Latest / The iAlign Podcast with Flint Mitchell / #7 - Documenting Change and Empowering Women With Film Producer Robin Hauser

Transcript

#7 - Documenting Change and Empowering Women With Film Producer Robin Hauser · The iAlign Podcast with Flint Mitchell

0:09
SPEAKER_02: What's up y'all?
0:10
SPEAKER_02: Welcome to Seeking Authenticity.
0:12
SPEAKER_02: My name is Flint Mitchell, and I get absolutely psyched by having conversations with authentic people that I admire about the things they value.
0:21
SPEAKER_02: Their stories and perspectives don't just make me smile, laugh, and think.
0:25
SPEAKER_02: They inspire me to wake up earlier, listen better, focus, and work harder, and help make me a better version of myself.
0:32
SPEAKER_02: And it's my hope that sharing these conversations through this podcast might do the same thing for you.
0:39
SPEAKER_02: In this episode, I talk with Robin Hauser, a documentary filmmaker.
0:43
SPEAKER_02: She has produced several widely known and impactful films, including Running for Gym, which follows a high school cross-country team as they vie for a state championship for their coach, who was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's disease earlier that season.
0:55
SPEAKER_02: And Code, Debugging the Gender Gap, which looks into the current gender disparities in technology.
1:01
SPEAKER_02: I've known Robin my entire life, being close friends with her and her family, and have been fortunate enough to have gone to screenings for several of her films.
1:08
SPEAKER_02: It was really a privilege not only to see these films, but also to listen to the question and answer panels afterwards and get her take in person.
1:16
SPEAKER_02: Robin is a really strong person who is trying to make an impact, and I respect that a great deal.
1:21
SPEAKER_02: She also has some TED Talks that are well worth a listen, and a new film in production right now, which I'm sure will be even better than the last.
1:28
SPEAKER_02: The links to those will be in the podcast description.
1:31
SPEAKER_02: In our conversation, we talk about how Robin got into the field of filmmaking, the learning curve associated with it, and some of her strategies for making a compelling argument.
1:40
SPEAKER_02: Likewise, she tells some powerful stories from her screenings around the world and about the reason behind her motivation to create these impactful documentaries.
1:48
SPEAKER_02: I really enjoyed listening to Robin, and I know you will too.
1:57
SPEAKER_00: You know, why aren't why aren't more women coding?
2:00
SPEAKER_00: Why aren't more people of color coding?
2:02
SPEAKER_00: But when you're making a non-scripted um nonfiction documentary, you have to be open to change.
2:10
SPEAKER_00: You have to be open to, you know, willing to pivot if something uh is different than how you thought it was going to be.
2:17
SPEAKER_00: We ended up, I mean, not only were we allowed on the track, but I was myself was sitting on top of the starting cage with my camera, shooting.
2:28
SPEAKER_00: There are times that I'll say, okay, I'm never doing this again.
2:30
SPEAKER_00: I mean, incredibly frustrating and hard.
2:33
SPEAKER_00: But there are also times that, you know, I know ultimately how rewarding it is when I can end up making the film and that I feel like it's actually having impact.
2:42
SPEAKER_00: And then at QA, a young woman, so maybe in her 30s, raised her hand and she said in broken English, she said, Um, I don't know about coding.
2:53
SPEAKER_00: I barely, I just have a computer, but I understand what it is to be a woman.
2:59
SPEAKER_00: And thank you for film because I feel special to be a woman now.
3:05
SPEAKER_00: I guess if I could just say it, if you if you want really want to do something, if you have a good idea um and you believe in it, then then you you gotta do it.
3:13
SPEAKER_00: You gotta do it because it it it it's if it lives in your head, it's not gonna get out there to impact people and to help people.
3:22
SPEAKER_02: Thank you for doing this with me, Robin.
3:24
SPEAKER_02: I really appreciate it.
3:25
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
3:26
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I've always admired your driven perspective.
3:30
SPEAKER_02: I think it's cool to watch you because you seem like someone who doesn't let others get in your way when you have something you're really passionate about and know is is right.
3:38
SPEAKER_02: And that perspective, paralleled with your clear desire to support and empower people, specifically women and minorities from your previous work, is is fantastic because it that's what drives change.
3:53
SPEAKER_02: Um, and I want to get on that.
3:55
SPEAKER_02: But the first question I'd like to ask, and the first thing I'm really curious to hear about, is your experience producing your first documentary running for Jim.
4:03
SPEAKER_02: I was wondering if you could tell me a bit about how the experience of seeing Holland's uh viral race finish and of Jim's disease, and seeing that as an opportunity both to raise awareness for Lou Gehrig's disease, but also kind of as uh a pivot point to jump into something new as a producer.
4:25
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so you know, I'd been a photographer for a long time, and I especially did a lot of photography around sports, um, primarily that sports that my kids were participating in in high school.
4:35
SPEAKER_00: It was a great way for me to sort of be around when they maybe didn't want me to be, right?
4:40
SPEAKER_00: Um so but the schools allowed me to be on the field and and be around to take pictures.
4:45
SPEAKER_00: So um it was a perfect win for me to to be able to be present.
4:49
SPEAKER_00: And and ultimately, of course, my kids did, you know, they they loved me being either at the race or on the lacrosse field or but um cross-country races I think are incredibly exciting.
5:00
SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, I really didn't ever think that I would end up uh making a film, and I don't think I'd recommend to anybody to try to make a film about their teenage daughter or that their teenage daughter is involved in.
5:12
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I was at this race.
5:15
SPEAKER_00: Um it was, let me see, I want to say fall of 2010.
5:20
SPEAKER_00: And um uh something kind of crazy happened, right?
5:25
SPEAKER_00: I mean, my my daughter was a cross-country runner, she was good.
5:29
SPEAKER_00: She was at least, you know, the first or second fastest on the team.
5:33
SPEAKER_00: And their team in general was fast and was good for Division V.
5:37
SPEAKER_00: And they had just learned that their coach who had Lugaric's disease, um, well, they just learned that he had Lugaric's disease, which is of course is a fatal disease.
5:46
SPEAKER_00: And um, I think in their mind as as juniors and she was a sophomore, I think, at the time, or no, yeah, sophomore at the time in the high school, uh, when they heard that he had the terminal terminal disease, I really think they thought that maybe, you know, he was gonna keel over tomorrow, for example.
6:02
SPEAKER_00: And um so they were doing anything and everything they could to win state the state championship for him.
6:09
SPEAKER_00: Um, and I think they put themselves really on the edge, all of them, the the entire team.
6:14
unknown: Right.
6:14
SPEAKER_00: Um Nike happened to be there at the race filming, and so I think just for your listeners, so they know my daughter um collapsed from overexertion.
6:23
SPEAKER_00: Uh, it's only a 3.1 mile race, but when you push yourself that hard and that fast, and she had also been suffering from a cold, and um, you know, it's easy to overexert at any distance if you push yourself to that point of exhaustion.
6:37
SPEAKER_00: So, anyway, um yeah, that she ended up collapsing and having to crawl across across the finish line, and um ultimately they did win uh the state championship division five for their coach.
6:50
SPEAKER_00: It was a really incredible moment, yeah.
6:52
SPEAKER_00: I I never thought that that I'd make a film about it at all then.
6:56
SPEAKER_00: Um I was approached by documentarians when it when it went viral, and I'm saying viral, like it was on it it was overseas, it was an Ireland, it was uh Super Bowl like motivation speech at halftime, right?
7:09
SPEAKER_00: Or something like that.
