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Transcript

The Billy Preston Documentary · The Bob Lefsetz Podcast

• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the bob Lefsets Podcast. My
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: guests today are the team behind the documentary Billy Preston.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: That's the way God planned it. We have three people
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: on the podcast, so I'm going to have everybody introduced
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: themselves individually. Let's start is the order they are on
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: my screen. Paris Barklay, tell me about yourself and how
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: you got involved in this movie.
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: Well, I'm Paris Barclay. I'm a director, producer, a writer,
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: and generally a very busy guy. And I got involved
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: in this when Stephanie Elaine gave me a call and said,
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: wouldn't you love to do a documentary? And I said what?
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: And she said, no, it's about Billy Preston. I'm making
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: up this converse. There wasn't quite as much fun as that,
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: but nevertheless I was enthralled. I know Billy Preston just
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: like we do a a certain generation, but I didn't
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: know a full story. And the deeper I got into it,
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: the more I read about it, the more I said,
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: you know, I meant this guy is a parallel person
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: to me, and I identify with him in so many
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: different ways. I got to do this documentary.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: How long ago was that conversation?
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: About four years ago? Now, right, ladies, I think it
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: was about four years ago, is just before COVID. If
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: you can remember those days before COVID where we actually
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: met live and we didn't do zoom and all that stuff.
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: It was in that time. I have to ask you, say,
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: you see parallels you identify can you expand on that?
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: Oh, Billy Preston, I had the records, I knew the
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: hit songs, but since I didn't know about his life.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: It took Daniel Shaw, who was a writer and a
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: great friend of the entire enterprise, who had written a
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: book proposal that really laid out some of the stories
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: of his life and how he developed and part of
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: his genius that we didn't all see. And as I
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: got into it, I realized, Wow, I grew up in
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: the church, Catholic church versus Baptist. I was a piano
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: player and an organist, not anything like Billy Preston, but
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: you know I did have those skills. I do have
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: those skills actually to this day, and I had a
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: lot of parallels in my life. My brother died at
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: a young age around the same time as Billy Preston's
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: brother died, and I think that was a seminole thing
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: in his life. I had some abusive situations in my
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: life that I have always remembered, and I have always left
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: a little bit of a dent in my personality which
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: I've been dealing with. And I was an alcoholic and
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: a recovering drug add just like Billy. So just like
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: time and time again, as we went into the instance
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: of his personal story, I felt a parallel. I felt
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: a kinship, and it made it easier for me to
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: be empathetic person and can tell me my audience a
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: little of your history in the movie.
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: Business, my history in the movie business, Well, I was
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: in advertising before I did this whole thing.
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: I spent ten years working in advertising in New York,
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: which has really stood me in good stead in the
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: movie business. And I left advertising my job as a
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: creative supervisor to help a new struggling music video company
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: called Black and White Television. I was the black and
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: my partner Joe was the white, and we created a
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: company that was primarily about getting minorities behind scenes and
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: music videos because there were none for very very few,
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: and all these great hip hop videos in the early
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: nineties were being directed by white men, which we thought
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: was okay, but I think we could do better, and
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: eventually I got all Kool Jay as a client and
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: did ten videos with him, including Mamison Knock You Out,
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: which threw the attention of the people on the West coast.
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: They said, this guy's a storyteller. He's not just doing
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: a video, He's telling a story, which led to my
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: first job in television, and from there I pretty much
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: have stayed in television other than a couple of departures.
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: I did a feature film called Don't Be a Menace
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: to South Central Audrickeye or Juice in the Hood, which
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: is a cult favorite. And you know, I've done some
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: television movies, but primarily I've done series now one hundred
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: and ninety two of them, most recently The Night Agent,
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: which is on now Brilliant Binds. I did The Menenda
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: Story and Domer Monster, lots of shows, and from there
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: I've learned that there's a story and then there's a story,
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: which is part of the reason why Billy Press was
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: both a challenge for me and of the light.
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: Okay, where are you from?
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: Originally Chicago, Illinois, which is a great place to be
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: from Okay to Chicago. There's the South Side and there's
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: the suburbs.
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: Where did you grow up?
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: I was in the South Suburbs, which was, you know, nice,
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: but a little ghetto. It started out, as I grew
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: up as a very nice suburban suburb. By the time
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: I left, it was drugs and coke and everything and criminality.
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: And now the town that I grew up in is
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: the murder capital of the South Suburbs, which is something
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: that they hold a great deal of private.
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: Stephanie, it looks to me like, wow, that's a title. Okay,
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: and this is gonna sound very general, But to what
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: degree have you experienced racism in your life and career
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: and has that affected you or held you back? That's
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: a deep question. I have experienced some racism, but not
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: as much as some friends of mine, to be honest.
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: Part of the reason why I had success fairly early.
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: And once you're successful, color seems to sort of fade away.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: But when you're struggling, it's a very important thing. This
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: is a black director. I don't know if we need
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: you know, it becomes a thing. It becomes a thing
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: that makes people decide to work with you or not.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: I dealt with much more homophobia.
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: Than I dealt with actual racism in my career, and
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: that has been a struggle. It led me to coming
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: out quite early, unlike Billy Preston, to be openly gay
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: seem to be the best solution to me. So I
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: would say homophobia top racism when it comes to obst Okay,
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: did you go to.
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: College after being in South Chicago? Yes, I did. I
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: went to a little known college called Harvard, which is
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: in Boston area, which took me five years to graduate
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: from because A I did go to class, and B
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: I was much more interested in music and theater than
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: I was in the many great professors that I had.
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: And if I had it to do all over again,
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: I would certainly go to class. And so if you're
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: at Harvard, now go to class, because you'll wish you
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: did when you're my age. Yeah, I went there, and
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: then then I went to New York. And how did
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: you end up in advertising? I just thought it.
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: Would be easy. Also, I love Bewitched, and Bewitched was
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: filled with Darren Stevens, and you know, they always had martinis.
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: Samantha was making him a martini as he came home
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: and it just made advertising look so delightful and as
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: you can tell him fairly talk to it him pretty glib.
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: And so it became a good job for me. And
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: also I could do my musical you to work at
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: night because the job was relatively easy, and I could
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: then work on musical theater and shows in New York,
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: which is really what I wanted to do.
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: Okay, And how do you know, when did you meet Stephanie? Wow?
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: When did I first meet Stephanie? A very long time.
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: I think we were children back in the day. She's
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: a producer. I've always admired She produced a lot of
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: things that I thought were essential viewing for people, especially
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: for black people, but for everyone. Her work with John
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: Singleton and bringing him to the four was a very
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: big deal. So she was a sort of celebrity.
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: In my world.
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: And her husband, Stephen Bray, is a friend of mine,
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: and we've met socially and so we never we hadn't
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: worked on anything together before. We just knew each other
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: and had a mutual admiration society.
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: So, Stephanie, where are you from?
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: I am from New Orleans.
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: New Orleans, Okay. What was growing up in New Orleans.
• 7:58
  Speaker 4: Like well, I spent a couple of years in New Orleans,
• 8:02
  Speaker 4: but my father, who was in school, drove us to
• 8:07
  Speaker 4: California in nineteen sixty five, so I pretty much grew
• 8:12
  Speaker 4: up in LA. I spent the summers in New Orleans
• 8:14
  Speaker 4: with my grandma, and.
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: We're in La Miracle Mile, Miracle Miles. So what was
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: it like growing up there? And this was before or
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: after the watch riots that you give this.
• 8:29
  Speaker 4: We came the summer of the riots, so I think
• 8:32
  Speaker 4: it was in July or Yeah, it was pretty it
• 8:36
  Speaker 4: was a big deal, I remember.
• 8:37
  Speaker 3: But you know, we grew up in Wiltshire area.
• 8:41
  Speaker 4: You know, I went to Catholic school, like I don't
• 8:44
  Speaker 4: know if Paris went to Catholic school when you were young.
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: I did, of course, so in my high school too.
• 8:48
  Speaker 4: Yeah, and I went to all girl Catholic High school
• 8:51
  Speaker 4: in Inglewood Saint Mary's And uh yeah. My father is
• 8:56
  Speaker 4: a was a biochemist. My mother's an educ cater. But
• 9:02
  Speaker 4: I just fell in love with books. I fell in
• 9:04
  Speaker 4: love with reading, and I fell in love with movies
• 9:07
  Speaker 4: at a very very young age. So and I didn't
• 9:11
  Speaker 4: even know there was a movie business, to be honest,
• 9:14
  Speaker 4: I didn't know what a direct. I didn't know anything
• 9:16
  Speaker 4: except for when I read The Godfather and then saw
• 9:19
  Speaker 4: it on the screen, or when I read The Exorcist
• 9:22
  Speaker 4: and saw it on the screen. I just there was
• 9:25
  Speaker 4: a connection there. So I went to USC, I dropped out,
• 9:32
  Speaker 4: moved to Hawaii.
