ‘No Thanks.’” Nothing.

That’s very typical of job-hunting in the metro-Seattle area, mind. No common courtesy just institutionalized apathy that borders on the passive-aggressive. All part of a cultural perspective, here, I have yet to understand.

Then someone advised me that I really shouldn’t be doing such extensive work as part of an interview…after all, what’s to keep the other party from using your work as their own..?

Crap.

I supposed I could do some kind of obit search for the stone(s) I designed, but I fear it would be more trouble than it was worth.

I no longer trust anything or anyone found on Craigslist.

So this was one of my first forays into the land of freelance design…this was one of my first efforts to climb a new Learning Curve. And if a Learning Curve is defined by the AMOUNT you learn and the TIME IT TAKES to learn it, I live in fear of not living long enough, as I need plenty of time to process.

Simplicity Is...

In the winter of 2001 I was flung into a new life. The attack on the World Trade Center was yet months away. I was a newly-made single man, living alone on the outskirts of a very big city with few to connect to and little to connect with. I worked a swing shift and commuted an hour by bus into downtown Seattle. The route home each evening was dreary and lonely, made all the more dreadful by the anticipation of even more dreary loneliness awaiting me at home. I didn’t care much for my life but I did struggle to improve it, and my perspective, as best I could, from scratch.

The one light during this time was the Internet, access to which, for the first time in my life, was all-my-own-alone.

Part of my efforts involved a great deal of thinking, thinking about the notion of Simplicity. Like Pirsig’s pursuit of Quality in ZEN AND THE ART OF MOTORCYCLE MAINTENANCE, I was seeking Simplicity. I imagine there wasn’t a great deal of difference in that which I was seeking to subsume and Pirsig, it was really just semantics. I thought a lot about how I could shape this new life of mine into something better, something stronger, but I had no one in my immediate airspace with whom to connect, to resonate.

Always seeking some level of connection, I polled all the folks on my email list, asking them to define for me, in their own terms, the notion of Simplicity.

Responses to my inquiry were fair to middling. After reading them over, I dropped them into a file in my yahoo mail account, and there they sat for over eight years. But they were never entirely forgotten. Some are so frighteningly profound they still evoke an intense emotional response in me even now. I believe the response so deep because I have the honor of knowing the person from whom it was formed.

In this age, information is the greatest of commodities, it is the stuff of our lives…but unlike material stuff we can accumulate and horde and squirrel away out of sight, digital information does not gather dust. Had it that capacity, I may just have taken the time to lug these responses into the light and “dust” them off sooner.

Such is life, when it is not as simple as one would wish.

I’m finally sharing these responses, and I’ll leave names in place until I am requested to do otherwise. It was sad to realize just how many of these folks have dropped from my radar, or vice versa. In retrospect, there is a dearth of responses here, something which surprised me in re-reading them after all of these years. Perhaps I don’t think and ask the same questions as my peers, perhaps I ask them too soon, or too late.

But it all, ultimately, begs the question; is my life any simpler now than it was then? I if say ‘yes,’ I fear I will be lying, and if I say, ‘no,’ I fear the response more negative than is factual. Not a particularly simple answer, now was it? But I will say that I am closer than I have ever been before because, frankly, I quit making it a conscious concern to pursue that which is Simple several years back. I believe now, instead of thinking, I began to work on doing…

…or I could just be blowing a lot of smoke.

It did occur to me that another such poll is in the offing; times have changed, the original respondents have changed…and now I keep this blog, and this is such and ideal filler.

Oh, and any insights you may wish to share are always welcome.

Please read on.

Simplicity is…

"Complexity that no longer worries. Peace of mind is simple, but it's reached through many worries first. Decide what you will do, don't rush the decision, and do it. If the course is wrong, lather, rinse, and repeat.

Consider that the elegance of Shaker furniture took a lot of consideration."
-Gene Ha


"Simplicity is the art of making the least possible more than enough."
-Professor Jack Watson

"Simplicity is.... an answer "yes" or "no".
Simplicity is...a lie of the "white" variety
Simplicity is...pantheism
Simplicity is...doing what feels right
Simplicity is...a shirt devoid of marketing
Simplicity is...a cirrus cloud at dusk"
-Douglas Hayko


"Simplicity:
Not letting what you THINK you want
Get in the way of what you really need."
-Rocco Lieuallen

"Simplicity: Trusting that God will guide me to glorify Him in all things I do. Anything else doesn't matter, really."
-Joseph Butler

"Simplicity…A lack of chaos and confusion (and my personal goal)."
-Susan Paige-Giberson

"Simplicity...
--Balance, as in the Tao
--Efficiency and elegance
--Occam's Razor"
-Kevin Smith

"Simplicity is
A striving for contentment, if you will, for what I have. Not a longing for things I don't have and don't need. Breaking down into something’s basic parts - what is needed?"
-Traci Smith

"The first thing that comes to my mind is the road that I live on. There are no lines on the road. There are only 3 farms on the road...2 dairy farms and my horse "ranch." It is the kind of road that if someone drives by, you stop what you are doing to wave. The majority of the traffic is from tractors. (Although if one vehicle goes by an hour it must be rush hour!) I don't lock my door, EVER! I leave my keys in my vehicles-and don't lock the doors-all the time, my vehicles are parked outside. It is a simple road; it makes part of my life simple, calm, serene and happy."
-Marsha Vine

"Uncomplicated, requiring few steps and not
difficult to follow. This word in particular brings to mind the Simplicity patterns for sewing, which are designed for anyone to use. You don't have to be a professional for it to come out correct."
-Laura Poor

"Explaining something so that a child could understand."
-Melissa McKee

"Simplicity is the opposite pole of complexity - it forms a dynamic balance and whole with complexity, the relaxation phase as counterpoise to the action phase. It is the inward breath - taking in preparation for the out-going breath - putting out."
-Thea Rowe

"Simplicity is the most basic and organic way in which to react to or create an idea or circumstance.

I will leave you with this on line answer, thus keeping it simple."
-Cynthia Bestemen

"Unadorned perfection."
-Sarah Engler-Young

"When I do not have to analyze something to find the meaning behind it."
-Courtney DiMartino

"Simplicity is bare-bones living. Easier and less fraught with worry than Complexity."
-Heather Ronai

"Freedom."
-Kelly Warren

"The absence of clutter. Literal and figurative."
-Rob Harriman

"Simplicity is sister to science, brother to function."
-Prof. John Schmor

The Shittiest Day in I Cannot Remember When...

In 1987 I came across this beautifully illustrated children's book written by Judith Viorst and illustrated by Ray Cruz called, "Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day." (ISBN-13: 978-068971173) I was 22 when I discovered the book. I do not recall how I came across it, but over the past 20 years, whenever a Cascade of Crumminess tumbles over my day, I see the cover of the book in my mind, and hear echoes of the first few lines of text, "I went to sleep with gum in my mouth and now there's gum in my hair and when I got out of bed this morning I tripped on the skateboard and by mistake I dropped my sweater in the sink while the water was running and I could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.."

This day was one of those Terrible, Horribles...

Imprimis:

I started out today researching an article on "green concessions" packaging for Boxoffice...then covered a shift at the computer lab for Denny (I dropped him at the airport Thursday for his return to Hawaii...poor bastard will be there until August).

A student asked for my feedback on his packing graphics for Design 6, I offered to show him my own from my on line portfolio. He looked at it and said, "Oh my God, when you're rich and famous can I PLEASE REDESIGN your website for you?" I didn't appreciate his tone. He later says to me, "You always seems so irritable." I mumble a mock compliment regarding his admirable lack of inhibition.

...he thinks I said, "ignition."

After my shift at the lab, I rush from Shoreline to First Hill for an American Radio Theater recording session. I remember to bring disc recordings of my audio play, WHEN THE WORLD SCREAMED, for any actors in the company who've not received their complimentary copies. One actor reads over the CD insert I've designed, looks over my graphics and adapter's notes, and immediately points out a type-o that no one over the last five months has caught, including me. The Artistic Director points out the inherent inconvenience of my design being that it's fourteen inches long. Evidently purchasing 11x17 size sheets of paper is a hardship for her. I feel she is insinuating I redesign the insert.

We rush through recording 80+ pages of transcript from the Artistic Director's latest project, NAMING NAMES which deals with the McCarthy Era Hollywood Blacklist. As per usual, we have no rehearsal, no read through, not even a discussion of the subject matter. As is often of late, I feel a creeping agitation over this lack of preparedness and how it just seems to compound the inconsistency of acting and directing experience in the group.

Near the second to the last page of the piece, a newer male member reads from a scene between an FBI agent and a blacklisted actor. The question pertains to the relationship the actor shares with his girlfriend. The FBI agent asks, "Did you perform 'coon-uh-ling-Goos' on your girlfriend?" I just about rip open a bowel trying to contain myself. I do my best to keep quiet. The digital disc is still recording.

This performer's wife is in the room. They're over 50.

Cunnilingus. Say it out loud--it sounds just like it looks, for god's sake. Sad. I guess he doesn't know what it looks like.