7:10
SPEAKER_00: Tom Coughlin from the New York, from the uh the New Yorkers, right?
7:14
SPEAKER_00: Wait, what were they called?
7:15
SPEAKER_00: The New York Giants.
7:16
SPEAKER_00: The Giants, yeah.
7:17
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.
7:18
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I mean it was incredibly motivating to see this young young woman, you know, crawl across the finish line rather than be touched or helped by anybody, so she didn't want to be disqualified.
7:27
SPEAKER_00: And yeah, um, as a mother, honestly, the only thing I saw thought at the time was I I was horrified.
7:33
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I was horrified.
7:35
SPEAKER_00: This was her junior year, colleges were looking at her.
7:38
SPEAKER_00: Uh, she obviously didn't do as well as she wanted to do at all.
7:42
SPEAKER_00: Um, when she collapsed, I was worried about her health, I was worried about her safety.
7:46
SPEAKER_00: So I was worried about the team, you know, it was it was a horrible stressful moment as a parent.
7:52
SPEAKER_00: Um, but ultimately I was approached by documentarians who wanted to make a film about this.
7:57
SPEAKER_00: ESPN also did a short um film about it.
8:00
SPEAKER_00: And so I was really reluctant.
8:02
SPEAKER_00: But when I realized that they were going to do it anyway, and I wanted to really protect my daughter and make sure that she and the rest of her team were personified the way they should be, the way they deserve to be.
8:15
SPEAKER_00: And really they looked at it as an opportunity that we could be raising awareness about Lou Gehrig's disease and about how even 75 years after Lou Gehrig died of this disease, there still was no cure.
8:28
SPEAKER_00: Um, and so I really that was, you're right, that was sort of my foray into the idea of um films that are cause-based or really trying to raise awareness um through documentary films.
8:42
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's wild.
8:43
SPEAKER_02: People, so people approached you in order to create the documentary.
8:48
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, there were other people that um that had had the idea to make a documentary and they came to me uh knowing that I had some, well, that my daughter was involved and that I was closely connected with the school and with the with the coach.
9:01
SPEAKER_00: Um so I joined them because I wanted to learn about documentary filmmaking.
9:05
SPEAKER_00: I'd I'd always, I as a photographer, I'd always been interested in in documentary filmmaking.
9:10
SPEAKER_00: Um, I never knew when that, I was like, someday I'll make a film, you know.
9:13
SPEAKER_00: Well, someday sort of landed in my lap.
9:15
SPEAKER_00: Um, and then I ended up taking the project over.
9:18
SPEAKER_00: So um I did, I was taught a lot by by one of the um directors that I started working with, and then ultimately um I took the project over on my own.
9:28
SPEAKER_00: And it was like going to film school.
9:32
SPEAKER_00: It's crazy.
9:33
SPEAKER_02: No, yeah.
9:35
SPEAKER_00: Ultimately rewarding.
9:36
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
9:37
SPEAKER_02: What at some point during that production then did you have the idea of, oh, this is fun.
9:43
SPEAKER_02: I should see if I can continue with this.
9:46
SPEAKER_00: You know, when I saw the light at the end of the tunnel and knew that I would raise the funds to make that film and actually complete the film, and then when it started getting into film festivals and I realized it wasn't just going to sit on the shelf of the, you know, athletic director's um office at the high school, um, yes, I was really incentivized to make another film and to do it sort of my way, to start from the beginning, to build my own team.
10:12
SPEAKER_00: Um, and and I was really excited about that.
10:14
SPEAKER_00: And and the second film was called Code Debugging the Gender Gap about the lack of diversity in tech, which again I thought was a film that would maybe touch people in Silicon Valley, maybe Silicon Alley.
10:26
SPEAKER_00: Uh that film's been to over 80 countries now.
10:28
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
10:29
SPEAKER_00: So crazy.
10:30
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
10:31
SPEAKER_02: So you had really no hint that in the back of your head when you're starting to produce the the Brilliant for Gym that this was going to be a new career, a new path.
10:43
SPEAKER_00: No, I I mean I didn't.
10:44
SPEAKER_00: I I I was excited to start something new.
10:47
SPEAKER_00: You know, I I hadn't been a super active um participant in the corporate world uh since I had gotten married and had my kids.
10:56
SPEAKER_00: And I was happy to to be able to you know spend a lot of time raising my kids, but I missed working.
11:01
SPEAKER_00: I really missed working.
11:02
SPEAKER_00: I I'd always wanted to be um you know productive.
11:06
SPEAKER_00: I think it's the it's the struggle that a lot of women go through wanting to be both um productive um in terms of of work and also raise your kids.
11:15
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, um I was excited to get back into the working world and you know I have my MBA, I've I've worked in the corporate world, and this of course is something can completely different than that.
11:25
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I loved it because it was business and creative.
11:29
SPEAKER_00: And so um I think that's probably why I love corporate, I love filmmaking as much as I do.
11:35
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
11:37
SPEAKER_02: What was the what were maybe the major learning curves you had in jumping into something that was super creative about kind of building something from scratch?
11:48
SPEAKER_00: Well, I mean the learning curves had to do with a lot, not just the fact that it was creative.
11:52
SPEAKER_00: I would say that um some of the things that I learned that were most important is you really need to look into carefully and build your team carefully.
11:59
SPEAKER_00: It's important to have you know as diverse a team as possible.
12:03
SPEAKER_00: Um it's uh it's important to make sure that you know who you're working with when you're working that carefully with people.
12:10
SPEAKER_00: So that was a a big lesson for me.
12:13
SPEAKER_00: Um I also think that understanding you know the end goal and um just absolutely believing in what you're doing, uh, especially because you know, along with filmmaking comes finding the money to support the film.
12:30
SPEAKER_00: I mean, if you're you have if you haven't have those sort of resources at your disposal, then that's not an issue.
12:37
SPEAKER_00: But for me, I really need to raise the money.
12:39
SPEAKER_00: And my films, you know, the first one I think cost me maybe, oh gosh, I don't know,$385,000.
12:46
SPEAKER_00: And then the budget for the second film was closer to$800,000.
12:50
SPEAKER_00: And the third film uh was you know over a million, and right now I'm trying to raise a million five.
12:56
SPEAKER_00: So and that's not just because I mean partly it's because production value needs to go up, but also once you have films under your belt, I think people really expect a certain amount of quality and production value from you.
13:10
SPEAKER_00: And um, I also learn more about it, and I want you know to get better and better as a filmmaker, so it costs money.
13:17
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
13:18
SPEAKER_02: Can you tell me a bit about then the process of selecting a team for for producing that documentary?
13:24
SPEAKER_02: How do you find out who's right?
13:27
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, I've been incredibly lucky because I've met people and I've had friends and then different contacts within the San Francisco um documentary film world who have been so generous with me with their knowledge and their time, their coaching.
13:42
SPEAKER_00: I really owe so much of um you know my filmmaking experience and success um to them because I knew I knew nothing.
13:52
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I came out of this from the perspective of having been in the business world, um, you know, having gone to business school and having been a photographer for many years.
14:03
SPEAKER_00: Um but I really didn't know a lot about documentary filmmaking.
14:07
SPEAKER_00: And I'm so grateful to have aligned myself with some of the best um producers, line producers, editors, um, and shooters, you know, in the Bay Area that that helped me make these films.
14:23
SPEAKER_00: So I couldn't have done it on my own.
14:24
SPEAKER_00: And I I think in order of like how do you actually select them, I think a lot of it has to do with um talking around and then meeting with people and trying to re see if you have the right vibe with that person.