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: I waited a couple of questions. One what's better Godfather
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: one or two?
• 9:40
  Speaker 4: I don't know.
• 9:40
  Speaker 5: One is so classic, but two is even better.
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: I agree. Okay, when you went to USC, I mean
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: USC is legendary on the West Coast for film studies.
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: Were you in that division?
• 9:55
  Speaker 4: No, I was pre law I was I was in
• 9:58
  Speaker 4: I was yeah. I was taking and ethics and political
• 10:02
  Speaker 4: science and things that I had no idea.
• 10:05
  Speaker 5: I was very unhappy.
• 10:07
  Speaker 4: I went to see the counselor and he said, well
• 10:10
  Speaker 4: quit and I said really, he said yeah.
• 10:14
  Speaker 5: So I dropped out and I moved to Hawaio.
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: How long did you go before you dropped out? And
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: what did your parents say?
• 10:21
  Speaker 4: I was I went for a year and a half.
• 10:24
  Speaker 4: My mother cried. My father I can't remember what he said,
• 10:28
  Speaker 4: but I just I was so unhappy. So I moved
• 10:32
  Speaker 4: to Hawaii, which created a lifelong connection with Hawaii. It's
• 10:36
  Speaker 4: still my happy place, and I realized that I actually
• 10:41
  Speaker 4: could be in the arts. Because my parents like a
• 10:43
  Speaker 4: lot of folks law, medicine, smart things, you know, things,
• 10:50
  Speaker 4: professional things. There were no artists in my family. So
• 10:56
  Speaker 4: then I realized I was transferring. I transferred to UCEE
• 10:59
  Speaker 4: Santa Cruz, which was very hippie dippy. I got a
• 11:03
  Speaker 4: degree in poetry, which was even more hippie dippy.
• 11:08
  Speaker 5: And then I followed that by going to Cowarts for dance.
• 11:12
  Speaker 6: Okay, ground producer might when you're finished with Cowlarts for dance,
• 11:18
  Speaker 6: what year are we in nineteen eighty three and you
• 11:24
  Speaker 6: graduate from cal Arts?
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: Do you pursue a career in dance?
• 11:30
  Speaker 5: I did for a second, but then I got pregnant,
• 11:34
  Speaker 5: and so.
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: Well, hold on a second, wait a second, assuming that
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: baby was born, who is the father of that child?
• 11:41
  Speaker 4: The father of the child was a fellow UC Santa
• 11:45
  Speaker 4: Cruzian who I ended up marrying and have two kids with,
• 11:50
  Speaker 4: and then divorced and then married Stephen Bray, who, by
• 11:53
  Speaker 4: the way, thanks you for your colonoscopee piece.
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: Well, before we got to Stephen Bray, how long were
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: you married to the first husband? Ten years? Ten years?
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: And what was he up to? Who is he?
• 12:09
  Speaker 3: He's a director, He's a writer director.
• 12:10
  Speaker 4: He has a movie now on streaming called I Don't
• 12:13
  Speaker 4: Love You Anymore. And he's a writer director. He's a
• 12:17
  Speaker 4: fabulous guy. He's my best friend. He got married at
• 12:19
  Speaker 4: my house, at me and Stephen's house at our house.
• 12:24
  Speaker 4: He lives walking distance from me, and we just made
• 12:28
  Speaker 4: a pact when we got divorced that we were always
• 12:30
  Speaker 4: going to be friends, and we've stayed friends.
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: Then what are your two kids up to?
• 12:35
  Speaker 4: My youngest son is Emmy nominated editor for sixteen nineteen.
• 12:39
  Speaker 4: He lives in Brooklyn. He's going to Hunter College to
• 12:42
  Speaker 4: get a master's in experimental filmmaking.
• 12:46
  Speaker 5: I don't know.
• 12:48
  Speaker 4: And my oldest son is a writer, director, actor from
• 12:53
  Speaker 4: He was on Insecure for six years as an actor.
• 12:56
  Speaker 4: But he just directed the remake of Don't Tell Mom
• 12:59
  Speaker 4: The Babysitters Day. He's also a TV writer and he
• 13:04
  Speaker 4: has my two delicious granddaughters.
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: Okay, and how do you meet Stephen Bray?
• 13:12
  Speaker 5: This was my only blind date?
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: Who set you up?
• 13:19
  Speaker 4: We got set up by three different people who didn't
• 13:22
  Speaker 4: know each other, but who knew us and said you
• 13:24
  Speaker 4: guys would be perfect. We met in the middle of
• 13:28
  Speaker 4: one of my movies because he was making the color
• 13:31
  Speaker 4: Purple on Broadway, and Donald Byrd, who's a very famous
• 13:36
  Speaker 4: choreographer who was doing the choreography, said, and who I
• 13:39
  Speaker 4: dance with, said, you guys have to meet. We met,
• 13:43
  Speaker 4: we had dinner, and we've been together twenty years.
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you have this parapatetic lifestyle. How do you
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: end up in the entertainment business.
• 13:53
  Speaker 4: Well, when I was pregnant with my first son, Wade,
• 13:56
  Speaker 4: the only thing I knew how to do was read.
• 13:58
  Speaker 4: And then I heard there was a job called reader,
• 14:01
  Speaker 4: and I thought, perfect, I'm a reader.
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: I can read.
• 14:06
  Speaker 4: And my first job was at CIA in the story department.
• 14:09
  Speaker 4: So I read books and then wrote up.
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: Robert, Let's start a little erway. How'd you get the
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: job at CIA?
• 14:17
  Speaker 4: I knew one person in the movie business, my first
• 14:20
  Speaker 4: husband's father's friend, Mike Glick, who was a line producer,
• 14:25
  Speaker 4: and I don't know. He said, well, there is a
• 14:28
  Speaker 4: story department. He called. I had to call every other
• 14:32
  Speaker 4: week for three or four months to get that job,
• 14:34
  Speaker 4: until finally they were like, okay, stop calling.
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: Take the job. It was the best job ever because.
• 14:41
  Speaker 4: I learned how the written word gets looked at by
• 14:46
  Speaker 4: a reader, which is what I was, and broken down
• 14:50
  Speaker 4: into the possibilities of being a film So and this
• 14:53
  Speaker 4: is when there were no computers, there were typewriters. So
• 14:55
  Speaker 4: I'd read a book, I'd go into the writing room
• 14:57
  Speaker 4: and just bang out the synopsis in the comments and
• 15:01
  Speaker 4: then walk it upstairs to Mike Ovitz or you know,
• 15:04
  Speaker 4: Rick Mesita or whoever was you know, requesting my coverage.
• 15:09
  Speaker 5: And I was quite good at it.
• 15:11
  Speaker 4: So the next step, the next step is I went
• 15:15
  Speaker 4: from that job to being a professional story analyst at
• 15:20
  Speaker 4: twentieth Century Fox. And my mentor person who I credit
• 15:25
  Speaker 4: with really opening the doors was Amy Pascal, and Amy
• 15:29
  Speaker 4: Pascal hired me when she went to work for Dawn
• 15:32
  Speaker 4: at Warner Brothers. Was Warner Brothers, Yeah, And I went
• 15:35
  Speaker 4: along as a reader. And then when I read for
• 15:38
  Speaker 4: a year, they promoted Dawn promoted me to a creative executive,
• 15:41
  Speaker 4: and five months later I was reading to replace myself
• 15:45
  Speaker 4: in the story department with a young guy named John
• 15:48
  Speaker 4: Singleton who really didn't want the job. He really just
• 15:51
  Speaker 4: wanted to talk about this script he'd written, Boys in
• 15:54
  Speaker 4: the Hood.
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: Okay, just to be clear from my audience, What does
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: the story analysts do?
• 16:01
  Speaker 4: A story analyst is basically a reader, a reader of books,
• 16:04
  Speaker 4: of articles, of screenplays, and then once you read it,
• 16:07
  Speaker 4: you condense it down.
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: To a two or three page book report.
• 16:10
  Speaker 4: Basically it's a synopsis and then a page of comments
• 16:14
  Speaker 4: how well will this translate into a movie or television show?
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: So how does John Singleton walk in the door?
• 16:24
  Speaker 4: John Singleton is a senior at USC and he already
• 16:28
  Speaker 4: had an agent, believe it or not, a CAA agent,
• 16:31
  Speaker 4: Brad Smith. And because he had won the Nicholson screenwriting
• 16:35
  Speaker 4: competition two years in a row, and the one that
• 16:39
  Speaker 4: he had just won for was Boys in the Hood,
• 16:41
  Speaker 4: So he was you know, USC is a school in town.