Earlier in the recording session, the Artistic Director attempted to deliver a line in Spanish and mangles it badly. I ask if I can give it a shot. I've barely mouthed two words, when another member of the group with not a fraction of my action experience (but prides himself on being a top-notch mimic) hovers over my shoulder, feeling obliged to coach me on my efforts at pronunciation. I've had two years of Spanish in high school, another two in college. I feel the heat rising, so I cup my hand over the mic and firmly say to the Mimic, "Thank you." He doesn't get my tone, and proceeds with his efforts to coach me. I ask him if he'd rather do it and I sit down. It takes him about 9 takes for a line of dialog made up of 6 words. He doesn't understand why I'm irritated.

Afterwards, Margery, in whose house we meet, insists I take home a Tupperware of some fresh fruit she has been storing. She's fearful it will spoil and (besides) the raspberberries will be coming in before summer's end, and she needs to make room. I accept, and stick the container in my bag. I forget about it. I have to drive the Mimic home. At some point in the evening, he hurt his voice while attempting to create as much vocal variety for each of his characters. He coughs dramatically, and speaks in a choked voice as though he's trying to hold a wad of mashed potatoes in the cleft below his uvula. It is the most quiet ride home I have ever shared with him. For a moment, I feel blessed.

I drop off the Mimic, and a few minutes later I pull into my apartment parking lot and see the OIL light on the dash has become a steady red glow. That's a bad sign, it means the well has hit bottom. I'm frustrated, I'm well aware this rattle-trap burns oil like no tomorrow, but I just added two quarts on Saturday afternoon. I get out and walk around the front of the car. Black runnels of oil drip over the grill and there is a fine patina of black ooze on the hood. For the second time since buying this car, I have neglected to properly seal the oil cap. I lift the hood and see the cap is long gone and everything underneath has been spattered in black ooze. I drop the hood and decide to deal with it first thing in the morning.

"oh, yes, there will be blood..."

I get into my apartment and set my shoulder bag on the kitchen counter. It leaves a wet smear when I shift it the right. I've forgotten about the Tupperware container of fruit. Liquid has poured all over the inside of the bag. My date Planner, Phone Book, Note pad, sketch book, small-scale portfolio, an issue of The Fortean Times, and two comic books are soaked and now ruined.

Its late but I disregard the neighbors and yell, "What else you got for me, huh? Come on, I KNOW you're just getting warmed up!" I yell to no one in particular, not even the cat.

I open up my email and see a message from the Golden Eyed Woman I took to see a play on Saturday night. We're very different, but think she's incredibly striking and more than just a wee bit intriguing. She writes, "My dad was a logger as well as an engineer. I have a predisposition for smart rough mechanic-types. These days I seem to specialize in male friends. Really sweet, good, dear ones, who I want to hug, and dance with, or do Tai Chi and Chi Gong with and joke a lot and am among the persons wondering why it isn't a romance. But it isn't. None of them really are. So I feel like saying, be my friend, but please, don't go getting romantical on me, okay?"

I hesitate in emailing her back with a link to the Wikipedia definition for "Fag Hag." However, I do spend a few vain moments trying to locate online resources for women of that particular inclination.

...and thank god I've finally met a woman with the good sense to admit outright that, YES, she's actually looking for nothing more than a replacement for her father. Because, Jesus-shit, I really wish the last five or six women I've dated had been capable of extending me that courtesy.

It's 2:30am on June 10th and my shittiest day in I cannot remember when is now two and a half hours over.
I hope.

Timeslip: Mary Ann Got Busted

Have you ever noticed that little button on your DVD remote that seems gadgetry’s equivalent to the appendix, that thing called Timeslip button? I have no freaking clue how to work it, but it has a use…I looked it up; Timeslip: The ability to playback and record at the same time.

That’s just great. But I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how to apply said definition. I thumbed through the manual, I looked on the internet, but each and every bulleted list of instructions was just about as counter-intuitive as…well, a VCR instruction manual.

But, god, the term is so very cool, and when you say the phrase, Timeslip, all kinds of cool science-fictional and fantastically speculative images tumble about in your mind…well, my mind, anyway.

Let’s play with the idea—Are we, as human beings, not subject to Timeslip? Sure. Think about the flesh-and-blood counterparts to the characters that populate our popular culture and personal myth. We all know beings that play back and forth in time through our consciousness…

If the above was just a bit too obtuse, please forgive me; I’m referring to actors. Specifically, those who devoted a greater part of their careers (if not their lives) to playing characters that, intentionally or not, became part of our interior audience, our personal chorus, our popular (if not personal myth).

Take, for example, Mary Ann Summers. As a pre-adolescent young male, I don’t think I even knew if she had a last name until I did a Google search this afternoon. As a matter of fact, I don’t think a great many of us knew she, nor any of the seven fellow-castaways of Gilligan’s Island had last names (or first names in some cases) because those details didn’t matter to us. She was just Mary Ann, when her name was uttered among my chums on the playground, they all knew to whom you referred. She was an icon, a crucial element, and a fixture in the pantheon. What really mattered, initially, was how Mary Ann and her compatriots made us feel—and they usually made us feel pretty good; they tickled our insides, they made us grin, but when the credits rolled at the episode’s close, we didn’t think much more on them until the next day the show aired; Timeslip. That is, until we (well, those like myself in the heterosexually inclined strata of the viewing audience) began to suffer the slow-creeping of hormonal change of preadolescence and Mary Ann’s presence became more persistent. She didn’t go away at the flip of the dial. Desire does not fade like the ancient glow from the cathode ray generator.

We had three potential objects of desire women in the Gilligan’s Island pantheon—well, two, really, as Mrs. Howell couldn’t possibly fit into the equation. Mrs. Howell was about as sexually appealing as Grandma, and sadly, for many of us, she was the equivalent surrogate.

Ginger was just too dangerous. Ginger was best defined by a term I learned a lifetime later, in college; Ginger was Sex on a Stick. Ginger was a train-wreck of glamour and neon-lit eroticism; she was glitter, she was tinsel and gold, and to a small-town boy like me, she was the absolute pinnacle of that which was unattainable. Ginger came with a hefty price tag. Not a price tag in a pejorative sense; I’m not talking hustler-ship or harlotry—I’m simply saying to woo her, wed her, and possibly bed her, you had to have a healthy pocket book to keep in Ginger Grant’s good graces.

Mary Ann’s character was brilliant in design; she was simple and just a little bit insidious. Obviously Mary Ann was constructed to be the Girl Next Door. She’s the gal you’re supposed want. She’s the gal you could bring home to Mom, because if you were to bring home Ginger, you may never be allowed through that door again. No, with Mary Ann you were given a rare combination of sincerity, simplicity, a touch of serenity and maybe, just maybe, a pinch of something spicy—something sexy, though you’d never actually call it that. And that was okay—for some reason it was okay to harbor these feelings for Mary Ann. Maybe it was the ponytails, maybe it was the plaid, the calico, the bobby socks, the maryjanes…because Mary Ann was an erotic safe-zone. You didn’t have to feel guilty for feeling something naughty about Mary Ann, and for that reason your gradual march into sexual awareness was softer, gentler, and when you thrummed with that first vibration of soft erotic tickle for Mary Ann it was something you were supposed to do. You wanted her, yet you felt a certain chaste protectiveness of her. In your mind’s eye, you never saw her in lascivious poses and you’d probably whither up and die to see her in a two-piece. No, Mary Ann, as a presence, was something to be protected, protected in the same safe place you kept those very early feelings, when the rough mechanics of sex began to take over and propel you toward adulthood.

And on October 18th, 2007, Dawn Wells was busted out in the toolies of Idaho for reckless driving and possession of drug paraphernalia.

“Mary Ann: Busted!” the headlines ran.

That really rattled me.

But the image attached to the police blotter brought home to us by CNN, MSN, and E! was not the winsome object of novice-love, but someone bearing closer resemblance to a certain melon-mugged and wizened Jedi master. And this, this moment, this is where we must step back from the flow of the Timeslip and shake ourselves a bit. Dawn Wells, actor, aged 69, founder of the Idaho Film and Television Institute and organizer of the region's annual family movie festival (known to all as the Spud Fest) was sentenced to five days in jail, fined $410.50 and placed on probation after pleading guilty to one count of reckless driving, was the one got busted—not Mary Ann Summers.

Mary Ann lives on a perfectly pleasant desert island, somewhere in the Pacific, with all those loveable characters. And she’ll exist, in the Timeslip, where we view, playback, and record her over and over again.

Dawn Wells will go on with her life, and hopefully not get busted for reckless driving, or drug paraphernalia because, you know, that’s not the best example to be setting for the youth of America.

Regarding (a Certain) Sunday...

Once upon a time I worked at this godawful customer service job at an equally godawful student loan guarantor. I worked nights, the only benefit being I usually had no sociopath supervisor staring over my shoulder. In between calls I had too much time to think, but just enough time to write. I wrote a whole series of biographical snippets...this was in the days before blogging was in vogue (at least, I think it was). Many of those witty little missives are long gone, held in the silicon grip of one or more of my former, virally corrupt, PCs.

This story has been in my yahoo email draft file for years. I passed it around to friends via email. Many of them laughed. It became a key element of a novel I have been working on (on and off, now mostly off) for the last 6 years. Funny, I have yet to reach this story's point in my novel.

Mary was a woman I met when I was a freshman in college at the Univeristy of Oregon. I was smitten beyond words. That was in 1985. In 2001, through the magic of the internet, I tracked Mary down. At the time she was living in Portland, but eventually moved to Seattle. We had coffee, we had a great talk, and she invited me to dinner.