14:35
SPEAKER_00: Um look at their work, see if it speaks to you.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: Um and then I as much as I love to work with the same people over and over because you build a team and you sort of trust them, it doesn't always work out that way.
14:47
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes people go on to different projects and then you want to start a new project and they might not be available.
14:52
SPEAKER_00: Um or you know, just something's not aligning, you know, in terms of their timing and your timing.
14:59
SPEAKER_00: So um I also try to keep my team as diverse as possible.
15:04
SPEAKER_00: Um, so that's something that I I'm it's not as diverse as I'd liked it to be.
15:09
SPEAKER_00: Um and that's something that I I continue to strive for.
15:13
SPEAKER_00: But I think diversity and perspective and backgrounds, all of that really just adds to the team, which I think is is also super important.
15:23
SPEAKER_02: It makes sense when you're producing something so large, you know, you're putting a million dollars into a project, you want to have the right team for it.
15:29
SPEAKER_02: But it sounds like a lot of upfront work to even put the team together to start the project.
15:35
SPEAKER_02: What I I would I'd be interested to hear if it was difficult then to kind of wrap your head around producing running for gym, um, when it sounds like you didn't have any prior experience.
15:48
SPEAKER_02: Were you just completely relying on your mentors?
15:50
SPEAKER_02: Or how'd you how'd you run into that kind of big project?
15:53
SPEAKER_00: You know, I I definitely started out by um relying on um a gentleman named David Brown, who was a very experienced documentarian um in the Bay Area, and he he brought me on and and you know taught me a lot about filmmaking.
16:10
SPEAKER_00: Um and then I just tapped into some of the skills that I think I I have, like uh you know, fundraising and networking, and um I relied on my um sort of creative sense and in order to storytell.
16:26
SPEAKER_00: Um I also think that I look deeply into research in terms of um you know this disease, um, ALS and what's important to tell.
16:37
SPEAKER_00: So um yeah, I learned a lot um about just the sort of the, you know, where do you start and where do you move to next in terms of documentary filmmaking?
16:47
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
16:48
SPEAKER_00: But I also I it was really fun for me to learn as I as I went along.
16:53
SPEAKER_00: And um again, you know, I talked with a lot of people, met with a lot of people.
16:56
SPEAKER_00: Uh Jamie Redford was was a mentor and somebody who I highly respect as a filmmaker.
17:02
SPEAKER_00: Um, and uh you're probably too young to know who that is, but yeah.
17:06
SPEAKER_00: So Robert Redford is a famous uh actor, and this is his son.
17:11
SPEAKER_00: Um Jamie, regardless of his father's uh talent, uh Jamie is a very talented filmmaker and documentarian in the Bay Area, and he was extremely generous with his time and with his counsel.
17:23
SPEAKER_00: And uh yeah, yeah, it's really good.
17:27
SPEAKER_02: Then after you moved away for or finished running for gym, um, how did you decide what your next topic would be on?
17:36
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so um I was out for a run with a very good friend of mine who I went to college with and who had helped me.
17:43
SPEAKER_00: I she was looking to she had some extra time and wanted to get it back into to work.
17:48
SPEAKER_00: And so I um I brought her on board to help finish uh running for gym as as producer, uh Stacy Hartman.
17:55
SPEAKER_00: And so um we were brainstorming out on a run one day about what we can do um for the next film, what's a what's a pressing issue, but also super relevant and what will be, you know, it takes a year and a half, two years to make a film, so what will be a big issue?
18:09
SPEAKER_00: And her daughter was working in tech at the time.
18:11
SPEAKER_00: Uh her daughter was one of the first six uh people at Snapchat.
18:16
SPEAKER_00: And so we and I had begun to read in newspapers a lot about and articles about you know how important uh the skill of uh coding was and how many jobs there were for coders and and um the dearth of of coders in the United States.
18:33
SPEAKER_00: Um and so Stacy and I together decided that this would be a pretty cool subject for a film would be about wait a minute, why are they all men?
18:40
SPEAKER_00: Like if there are if there are so many open jobs, why is it that it's all white men?
18:46
SPEAKER_00: You know, so um and we were in, you know, people like to say, wow, you were so lucky with timing.
18:52
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I'd like to say it's more than luck, right?
18:54
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we really looked for a relevant subject that yeah, that that was forthcoming.
19:00
SPEAKER_00: And also, frankly, when you're restricted to budget, you think about well, where do we have access?
19:05
SPEAKER_00: And well, we're right here, pretty close to Silicon Valley, so we do have access.
19:09
SPEAKER_00: And we're women, so we understand what it's like to be on the minority side.
19:13
SPEAKER_00: Um, we're white women, so we don't know what it's like to be a person of color, but we can empathize and and understand.
19:19
SPEAKER_00: And more than anything, we're we're curious and we want to know, you know, why aren't why aren't more women coding?
19:25
SPEAKER_00: Why aren't more people of color coding?
19:27
SPEAKER_00: So that was that's how we got into that project.
19:30
SPEAKER_00: And um, you know, it turned out to be a pretty good and timely uh subject.
19:35
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, no, it's fascinating.
19:37
SPEAKER_02: It was once again that kind of upfront work of doing the research into what is really relevant right now, what do I kind of have a perspective on?
19:44
SPEAKER_02: And then how can I because it seems like the documentary process is really about, from what I'm hearing, further research.
19:53
SPEAKER_02: It's about doing a bunch of research on your own and really trying to fundamentally understand an issue in order to, right, when you can teach something, that means that you understand it.
20:02
SPEAKER_02: So it's trying to get to a level where you can teach it to other people.
20:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's a lot of research.
20:06
SPEAKER_00: It it also takes a lot of flexibility, right?
20:10
SPEAKER_00: So let's just say that you're if you're making a narrative film, meaning a scripted film, um, you pretty much sit down and write the script and then you and then you go out and shoot it.
20:21
SPEAKER_00: So you plan, you bring your actors in, you know exactly what you're gonna shoot on day one, day two, day three, you've got it scripted.
20:27
SPEAKER_00: But when you're making a non-scripted um nonfiction documentary, you have to be open to change.
20:34
SPEAKER_00: You have to be open to, you know, willing to pivot if something uh is different than how you thought it was gonna be, right?
20:42
SPEAKER_00: So you can write sort of a rough outline, you you write a treatment, but but then ultimately you learn um something that isn't necessarily true that you thought would be true, or um, or you can't get one of the main subjects you were hoping to get, or um you know, something changes.
20:59
SPEAKER_00: If you're following a character, that character's life might suddenly change and pivot.
21:02
SPEAKER_00: And so you have to be willing to adapt.
21:04
SPEAKER_02: Do you have any examples of times that's happened in your work when you were doing something maybe with a like in your head you were going a certain direction, and then the the subject just had to pivot?
21:14
SPEAKER_00: Well, it's happened quite a bit with COVID, as you can imagine.
21:17
SPEAKER_00: So we were subject, um well, I was all lined up.
21:21
SPEAKER_00: We weren't gonna film too much in March, but um starting in April and May, we were lined up with seven different shoots.
21:28
SPEAKER_00: And some of them involved um people, this was for my current project called Savvy, and we had people booked who were gonna be teaching in schools.
21:37
SPEAKER_00: Um, we had you know permission from the classroom teachers to be to be filming.
21:41
SPEAKER_00: Um, we had scenes that involved being in New York City and people's apartments, and um everything changed.
21:50
SPEAKER_00: So in some cases it's just delayed, and we're still hoping to be able to film that, but in other cases we've had to completely drop characters.
21:57
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
21:57
SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, nobody's shooting in schools anymore.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: Because there are no schools, right?