• 16:45
  Speaker 4: They matriculate folks and really try to place them and
• 16:48
  Speaker 4: find jobs. He'd heard that, you know, we were looking
• 16:51
  Speaker 4: for a reader position through some friend of his, and
• 16:54
  Speaker 4: showed up in my office because I was tasked with
• 16:57
  Speaker 4: replacing myself in the story department.
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: So how did Boys in the Hood get made? Boys?
• 17:05
  Speaker 5: And the hook got made?
• 17:05
  Speaker 4: Because once I read it, I flipped out and I
• 17:08
  Speaker 4: had the big Oprah Winfrey aha moment and it was like,
• 17:12
  Speaker 4: this is why I am here. It was just very
• 17:15
  Speaker 4: clear to me that I had to get this movie made.
• 17:18
  Speaker 4: So I went to every single executive at the time.
• 17:21
  Speaker 4: It was like Michael Nathanson and Lorenzo Debana Ventura. It
• 17:28
  Speaker 4: was all in dawn, and I said, we have to
• 17:30
  Speaker 4: make this movie. And then one week later the company
• 17:35
  Speaker 4: was sold down, was fired.
• 17:37
  Speaker 5: John and Peter came in.
• 17:39
  Speaker 4: We moved all the way from Warner Brothers, where we
• 17:42
  Speaker 4: were sharing the lot with Warner Brothers, to Culver City and.
• 17:46
  Speaker 5: Frank Price was in charge.
• 17:48
  Speaker 4: This all happened within like a month, and so I
• 17:51
  Speaker 4: finally waited until everybody had read it. I put it
• 17:54
  Speaker 4: on Weekend Read and the next day I came into
• 17:58
  Speaker 4: that room where everybody promised they were going to be supportive,
• 18:01
  Speaker 4: and they all trashed it except for Amy and Frank.
• 18:05
  Speaker 4: And Frank said, we're going to make it, and we
• 18:07
  Speaker 4: any did and I said, oh, but by the way,
• 18:10
  Speaker 4: John's going to direct it. And John had never really
• 18:13
  Speaker 4: directed anything except for a terrible music video, which I'm
• 18:17
  Speaker 4: sure Paris would have borne apart. I said, we're not
• 18:21
  Speaker 4: showing this to anybody, We're just saying you're directing.
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: Okay. There are many steps between a good idea and
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: a good story and a good screenplay to a good movie.
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: So that movie came out lauded everywhere, successful commercially. Was
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: it like your first time and this looked easy or exactly?
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: Bob, I was like, this shit is easy. I'm just
• 18:49
  Speaker 3: going to do this again. I've never had.
• 18:51
  Speaker 4: That level of success in a movie that I've I
• 18:54
  Speaker 4: mean I've had I've had successes, but never that.
• 18:57
  Speaker 5: And that was nineteen ninety one.
• 19:00
  Speaker 3: So there you go.
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: Okay, the thirty five years that have ensued, give us
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: your greatest hits, greatest.
• 19:07
  Speaker 3: Hits, hustle and flow. Dear White People.
• 19:13
  Speaker 4: I produced the Oscars twenty twenty Oscars, which was pretty fabulous.
• 19:19
  Speaker 4: I also did the TV show for Dear White People.
• 19:22
  Speaker 4: My last movie I love. My last movie is this movie,
• 19:25
  Speaker 4: which I love, love, love Billy Preston. But right before that,
• 19:29
  Speaker 4: I did a beautiful movie called Exhibiting Forgiveness. So I
• 19:33
  Speaker 4: produced twenty thirty I don't know movies and a little
• 19:37
  Speaker 4: bit of television and really spent at least a quarter
• 19:40
  Speaker 4: of my time working on inclusion and belonging and diversity
• 19:45
  Speaker 4: within the industry. Right now, I'm the president of the
• 19:48
  Speaker 4: producer's guilt. I've been president for four years. I've been
• 19:52
  Speaker 4: on the boards of Women in Film, Film, Independent, Cast
• 19:55
  Speaker 4: and Crew. Right now I sit on the board of
• 19:57
  Speaker 4: American Cinema Tech. Our mission is to save theaters that
• 20:00
  Speaker 4: save that movie experience. So I'm a grandmother mother.
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, my mother, she was still alive. She heard all that.
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: She would say, well, what else have you done?
• 20:14
  Speaker 3: And I'll tell you. I read a children I do
• 20:20
  Speaker 3: want to say.
• 20:20
  Speaker 4: I wrote a children's book for my granddaughter called Who's
• 20:24
  Speaker 4: in Charge About Body Autonomy? And it's it's It's Penguin
• 20:28
  Speaker 4: published it. It's doing very well.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: Okay, just so I don't mangle it. How do you
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: pronounce your last name?
• 20:42
  Speaker 5: Helene?
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: That's what I would have said. I'm not good with French,
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: but okay, Gene, Am I correct in saying your name
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: is Jeene Elphon Festa.
• 20:54
  Speaker 5: Yes, yeah, you're fine. You could call me Jane or Gene.
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: Okay, wait, wait, why three names?
• 21:00
  Speaker 5: Because my my my name is Elfon. I was born
• 21:03
  Speaker 5: with Elfon, I married a Festa.
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: Okay, so it's not a middle name or something.
• 21:08
  Speaker 5: So my middle name is Royce.
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: So how some people use you know, both names other
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: people don't. How did you decide to use it?
• 21:17
  Speaker 5: Because my parents were so influential in my life in
• 21:20
  Speaker 5: a very very positive way, you know, even this film,
• 21:23
  Speaker 5: how this film came about. They were both very, very
• 21:27
  Speaker 5: big into music and had a massive record collection. They
• 21:31
  Speaker 5: are they, you know, really from relatively meager beginnings, from
• 21:37
  Speaker 5: both from Brooklyn, uh in a very My mom lived
• 21:40
  Speaker 5: in a tenement building and my dad lived in forty
• 21:44
  Speaker 5: second forty second in Utrecht. I hope I had that
• 21:47
  Speaker 5: correct my Brooklyn nights. And they dreamed big and they
• 21:54
  Speaker 5: pushed me out. I was I was a stutter growing up.
• 21:58
  Speaker 5: They pushed me out into just living what I wanted
• 22:03
  Speaker 5: to live, and it was very I was very lucky.
• 22:07
  Speaker 5: I'm the youngest of three kids, and I was very lucky.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: Okay, you say they came from humble beginnings. What did
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: they end up doing for money?
• 22:17
  Speaker 5: My dad wanted to be a saxophone flair, but he
• 22:21
  Speaker 5: ended up going to med school and became a p
• 22:23
  Speaker 5: diatrist and a quite well known one in Pacific Palisades
• 22:27
  Speaker 5: when Pacific Palisades was like Mayberry RFD. And they bought
• 22:32
  Speaker 5: a fourteen hundred square foot house and actually They started
• 22:37
  Speaker 5: in apartments and then eventually bought a fourteen hundred square
• 22:40
  Speaker 5: foot house where it would have still be standing had
• 22:42
  Speaker 5: the fire not burned the whole town down. But yeah,
• 22:45
  Speaker 5: they were, and my mom sold real estate. My mom
• 22:48
  Speaker 5: sold real estate before that, she did books. She did that,
• 22:51
  Speaker 5: you know, taxes and things like that.
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: Okay, So were you born in the Palisades or living
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: in that area?
• 22:59
  Speaker 5: Born in born and raised in Santa Monica. But yes,
• 23:02
  Speaker 5: Pacific policies. I am a native Californian.
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: Okay. So you go to school, and then where do
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: you go to college?
• 23:11
  Speaker 5: I went to Wright, went to Pali High. I went
• 23:14
  Speaker 5: to the Fashion Institute of Design Merchandising, where I learned
• 23:19
  Speaker 5: marketing and factoring and selling friends lines. I wrapped a
• 23:24
  Speaker 5: children's clothing line for years called step by Step, which
• 23:28
  Speaker 5: was in direct competition with with a Spree. I don't
• 23:33
  Speaker 5: know if anyone remembers children's.
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: But we took over Slippers roller Disco at Losiena against Sannic.
• 23:41
  Speaker 5: Yes they did. I know, it was sad. I remember
• 23:43
  Speaker 5: when that happened. And they also took over place here
• 23:45
  Speaker 5: in Hollywood that I remember. Yeah, Well, I didn't wrap
• 23:48
  Speaker 5: a spray I reapped side by side so and and
• 23:53
  Speaker 5: it was it was a really fun time in my
• 23:55
  Speaker 5: life creating. And I too got married very young and
• 24:00
  Speaker 5: I'm still married. He'll be married forty years this September
• 24:03
  Speaker 5: and have two kids. And yeah, so that was that
• 24:07
  Speaker 5: part of my life. And then I had another part
• 24:09
  Speaker 5: of my life.