I'll post the piece below

***************************************************************************

THIS IS A TRUE STORY.

So. I left my apartment at about 5:15pm to beat the traffic and the rain and make it to Mary's house by 6:00pm. I had downloaded the street directions from the internet and called to verify I had accurate directions. Needed finer details; her apartment was around the backside of a two-story house, brick with blue trim. Brick, with Blue Trim. Did I need to dodge dog poop? No, theres a path.

I made it to 83rd Ave North with time to spare. Raining VERY hard. I pulled up to house number 543 at 5:30pm. Way early. Best to sit tight. Breath deep. Have a smoke and listen to the rain. Did that, for 15 minutes. At 5:55pm I put my club on the Duck Truck steering wheel, slung my satchel bearing two bottles of whine over my shoulder, and hefted a cardboard box holding three freshly painted figurines (one for Mary, the other two to simply show-off) and marched up to the house. 543. It was white and the lights were out. I wandered up the driveway. Yeah. There's an apartment back there. But it is dark as well. Brick house, blue trim. I wondered if I had not had a moment of dislexia, inverted the house numbers. I pulled my phone book from my bag, water dripping off my baseball hat...No...It says 543...I wander down the street, looking for, perhaps 543...533...I see a medium sized dog standing in a driveway...533...Mary has a dog...Could THAT be it? I wander up the driveway, the dog barking at my heels.

I have a bag with two bottles of whine slug over my shoulder and a cardboard box with three sculpted and painted figurines in my arms. The next thing I know, the dog has leapt up and bitten into my right arm. Had I not been wearing my leather motorcycle jacket, the bite would have gone clean through and broken the skin. I keep moving and suddely realize I cannot move my leg...I am dragging a dog that has now locked it's jaws around my right calf. I look to my left, and mounted to a mail box post reads a sign...BEWARE OF DOG. Shit. Shit. Shit. I get back in the Duck Truck and start giggling like a madman. What the hell is this? Who is responsible? Is it HORNADAY LUCK? Is it ANDERSON LUCK? TURNER? CHENOWITH? Who is accountable for this freaking Sorry Pass?

Don't panic, Ace, shit happens.

It dawns on me I must call Mary. I do not even LOOK at my watch. I didn't bring any cash, not even a spare quarter. But I remember that my Mother, several months ago, in her infinite kindness and charitability and foresight gave me a calling card from Verizon with 30 free minutes. Please God, let it still be in my wallet. My leg is starting to throb. Do I feel blood dripping into my boot? Or is it just rainwater?

I pull out onto the main drag of Fremont Ave and find a payphone. I dig through old business cards and outdated coupons. There it IS. I dial her number,

"Uh. Hi. Mary. It's Me, um, I think I wrote your address down wrong...543?"
"Yes..."
"Um. North 83rd Avenue?"
"Oh. No, Cole, 84th..."
"urrrr. Okay. I'm Okay now. I'll be right there..."

Brick House, Blue Trim.
Brick House, Blue Trim.
Am I bleeding?

Brick House, Blue Trim and a little black dog-face peeking at me through the doggy-door. CHRIST ON A FUCKING CRUUUUUTTTTCCCCHHHH!!!

The dog barks, sniffs. I reach up and ring the bell, my arm still throbbing.

...and a pause in which all the Great Blue Whales of the Oceans give birth...And Mary opens the door into the dark and Claire, her Lab-And-Something mix rubs up against my leg and wags her tail and says, "Hello."

And I cannot TELL you how badly I had to pee.

I told Mary what happened. I re-introduced myself to her not as Cole Hornaday, but as the Crown Prince of Goobs. Nice to meet you.

We talked lots. I played "kick-the-ball" with Claire while Mary cooked and we finally got down to the nitty-gritty of swapping some stories. She made Salmon and rice with ochra and dessert was some sort of shortcake with peaches, flambe. And Mary was grateful because I got Claire tuckered out enough that she fell asleep at our feet while we ate..And we put away both the bottles of Reisling AND the Chardonnay and I got her to tell me more of her story and I freaked her out (again) with my stainless-steel memory because I recognized an antique globe in an alcove as being the same her Mother had had in the window of her living-room in Salem, circa 1987. And at about 10:30pm I said, "You look really beat, I'm gonna get out of your way."

And I said, "I have really enjoyed spending time with you and I hope you feel the same..." I made some suggestions.

"I will give you a call week after next."

And I got two hugs and I walked back into the night feeling just fine. Feeling like, "Yeah, I AM okay." And today I am really proud of who I am and who I represent and how I was raised and what I believe in and even if she doesn't feel the same way about me, which she most likely does not, that's okay too, Because I got more than I had ever hoped. I got to finally hear her story. I want to hear more chapters...But I also am wise enough to not be greedy. I made her laugh and I made her nodd her head at my insights and I did a good job. I gave her the deer sculpture I had made and I think she liked it. I did a good job of just being me.

This morning I found I was sporting a bruise the size of my nephew's fist on my left calf. No blood.

Brick House, Blue Trim.

THIS IS A TRUE STORY.
By cole hornaday, age 36.
the end.
***************************************************************************

Epiloque. 2006

Nothing really happened with Mary and I. We went out to dinner a few weeks later. She was distant and distracted. Clearly uncomfortable with what I was willing to pay for our meal. Several days later, she sent me a terse email saying, basically, "Thanks, but no thanks." That was okay. It wasn't entirely unexpected.

Making contact with her, again, was the equivalent of fantasy come to life, but the reality was, we really had very little in common. I don't know how I thought we ever did. I was young. Really young.

But one thing that has always kind of bothered me, and maybe this is all simply my ego at work; Mary had no recollection of me. She didn't remember the time we spent together in school, she didn't remember our talks over coffee, nothing. Even with my efforts to reach back in time, to find this woman again, she is now, as she was to me over 20 years ago, a mystery.

Sometimes mystery's never get solved. And that's okay.

I keep a picture of her framed on my bathroom wall. I look at it every day. It is there to remind me of some things, and to keep other things in perspective. And, sometimes, to simply remember to let go.

Addendum. May, 15, 2009

It was a hurried afternoon. I'd been out of town all weekend covering the McMinnville UFO Festival for a potential freelance project. My cat was sick and not eating. I was rushing around trying to catch up on all the things I didn't get done over the weekend, like buying canned cat food instead of dry in a desperate attempt to get her to eat. I stopped in at the QFC on Holman Drive on the way to several other errands. While pushing my cart past the check-out stands I saw a familiar flash of gold and blue.

"Naw. That couldn't be...she's long-gone from here. Grad school or some such."

I half-heartedly piloted the cart down the spice aisle, all the while taking delicate glances over my shoulder.

"Geez, girl, lift up your head from your pocket book so I can be sure..."

I decided not to bother. This was old ground that I'd passed from long ago. I finished my shopping and trundled into the checkout line. Good God if she wasn't still there. I looked her up and down. It was Mary. How old was she now? She looked amazing. And her frame was as lithe and compact as I remember. I tried not to stare. I was close enough to smell her. She didn't look up or see me.

Usually a steady stare laid on a person unbeknownst will kick in at least some kind of sixth sense and they will look up at you...not this time.

She rebuffed the bagboy's offer to help her out with her groceries and pushed her cart away. I heard her voice. I check the music against those engrams, deeply buried. It was the same. I numbly paid for groceries and let my eyes follow her out of the store.

While stuffing the sales receipt into my wallet I looked up to see her returning her cart.
What the hell. I'll head out that way and see if I don't intercept her. I did.

"Hi. Mary. Do you remember me this time?" There came that inevitable bland look someone gives you while there brain flips through file cabinets and dusty rollodex.

Pause. "Oh-YES! How are you..."
"Cole."
"Yes--Cole, I knew that..."

And we talked a little. She'd gone to graduate school in Switzerland. Switzerland--wow. And was now back at Harborview Medical working on AIDS research.

"Wasn't that what you were doing before? Or something like it?" No. It wasn't.

For some reason I felt I SHOULD have felt as though I'd put my foot in my mouth, but this time I did not.

She had problems fitting into the culture of Switzerland, felt out of place. I commented on how I discovered fitting in somewhere is not about the established culture's resistance to you, but your need to simply build yourself an island of like-minded people. When you're young, that takes little time at all because we are all so many blank slates and so very malleable. As adults it is a struggle and something I live with daily. But once you've built that island, you have to work very hard to keep it 'shored up.' Pun failed. Moving on.

She asked what I'd been up to and there I was unwashed, graying and portly--never expecting to ever see her again--I took a deep breath, found my light, my pitch of voice...and stopped myself. There never was nor ever would be a need to put on a show for this woman. There was no point.

The needles came down, the dials twisted counter clockwise.

I told her about quitting my job, going back to school, lucking in to becoming a professional writer, radio theatre, and my efforts to get involved with Seattle fringe theatre. I gave her my card saying, "You can visit my website to get an idea of what all I've been working on." And then I broke it off and said I needed to get moving.

But I did say that to her that I was probably happier now than I have been in a long time. I had to throw in the obligatory, "Granted, I live alone with my cat..." comment. I couldn't help it. I've got to create those Checkovian 'Laughter Through the Tears,' moments or I simply don't feel fulfilled.