22:01
SPEAKER_00: Schools completely shut down until the fall.
22:04
SPEAKER_00: And if we'll be way off schedule if we wait until fall to film those.
22:07
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, we've had to be really flexible and come up with other creative ideas.
22:13
SPEAKER_00: And okay, if if this person can't be in the film, then who can?
22:16
SPEAKER_00: And um it's easy to make a talking head documentary, right?
22:20
SPEAKER_00: Just a bunch of experts telling you how it is.
22:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
22:24
SPEAKER_00: It's a lot more challenging to find scenes that have action in them, scenes that um, you know, are verite or are actually like something's happening.
22:34
SPEAKER_00: And uh I think that's obviously ultimately what people want to watch.
22:39
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
22:39
SPEAKER_02: So no, I've never thought about it that way.
22:42
SPEAKER_02: It makes sense, right?
22:43
SPEAKER_02: There are plenty of academics you could email and they want to sit in a chair and talk for as long as you want them to on their profession or their or their their niche of study, but it's more about, I mean, that's definitely relevant.
22:55
SPEAKER_02: You need the expertise, but it's more about creating or finding action.
23:01
SPEAKER_02: It's not about creating it because it's that's documentary.
23:03
SPEAKER_02: How do you do that then?
23:05
SPEAKER_02: What is the process of trying to find active elements of the film?
23:08
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, again, it's a lot of research.
23:10
SPEAKER_00: So I rely on my producers.
23:12
SPEAKER_00: Um, and you know, on my uh just I read, I put a Google alert on women and money, women finance, um, you know, wealth gap, uh any sort of buzzwords that that pop up.
23:25
SPEAKER_00: And so I get every morning I get a slew of emails about different articles that have been written.
23:30
SPEAKER_00: Um and uh so I do a lot of reading.
23:32
SPEAKER_00: And when I read this interesting story about somebody who maybe has started a an investment club or someone who's doing really cool stuff to teach um, you know, kids in um marginalized areas um about finance, you know, I I I researched that and then I do a lot more research about that person, and then I contact them and and see if they might be the right fit for the for the film.
23:57
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's wild.
24:00
SPEAKER_02: It's so much more active, really, than I than I pictured it.
24:04
SPEAKER_02: Um I guess maybe because the majority of documentaries I watch are nature documentaries, and those are pretty scripted.
24:10
SPEAKER_02: Um but it's it's really wild how it it really parallels the the research process of of any any type of research.
24:20
SPEAKER_02: I was doing scientific research for a while and there's always pivot points, but it's cool to see that in another context of where you're actively filming something and it has to shift because that's what's happening, like right?
24:32
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
24:32
SPEAKER_00: Well, so here's an interesting example.
24:34
SPEAKER_00: Um Icarus, for example.
24:37
SPEAKER_00: That, you know, Icarus is a documentary that that won, right?
24:41
SPEAKER_00: That won a um it did, I think it won an Oscar.
24:46
SPEAKER_00: Um, and you know, he started out to just kind of see what it would be like if he started doping and and how he would be, you know, if his cycling would change.
24:54
SPEAKER_00: Um, and he decided to contact one of the people that he understood was one of the best, um, you know, somebody that that knew a lot about doping.
25:02
SPEAKER_00: And so he contacted, you know, the Russian coach and and or the Russian, I guess he was medic for the team.
25:08
SPEAKER_00: And then before you know it, I mean, I I know some of the producers he was working with, and suddenly he gets involved in this super spooky Russian kind of situation.
25:20
SPEAKER_00: Um, and he was like, Whoa, I thought this thing, what it would be like if I went for a ride after, you know, mixing a little.
25:27
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's a perfect example of how something completely changed for him.
25:33
SPEAKER_00: And that's really what made the film, right?
25:35
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's exactly what made the film so interesting.
25:38
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
25:39
SPEAKER_02: But what's and something that's really interesting about that is that inherently means that the message has to change too, sometimes.
25:47
SPEAKER_02: Like the message behind the film.
25:49
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it might, right.
25:50
SPEAKER_00: So the message could could change totally.
25:52
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I also think that it's really responsible for the the type of documentarian I've always wanted to be is I I try to be super fair.
26:03
SPEAKER_00: So let's just say that I'm um, if I believe that financial education should be in schools, and then I start interviewing somebody who's a money, a financial psychologist or a behavioral psychologist, and they start telling me in the interview, well, actually, it'll make absolutely no difference to have it in school because if it's not relevant information, then nobody's gonna retain it anyway, and it has to be practical.
26:28
SPEAKER_00: You know, there's something called confirmation bias.
26:30
SPEAKER_00: So do I do I include that?
26:33
SPEAKER_00: Is that an interesting perspective, or do I think, oh, that doesn't prove my point?
26:37
SPEAKER_00: So I try not to have a point to prove.
26:40
SPEAKER_00: I try to pick an issue that I think is interesting, and then I research and present the options to my audience and and they can decide, you know, for themselves.
26:51
SPEAKER_00: Obviously, you know, I am I am biased toward female empowerment, I'm biased toward, you know, certain things, but I will include the other perspective because I think it actually just makes your own, you know, argument stronger.
27:06
SPEAKER_00: But again, I I think it's important to say that I don't necessarily have my own argument.
27:11
SPEAKER_00: I just know that it's really important that women have financial independence.
27:15
SPEAKER_00: And so whatever you know type of perspective is out there about that, I should include.
27:23
SPEAKER_02: Why does having that opposing point of view make your argument more powerful?
27:28
SPEAKER_00: Well, again, I want to be careful to say that.
27:30
SPEAKER_00: And I did, those are my words.
27:31
SPEAKER_00: I did say my argument, and I and I think it's important to say that I don't have necessarily, I shouldn't, as a as a subjective and objective, you know, documentarian.
27:44
SPEAKER_00: Uh, there are documentarians out there, Michael Moore is one, that that has you know their argument and they want to prove their point, and that's fine.
27:51
SPEAKER_00: That's that he's obviously a very gifted uh filmmaker.
27:56
SPEAKER_00: I think it's important.
27:57
SPEAKER_00: My my goal is more to let the audience decide for themselves, and I just present them with um experts that I think have valuable things to say on the subject.
28:08
SPEAKER_00: Right.
28:10
SPEAKER_00: I do think providing the Connor, so this is what I try to do.
28:14
SPEAKER_00: I try to always sit in the in the seat of one of my movie goers and think about if I were super skeptical, what would I be saying to all of this?
28:25
SPEAKER_00: So would I sit there and think, wait a minute, wait a minute, okay, well, there's a reason that there aren't as many women coders as male coders, men coders, because women's brains don't work that way, right?
28:38
SPEAKER_00: So I think, okay, I'm gonna go out and talk to a brain scientist and I'm gonna see what the brain scientist says about it.
28:44
SPEAKER_00: Because then the people that have that thought in the audience, I'm gonna answer their question.
28:49
SPEAKER_00: So I got a male, uh actually I found a female brain scientist at Stanford.
28:55
SPEAKER_00: That was the easiest.
28:56
SPEAKER_00: She was close by, right?
28:57
SPEAKER_00: Um, and then I thought, oh no, well, they're gonna be maybe people in the audience that think, well, of course she's gonna say that she's female.
29:03
SPEAKER_00: You know, of course she's gonna say, no, women, there's no uh innate reason that women can't be as good at coding as men.
29:10
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
29:10
SPEAKER_00: So I thought, well, now maybe I need to get a male um, you know, uh brain scientist to tell me his perspective.