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: Okay, what does your husband do for a living?
• 24:13
  Speaker 5: He's an insurance agent.
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: And how did you meet him? Yep?
• 24:17
  Speaker 5: Really, my mom fixed us up on a date when
• 24:22
  Speaker 5: I was seventeen, in eleventh grade.
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: And it's lasting all this time.
• 24:27
  Speaker 5: It's last.
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: So what's the keto of forty year relationship?
• 24:33
  Speaker 5: You know, forgiveness for sure, and allowing the person to grow,
• 24:38
  Speaker 5: just allowing it and know that there be know who
• 24:41
  Speaker 5: you are so that you're comfortable.
• 24:44
  Speaker 3: That is key.
• 24:45
  Speaker 5: And knowing that that person needs to do what they
• 24:48
  Speaker 5: need to do and they allow it. And that is
• 24:51
  Speaker 5: what we have always done.
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you started fit.
• 24:57
  Speaker 5: Fit them fashions?
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: How does that lead to Billy Preston?
• 25:05
  Speaker 5: Well, it was another life. I mean, certainly, factoring is
• 25:08
  Speaker 5: very similar to doing do factoring in a movie. You know,
• 25:12
  Speaker 5: you're looking at trends, you're looking at what is the
• 25:15
  Speaker 5: fact factoring is it's very similar to what we do
• 25:19
  Speaker 5: when we're looking at you know, you're like thinking about
• 25:23
  Speaker 5: pre selling your film. Maybe not so much as it
• 25:27
  Speaker 5: is with jocks, although at the very beginning we did
• 25:29
  Speaker 5: want to always test the marketplace to see whether or
• 25:33
  Speaker 5: not something would sell. So, Uh, at the beginning when
• 25:38
  Speaker 5: of this business, that I learned from Nigel Sinclair Whitehorse Pictures.
• 25:41
  Speaker 5: Prior to that he was doing this company, his documentary
• 25:45
  Speaker 5: division was Spidfire Pictures that did Bob Dylan, No Direction
• 25:49
  Speaker 5: Home and George arsenaling Material World. Uh, that I had learned,
• 25:54
  Speaker 5: I took the tools that I learned at the Fashion Institute,
• 25:58
  Speaker 5: a design merchandising with me to filmmaking by knowing how
• 26:03
  Speaker 5: to market something, knowing what people pullp I guess pulling
• 26:08
  Speaker 5: on your heartstrings, and really becoming committed into a project.
• 26:14
  Speaker 5: And when I mean committed, it's it's it's a passion.
• 26:17
  Speaker 5: And if you don't have have that passion for a project,
• 26:22
  Speaker 5: you cannot bring people to it. How else to describe that?
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: Okay, just to close this loop is in factory Basically,
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: you know, in the fashion business it takes so long
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: to get paid if there's a company that will buy
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: your receipts at a.
• 26:37
  Speaker 5: Discuss exactly exactly. Now, that's not exactly the same thing
• 26:42
  Speaker 5: as a business that we're that with film business, but
• 26:45
  Speaker 5: you certainly are going to factor in what it is
• 26:48
  Speaker 5: that you think that you could sell something for and
• 26:50
  Speaker 5: what do you think you could make it. Oh okay,
• 26:52
  Speaker 5: so it's still similar.
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: How do you get from the clothing business to work
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: in the film business.
• 27:03
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I had a lot of life in between. I
• 27:06
  Speaker 5: had a family, I had kids, I had uh life
• 27:13
  Speaker 5: and death. It has a happy ending, but it didn't.
• 27:16
  Speaker 5: You know, my my husband was very ill for quite
• 27:18
  Speaker 5: some time. When the world became chaotic, I went and
• 27:23
  Speaker 5: felt I needed to control things. And I went and thought, well,
• 27:27
  Speaker 5: you know what, what's going to help me. I'm going
• 27:28
  Speaker 5: to go into stand up comedy. And I went to
• 27:31
  Speaker 5: stand up comedy just to give myself a release. I
• 27:36
  Speaker 5: ended up meeting a lot of people who actors, started
• 27:40
  Speaker 5: taking acting classes, did a couple of commercials, obviously nothing major,
• 27:45
  Speaker 5: and and I went to UH to. I actually was
• 27:50
  Speaker 5: much better at selling my friends uh you know one
• 27:53
  Speaker 5: act shows than I was at anything else. I had
• 27:58
  Speaker 5: met a group of players who had a who were
• 28:01
  Speaker 5: trying to put on a play. And I produced this
• 28:04
  Speaker 5: play for years and tried to get it onto Broadway.
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 28:08
  Speaker 5: It was that is really how I came to be.
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you're selling this play. What's the step after that?
• 28:16
  Speaker 5: The step after that was the people that I literally
• 28:19
  Speaker 5: brought intooth and nail. One of my friends and neighbors
• 28:23
  Speaker 5: was Missus Nigel Sinclair, Pat Sinclair, and they came to
• 28:27
  Speaker 5: this play. And in the meantime, I was also doing commercials,
• 28:31
  Speaker 5: so I was I was also meeting directors. I brought
• 28:35
  Speaker 5: them to the play and I was trying to pitch
• 28:39
  Speaker 5: a story about this man, George Moses Horton, who was
• 28:44
  Speaker 5: the first African American male whoever was published in the
• 28:47
  Speaker 5: United States of America. And I could not get the
• 28:50
  Speaker 5: script off the ground. That brought me into a lot
• 28:54
  Speaker 5: of rooms, and that is I hopefully can make that
• 29:00
  Speaker 5: movie one day. And that is what I have a
• 29:04
  Speaker 5: lot of KTA and I pick up phones and just
• 29:06
  Speaker 5: call people. And I literally got people like Jimmy Iven
• 29:11
  Speaker 5: to show up to this play, and I got, you know,
• 29:15
  Speaker 5: a Christiemonian to show up to this play. A lot
• 29:17
  Speaker 5: of you know, people at C a. It was quite remarkable.
• 29:21
  Speaker 5: I was very proud of myself.
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: Okay, that play fizzles, ultimately, it does, So what's your
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: next job?
• 29:31
  Speaker 5: My next job was putting this action into the into film.
• 29:38
  Speaker 5: My Nigel was talking to the Weekend, you know, just
• 29:43
  Speaker 5: on the street. I don't remember how it actually came
• 29:46
  Speaker 5: to be. I think it was, Oh, I know what
• 29:48
  Speaker 5: it was. I was here, I was at the offices
• 29:51
  Speaker 5: and and you know it was I was pushing George
• 29:55
  Speaker 5: Moses Horton and he had said that Dave Grohl had
• 30:00
  Speaker 5: called the office to have them do a documentary about
• 30:04
  Speaker 5: the making of the Foo Fighters, and I chimed in
• 30:07
  Speaker 5: and literally pushed my way into that project, quite literally,
• 30:11
  Speaker 5: and I felt that was that was definitely my my
• 30:16
  Speaker 5: shove into the room, and I was brought in on
• 30:18
  Speaker 5: that team.
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: Okay, approximately three decades ago. Bring us up to today.
• 30:24
  Speaker 5: Let's see, after the Food Fighters we rolled into I
• 30:29
  Speaker 5: had forgot. I did get a first look deal at
• 30:32
  Speaker 5: Exclusive Media. A lot of failed things and a lot
• 30:36
  Speaker 5: of great things we did. The Beg's had them mend
• 30:40
  Speaker 5: a broken heart. I'm trying to go in order here.
• 30:42
  Speaker 5: We did the Beatles eight days a week. I was
• 30:44
  Speaker 5: part of that team Pavarotti with Ron Howard directly.
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: Okay, okay, you do all those things. What's your special sauce,
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: what do you bring to these projects?
• 30:56
  Speaker 5: I think I'm really good at team building at the
• 31:01
  Speaker 5: great with client relations, developing trust, that is I think
• 31:06
  Speaker 5: a key thing in this world and in this business.
• 31:11
  Speaker 5: I organize the the the basic research and and if
• 31:19
  Speaker 5: you're able to go on a deep dive, I'm very
• 31:22
  Speaker 5: because I'm dyslexic. I think I do these research documents
• 31:25
  Speaker 5: that are very easy, easy to deep dive in it,
• 31:28
  Speaker 5: you know, with lengths and things, so you can kind
• 31:31
  Speaker 5: of go in and out of this of somebody's life
• 31:34
  Speaker 5: and not get bored. So I think that's my expertise.
• 31:38
  Speaker 5: And of course because that helps engage director.