She said, "It's good to see you, Cole. I'm so glad to hear you are doing well." Pleasant, clinical. She owes me nothing.

But her eyes are still that very spring-glacial blue and her hair is still of molten honey, and though I saw a little more age peering back from the wells of her eyes, I still cannot help but feel there is a pantheon out there missing a goddess.

But that's just me.

Interview: Marjane Satrapi

Hey All,
The work I did for the Boxoffice.com website has been archived within the site, but each time I brag about having interviewed So-And-So and I attempt to forward the link to the victim of said bragging, the link never works. I am dubious that my contributions will be preserved for posterity, so, at the risk of breaching some contract and facing legal repercussions, I'm going to cut and paste at least one of those previously published pieces here; my interview with Marjane Satrapi. I conducted this interview about a month prior to the release of Satrapi's film, PERSEPOLIS, in the states. A much, much longer version version exists on my hard drive, but I think this (heavily edited) version a much more enjoyable read...

So, enjoy already...

Marjane Satrapi

December 18, 2007

Illustrator and storyteller Marjane Satrapi has found an audience with young and old all over the world. She is a regular contributor to The New Yorker and The New York Times, and has produced such graphic works as Chicken with Plums and Embroideries; but it is Persepolis, her four-part series of illustrated biographical novels recounting her childhood in Iran during the rise of fundamentalist Islam, that has earned her international attention. Now an animated feature directed by Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud, Persepolis has garnered accolades from Toronto International, Telluride, and New York film festivals. Released through Sony Pictures, Persepolis arrives in New York and Los Angeles on Christmas Day.

Q: Where does the title “Persepolis,” come from?

MJ: Persepolis is the ancient capital of Persia. It is the name the Greeks gave to it. “Persepolis” in Greek means the city of the Iranian….It…helps people to not forget that this is a country with 4,000 years of history. Plus, its one word, its easy to remember—a beautiful word. When titles are too long, you never remember them. Once you hear the name “Persepolis,” you remember it.

Q: In reading Persepolis, one is struck by your parents very liberal intellectual depiction, especially against the dominant fundamentalist culture of the time…

MJ: You have liberal parents and crazy fanatic parents—you have them everywhere. I have a friend who lives in Salt Lake City. All of her neighbors are Mormon. Jesus Christ, thank God I was born in Iran and not in Salt Lake City with those kinds of parents, that would be just Hell.

I am much happier to have been born in Iran—a challenge though it was. But having the parents surrounding me that I had, unlike being born into these Born Again Christian families—I’m ten times happier. I am very happy to have not been born into a fanatical family. It doesn’t matter if you are born into the freest country in the world; if you are born into a fanatical family…if you are stuck with them in your childhood, you are stuck with them….

Q: Were people of your parent’s mindset very commonplace in Iran, or do you feel your parents were the exception to the rule?

MJ: I don’t know if I can say “common.” If I say that about the whole if Iran, it’s definitely not true, but I come from Tehran, and I came from a middle-class family and we had enough money to travel to Europe, to go to movies, etc—and not to have major problems….All of my friends had similar situations as my parents did; very educated, very open-minded,

Q: In your preface to Persepolis you characterize Iran as being a strong nation, a nation whose language and culture stood up to repeated invasions for centuries. And yet, the most detrimental alteration of that culture ultimately came not from without, but from within. Why was this?

MJ: Let’s remember there is 5,000 years of history here. The Persian Empire was the biggest in the world—ever—until that point in time. The first words of the world were written in this country, the first Federal System was established in this country. It is a strong identity that is there. But this condescension with which the western world looks upon this region of the world can be unbearable. Changes in a country, of course, have to come from within the country. From the second you say, “I will go and bring peace to this country,” from the second you invade this country you are an enemy of this country, whether you wanted to be or not. If you love your own country and you think it belongs to you, you need to remember other people share exactly the same feelings. So how is it that we can determine that pride for here is good, but the pride there is not? How can we determine if people in another place have great pride for their own country and that other people don’t have any pride?

In making Persepolis--if there was a goal to it as an artistic project—it was to show that a human being is a human being no matter where in the world they come from. I wanted to show what it was like to grow up in a place where the individual is repressed and what you do to grow up in that and what you do when it comes time to leave. For the living, it is not just enough to be alive, as individuals we need more. This is a story about things that have happened and are still happening and will continue to happen in many countries of the world. Once in a while those changes come from your government, once in a while it comes from your family, from your school friends, but that’s why some many people can identify with the story.

Q: In the latter half of Persepolis, your boyfriend, Markus’ character says, “ Culture and education are the lethal weapons against all kinds of fundamentalism,” and yet it was a group of Iranian student revolutionaries who seized the American Embassy in 1979, holding them captives for nearly three years…

MJ: You need to understand something--the Shah originally took power in Iran by a coup d’etat supported by the American government in 1953. Memories carry from one generation to another. Imagine that in 1951 we nationalize our oil, Egypt nationalizes the Suez Canal, and whole wave of democracy comes into this region. Suddenly this coup d’etat happened. President Truman didn’t want the coup, but it happened and after we didn’t have any trust for the American government. You have to understand that the secret service of the Shah was very much helped by the CIA—they kidnapped people and tortured them. So, the people are not very friendly toward the US government. When the hostage situation happened, it was a big deal for you, but for us not so much because these were not nice people to us. Also, let’s face it, nobody was killed and nobody was tortured. They spent 444 days there and then they came back to their country and that was it.

I grew up with the idea that Americans were the worst people in the world… because of what I was taught in school. But I come to America for the first time, looking for other reasons to hate them, and I got this slap in my face because they were all so fucking nice. During the last election—me, the Axis of Evil— here I am defending Americans in France, declaiming what was being said about Americans—Why? Because I know who Americans are, they are not pro war either, they are nice people and they want peace in the world. Why did I feel this way? Because I had been instructed to do so? No, it was because I went and I saw and I tried to understand who the American Person is…Being very much constricted by your ignorance is where the problem lies…I make an effort and make discoveries and suddenly things are not the way I thought.

If we understand that we have different points of view, how can we hate each other?

Q: In the publishing realm there does exist an effort to maintain a distinction between the graphic novel and the comic book, at least in the West. Case in point, Alan Moore (creator of V, For Vendetta, The Watchmen, and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen) has referred to comics as being predominantly superhero stories, or more precisely, “thirteen-year-old power fantasies.”

MJ: All of that is Comics. It’s just the medium of Comics and I like Comics. I always say that I am a cartoonist and I make comics. I have never said that I was a “Graphic Novelist.” What is a Graphic Novel…? “Graphic Novel,” is really a term that the publishers created to save the bourgeois from being scared or ashamed to read comics in front of their friends. I’m a cartoonist and I make comics and I don’t care for this “Graphic Novel” stuff.

Making comics is just a medium--it’s just an arrangement…It’s like animation, people ask, “Why did you make your movie an animated movie instead of using real people?” It was the choice that seemed the most logical. Animation, really, is not a style of storytelling, its not a genre, it’s a storytelling technique.

Q: Were there any particular challenges in seeking support for adapting Persepolis to film?

MJ: The biggest challenge for people…was getting them to understand that a comic book is not a storyboard for a movie. There was this initial feeling that if you are adapting Comics, all you have to do is take the book and film the frame one after the other and you have your movie, which is not true. A movie is a completely different narration and you don’t have the same relationship to it. They’re two different media and two different kinds of narration. We kept many of the main elements from the comics, like the characters, but a whole new framework around it had to be created. The two works, the book and the film, are very similar, but at the same time they are very, very different and that is the whole paradox of the project.


Q: In adapting Persepolis into an animated film, were there moments that stood out as being particularly challenging?

MJ: No, we really tried to proceed with the story and forget about the book. We just pulled the comics apart and started to develop the narration. If there was dialogue that would be good for the movie, we kept it—but just some of it—for the most part we had to recreate the whole thing.

Q: While watching Persepolis evolve into a feature-length film, did you make any new discoveries about your story?

MJ: Absolutely. In a book, for example, it’s very easy to cover sixteen years of someone’s life, but it’s not so easy in a movie because then you would have five movies in one. You have to choose an axis; you have to choose a turning point. When we began making the movie, I was in a very nostalgic time of my life, so we decided to structure the whole film a flashback. Setting it up this way is all part of the decisions you have to make for film but not for a book. In a book your audience can take their time, in a film, your time is limited.

Q: You made the conscious decision in 1994 to leave Iran indefinitely, and yet you still refer to it as “my country.”

MJ: Of course I do. It was not an actual decision. I can go back, the problem is, if I may leave once I go back—that is the question! Of course I see Iran as my country, but France is also my country. The situation is not exactly the way I want it to be, but it will never stop being my country.

Q: What is the one thing you hope your audience retains from viewing Persepolis?

MJ: That they find themselves saying, “These people are just like us.”

Wheeled Wonder Women: Producing and distributing Blood on the Flat Track: The Rise of the Rat City Rollergirls

**Below is the unpublished article written for boxoffice.com**

If you’ve been raised in this country with even a smidge of liberal education you’ve undoubtedly been subject to the ongoing struggle for women’s equality. Those with an even more extensive liberal background have even Majored in Women’s Studies, where one is frequently immersed in intensive essay, lecture, and testimonial inscribing the suffering brought on by the weight of a very male dominant culture bearing down upon the Feminine identity.