29:17
SPEAKER_00: So I mean, I I think that that's just important to, you know, you could go overboard that way too, but I think that if you can answer any question that the audience has, it's gonna make a more thorough and probably convincing film, right?
29:38
SPEAKER_00: Because it's not seeming because you're not as slanted, you're not just presenting one view.
29:43
SPEAKER_00: And to acknowledge is the same thing if you're discussing with somebody.
29:46
SPEAKER_00: If you say to them, look, I understand that um, you know, I understand that you don't want uh scum to grow in the lagoon, and I understand that it's you know that presents different problems.
29:58
SPEAKER_00: However, I'm not sure I want to put you know herbicide in there because I'm worried about what it might do to my kids.
30:06
SPEAKER_00: Right.
30:06
SPEAKER_00: I mean, just trying to at least acknowledge the other side of it.
30:09
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, no, it's in it's I really like that perspective, it's true, right?
30:14
SPEAKER_02: When a person is willing to show the other argument, you're as a skeptic, you're probably more willing to think about what they have to say.
30:23
SPEAKER_02: Right?
30:24
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's important, and it's really important in documentary, it's important anything, especially with these very relevant topics.
30:32
SPEAKER_02: I mean, when we're talking about the coding or the any sort of gender gap, it's happening now, and so you need to convince people now or at least let them become aware of it.
30:42
SPEAKER_01: Right.
30:43
SPEAKER_02: Um shifting a bit, how has the experience been then delivering these creative projects and and seeing your work be received?
30:56
SPEAKER_02: Is that a cool experience?
30:58
SPEAKER_02: Is it is it nerve-wracking?
31:01
SPEAKER_00: Oh, well, it's both.
31:03
SPEAKER_00: The first time uh that I show any film to a public audience, yeah, it's incredibly nerve-wracking.
31:11
SPEAKER_00: You know, you're putting yourself out there.
31:12
SPEAKER_00: And in biased documentary, I was actually in it, right?
31:16
SPEAKER_00: So I and that was a big decision.
31:19
SPEAKER_00: That was a decision that I didn't that we made we were a third of the way through making the film before we came up with that decision.
31:26
SPEAKER_00: So um I didn't set out ever to say that I was gonna be in the film, but I'm a privileged white woman and I was making a film about bias, about unconscious bias, gender and racial bias, you know, predominantly.
31:39
SPEAKER_00: So who am I to tell that story unless I was willing to expose some of my biases?
31:44
SPEAKER_00: Um, and I, you know, jumped in to to put myself in.
31:48
SPEAKER_00: Now, we did do a test market, and so we had a sense of how the audience was going to react.
31:52
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, um, but you never really know.
31:55
SPEAKER_00: And so that that that first sort of premiere, or I'll tell you what, even the first time you gather your funders, so you gather your technology and you gather the people that have um given you money up front, corporate sponsors, and really stepped away.
32:10
SPEAKER_00: They don't have any any influence um on the creative aspects of the film.
32:16
SPEAKER_00: And so the first time you show it to them, you know, uh everyone thinking, I hope they like this, you know, I hope it's in line with, and generally I know that it's in line with their sure um initiatives, but uh yeah, it's nerve-wracking.
32:30
SPEAKER_00: It's also extraordinarily, you know, uh it's thrilling.
32:35
SPEAKER_00: I I even get that way where I'll set up a shoot, um, I'll do the interview, I'll film the B-roll, I'm there on set, right?
32:44
SPEAKER_00: And then the first time I actually see the footage, and especially if the editors put it together into a scene or with a little bit of music and it just comes alive, that's also incredibly f thrilling because I live a lot in my head and I see scenes that I want to make, and I see I have ideas about how it's gonna turn out.
33:03
SPEAKER_00: And when you first see it up on you know the screen, or you're actually seeing what you imagined, it's uh it's really exciting.
33:10
SPEAKER_02: Are there any scenes that where that's really happened where what was in your mind exactly was on the screen?
33:17
SPEAKER_00: Well, it's always a little bit different, right?
33:19
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, so in Running for Gym, um the coach talks about how um as a kid he got into running because his father worked at the racetracks.
33:29
SPEAKER_00: Uh-huh.
33:29
SPEAKER_00: And he um wanted to, you know, he and his brothers and sisters and some of the other kids from the the whose fathers worked at the stables um would go down once they finished and cleared the horses off, they would go down and actually run, pretend they were horses and party gates and run.
33:50
SPEAKER_00: And when he was telling the story, I just thought, God, that's so incredible.
33:53
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
33:54
SPEAKER_00: So I thought, okay, well, how you know, I've never had put together this kind of shoot before.
33:59
SPEAKER_00: I called up just right across the way, I thought, well, that's funny.
34:03
SPEAKER_00: There's stable, I know that there's a racetrack right across in in Berkeley.
34:08
SPEAKER_00: And so I did some research and I called them and I said, Hey, just, you know, this is what I'm doing.
34:14
SPEAKER_00: It's about this coach with Legerg's disease, and um, just wondering, you know, if there's any way that we can.
34:19
SPEAKER_00: And he goes, Well, we don't usually let people on the tracks.
34:21
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Well, I understand.
34:23
SPEAKER_00: Well, maybe we can just shoot from afar.
34:25
SPEAKER_00: And he said, Sure, come on over Thursday at four or whatever.
34:28
SPEAKER_00: So I booked some shooters who were really good shooters, and we went over there.
34:33
SPEAKER_00: And um, he had somehow mentioned when I was sort of chatting him up that he loved beer.
34:38
SPEAKER_00: So I went out and got some really, you know, some IPA or something.
34:42
SPEAKER_00: And I had that for him and handed it to him when we got there.
34:46
SPEAKER_00: And that I think but softened him up a little bit.
34:49
SPEAKER_00: But in the end, we ended up, I mean, not only were we allowed on the track, but I was myself was sitting on top of the starting cage with my camera, shooting.
35:02
SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
35:03
SPEAKER_00: Shooting actual racers at an actual race.
35:08
SPEAKER_02: No way.
35:08
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it was incredible.
35:09
SPEAKER_00: And then the kids showed up and we got the kid actors, you know, which were of course just a bunch of my friends' kids, and then I got them to get in the starting gates, and we got the gates to open and we shot it from all different angles.
35:21
SPEAKER_00: So when that scene, when I first saw that scene come together, and that we had this brilliant editor at the time, Lou Wirth, and when he put together that scene and I saw it up there, I mean, I had goosebumps.
35:33
SPEAKER_00: It was so cool.
35:34
SPEAKER_00: It was so exciting for me.
35:36
SPEAKER_02: That's so cool.
35:37
SPEAKER_02: I love that it's realizing that creative vision that was in your head.
35:41
SPEAKER_00: And anything goes, you know, it's all about access.
35:43
SPEAKER_00: It's about access.
35:44
SPEAKER_00: And thank goodness to the manager over there who let us have that access, who believed in our our cause.
35:49
SPEAKER_00: Um, I mean, I think that's the other thing I've learned is just be nice to everybody, treat everybody like they own the place because well, first of all, because it's the right thing to do.
36:00
SPEAKER_00: But but I I just think that there's someone said to me once, hey, you never know when the receptionist is going to be the CEO.
36:06
SPEAKER_00: And that's so important.
36:08
SPEAKER_00: It's about it's about just being respectful and and kind to everybody.
36:12
SPEAKER_00: And I think in many cases, doors will open when you when you treat the world that way.
36:17
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
36:18
SPEAKER_02: No, it's powerful.
36:19
SPEAKER_02: It's powerful to in reflection see people's.