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's get back to the Billy Preston movie. Where
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: does it start? Now? Everybody's involved, everybody get participate. Where
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: does it start?
• 31:51
  Speaker 5: Starts with Jeanie. So yeah, it started the first time.
• 31:58
  Speaker 5: I mean that I can't It started the first time
• 32:01
  Speaker 5: sitting down in the living room when I was a
• 32:02
  Speaker 5: young kid and listening to my parents' record collection and
• 32:05
  Speaker 5: my dad loved Sam Cook and anything Sam Cook loved
• 32:09
  Speaker 5: my dad loved he had Billy Preston's sixteen year old soul.
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: And where I grew up in the East Coast, that
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: was meaningless on the East Coast. Your father was a
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: white guy in Pacific Palisades. How does he even know
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: about that record?
• 32:25
  Speaker 5: Well, he was a he loved Heartlem and he loved
• 32:30
  Speaker 5: you know. When I lost my dad when I was
• 32:33
  Speaker 5: like twenty six years old. He was a massive influence
• 32:36
  Speaker 5: on my life. And he used to recall me was
• 32:38
  Speaker 5: regale us. It was very legendary with stories about him
• 32:41
  Speaker 5: taking his saxophone and waiting for musicians to come out
• 32:45
  Speaker 5: of the Apollo Theater so he could play with anyone,
• 32:50
  Speaker 5: and sometimes he would and sometimes he couldn't. But he
• 32:55
  Speaker 5: ended up going to pu Dietary School and doing his
• 32:58
  Speaker 5: residency in Heartlem and absolutely loved Harlem. They fell into
• 33:03
  Speaker 5: Pacific Palisades. You know, that is a murky story, what
• 33:08
  Speaker 5: Pacific Palisades. They were also, you know, very involved in
• 33:12
  Speaker 5: theater in their own in their own Jewish group. So
• 33:17
  Speaker 5: one of their friends was Virginia Munchin, who was an
• 33:20
  Speaker 5: actress and her father, her parents. I'm named after her,
• 33:24
  Speaker 5: So that's why I know her name. Her father was
• 33:26
  Speaker 5: Royce of Royce Hall. That is my real mental name,
• 33:29
  Speaker 5: Geene Royce. She had found this little town called Pacific Palsades,
• 33:33
  Speaker 5: rented a tiny apartment for them. They left the same
• 33:36
  Speaker 5: year that the Brooklyn Dodgers left four Pacific Palisades. But
• 33:41
  Speaker 5: that's how you know fifty I think it was earlier
• 33:45
  Speaker 5: than fifty eight.
• 33:46
  Speaker 7: Continue whatever, But anyway, anyway, and and you know, then sadly,
• 33:52
  Speaker 7: my dad was in the City of Hope because he
• 33:54
  Speaker 7: had he had he came down with tuberculosis, so what we.
• 33:57
  Speaker 5: Didn't know whether or I was going to live or die.
• 33:59
  Speaker 5: But his love for music was incredibly deep. And my
• 34:03
  Speaker 5: parents were very, very liberal, very well. Ready you didn't
• 34:11
  Speaker 5: know they came from Brooklyn. They really took that accent out.
• 34:14
  Speaker 5: They sounded like they were from the Upper West Side.
• 34:18
  Speaker 5: They just were you know, my mom looked like June Cleaver,
• 34:23
  Speaker 5: but her her politics were incredibly left, very very good.
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: Just for one stay second. Do you have any siblings?
• 34:32
  Speaker 5: I do?
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: How many?
• 34:33
  Speaker 5: I have an older sister and older brother. I'm the
• 34:35
  Speaker 5: youngest of them.
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: You're the youngest, So what are they up to?
• 34:39
  Speaker 5: My brother and sister went to Ucla, my sisters in marketing,
• 34:43
  Speaker 5: and my brother's a lawyer.
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you grew up with all this music in
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: the background. How does that bring us to wanting to
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: make a movie about Billie Preston.
• 34:54
  Speaker 5: Well, I always loved music, and I've always loved storytelling,
• 34:58
  Speaker 5: and I've always loved the movies. And uh, when you know,
• 35:04
  Speaker 5: you know, you could ask my business partner here, Nigel Sinclair.
• 35:08
  Speaker 5: I loved Billy. I love Billy Preston. His story is
• 35:12
  Speaker 5: sad and sweet. And he was an LA native or
• 35:16
  Speaker 5: not from when I before I did all the research,
• 35:19
  Speaker 5: I thought he was born and born in in in
• 35:22
  Speaker 5: LA but he was actually born in Texas. But his
• 35:24
  Speaker 5: formative years were here in Los Angeles. So we knew
• 35:28
  Speaker 5: about the good stuff and we knew about the not
• 35:30
  Speaker 5: so good stuff, the complexities of his life. We uh,
• 35:35
  Speaker 5: this was he was always on this list that I've
• 35:37
  Speaker 5: got in my head of the artists that I've always
• 35:40
  Speaker 5: wanted to tell their story because it's a because it's heartbreaking,
• 35:45
  Speaker 5: but it's also beautiful because he did he touched upon
• 35:48
  Speaker 5: so many genres in music.
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: Is this your job such a that you're always looking
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: for material or did you have a special identification with
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: Billy Preston from his heyday in the seventies.
• 36:02
  Speaker 5: I had a special connection to him because I heard him,
• 36:08
  Speaker 5: because it was because of his seeing him on that
• 36:13
  Speaker 5: I remember. I remember sitting on the floor watching that
• 36:16
  Speaker 5: first SNL and I remember my dad humming nothing from
• 36:20
  Speaker 5: nothing means nothing. I just it was ingrained in me
• 36:23
  Speaker 5: in a beautiful way.
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: Okay, this movie actually got made. The nature of the movie.
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: Business people are juggling projects. So what was the next step?
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: You had this idea, it was on your list. How'd
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: you gain traction?
• 36:40
  Speaker 5: Here's what happened. I'm driving home after a really long
• 36:43
  Speaker 5: day and I get a phone call from my partner
• 36:47
  Speaker 5: coming back from the mclark tunner going through pch And
• 36:52
  Speaker 5: and he said, I you won't believe. I just got
• 36:55
  Speaker 5: off the phone with our friend Gilly, who got off
• 36:57
  Speaker 5: the phone with his friend Daniel Shaw, who wrote this
• 37:00
  Speaker 5: book Proposal about Billy Preston. And he reads me the
• 37:03
  Speaker 5: first page, which is amazing first page, and I wish
• 37:06
  Speaker 5: ahead in front of me, I would have read it
• 37:07
  Speaker 5: to you. But it reads like, uh, you know, like
• 37:11
  Speaker 5: a Zelig type of character who has been in a
• 37:14
  Speaker 5: weaven woven inside all of these woven through all of
• 37:18
  Speaker 5: these incredible people, and and uh and I said, okay, great,
• 37:21
  Speaker 5: so it's a great book proposal, but I don't have it.
• 37:24
  Speaker 5: How are we going to get to the powers that
• 37:26
  Speaker 5: be who are running his you know, who are in
• 37:28
  Speaker 5: charge of his leg you know his the share that
• 37:33
  Speaker 5: people were running his life right And we knew he
• 37:35
  Speaker 5: had passed away already. So I didn't know his manager,
• 37:38
  Speaker 5: but Daniel did. Daniel wrote this, which I did not
• 37:42
  Speaker 5: listen because it takes me three times to hear hear
• 37:44
  Speaker 5: something before I, you know, comprehend it. I did not
• 37:49
  Speaker 5: hear that Daniel Shaw and Joyce Moore, who is his
• 37:52
  Speaker 5: Billy's manager, had written this, this, this book proposal together.
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: Just to be clear for those weapons in the movie.
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: He is the wife of Sam Moore, of Sam and Day.
• 38:02
  Speaker 5: Correct.
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: Okay, so now you know there's the manager. What happens then?
• 38:08
  Speaker 5: So I we I mean literally the next day we
• 38:14
  Speaker 5: spoke to Daniels, We had a phone call with Joyce
• 38:17
  Speaker 5: Brett per cursed cursory phone call with Joyce, and then
• 38:21
  Speaker 5: I want to build my team. All I'm thinking was
• 38:23
  Speaker 5: there's a person that I no shit, this isn't dribble.
• 38:28
  Speaker 5: There's a person that I always wanted to work with,
• 38:30
  Speaker 5: and when you're building a team, you want to build.
• 38:34
  Speaker 5: I just thought this person would be an amazing person.
• 38:37
  Speaker 5: And her name was Stephanie Elaine. And we cold called
• 38:41
  Speaker 5: Stephanie Elaine with this idea to see what she thought
• 38:45
  Speaker 5: of it, and then the connection was just amazing.