But attend one women’s Roller Derby bout, and all those essays, all those testimonials, and all that worrisome oppression becomes a distant memory, if not a questionable and foggy fantasy. Attend one Roller Derby bout and you may very well wind up fearing for the sanctity of your fragile, liberal-educated soul. And like most, you’ll ultimately find yourself reveling in the audacity of spirit, the ferocity of competition, and the raw, uninhibited theatricality of a spectator sport that, for nearly a generation, went into a strange dormancy and was all but forgotten by American Popular culture until a handful of outrageous women, some promoters, some punks, and some savvy business people came up with the notion of revitalizing the sport, hence the inspiration for the Leaky-Sleazewell Production’s recent documentary, Blood on the Flat Track: The Rise of the Rat City Rollergirls.

The rebirth of Women’s Roller Derby and, in particular, the emergence of the Pacific Northwest’s eminent league, The Rat City Rollergirls, has been as fast and as furious as the very nature of the game. So let us thank the gods of modern technology that as this new subculture bloomed, sprawled, and entrenched itself in popular consciousness, that several young documentary film makers had the means, the time, and the inspiration to detail the event from the inception.

“If you’ve ever seen Roller Derby and, especially, if you are someone interested in the spectacle of cinema—how would you not want to film this?” Lacy Leavitt, one half of the Leaky-Sleazewell Production’s duo, who with her co-director Lainy Bagwell, state they saw the potential of a powerful documentary subject within moments of viewing their first Rat City Rollergirl bout, “it’s so big and beautiful an sexy and funny. It was just obvious immediately to both of us that we had to make a film about this.”

But for all the above noted flamboyance of this fresh, new subculture, it is Leavitt and Bagwells’ delicate documentation of the leaguers’ individual stories that enhances the vitality of this community for the viewer, an aspect of Blood on the Flat Track of which many league fans were critical, but as Bagwell says, “You see these women and you figure they must all drink beer and kick ass and take heroin…but this film takes away all that because you get to know them and see what they do for a living and what their families think and the things they go through.”

With the same grit and vigor that so inspired their filmmaking, Leavitt and Bagwell set out two years ago to capture the evolution of this roller derby league with more than one facet to their agenda. Intent on keeping costs and crew to a three-person minimum, they shot, with the assistance of editor and videographer Wes Johnson, over 250 hours of footage with a production budget subsidized by two temp jobs resulting in a very tight, very dynamic 95 minute film. The filmmakers admit their funding was sporadic, “It came from our bank accounts. We worked temp jobs…the nice thing about doing a documentary about roller derby is that roller derby is not the girls’ full-time job; they’re playing and practicing on nights and weekends so we were there nights and weekends.”

Blood on the Flat Track premiered at the Seattle International Film Festival on June 15th, 2007. It was a gala event for the Seattle roller derby community; red carpets, chandelier earrings, shimmering, open-backed dresses revealing a whole tapestry of tattoos, flashbulbs and video cameras galore but sadly, no war paint. Granted, the premiere evening audience was ramped to unconditionally support the film, but even those not deeply indoctrinated into the roller girl community could not deny the documentary was an impressive piece of independent film. Since then, the film has made the rounds to at least eight film festivals nationwide and garnered positive reviews, and even though an independent film producer could not ask for a more eager viewing audience, firm distribution the film is still forthcoming.

“Through working with at IFP (Independent Feature Project) and Film Market,” Bagwell points out; “I’ve contacted several people…there are a couple (distributors) who’ve seen screeners who are interested. We’ve sent it out to some of the larger film industry festivals and are waiting to hear back. Of course, we’d love to have a small theatrical release or DVD release, but if not, we’ll do it ourselves…”

Indeed, not all independent filmmakers would have the luxury of tapping into such and eager and enthusiastic audience, the benefit of choosing such a dynamic community as the subject or your film. Says Leavitt, “Obviously any filmmaker would love to be in the position where they have several people banging on their door wanting to distribute their movie. The only real major concern is having to go with a distributor that’s going to try and sell as some schlocky sex-piece.”

Yet, unlike many other films, Blood On the Flat Track has a very unique fall-back position for distributing their film, “We have potential to tap over 200 leagues worldwide…,” says Bagwell, “You average over 70-80 girls to a league, 200 leagues—somebody in there knows somebody that runs a theater or who works in distribution…We get so many emails from derby leaguers wanting to know he the DVD will be done so they can sell it at their merch (merchandise) tables, but we wanted to wait and make sure we had exhausted all our options before we look into self release.” One wonders why these filmmakers would even hesitate to go directly for the roller derby attendee market, and bypass the whole gauntlet of conventional film distribution.

“The biggest challenge,” Bagwell confides, “is that we are up here in the Northwest without a lot of resources to be traveling down to LA or New York. I think if we were in LA right now, it would be a lot easier to get this done. Right now everything is over email and the phone, but I don’t think is anything that’s insurmountable.”

For updates on film festival screenings of Blood on the Flat Track: The Rise of the Rat City Roller Girls, please visit their website www.ratcitymovie.com.

-Cole Hornaday, January, 2008

Dangerous Women: The Kind to Bring Home to Mom

Hey All,

I don't know if I've blathered on quite enough about the high level of DIY documentary film being made in the Pacific Northwest of late. Its a dangerous breed of filmmaking, as all it takes is modicum of patience, an ounce of discipline, at least one video camera, a love of puzzles, and a sterling sense of vision.

As of last night I've seen three documentary films within the last year, produced in the Pacific Northwest that moved and rattled me beyond measure; PIRATE RADIO, USA, BLOOD ON THE FLAT TRACK, and GIRLS ROCK!

While writing for boxoffice.com I had the opportunity to pitch my own articles and not simply wait around for the editors to call me with an assignment. Being the champion of the undergod I feel obliged to to be, I sought every opportunity to promote two of the films listed above.

One article that was entirely aborted thanks to the editorial collapse of boxoffice.com was my coverage of the Leakey-Sleazewell production, BLOOD ON THE FLAT TRACK: The Rise of the Rat City Roller Girls. You can find out more about the film itself at the site below.

http://www.ratcitymovie.com/betasite/

I had the good fortune to have friends in common with the filmmakers, Lainy Bagwell and Lacey Leavitt, so convincing them to meet me for an interview was rather uncomplicated. My interview session with these two women was a peak moment for me, a peak moment of Seattle living; sitting in a faux-punk/cabaret club, drinking beers, talking with two brilliant, creative women about making their movie about Roller Derby chicks and their culture.

Man, it don't get much more "Seattle," than THAT.

I'll post the interview transcription below, with the intent of posting the actual article drawn from it at a later day.

Enjoy.

Interview, Lainy Bagwell, Lacey Leavitt
Writer/Director Team of BLOOD ON THE FLATTRACK: The Rise of the Rat City Roller Girls


Q: Tell us a little about your background(s) in documentary filmmaking. So, were you two AV Club Geeks high school?

Lainy Leavitt: I totally wasn’t (an AV Geek) I was a journalism student. I edited my school paper at Lake Stevens High School (just north of here). I’ve always been into writing. I wrote for the Everett Herald when I got out of high school. I always thought that I would go into journalism, but at a certain point in high school I realized films were more something that you could do—you could actually make films. I was like, “Why wouldn’t I want to do that, that’s a lot more fun and creative,” so I immediately set my sites on screen writing. I went to UW and did the cinema studies program but determine that I am just too bossy to let someone else take my script and do what they want to do with it. But I also wanted to direct. My mom had daycare kids in our basement and I got them together with a video camera and got them to do a re-enactment of A LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN which we still cannot find the VHS tape for…. it’s going to be an Easter Egg on one of my DVDs someday.

Oh—sort of a side note-- But while I was home for the holiday, my mother found these old Barbersol commercials I’d mocked up with Barbies when I was nine—remember those awful Barbersol commercials? Barbersol mated with Barbies, it was awful with my home phone number as the phone number to call.

After graduating I went to New York and worked on The Squid and the Whale. Seattle didn’t have a lot of film stuff going on so I decided I would just move to New York! I became assistant producer on The Squid and the Whale, I started working film festivals and I worked for the IFP New York, I’m on the board here in Seattle now, but I’d been working and then I went to Slamdance because I knew someone out in LA which where I met Lainy who was also from Seattle. I was living in LA by that point, but she was in Seattle. I had a couple of screenplays, but we kept in touch and I went back to New York and was working a documentary production company that was a really terrible experience because the guy was crazy and I hated it. So, I decided I would come back to Seattle for the summer and work on a documentary project. We decided to go check out the Rat City Roller girls and that’s kind of everything up until this point and how that all worked out.

Lacy Bagwell: I’d been a film fan since I was about 10 or 11 years old. Didn’t do anything in high school other than smoke a lot of pot and drink a lot of beer.

I was not in the AV Club; I was kind of a bad kid. My parents didn’t really know I was a bad kid because I hid it well.