36:26
SPEAKER_02: I guess I've seen this recently.
36:29
SPEAKER_02: Um, I've had colleagues from years ago where I didn't really realize, I mean, I liked them, I was being nice to them.
36:37
SPEAKER_02: And then years later I contacted them about needing work or something like that, and they helped connect me.
36:41
SPEAKER_02: And it was this understanding that all it took was like the mutual respect that to create that relationship.
36:49
SPEAKER_02: Like all you had to do is not be a jerk.
36:53
SPEAKER_00: And it's, you know, it's really so easy to not be.
36:56
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I think times when we're all cranky and times when you know, I I think about that though now because there are times, and I and I still have a hard time really fully grasping this, but there are times now when people will email me through the website or something, come to me and say, Hey, I've seen your work, I really like it.
37:15
SPEAKER_00: I just I'm just thinking about starting a career in documentary filmmaking, I and I wonder if you have time to connect.
37:21
SPEAKER_01: Right.
37:21
SPEAKER_00: And you know, there are times when I literally don't have time for that.
37:25
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I just I don't want to say that I'm super important or anything, but there'd literally days that I have just I'm shooting or I'm you know I'm traveling or I've got you know back-to-back calls.
37:37
SPEAKER_00: But I always, and I promise myself this early on, I always um will respond to somebody and I will always try to schedule it, even if it has to be two weeks out or something, try to, you know, to be there because that's how that's how I got to be a a filmmaker, was because people were generous with their time with me.
37:55
SPEAKER_00: And so I really believe in paying it forward and giving back.
37:59
SPEAKER_00: And um, you know, obviously there are times when I just have to say I I can't do it for a month or whatever, but um I I do believe that um I think that giving back is important.
38:11
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and that's clear because it's also kind of the perspective of your job right now, which is the documentary is a form of trying to maybe not give back, but empower, right?
38:25
SPEAKER_02: It's a form of giving back.
38:26
SPEAKER_02: It's spending your time in a way that's trying to help other people or show.
38:30
SPEAKER_00: Oh absolutely.
38:30
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I think that's ultimately what motivates me, you know.
38:33
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I do need to um make a living, I need to support myself, so that's important.
38:38
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I, you know, and um I couldn't I couldn't make a film that I didn't believe in.
38:45
SPEAKER_00: I couldn't make a film that had a message that I didn't believe in.
38:49
SPEAKER_00: And so I think ultimately that's the only reason that I, you know, work as hard as I do, and especially when it comes to fundraising.
38:56
SPEAKER_00: I mean, fundraising is a bear.
38:58
SPEAKER_00: And and the fact that I spend in the early days of of production, you know, at least 50, if not 70% of my time just trying to fundraise.
39:07
SPEAKER_00: Um, there are times that I'll say, okay, I'm never doing this again.
39:10
SPEAKER_00: It's incredibly frustrating and hard.
39:13
SPEAKER_00: Um, but there are also times that um, you know, I I know ultimately how rewarding it is when I can end up making the film and that I feel like it's actually having impact.
39:25
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it really takes just one or two emails or um response on um social media saying, I just saw your film and I'm so inspired, or I decided to start coding because I saw your film code debugging the gender gap, or you know, recently with with Black Lives Matter uh crisis, I've I've gotten a lot of uh interest and inquiries about my film bias.
39:52
SPEAKER_00: And um just you know, hearing people's feedback on that, thank you for making this film, and it it's really rewarding, and and I think it's what keeps me, you know, getting up in the morning.
40:04
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
40:06
SPEAKER_02: It's really quite a powerful thing to be able to produce something from nothing with a team and then have random strangers come watch it and or people you've never met and tell you how much it changed though.
40:26
SPEAKER_02: I mean that's wild.
40:27
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's wild.
40:28
SPEAKER_02: Do you have any fun experience?
40:30
SPEAKER_02: Well, maybe what was the first time that that happened?
40:32
SPEAKER_02: Do you remember that?
40:34
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I do.
40:36
SPEAKER_00: It was interesting with um, I think it must have been with, well, it's happened a lot with code, especially, but it happened with running for gym too.
40:46
SPEAKER_00: I had um I had people from the ALS community reach out and say to me, there was a man that said, uh, someone saw your your film uh Running for Gym at a film festival, and I was recently diagnosed with um ALS.
41:04
SPEAKER_00: I haven't told anybody yet.
41:06
unknown: Wow.
41:07
SPEAKER_00: Um he said, not my wife, not my kids.
41:10
SPEAKER_00: He said, um, but I, you know, I I watched your film and I now decided that I want to sit down with them and and we're gonna watch this as a family, and then I'm gonna tell them.
41:21
SPEAKER_00: And he said, but I think it's the way to break the news to them, and I think that it's really um an inspiring film, and thank you for that.
41:27
SPEAKER_00: And I I mean I felt the weighted responsibility of that, which was like, whoa, like this is heavy.
41:34
SPEAKER_00: But I also thought that was just so cool that so cool, you know, something that that yeah, that that that it's had that kind of effect on people, on at least on one person, right?
41:46
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and it kind of speaks in a in a kind of far-off analogy to what you're saying about always be nice and respectful to people if you have the opportunity to, because you know, in this sense, it's doing the best you can to create a positive message through this documentary because you don't know who could impact, right?
42:04
SPEAKER_00: And then yeah, yeah, absolutely no no way of impacting.
42:08
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the other thing is that the fact that these films have had such a big international um audience is kind of crazy to me.
42:15
SPEAKER_00: I got one story where I was invited by the US Embassy um of um God, where was I at this point?
42:26
SPEAKER_00: Oh my god, name is it um Cambodia, okay.
42:29
SPEAKER_00: So the US Embassy, US Embassy of Cambodia invited me to um to come over and screen the film, and they had touched base with several different cities um around um you know in Cambodia to to show the film to.
42:43
SPEAKER_00: And a lot of them were government organizations and and people when we had it, um we had it subtitled.
42:49
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
42:50
SPEAKER_00: And then one day there was a there's an expat that lived way far out in a um fishing village.
42:56
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
42:56
SPEAKER_00: And he said, you know, hey, I want to I'll do a screening here for the local community and the school teachers and stuff.
43:02
SPEAKER_00: And so about maybe 15 people showed up.
43:04
SPEAKER_00: Some of them were were foreign nationals and you know, some were locals and some were expats.
43:10
SPEAKER_00: And in the middle of the film, the the main host turned to me and he said, Oh boy, you know, I I didn't watch this first, and I think this is way over all of their heads.
43:19
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Well, you know, geez, yikes, sorry about that.
43:23
SPEAKER_00: I said, Well, let's be entertained.
43:24
SPEAKER_00: And then at QA, a young woman, so maybe in her 30s, raised her hand and she said in broken English, she said, Um, I don't know about coding.
43:35
SPEAKER_00: I barely, I just have a computer, but I understand what it is to be a woman.
43:42
SPEAKER_00: And thank you for film because I feel special to be a woman now.
43:48
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
43:49
SPEAKER_00: And I thought, okay, so here there's the cultural barrier, there's the language barrier, there's you know, so much happening here.
43:56
SPEAKER_00: And yet some part of this film made her proud to.
44:00
SPEAKER_00: Be a woman in a fishing village in Cambodia.
44:02
SPEAKER_00: And I thought, you know, right on.
44:04
SPEAKER_00: That's cool.
44:05
SPEAKER_00: So heavy.
44:06
SPEAKER_02: That's so crazy.
44:08
SPEAKER_00: And then the another experience on sort of the whole opposite end of that was I was in Wisconsin and I did a screening.