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: Okay, it's twenty twenty six.
• 38:53
  Speaker 5: When was that conversation twenty end of twenty twenty.
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: Relatively recently under the circumstances. So you call Stephanie and
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: how does a conversation go?
• 39:06
  Speaker 5: It went amazing? It was like it was, it was great.
• 39:10
  Speaker 5: I mean, Steph, do you I mean, I just remember
• 39:13
  Speaker 5: feeling the first time I spoke to you, feeling like
• 39:18
  Speaker 5: you hear me. It was almost like what I can
• 39:21
  Speaker 5: get emotional. It was almost like the way Olivia said,
• 39:26
  Speaker 5: I'm gonna cry. I never thought of it. That's a
• 39:28
  Speaker 5: good question. It was almost the way Olivia said that
• 39:31
  Speaker 5: George said of George and Billy, Yeah you saw me,
• 39:38
  Speaker 5: Stephanie saw me, and yeah.
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: Okay, Stephanie, we'd established you don't have much of a
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: resume and no one calls you, so you know, people
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: are working for you morning the night. What about this problem?
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: Jack said that you wanted to give it your attention.
• 40:05
  Speaker 4: That's really funny. Nobody calls me. Is this is the
• 40:08
  Speaker 4: life I live. Nobody calls me, And the.
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: Wait, is it because they email you or they don't
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: contact you.
• 40:14
  Speaker 4: No, it's because I generate a lot of my own stuff,
• 40:17
  Speaker 4: you know what I mean. It's and also, like you
• 40:19
  Speaker 4: were asking Paris, do you experience you know, racism and
• 40:24
  Speaker 4: you said homophobia. Well, sexism is very real in Hollywood, okay,
• 40:29
  Speaker 4: And so as a black woman, I am pretty much
• 40:34
  Speaker 4: on my own, to be honest. And so I got
• 40:38
  Speaker 4: this call from Jeanie and I had met with them before,
• 40:40
  Speaker 4: maybe a year before that, because they were trying to
• 40:42
  Speaker 4: do something with Billy Holliday, who's also like my all
• 40:46
  Speaker 4: time favorite. So when she called me about Billy, first
• 40:49
  Speaker 4: of all, I knew their reputation. I knew that White
• 40:51
  Speaker 4: Horse was the shous nizzle when it comes to music docs, right,
• 40:55
  Speaker 4: And I had never made a doc. I didn't know
• 40:58
  Speaker 4: anything about making documentaries. And then you know, Jeanie and
• 41:02
  Speaker 4: I have girl crush, so we we just we just
• 41:05
  Speaker 4: hit it off. And I was like, and also I
• 41:07
  Speaker 4: grew up the same I'm saying Age's Paris. You know,
• 41:10
  Speaker 4: I grew up in la in the seventies, dancing in
• 41:14
  Speaker 4: the Baldwin Hills basements to his music, right and so,
• 41:19
  Speaker 4: but I didn't know his story.
• 41:20
  Speaker 5: I don't even think I knew he.
• 41:21
  Speaker 4: Was the fifth Beatle until I read Daniel's proposal and
• 41:25
  Speaker 4: I saw, wow, there's a lot here, and so you know,
• 41:30
  Speaker 4: I said, okay, I'm in. What's the first thing we need?
• 41:33
  Speaker 4: And Nije and Jeanie said a director.
• 41:36
  Speaker 3: So I was like, okay, wait when he isn't the
• 41:39
  Speaker 3: first thing?
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: You need money?
• 41:42
  Speaker 4: Actually, no, you need the director and the concept to
• 41:44
  Speaker 4: go get the money. So we needed a director to sery.
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: Okay before we tut time out, before we get to
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: the director. Genie, when you contacted Stephanie, what were you
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: exactly looking for?
• 41:58
  Speaker 5: What was your team mate? Team leader?
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: Really? A goal?
• 42:02
  Speaker 5: My goal is I everyone you know we've got We did.
• 42:06
  Speaker 5: I can't believe I forgot to mention the Apollo Theater.
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: We did.
• 42:10
  Speaker 5: My partner and I, Cassidy Hartman. We here at white Horse.
• 42:14
  Speaker 5: We shepherd this project about the Apollo Theater. The most
• 42:17
  Speaker 5: important thing about a subject especially documentaries. Is you need
• 42:21
  Speaker 5: to have the right storytellers for the right subject. So
• 42:25
  Speaker 5: you can't have bluntly two white girls telling the story
• 42:29
  Speaker 5: about the Apollo Theater in Harlem and and and be
• 42:33
  Speaker 5: and have it be authentic. You could try it, but
• 42:37
  Speaker 5: it's not gonna it's not going to go over well.
• 42:40
  Speaker 5: And and I just was a.
• 42:41
  Speaker 3: Diversity for sure. Yeah, I know.
• 42:46
  Speaker 5: But it's a matter of it's a matter of of
• 42:51
  Speaker 5: not it's it's a matter of building the right team.
• 42:56
  Speaker 5: And there's no question that you are a team leader, Stephanie.
• 43:01
  Speaker 5: You're a team leader. You look at things in they
• 43:04
  Speaker 5: in they, You're always looking at positives before anything, and
• 43:08
  Speaker 5: you're always pushing people out. You're making your other team
• 43:10
  Speaker 5: members better than they than they think they are. And
• 43:14
  Speaker 5: that's a unique gift that you have. That's a unique gift.
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: Okay, that's why you contact Stephanie. Stephanie established. The next
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: step is a director. So, ay, how fast does this
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: project moving be? How do you get a director?
• 43:30
  Speaker 4: So typically make a list, right, make a list of directors.
• 43:35
  Speaker 4: To be honest, Paris was at the top of that list.
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: And how wait, wait wait, talking about how did you
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: know of Paris?
• 43:42
  Speaker 4: I knew Paris because obviously everybody in Hollywood knows Paris.
• 43:45
  Speaker 4: He was the you know, he's the most celebrated TV
• 43:48
  Speaker 4: director ever. He was the head of the DGA, you know,
• 43:52
  Speaker 4: as the head of a guild. You know, you respect.
• 43:54
  Speaker 4: That's a big job, you get. You know what that
• 43:56
  Speaker 4: means that person is at attention that big job. Yeah,
• 44:00
  Speaker 4: it's a big job. And it's and you do it
• 44:03
  Speaker 4: for free, by the way, so you know, it speaks
• 44:07
  Speaker 4: to integrity, It speaks to commitment to the whole, you know,
• 44:13
  Speaker 4: and in his case, the whole of directors, in my case,
• 44:15
  Speaker 4: the whole producers. But and also he'd been hanging out
• 44:18
  Speaker 4: with Steven because they were talking about doing some kind
• 44:21
  Speaker 4: of Studio fifty four musical at one point, and he
• 44:24
  Speaker 4: was already in the studio. I was like, yeah, And
• 44:29
  Speaker 4: I knew that he knew music, and I knew that
• 44:32
  Speaker 4: he was gay, and I knew that he was smart.
• 44:34
  Speaker 4: And so I was like, what about Paris? Since they
• 44:37
  Speaker 4: said can you get him? Can you get to him?
• 44:39
  Speaker 4: I was like, yeah, I think so. So I cold
• 44:44
  Speaker 4: called Paris, and you know, typically what happens is you
• 44:48
  Speaker 4: meet I said, would you like to meet? He said yes,
• 44:50
  Speaker 4: So we sent him some material and then we've set
• 44:52
  Speaker 4: this meeting. And typically when you're meeting, you're interviewing, right,
• 44:58
  Speaker 4: you're interviewing somebody. And and so we get on the
• 45:02
  Speaker 4: phone on the zoom with Paris because now it is
• 45:05
  Speaker 4: COVID and we're on the zoom, and he just starts
• 45:09
  Speaker 4: talking to us about all the parallels and his connection
• 45:13
  Speaker 4: and emotional connection and pretty we're like on the verge
• 45:17
  Speaker 4: of tears. And then at the end he goes, Okay,
• 45:19
  Speaker 4: I'm in and we're like, what wait, what happened just now?
• 45:23
  Speaker 5: Did we just get a director?
• 45:26
  Speaker 4: Because typically you well like that was great, we'll get
• 45:28
  Speaker 4: back to you whatever whatever, But it was so much exactly.
• 45:32
  Speaker 4: But it was that kind of meeting that just felt kiss.
• 45:35
  Speaker 4: It just felt right, you know. And so we hung
• 45:38
  Speaker 4: up and we're like, I think we have a director.
• 45:41
  Speaker 4: And that proved to be really auspicious because when we
• 45:44
  Speaker 4: then put our package together to go out to raise
• 45:47
  Speaker 4: the money, Paris is who they want to hear from.