After high school I didn’t really know what I wanted to do. All I knew is that I really like film, so I went to the video production program at Seattle Central Community College for two years and after that there just wasn’t a whole lot of work in Seattle so I went out and did a variety of other jobs, still thinking, in the back of my mind that this (film) is what I want to be doing at some point. I started working for film festivals; volunteer for SIFF for six or seven years and then got a job with them. I’ve worked for them, now, for five years and I knew the woman who was the director of the film festival at Slamdance because I had worked with her in Seattle. I went out to work with her in Park City and that’s how I met Lacy.

I didn’t work on any productions up to that time at all. I think I had this fear for a while that since I didn’t have a resume, who was going to take me? I don’t have any experience; really, all of my experience is old. I figured I might as well start from scratch, and start on my own, and come up with an idea and work with someone who has experience and knowledge and go from there…I just thought it would be easier to do something with someone else start from there and gain experience that way.

That’s really it. I PA’s on a film in the middle of working the Roller Girl film to get some knowledge on how film sets work. I didn’t get paid for it or anything…


Q: In reading your biographies, you mention you had begun work on a documentary on Meth addiction. That sounds like a very ambitious project for two new filmmakers.

LL: It would be a big thing. I still want to do it some day. I’m from Snohomish County and my dad used to work for the Granite Falls school district and I think at one time they were the number one Meth capitol of the whole of the United States. My aunt actually runs the anti-Meth coalition in the Ellensburg area so I had been talking with her. But I actually know someone from my hometown, my next-door neighbor’s son-in-law. I once had the biggest crush on him; totally attractive, totally good looking, had a wife and two beautiful kids, they were adorable, just like the perfect family, and he ended up getting a Meth addiction. It started out and he was doing cocaine and went to meth while he was doing construction jobs to stay awake. He wound up just completely throwing everything down the tubes and ended up in jail for armed robbery after he held someone up at knifepoint—a whole family up at knife point, actually, after he broke into their house.

I’d been talking to my neighbor and thought I would do this documentary over the summer. That turned out to be a much more ambitious project. We actually did one interview with the police chief at Lake Stevens and with the wife. That was intense. Of course they are friends of the family so that was very intense—I also have some cousins who are meth-addicted-- I want to do it at some point but it’s pretty big.

So, then I figured I was just there for the summer we’ll just shoot the Roller Girls and we’ll be done in three months. I figured I’d just stay until the end of the season, and by that time we’d just begun to learn about what was going on so then we decided to wait until the end of next season and so on and here we are two years later. I’m still here.


Q: What drew you to this particular project?

LL: We brought Lainy’s camera to the first bought we ever went to—I’d been back in Seattle for a week and I heard about the Rat City Roller girls least three times within the week I was back. We were turned on to the idea of doing a film about them so we decided to bring a camera to our first bought and see what happens. If you’ve seen Roller Derby and, especially if you are someone interested in the spectacle of the cinema—how would you not want to film this, its so big and beautiful and sexy and funny—it was just obvious, immediately, to both of us, that we had to make a film about this.


Q: As a duo, how did you negotiate a single vision that was going to go into the film?

LL: Man, if we’d only done Deal Memos back in the day.

LB: Loaded Question.

LL: Being a writer I loved documentary filmmaking, but never had any idea I would go into documentary filmmaking. Going into the second season we talked a lot and we had a pretty clear idea of what we thought the story should, what we wanted to show people about the league. We used some footage from that first year, but it was only after being around the girls for so long that we could put together the parts that we wanted to show. There are so many girls that we wanted to show that aren’t in the movie because there were just too many amazing personalities. Going through and strategically looking at each of the teams, looking at the relationships this makes the most sense to show this part of the league and that relationship makes the most sense to show that part of the league. Eventually it ended up that we were in the culture for a long time and we came to a decision on what we wanted to do.

LB: I think even more of it came out toward the end after we’d shot everything. After looking at all of the interview footage we got a better idea of where we could go with this—its almost like the story kind of writes itself with the girls from what we got out of the interviews and the things that they do. A story can take a 180 degree turn depending on the situation.

LL: And along those lines, sometimes of the footage would inform the interviews. We’d seen something and asked them to talk about it or in an interview they’d sometimes they’d point out things that we never even noticed about the league or about a game. That turned out to be interesting too. We had a clear, but fairly nebulous idea but of course in documentary you’re kind of at the mercy of your subjects

Q: A great deal of time in this film is devoted to the players’ personal stories, in particular, their relationships to their partners in and outside the league, rather than the actual blood and guts aspects of the sport. What type of feedback did you get after the fact with regards to these choices?

LL: The majority of the feedback I’ve received has been that people really liked the amount of time we spent on the players. I’ve only heard two nay-sayers talk about how much time we didn’t devote to actual bouts and plan strategy—but they were the most hard-core derby fans they know a lot l about roller derby already and really get in to the strategy. You may not get it from our film and I don’t think you get it from watching just watching two bouts, but once you start to really pay attention to roller derby, the strategy is so amazing and actually very subtle. It’s a very subtle sport that is actually really funny when you are watching all that is going on, but there are actually some very subtle strategies going on. But the vast majority of people we talked to really like the amount of time we spent with the girls.

One of the reasons I wanted to spend so much time with these girls was when you think of roller derby, you automatically think they must all be crazy, they must be drunk, bartenders, barflies and aren’t doing anything else with their lives—just crazies—of course, there are some of those of those—but they’re lovely, too, it doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing. But there is just such a wide spectrum of women who are in roller derby and for us to have been involved in the league for so long we really wanted to capture that. We were as interested in the girls personally as we were in the stuff going and hoped that would translate to the audience.

LB: I think what we did was do away with a lot of the stereotypes. You see these women and you figure they must all drink beer and kick ass and take heroin or whatever. But this film takes away all that because you get to know them and see what they do for a living and what their families think and the things that they go through. I only heard one or two people complain about the bout stuff, and it was the same thing, it was people who were already derby fans. But we weren’t making a movie for derby fans we were making a movie for people who don’t know what its like to play derby and don’t know what these girls are going through. A lot of people had never even heard of roller derby who came to see the film, so they got an education at the same time. And it’s across the country, its everywhere, that’s the nice thing about it, you can go see it anywhere even outside of the country.


Q: Roller Derby went into a lull for several decades as a popular spectator sport. What’s your take on the process of reviving roller derby as a part of a subculture?

LB: I do know that what culture in which it has never lost its popularity is Japan. In Japan its men and women combined. They’ve been around constantly there’s never been a break for them. That’s the only place that I know of and I’ve done a little bit of digging. They started, again, in Texas in 2002.

Q: How long did principal photography take?

LB: We shot for two years and we shot a little over 250 hours of footage. We shot everything that the girls did—followed them around; we went to practices, we went to meetings, we went to the bouts, we went to the bar nights that they had—karaoke, everything that they did, that we could possibly go to, we went. We went out of town with them a couple different times. We shot every single thing that they did.

Q: Tell us about some of the unforeseen challenges in making this film?

LB: That we shot way more footage than we could ever use. There was a point where I’d tell Lacy, “We’ve got to go shoot this, and she’d be like, ‘Why?’” And there were time’s she’d say “We’ve got to go shoot this, and I would ask, ‘Why?” It was because we had enough footage and we needed to stop at some point. Finally we did, but there were so many things out of 250 hours and film was 95 minutes. Do you know how much crap I have at home and she has at home? We have a ton left over, and a lot we’ll use for the DVD. That was it for me—we shot a lot of really, really good stuff, but a lot of it we’ll never use. I guess the only other challenge would be that we really should have looked into raising some sort of funds before we got started.

LL: Just to ad to what Lainy said, I wanted to say that, toward the end, I was more about what I didn’t want to be shooting because I had an idea of what we were using and what we’re not going to be using and we’re not going to use that. So I had to ask, “Do we really want to be spending another $20 on tapes because I know we’re not going to use it.

One of the challenges for sure, when we first started out, we brought our cameras to our first bout-- we’d called ahead to make sure it was okay. We just show up saying, “Hey we’re two people who want to make a movie about you guys so you’re going to let us film everything you do, right?” And they were like, “No.”

In the beginning, especially, Darth Skater who was the head of media at the time, was very much, like, “Wait minute, who the heck are you people, what the heck is going on…” and was very concerned about what we were doing and what we were all about. The Roller Girl reality show has just come out and there was a lot of concern about just letting strangers film them all the time—“Look what they make those girls look like all of the time—we don’t want to look like that kind of thing.” But finally, by the end of the first season, we finally had won over enough trust, they knew who we were, they knew what we were about, they knew we totally respected their community, and the fact that we were women also really helped, by that time we had finally established enough of a trust that they invited us to a lot of the stuff too, certain teams more than others. We would get calls, “Hey, we’re doing this, do you want to come out?” “Yeah, thank God, we didn’t know about that,’ when in the beginning we would have been dying to know about those things.

Q: And how long do you think that took to get incorporated into their family?

LL: We started shooting in June of their very first season, so basically, half way through the first season. Four to five months? We were totally in by the second season.

LB: By the time we stared the second season, we were gold. And Darth Skater now is like our greatest advocate. She was the one person in the beginning who was most leery of us.

LL: She was just doing her job. We kind of got on just before the big media wave hit-- right when we came they started getting bombarded with media requests and photography requests, it was way too much and nobody could really discern what was going on. At the premiere we did a private screening for the girls before we showed it. It was in our contract with them. It went really well. Darth Skater came up on the stage and said, “I’ve just got to say that I gave these girls so much shit in the beginning and look what they’ve done –they’ve done such a great job!” It was sort of the perfect little bow to tie up the package at the end of the story.