44:16
SPEAKER_00: It must have been at a film festival.
44:19
SPEAKER_00: And a young girl stood up.
44:21
SPEAKER_00: She was maybe 12 or 13, and she's and this was code debugging the gender gap.
44:25
SPEAKER_00: And she stood up at during QA, raised her hand, and said, Hey, I um I am so excited because your film taught me that I want to learn to code.
44:34
SPEAKER_00: She said, I'm really excited.
44:35
SPEAKER_00: Do you know where I can go to take classes?
44:38
SPEAKER_00: Because I don't even have a computer.
44:40
SPEAKER_00: She said, and I don't think my parents can afford a computer.
44:45
SPEAKER_00: And so I was gonna, you know, tell her I'd connect later.
44:48
SPEAKER_00: But right then, another woman stood up in the theater and said, Excuse me, I want to connect with her.
44:54
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna buy you a computer.
44:57
SPEAKER_00: Incredible.
44:58
SPEAKER_00: And the woman that stood up to offer the computer was part of an organization called Women in Technology.
45:03
SPEAKER_00: But how cool is that?
45:04
SPEAKER_00: And all this is happening in the theater in front of me, you know.
45:07
SPEAKER_00: That that's that was cool.
45:09
SPEAKER_02: It's so odd and it's so tangible.
45:11
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.
45:12
SPEAKER_00: Measurable impact.
45:14
SPEAKER_02: That's so cool.
45:16
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
45:18
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
45:18
SPEAKER_02: So what is that then that feeling of being able to create an impact or to feel change?
45:27
SPEAKER_02: What kind of ways does that push you into the future?
45:30
SPEAKER_02: What kind of ideas does it spur in your head that you're like, oh, this is really what I'm into.
45:34
SPEAKER_02: I want to help here.
45:36
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, in some ways, I think it puts pressure on me to come up with like the new like, okay, now what?
45:42
SPEAKER_00: Now what?
45:42
SPEAKER_00: Now what?
45:43
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
45:43
SPEAKER_00: But um I mean, so far, like if you ask me right now, what's my next film, I don't I don't have an answer for you.
45:49
SPEAKER_00: I don't, I don't know.
45:49
SPEAKER_00: I'm having a hard enough time getting through this one during COVID.
45:53
SPEAKER_00: But um, but I will, I will find the money somehow, and I will finish this film.
45:59
SPEAKER_00: And it, I do believe it will have impact.
46:01
SPEAKER_00: I think of all my films, I think this film, Savvy, which is about the importance of financial literacy, um, will have a lot of impact, especially in the in the wake of COVID-19 and with the resurgence of Black Lives Matter.
46:15
SPEAKER_00: I think that it really highlights how crucial personal finance is to survival and understanding personal finance.
46:23
SPEAKER_00: And I think it gives voice to people of color and just women of all socioeconomic backgrounds, really showing that um access to capital and financial education is key to narrowing this wealth gap.
46:40
SPEAKER_00: So I do think that it'll find its audience, uh it'll have a huge audience, I believe, um not just in the United States.
46:48
SPEAKER_00: And and then I'll get inspired, you know, to make something else.
46:52
SPEAKER_00: Um I guess it'll come to me.
46:54
SPEAKER_02: I think a better question then is what are the ways that these past experiences have shifted your perspective on whatever project you take on next?
47:07
SPEAKER_02: What is the most valuable thing about when when you're looking at new projects?
47:10
SPEAKER_02: You go, yeah, that's that's important.
47:13
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so I struggle a lot with do I want to make a film that's gonna be, you know, bought by Netflix, bought by Amazon, uh, a contender for you know the Academy Awards?
47:27
SPEAKER_00: Or do I want to make a film that is educational and impactful on you know, in a different way?
47:35
SPEAKER_00: Because I will tell you that my films have a huge audience when it comes to um film festivals, um, schools, organizations, universities, corporations internationally.
47:51
SPEAKER_00: But Netflix and Amazon and a slew of other companies all turned it down in terms of buying it as original content because it's not sexy enough.
48:01
SPEAKER_00: It's not as I think it was one of those platforms that said it's too intellectual.
48:08
SPEAKER_00: And and so I get that, I get it.
48:12
SPEAKER_00: You know, people come home at the end of the day and they want to grab a beer and put their feet up and be entertained.
48:16
SPEAKER_00: Do they really want to watch something that's gonna have to make them think, especially if it's gonna be about thinking about themselves, you know, thinking about unconscious bias, for example.
48:23
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's a lot of hard work.
48:25
SPEAKER_00: And my films do tend to be deeply researched and intellectual.
48:30
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I I don't think it's much of a burden as say sitting down to five hours of homework or even two hours of homework, but it's but they're thought-provoking, and that's how I want them to be.
48:40
SPEAKER_00: So I struggle with yes, I want to find characters that are interesting to make the film um, you know, entertaining and informative, but do I want to make them so commercial that they might not have as much intellectual cape, you know, capacity and say impact?
49:04
SPEAKER_00: I I don't know.
49:05
SPEAKER_00: I I think that I don't want to succumb to that because I think that the films that I'm doing are impacting a lot of people, and I think that's needed in this world.
49:15
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but believe me, you know, there are times that people say, Oh, you make corporate videos, and I cringe, you know.
49:22
SPEAKER_00: No, I don't make corporate videos.
49:24
SPEAKER_00: My my films might um you know be interesting to corporations, and yes, they're screened a lot.
49:32
SPEAKER_00: I make a lot of licensing deals with companies.
49:34
SPEAKER_01: Sure.
49:35
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I don't want to be thought of as a as a um, you know, a the filmmaker who makes corporate bit training videos.
49:43
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, right.
49:44
SPEAKER_02: It's and yeah, because it's they're valuable to corporations, but they're for culture aspects and probably way more than that, leadership aspects and recruiting aspects, but that's not why they're that, they're for a larger message.
49:59
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
50:00
SPEAKER_02: And it's a it's an interesting perspective.
50:02
SPEAKER_02: I think it can be seen in most fields, which is how do you maybe express the thing you really want to do in a way that is still attractive to other people.
50:13
SPEAKER_02: Um, it's and especially with the entertainment industry, I'm sure it's really difficult because it's so established in what is successful and what isn't, or sexy, as you said.
50:24
SPEAKER_02: Um and that's hard.
50:28
SPEAKER_02: It sounds like a hard issue, but it sounds like one you definitely have a perspective on, which is you know that these kind of things are impacting you, and there's a balance you have to find between the two.
50:37
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, so not to say that I wouldn't be interested in you know, in doing.
50:42
SPEAKER_00: I mean, with this film that I'm making now with Savvy, I am I am working hard to find characters that that I can, you know, follow.
50:51
SPEAKER_00: Well, no, I shouldn't even say follow because I really don't follow them.
50:54
SPEAKER_00: We we interview them, we shoot some scenes with them, and we tell their story.
50:59
SPEAKER_00: But it's not like choosing one character and following them.
51:02
SPEAKER_00: You know, running for gym had more of that, right?
51:04
SPEAKER_00: With running for gym, we followed the coach um for several months.
51:08
SPEAKER_02: And so that's a little bit of a different no and and that's kind of the feeling I got, and maybe I didn't say this well, but it was you're searching for the balance where you're still able to portray the message as you want it, or the the argument, whatever the film could portray, while still making it um available for a larger audience because yeah, I mean so there's there's a message, and you want to get the message across.
51:33
SPEAKER_00: And you want to have it entertaining, and I think that's important.