• 45:50
  Speaker 4: And so Paris literally had investors in Tears.
• 45:55
  Speaker 5: Oh don't forget chance.
• 45:57
  Speaker 3: Oh and Chao.
• 45:58
  Speaker 4: Yeah, we brought chaaw in who had also worked with
• 46:01
  Speaker 4: but it was really Paris who sold this thing.
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 46:04
  Speaker 4: He he was so honest and so connected to the
• 46:07
  Speaker 4: material that literally on the phone, investors were like, I'm in.
• 46:12
  Speaker 4: You know what I mean, like you Typically they'll say, yeah,
• 46:14
  Speaker 4: we'll think about it, we'll talk to our people, but
• 46:15
  Speaker 4: we had to say I'm in.
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: Okay, how much money were you looking for?
• 46:21
  Speaker 4: I think it's typically like a couple of million dollars,
• 46:24
  Speaker 4: you know, that's like, yeah, the which are like, okay, a.
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: Couple million dollars. Where did you find your list of investors?
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: How many were there? How many said yes? Or how
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: many said why?
• 46:35
  Speaker 5: I love this?
• 46:36
  Speaker 4: Because white Horse Pictures knows everybody. So basically like white
• 46:40
  Speaker 4: Horse has a list of people that have invested and
• 46:43
  Speaker 4: been paid back, you know, like what a notion. So
• 46:47
  Speaker 4: they trust white Horse as the as the purveyors of
• 46:51
  Speaker 4: excellence in documentaries, especially in music docs, and so we
• 46:55
  Speaker 4: just went to their list.
• 46:57
  Speaker 5: And by the end of going to the list, we
• 46:59
  Speaker 5: had the money.
• 47:00
  Speaker 2: And we have it.
• 47:01
  Speaker 5: We have usual film funds that we funders that we've
• 47:04
  Speaker 5: gone to in the past, and the film funds so
• 47:06
  Speaker 5: be roade, and we've got these other film funders. Chicago
• 47:09
  Speaker 5: Media Group and uh, Jenny Raskin of don't tell everybody,
• 47:15
  Speaker 5: don't tell everybody.
• 47:16
  Speaker 3: That's that's right.
• 47:17
  Speaker 5: Okay, okay, so yeah, that's that's true. You're right, Eric.
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: How many of these were individuals and how many were
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: consortiums funds?
• 47:25
  Speaker 3: It was a mix, right, it was a mix.
• 47:26
  Speaker 5: Yeah, it's a mix. It's a mix, definitely mix, lovely mix,
• 47:30
  Speaker 5: really nice mix.
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: How much did you get from each since this is
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: in the past, Well, like your biggest.
• 47:36
  Speaker 4: Adventurer, some people can put in we know a million
• 47:40
  Speaker 4: to fifty thousand.
• 47:42
  Speaker 5: That was a big mix.
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, it is the film business, I know.
• 47:47
  Speaker 5: But it's a documentary film business.
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: The right, the type of people who you know were sophisticated.
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: No that it's not easy to get your money back.
• 47:58
  Speaker 5: It's not.
• 47:59
  Speaker 4: This is what it's so crazy, which is and I
• 48:02
  Speaker 4: asked Genie this when we're on our stump and you know,
• 48:05
  Speaker 4: doing our panels like Bill, why did we think we
• 48:08
  Speaker 4: could get the money for Billy when if you say
• 48:09
  Speaker 4: Billy Preston, only people of a certain age really know
• 48:12
  Speaker 4: who he is. Oh, you know, nobody's like, oh Billy
• 48:14
  Speaker 4: presdent eleve him. You've heard Billy Preston so many times
• 48:17
  Speaker 4: you don't even know it because you don't know what
• 48:19
  Speaker 4: his contribution is. And so we thought we were selling
• 48:22
  Speaker 4: it as like the Zeleig of the seventies music scene
• 48:27
  Speaker 4: across all genres, you know what I mean, or or
• 48:30
  Speaker 4: you know and and that, And it was hard because
• 48:35
  Speaker 4: people don't know who he is.
• 48:37
  Speaker 3: But it's by association.
• 48:38
  Speaker 4: It's almost like Billy's life, you know, it's by association
• 48:41
  Speaker 4: that we I think we're able to persevere, you know,
• 48:48
  Speaker 4: m Yeah, and.
• 48:50
  Speaker 5: You know, of course we got you know this before
• 48:52
  Speaker 5: you even do well, before I even would have called
• 48:54
  Speaker 5: Stephan your called parasift to make sure that there's enough archive,
• 48:58
  Speaker 5: that there's enough tools to tell the story. So you know,
• 49:03
  Speaker 5: that is it. That's a that's a you know, discovery.
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: Okay, since you've made a number of films, what percentage
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: do the people get their money back?
• 49:16
  Speaker 5: We are people get their money back in all of
• 49:18
  Speaker 5: our films?
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: Wow for us? Wow was right? So the money participation,
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: what percent of the one hundred percent does the money.
• 49:27
  Speaker 5: Get I really don't I don't know. I don't know
• 49:32
  Speaker 5: that answer, but they they every what's the percentage of
• 49:35
  Speaker 5: the people who get say, that asked me the question
• 49:37
  Speaker 5: one we're taking.
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's say the film cost a million dollars. Let's
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: say it made the money back. There are other profit
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: participants besides the money. Okay, well what you recoup? How's
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: the money split?
• 49:55
  Speaker 5: Water It's very trans Yeah, it's a waterfall. It's very transparent.
• 49:59
  Speaker 5: It's like a you know, it goes into an ascraal account.
• 50:01
  Speaker 5: Everybody sees everything. It's very you know, camera. So it's
• 50:05
  Speaker 5: very very transparent.
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: Let me put it this way. I put five dollars
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: into your movie. The movie is recouped. I got my
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: five dollars back, okay, and I'm looking for profit participation. Well,
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: there's a director, there's this that the other they're all
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: gett ignored slice.
• 50:23
  Speaker 4: Typically investors own fifty percent and filmmaker's own fifty percent.
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: Okay, that goes there. Okay, so now you got your money.
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: What's the next step.
• 50:32
  Speaker 5: We got to make our list?
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: Well, we got to make the movie.
• 50:35
  Speaker 4: Yes, we got to make out this between research and
• 50:39
  Speaker 4: actually making that list of people that we feel will
• 50:42
  Speaker 4: deliver the story, we'll tell the story. And what's crazy
• 50:46
  Speaker 4: is you don't even know what the story is until
• 50:48
  Speaker 4: you start doing the research and talking to people, and.
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: Okay, there was a lot revealed in the movie that
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: I didn't know all They had lines if you live
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: through that in your fan your no, Yeah, when you
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: started the movie with this Daniel shaw a book, what
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: percentage of the information was in that book?
• 51:07
  Speaker 2: Honestly, I went back to the original sort of treatment
• 51:11
  Speaker 2: we did really just based in the book, and I'd
• 51:13
  Speaker 2: say seventy five percent of the story was there. Would't
• 51:16
  Speaker 2: you guys agree about seventy five percent? But it's the
• 51:19
  Speaker 2: twenty five percent that came out of the interviews that
• 51:22
  Speaker 2: surprised us. That David Flesh and the bones that made
• 51:26
  Speaker 2: it real.
• 51:27
  Speaker 4: We thought, or I thought, at one point we were
• 51:30
  Speaker 4: telling the story of a closeted gay man who when
• 51:32
  Speaker 4: he got to be a certain age, came into his
• 51:36
  Speaker 4: identity and authenticity. But then we went back and everybody's like,
• 51:39
  Speaker 4: oh no, he was gay, like everybody knew it. So
• 51:42
  Speaker 4: he wasn't really closeted in his personal life. He was
• 51:47
  Speaker 4: more closeted in his professional life. And that was that
• 51:50
  Speaker 4: was very interesting that there were so many people that
• 51:54
  Speaker 4: loved him, knew him, knew he was gay, and didn't
• 51:57
  Speaker 4: have like Olivia says, wasn't a big nobody.
• 52:01
  Speaker 6: Nobody thought about it, Okay, but the film says that
• 52:04
  Speaker 6: he was tortured about it.
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: But before we go that far, you have seventy five
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: percent of the information you have the money. Tell me
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: about the process of gaining the additional information and how
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: you're going to tell the story. Well, first we oh, sorry.
• 52:23
  Speaker 5: The first first thing that we do so so that
• 52:26
  Speaker 5: our directors prepared and our writers prepared, is we do
• 52:30
  Speaker 5: a little interviews on a zoom and we just talked
• 52:34
  Speaker 5: to people and just just say. It's almost like it
• 52:37
  Speaker 5: puts a pre interview before we put them on camera.