Q: Where did you get your financing?

LL: It came from out bank accounts. We worked temp jobs. The nice thing about doing a documentary about roller derby is that roller derby is not the girls’ full-time job. The girls are playing and practicing on nights and weekends so we were there nights and weekends. I worked on two films during the production as location manager here in town. But at a certain point I decided I couldn’t be spending 10-12 hours a day on someone else’s film because we needed to devote time to our own film. So, financing came from other crappy jobs.

My parents gave me a couple of bucks.

The nice thing was that Lainy owned a camera and our second cameraman, Wes, owned his camera. We had to rent green screens a couple of times for the credits, which was, like, $20 from a camera store. We have gurus, like my friend Joe who helped us out on all the post-production stuff. Otherwise we did everything else on Lainy’s computer or my computer.

LB: That’s the beauty of modern technology. DV Tapes are cheap.

LL: We’ve had three fundraisers so far where we had a bar night; we had two at the Funhouse, one at the Highway 99 Blues Club, the Socket Wenches Bar—one prior to completion and two after the fact. Really, the biggest cost for us has been in transferring it on to screeners, besides road-tripping down to Vegas or flying to Tuscon for the tournament.

Q: Did you consider the cut screened at SIFF to be the final version, or have their been cuts since that point in time?

LB: We’ve edited since then, but it was minor, very minor. We just fixed a couple of things. We had the sound redone, and maybe two or three little edits.

LL: When we did the last edit, or eyes were pretty blurry—we couldn’t see straight. We only finished editing it four days before we showed it and SIFF was like, “Alright, give us your tape NOW or we’re not showing your movie.” There was like one pause we thought was a little too long and two others that we shortened. Other than that it’s the same movie.


Q: How many festivals has the film traveled two thus far.

Both: Eight, so far.


Q: This film continues to make the rounds to film festivals, but how are you planning to distribute to the general public?

LB: Through working at the IFP and Film Market I’ve contacted several people through those organizations. There are a couple people who have seen the screeners who are interested. We’re obviously not too coy about handing out screeners because obviously we’ve had our premiere. Of course we would love to have a small theatrical release or DVD release, but if not, we’ll do it ourselves. We get so many emails from the derby leaguers wanting to know when the DVD will be done so they can sell it at their merch (merchandise) tables, but we wanted to wait and make sure we had exhausted all of our other options before we look into self release.

Q: That being said, is there a criteria you are following when it comes to shopping the film around to distributors?

LB: We’re just sending it out to film festivals right now. We sent it out to some of the larger film industry film festivals and waiting to hear back from them right now. The other scenario is that we have potential to tap is that there are over 200 leagues worldwide. You average 70-80 girls to a league—somebody in there knows somebody that runs a theater who works in distribution. I think we can get some kind of, at least, minor theatrical run.

LL: I’d say in terms of criteria, obviously any filmmaker would love to be in the position they have several people banging on their door wanting to distribute your movie and you can pick who wants to spend the most on P&A. But the only really major concern is that we wouldn’t go with a distributor that’s going to try and sell it as some schlocky sex-piece or something like that. Just as long as it’s not someone who would try to treat it like a B-Movie, and was someone who was willing to treat it well.

Q: What have been some of the biggest stumbling blocks in getting this film distributed and how did you overcome them?

LB: The biggest challenge is that we are up here in the Northwest without a lot of resources to be down in LA or to be in New York a lot. I think if we were in LA right now it would be a lot easier to get this done. Right now everything is over email and phone, but I don’t think its anything that’s insurmountable. There are so many documentaries about roller derby popping up.

LL: At this point we need to beat everyone to the punch.

LB: I don’t want this to be pegged as a regional film, that it’s just a Seattle film. I don’t think many realize that there is this awesome subculture of derby going around. I guess it’s about making sure people realize what big potential there is here. I think this film is very accessible to all sorts of people, just as roller derby is more accessible now to more fans than you think. The fans are pretty diverse, just look at how diverse are the fans in the movie.

Q: Where do you go from here?

LB: I’m producing a feature film featuring Aiden Quinn and Alicia Silverstone. I’m also writing a fictional script about roller derby and another comedy script as well. I think documentaries are great fun, but not really part of my skill set. I do want to got back to the Meth project some day.

LL: I have ideas on my brain and on paper, but nothing solid. I want to do a horror film. Totally 180 degrees.

An Interview with Margaret Avery

When I was but a lean and wan little punk, dreaming of being a professional actor, I knew from the get-go I didn't want to be a star. I wanted to be known, sure. I wanted to be respected and appreciated, sure. But I knew from observing at a cool distance that to be a celebrity was to submit to some form of self-imposed madness, if not torture.

No. I wanted to act, but preferred to conjure romantic fantasies of Shakespearian ensembles performing out of doors, to appreciative audiences in semi-rural Pacific Northwest, low-budget, Independent films that scored accolades at little film festivals at area wineries...

Honestly, I preferred the notion of the Working Actor, the Actor's Actor, that guy that never wanted for regular work, but who's presence fell just outside the scope of popular attention-- A good actor, a competant actor, an actor who was crucial to fleshing out the healthy body of an ensemble, but a guy who's role was no big deal and could wander in and out of the 7-11 after a case of Guinness without getting mobbed. I thought that sounded just about right, and I kept my eye out for actors I whose careers I thought rested upon a similar plane of professional success; Keith David, Brad Dourif, Clancy Brown. You may know their faces, or even their voices, but not their names--that is, unless you make it a conscious efforts, because the talk shows and tabloids are not and will not be burning their likeness into your brain.

Such an actor is Ms. Margaret Avery. Granted, her balloon went up above the herd in 1985 when she was nominated for an Academy Award Nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Shug in THE COLOR PURPLE, but not long after said balloon dropped below the eye-line once more. Ms. Avery never stopped working, and her contributions have been steady and strong. Ms. Avery has participated in a veritable spectrum film genres, and she has had the career I would have liked, had I grown up to be a real-live actor.

Below is an interview I conducted with Ms. Avery for the boxoffice website in January, 2008. Her most recent film, WELCOME HOME ROSCOE JENKINS, a comedy featuring Martin Lawrence, was set to release in February. Initially I was very frustrated in my efforts to successfully research Ms. Avery's career. I found lists, blurbs, and bullet points acknowledging her accomplishments, but no interviews with her on the internet. I was very excited, as this meant I may be the first to have the opportunity share her thoughts, insights, stories, and glories with the world wide web. Sadly, the editorial control of boxoffice.com went down the crapper shortly after I transcribed my interview with Ms. Avery.

I am posting the interview below, in the hopes that others will enjoy the incredible scope of experience in Ms. Avery's career as much as I.

On a more personal note, it wasn't until mere moments before I spoke with Ms. Avery on the phone that I discovered she'd been in one of my ALL TIME FAVORITE SF films, the public television adaptation of Ursula K. Le Guin's THE LATHE OF HEAVEN. I watched the film multiple times in high school, but was surprised to realize that I had not seen a re-broadcast for, well, decades.

POST INTERVIEW I discovered that THE LATHE OF HEAVEN was not only public television's most frequently requested film for re-broadcast, but the original prints had all been destroyed when PBS found they could not afford to renew copyright on the film. Why not? Because a key moment in Le Guin's story, and subsequently the film, featured a tune by THE BEATLES and we know how simply priceless a BEATLES tune has become in the marketplace of popular entertainment...

Yes, you can now find copies of THE LATHE OF HEAVEN on DVD (released in 2002) but, believe it or not, they are remastered the feature from the murky, tinny home video of a very devoted fan. A hallow, muzak-quality version of the original BEATLES tune now stand in place of the original tune.

In retrospect, I wish I'd spoken at greater length with her about THE LATHE OF HEAVEN past her passing comments...but such is life.

Anyway--enjoy.


Interview: Margaret Avery
Interview, 1.10.2008
Cole Hornaday


Q: You have an amazing resume that covers a breadth of experience that expands not only several different eras of filmmaking but eras of cultural transition as well…

A: The work I’ve done goes back quite some time, because when I look back I realize there are many people that are no longer with us. I think, “Oh my god, I’ve been at this a long time…”

Q: It is often heard that actors consider themselves a “success” as long as they’re working. Do you share this sentiment?

A: Its interesting you as that because when people say, “Oh, you’re an actor,” I say, “Yeah, when I’m working…” But, in another sense, Acting is something you’re doing all the time—You’re always observing people—as the actor. Sometimes you’ll meet interesting people and you’ll think, “I’ve got to use that in a role.” We sometimes—particularly as we get older, we’re doing more character work…somebody’s laugh or the way they look at you when they’re in doubt—its good stuff and its real stuff and if you can incorporate that into an interesting character its very enriching.

Q: Anymore, in this country, a highly successful actor has become the equivalent of royalty and the barometer to that level of success seems to be the level of harassment they receive from the paparazzi. That being said, what denotes a successful acting career in your eyes?