51:38
SPEAKER_00: I think finding a film that's entertaining, or you know, nobody wants to sit down and watch something if they're gonna feel like they're being number one lectured at, or whether I'm you know pointing a finger at them, and it and nobody wants to watch anything accusatory.
51:50
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, um, and I think the more that I can have a sense of humor and you know have a film that's highly um relevant, informative, impactful, and entertaining.
52:02
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's what I strive for.
52:04
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, big goal.
52:05
SPEAKER_02: That's uh that's hard.
52:08
SPEAKER_02: It's hard to both give off like the most authentic thing you the version of what you want to portray, but also do it in a way that because it's it's kind of like this idea of selling out.
52:20
SPEAKER_02: It's not selling out, but it's you have to sell it.
52:23
SPEAKER_02: It does have to be sold.
52:24
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
52:25
SPEAKER_00: No, I mean, I know what I would need to do if I wanted to get a film that could maybe get it.
52:29
SPEAKER_00: But then again, don't forget that a lot of these platforms are also shifting and changing what people are watching and what people want to watch.
52:40
SPEAKER_00: I mean, Netflix originally said they did not want to put code debugging the gender gap up on their platform.
52:46
SPEAKER_00: They turned down an offer to license it.
52:48
SPEAKER_00: And then a year later, they got so many hits for it on Netflix.
52:52
SPEAKER_00: After it was already up on Amazon Prime and and Google Play and iTunes, they came back to me saying, Hey, can we re-revisit this idea of putting it up on our platform?
53:01
SPEAKER_02: That must be a really cool form of impact or a really cool feeling of seeing that it's not just these, not to say that the woman in Cambodia isn't incredible or the the the girl in Wisconsin, but to see an actual potential shift in large corporations and kind of cultural norms because of the work you're doing.
53:25
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, or just knowing that our our subject is timely, I think that that's uh I think that's cool.
53:30
SPEAKER_00: I mean, again, with co-debugging the gender gap.
53:33
SPEAKER_00: I mean, honestly, I you know, we were just hoping that it was of interest to people in in Silicon Valley.
53:39
SPEAKER_00: And now it was too funny.
53:40
SPEAKER_00: Somebody said to me the other day, do you know there's a Wikipedia page for your movie, Codebugging the Gender Gap?
53:45
SPEAKER_00: I was like, what?
53:46
SPEAKER_00: And I searched for it and there it shows up.
53:48
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, nah, like, wow, that's interesting.
53:51
SPEAKER_00: So kind of cool.
53:52
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
53:53
SPEAKER_02: That's so cool.
53:55
SPEAKER_02: Well, I only have one last question.
53:58
SPEAKER_02: I really enjoyed this conversation.
53:59
SPEAKER_02: I think it's a really fantastic story.
54:01
SPEAKER_02: And it's cool that you've just kind of attacked this path, which is storytelling on impactful messages and things that are important to you and things that are incredibly timely and relevant.
54:17
SPEAKER_02: Um and the last question is if there's one thing that listeners could take away from this discussion, what do you think it would be?
54:24
SPEAKER_00: You know, it's hard to say this without it sounding cheesy, but I I think that so many of us have this idea of someday I'm gonna do that, someday I'm gonna run a marathon, someday I'm going to uh you know make a film, someday, and and I would say that just do it.
54:43
SPEAKER_00: And it sounds so stupid, but honestly, if you believe in it enough, um and it's scary, and I think if if it feels scary, then that's probably okay.
54:53
SPEAKER_00: If it gives you unbelievable stress, then it's like, well, maybe not.
54:56
SPEAKER_00: But but I I just think it's incredibly important um to jump in and believe in what you're doing and then just go headstrong about it.
55:06
SPEAKER_00: You have to.
55:06
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I have to be my biggest, the biggest advocate for the film I'm making.
55:10
SPEAKER_00: It's like my baby, right?
55:11
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I have to believe that it's the most important film in the world because without that, I won't raise the funds and I won't work as you know as hard as need as you need to to make a good um film that it covers all angles or as much of you know an angle as possible.
55:28
SPEAKER_00: So I think that that's just I guess if I could just say it, if you if you want really want to do something, if you have a good idea um and you believe in it, then then you you gotta do it.
55:39
SPEAKER_00: You gotta do it because it it it's if it lives in your head, it's not gonna get out there to impact people and to help people.
55:46
SPEAKER_02: So absolutely.
55:47
SPEAKER_02: No, that's a wonderful message, and that's so true.
55:49
SPEAKER_02: It's attacking the things that are impact uh important to you and then believing that you can do it, and then seeing what happens.
55:55
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.
55:56
SPEAKER_00: And by the way, you know, we've this another really corny thing to say, but we do learn from failure.
56:02
SPEAKER_00: I mean, my we learn from failure, and uh and I think that you know, don't we can't be afraid of success or of failure.
56:11
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
56:11
SPEAKER_00: Um, but it is scary.
56:13
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I you know, there's a lot of pressure.
56:14
SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of pressure to try to, what are you gonna do for your next film?
56:17
SPEAKER_00: What do you it's a lot of pressure all around?
56:19
SPEAKER_00: It's pressure to try to raise a million and a half dollars, you know?
56:22
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, no, absolutely.
56:23
SPEAKER_02: It sounds like a lot of work.
56:25
SPEAKER_02: Um well, thank you.
56:27
SPEAKER_02: That was perfect.
56:27
SPEAKER_02: That was so much fun.
56:30
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, thank you, Flynn.
56:31
SPEAKER_00: I really, I really appreciate it.
56:36
SPEAKER_02: I'm so grateful for that discussion with Robin.
56:39
SPEAKER_02: Also, as she mentioned, she's producing a new film called Savvy that documents women's financial independence, which is especially relevant during the economic turmoil of the COVID-19 pandemic.
56:49
SPEAKER_02: The link to her website and the upcoming film will be in the description of this episode.
56:53
SPEAKER_02: In the conversation, I enjoyed hearing more about the actual process of producing documentaries.
56:58
SPEAKER_02: It's fascinating to hear how while the filming is going on, it really is like a living document, always having to adapt and pivot when needed, even potentially shifting the entire message of it if necessary.
57:09
SPEAKER_02: Also, her stories are wonderful.
57:11
SPEAKER_02: Imagine producing something on an issue you really believe in, and then receiving tangible impact on it.
57:17
SPEAKER_02: Watching a young girl get connected with someone who can provide her with a computer to learn to code, or a woman in a country around the world finding pride in herself because of what you made.
57:27
SPEAKER_02: It makes me wonder what is possible for the ideas floating around in my head if I'm willing to manifest them in the real world and just see what happens.
57:35
SPEAKER_02: And maybe it makes you wonder the same thing for your ideas.
57:38
SPEAKER_02: Thanks for listening.
57:40
SPEAKER_02: If you liked this episode of Seeking Authenticity, that's freaking awesome.
57:45
SPEAKER_02: All I want to ask of you, the listener, in return for the time and effort I put into making it, is that you take a deep breath.
57:53
SPEAKER_02: I mean really breathe.
57:55
SPEAKER_02: Breathe so that it stretches out your shoulders and your back and your chest and pushes out your stomach.
58:00
SPEAKER_02: No more of these shallow, bullshit breaths.
58:02
SPEAKER_02: They're barely keeping you alive, my friend.
58:05
SPEAKER_02: And after you exhale, go out and soak up today.
58:08
SPEAKER_02: Because in the end, your actions and the way they interact with the world and the people around you right now are all you have in this life.
58:17
SPEAKER_02: So be authentic with them.
58:19
SPEAKER_02: Peace.