A: I think of the paparazzi as a nuisance myself. You think of people like Michael Jackson—some of the real icons—they cannot go anywhere without being bombarded by people. There is absolutely no privacy. I can see how they would wish to live in isolation. And money-wise, if you use that as an indication of success obviously they’ve got it, but who would want to live they way that they live. I like being around people, but I know that when we were shooting The Color Purple, if Michael (Jackson) was to visit the set we were all excited to meet him because he was very much involved with Quincy Jones at that time on several projects together. Before long word got around that he could not come because it would be too much of a disruption to the set, people are going to be following him and we thought, “That’s too bad.” Also, Whoopi Goldburg had just done her one-woman show for HBO, and I didn’t realize she had become so popular. We went to a concert for Patti LaBelle and Steven (Spielburg) insisted that she take his bodyguards because he wasn’t going to be in town for that weekend. Whoopi insisted; “Oh no I’m not going to need any body guards!” Well, we’re settling in for the concert, waiting for it to begin, and somebody discovered that she was in the audience, and this was before she had the notoriety that she has now—Oh my God—its seemed like the whole arena just came down on us—this mob that was just frightening to see come. Those experienced bodyguards just whisked her out of that area.

I’ve also had the experience when we went to screen The Color Purple in Alice Walker’s hometown, we were walking into the theater and there were all these people behind the ropes. I was walking a little too close to the ropes and some woman just grabbed my clothing, trying to rip it off me. I’m sure she was doing it to get a souvenir, but when you have this whole crowd of screaming people it can easily get out of hand because it can start feeding into the excitement of, maybe, somebody who wasn’t excited in the beginning but is now following along with the crowd—its like a riot. That’s very scary. So, would I like to have that happening to me all the time? No.

Q: There is a transition for some actors where acting goes from being your job to a livelihood to a Way of Life…

A: I would imagine that’s part of the upside or downside of you career choices. Everything has its upside and downside. People ask, “Don’t you get tired of people always referring to you as Shug?” The Color Purple was twenty-one years ago, and that’s a compliment. In one sense you ask, is that the only thing I’ve ever done? Well, no I was films and television for twenty years before The Color Purple and now its twenty years later, and I’ve still been working, but people remember me as Shug and I’ve come to accept that if that’s what they love about me then that’s okay, that’s a blessing. There are some many, many fine actors and people never remember them. I still get work because of being Shug (laughs). You accept what is, and just not let it get out of hand as far as letting it interfere with your personal life and know who you really are.

Q: You worked steadily during that period of cinema history we now call Blacksploitaion filmmaking…

A: Absolutely, I started out in that ear and was happy to get those films. It was like the beginning for black actors to work on film.

Q: We know that titles, or labels, for an era or time-period is a retroactive process, did you or your peer attribute a title to the type of films your were making at the time?

A: No, we were all glad for the opportunity to work. We were mostly experienced actors from theater. A lot of the actors were trained in New York. Myself, I’m a West Coast person and my training came from San Francisco and a lot of Free Theater in Los Angeles, though I did have a little training in New York. So, by the time we had the opportunity to do these films, we were trained actors first.

Q: Therefore, when you were working in this area of film, did you ever have a moment when you felt what the films called for was beneath you?

A: I think nudity was something I didn’t care to do. And at that time there wasn’t a lot of vulgarity as far as language—I think that just started within the last fifteen years. There was one incident where they were using a bible in the scene and I didn’t appreciate that and I did make a comment to the director and he said something like, “Oh, don’t be so prudish…” But I take religion seriously and I don’t think it should be integrated with entertainment all of the time.

Q: Tell us a little bit your acting background?

A: My mother, who was a hard-working, yet uneducated woman--she, when I was a child instilled in me that education was the most important thing. As a child I wanted to learn to dance and to sing and that to her was not acceptable, she felt; “Okay, we have enough black people dancing and singing and grinning—you need to be educated. It was always a priority that I go to college. In the 1960s women of color weren’t thinking about getting into corporate businesses or anything like that—black women—or all women, really, were looking at careers in teaching or nursing or social work. Those were basically the choices. So I chose Education.

My mom always told me, “Get your education first. No one can take that away from you...” So, I used that—I eventually did decide to go into acting, but I was substitute teaching during the day. I had four years of teaching experience before I decided to move to Los Angeles for film. I had taught first and second grade. That was one of the best things for me because it allowed me to work during he day as a substitute and then I did all these things at night in preparation for acting career—there was a lot of free theater, but you need money for your pictures and the acting classes, dance classes, voice training—its all very expensive. What else could I have done? I could have worked as a waitress, but that’s not always steady work either, and you’re depending on tips. At that time in the 60s and early 70s women of color didn’t have the same opportunities to work in the better restaurants and hotels as a waitress where you’re going to get more tips.

A lot of things have changed. I started out working about the time when credit cards were becoming common. At that time women couldn’t even get credit without a husband.

Once the Blacksploitation films started up, I was really ready. I had an agent at that time, they took me on, when they did sign me up, as a favor to a friend but they really didn’t think they would ever be able to cast me because Blacks weren’t on television, they weren’t in the movies other than Sydney Poitier and Cicely Tyson. Diane Carroll had a series but that was very rare. So when Black Exploitation films started up and it became Black Exploitation because we were exploited in the sense that it was the white producers, writers and directors getting the money and we were so anxious to work we didn’t quibble over not getting much money. Then they took the films and showed them in the black neighborhoods. So who was benefiting from the films? Yes, we were getting the experience, but you want to work for money too. That’s how exploitation started. As far as the films made today goes as long as people are being paid sufficiently then its not exploitation. If they’re not paying the actors or putting all the money in their pockets from the box office receipts or the video sales, then that’s exploitation—regardless of color—it’s the same thing.

Q: Coming up to the present, you appear in a new film, Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins?

A: Yes, and its definitely not an exploitation film. I think everyone got decent money on this one—I know I did.

Q: Tell us a little about your experience in this film…

A: It was awesome. I think the director sets the tone for the set and my hat’s off to Malcom Lee or director/writer/producer. He came around each morning and personally said, “Hello,” and asked how you were and it was genuine. If you had any anxiousness sitting in that make-up chair before going out in front of the camera, it was kind of a soothing thing that occurred. And it was not only with the actors, it was a genuine feeling on that set with the crew all the way down from lighting to the people who handled the catering. With the actors, I never felt there as any competition among us, it was a true, wonderful, ensemble group. We genuinely liked each other and were happy for someone to come into a scene and give it that cap line that it needed. And Malcom welcomed that in anyone’s ability. You know, looking at that cast, you have quite a few comedians; Mike Epps or Monique—we just rolled with them. The problem was that Malcom couldn’t get some of them to pick up a line at the same place—they were all so spontaneous—so at the end of the scene we’re all laughing and they all wondering, “What did I do?” Which is a little different from actors—James Earl Jones and I would just look at each other in awe and thing, “Is this not incredible what these young people can do?” Sure, we brought to it a little more stability of the “old school” acting, but I was very excited and impressed to hear people say that they had learned from me, to hear Martin Lawrence say, “Gee, I’ve learned so much from you Ms. Avery.” That made me feel really good.

Q: A film you did several years, that received quite a bit of critical response, but appears to have not been re-issued on DVD was the PBS adaptation of Ursula Le Guins’ The Lathe of Heaven…

A: Oh, yes—Well, I actually got a notice from the public television broadcasters seeking permission to broadcast it again. It was one of the first films I ever did as a leading lady, acting across from Bruce Davidson. I saw it late one night on television. I’d fallen asleep and woke up to the sound of my own voice coming from the television. I looked up and all I could think was, “My God, look how little my waist was!”

Q: The film has since been remade and broadcast on the Sci Fi Channel, but its unfortunate that the earlier version has not found a more permanent audience, as your work in it was quite significant and effective.

A: That’s the thing about film acting. When we’re acting on stage, we get immediate response from the audience. But on film you just never know what the response was because we don’t have the contact with the audience in the same way.

Q: You recently visited Ghanna and that brought up some valuable revelations and insights for you.

A: This was more of my own adventure. I initially thought I’d try to visit Acusla Busla who played Nettie in The Color Purple. I remembered her, a couple of years before, saying I should come and visit. Eventually I did get to hook up with her, but only by happenstance—communication didn’t work out, giving her prior notice—she didn’t know I would be arriving until I was actually there. But as far as my experience there was concerned, going to Ghanna, I just can’t explain it. To see where my ancestors were in the slave caves and those dungeons, to look out on the ocean where slave ships came in to get them was indescribable.

Q: Is this an experience you are planning to utilize in some way in performance or writing?

A: I don’t know-- that remains to be seen. But I certainly understand now, if inner strength or a sense of faith or hope—if its passed from generation to generation, I can understand how I’ve gotten my strength to survive the many obstacles in life that I have. Can you imagine trying to survive such a traumatic event in you life? Fifty percent or more of those people taken in to slavery died of disease or whatever.

You sometimes must look at your past, to see where you’ve come from in order to see where you’re going to go. And I understand that so much better now. The whole experience has made me a much better person. And if you yourself can become a better person and share that part of yourself with someone else and help them—that’s the other part of me, being a psychotherapist. You kind of begin to understand who you are and why you are the way you are by the path that you’ve traveled. As a counselor and psychotherapist I think that you have to try to get into another person and understand their struggle. To have a little bit of empathy and not push them faster than they can go.


End.

Awesome Lady.