• 52:41
  Speaker 5: And you interview a lot more people than you end
• 52:43
  Speaker 5: up using in your in your movie. I mean, Pavaratti,
• 52:47
  Speaker 5: it was like, you know, sixty five people we interviewed,
• 52:50
  Speaker 5: we had twenty if we had fifteen maybe, And with
• 52:53
  Speaker 5: same with Billy Preston, you know we had we interviewed
• 52:56
  Speaker 5: fifty some odd people and we had.
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: Okay, where did the list of fifty people come from?
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: We made it up?
• 53:06
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I know the research.
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: Okay, Billying Preston's been gone for twenty odd years, but
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: everybody involved is not young. How hard was it to
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: track these people down and were they reluctant or not
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: to go on camera and tell their story.
• 53:24
  Speaker 2: Most everybody was not reluctant. Most everybody wanted to do
• 53:27
  Speaker 2: it because there's just so much luck. So it's not
• 53:30
  Speaker 2: a struggle to get Soundra Crouch to talk about Billy
• 53:32
  Speaker 2: Preston and she becomes a key witness in the whole thing.
• 53:35
  Speaker 2: You know, Bobby Watson and Manny Kellogg that he played
• 53:38
  Speaker 2: with back in the day, they're there. It was a
• 53:41
  Speaker 2: lot of work to get Eric Clapton, and we were
• 53:43
  Speaker 2: lucky that it because Eric doesn't give a ton of interviews.
• 53:46
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 53:46
  Speaker 2: I basically had to beg him with the letter, and
• 53:48
  Speaker 2: then Jonathan Clyde, our producer in the head of Apple,
• 53:51
  Speaker 2: got to interview him. And they knew each other for
• 53:53
  Speaker 2: a long time, and so that interview was done by
• 53:56
  Speaker 2: Jonathan Clyde beautifully and becomes a pivotal, you know, a
• 54:00
  Speaker 2: pivotal interview.
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: In the whole movie.
• 54:02
  Speaker 2: So you just you work it and you work it
• 54:05
  Speaker 2: like you know, a drag queen on the runway until
• 54:10
  Speaker 2: all your sequence fall up.
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you got these fifty people, you get the
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: interviews as Stephanie said, you know, you think you have
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: one thing, but as you get deeper into the information,
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: you finally have something else. So just just to reestablish,
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: from the time that Genee contacts Stephanie, how long until
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: the money is locked up?
• 54:38
  Speaker 4: A few months?
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: I think very quickly. Yeah, okay, well.
• 54:43
  Speaker 5: To quickly doesn't always happen.
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: When you have the money. Do you have a target
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: date to start? Yeah?
• 54:53
  Speaker 4: I mean, as I remember, once we got the money,
• 54:57
  Speaker 4: then you can actually make the plan. Then you can
• 54:59
  Speaker 4: build the team out. Then you can hire your cinematographer.
• 55:02
  Speaker 4: Then you can decide which cities you're going to shoot in,
• 55:04
  Speaker 4: what how much money do you have, Where are your
• 55:06
  Speaker 4: key witnesses going to be? You know, so it becomes
• 55:11
  Speaker 4: like a beautiful The first is like a detective work
• 55:15
  Speaker 4: to figure out who to talk to and how to
• 55:17
  Speaker 4: find them, you know, which.
• 55:19
  Speaker 3: Is super fun, you know. And then it's like then.
• 55:22
  Speaker 4: We talk to them and go, okay, they're going to
• 55:24
  Speaker 4: be a good witness, and so you you know, you
• 55:26
  Speaker 4: try to guide those questions back to the park that
• 55:29
  Speaker 4: you liked that they said before, you know what I mean.
• 55:32
  Speaker 4: And it was just it's such a different way of
• 55:36
  Speaker 4: working from having a script and just trying to realize
• 55:39
  Speaker 4: that script on the screen. You know, because it's very amorphous,
• 55:42
  Speaker 4: you're just pulling things together, and also because our team
• 55:47
  Speaker 4: is experiencing all of this information together but also separately,
• 55:52
  Speaker 4: you know, so we all have to get on the
• 55:54
  Speaker 4: same page. It's a lot.
• 55:58
  Speaker 5: It's like Jess, you know, you got we're playing off
• 56:01
  Speaker 5: of each other, and you know that is It's a
• 56:03
  Speaker 5: lot like a jazz song.
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: So ultimately, is this in segments? Is it compartmentalize or
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: are you still researching when you're assembling the movie.
• 56:15
  Speaker 2: We're still researching. I mean we're still finding out more
• 56:18
  Speaker 2: people are leading us to other people that we want
• 56:20
  Speaker 2: to talk to. You know, it just continues to expand
• 56:25
  Speaker 2: and rarely contracts. And then when we end up ready
• 56:28
  Speaker 2: to go in the editing room, we just have too much,
• 56:30
  Speaker 2: which is a blessing. I mean, you really do want
• 56:33
  Speaker 2: to have too much. And then we just started trimming
• 56:36
  Speaker 2: it down. We just started saying what can we do without?
• 56:39
  Speaker 2: Who can tell the story better? And you know, it
• 56:41
  Speaker 2: all starts to sort of go through the sieve that
• 56:43
  Speaker 2: is the editorial process.
• 56:46
  Speaker 4: And as you're thinking and as you're hearing certain witnesses
• 56:49
  Speaker 4: testify you're also thinking about well, I was thinking about
• 56:56
  Speaker 4: a three act structure like you have in a regular
• 56:58
  Speaker 4: narrative movie, like how how do you how do you
• 57:02
  Speaker 4: lay this out so it has the same effect that
• 57:05
  Speaker 4: watching you know, a narrative does, which is an emotional
• 57:10
  Speaker 4: heart string tale that has, you know, a beginning, a
• 57:14
  Speaker 4: big middle, and a and a and a in an
• 57:18
  Speaker 4: ending of the second act that feels very dark, and
• 57:21
  Speaker 4: then a redemption. And thinking of it in that way
• 57:24
  Speaker 4: was very helpful to me because it it just reminded
• 57:27
  Speaker 4: me that we're still watching a too, you know, one
• 57:30
  Speaker 4: and a half to two hour movie, and and these
• 57:33
  Speaker 4: things apply.
• 57:34
  Speaker 3: They have always applied.
• 57:35
  Speaker 4: I used to teach Cassidy at USC and I talked
• 57:39
  Speaker 4: about Aristotle, I talked about Poetics, which is the very
• 57:42
  Speaker 4: first compilation of what does a two hour entertainment look like,
• 57:46
  Speaker 4: feel like? And what does it need to be successful?
• 57:49
  Speaker 4: And those things have never changed.
• 57:51
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I remember saying it has to we have to
• 57:54
  Speaker 5: have a MacGuffin at the end of that second mid
• 57:56
  Speaker 5: second act because and there always is in our in
• 57:59
  Speaker 5: one life, you know, there is something and Billie's was
• 58:02
  Speaker 5: they you know, the rests and what was going to happen.
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: Okay, Parish, you're the director, Ultimately you're in control. How
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: did your vision of what you wanted it to be evolve? Well,
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: it was.
• 58:16
  Speaker 2: It was helped because each of my partners here brings
• 58:19
  Speaker 2: a different point of view and a different skill set
• 58:21
  Speaker 2: to it, which adds to the whole thing, which is
• 58:23
  Speaker 2: why I was so glad I worked in advertising, because
• 58:26
  Speaker 2: advertising was very much about building the collaboration and getting
• 58:29
  Speaker 2: the best from everyone. So Jeanie's there, and she's she's
• 58:34
  Speaker 2: a lot. She's great with the details and everything else,
• 58:36
  Speaker 2: but she's also all hard and she's also a lot
• 58:39
  Speaker 2: of emotion, as you've seen in this interview, and that's
• 58:42
  Speaker 2: a wonderful thing. She's a great test of material and
• 58:45
  Speaker 2: what really moves her we know. And Stephanie's got that
• 58:48
  Speaker 2: story background that she just talked about, which is not
• 58:51
  Speaker 2: necessarily the way I look at it because I've never
• 58:53
  Speaker 2: been a story reader. I'm more into the ride and
• 58:56
  Speaker 2: what's the ride like? But then that helps you shape
• 58:58
  Speaker 2: the project. And my point of view is basically what
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: I learned back in college from my playwriting and screenwriting teacher,
• 59:05
  Speaker 2: William Alfred, who said I think. On the very first day, said,
• 59:08
  Speaker 2: if you're going to ask for two hours out of
• 59:10
  Speaker 2: someone's life, you have to think about what you're going
• 59:12
  Speaker 2: to give. What is the gift of the project you're making.
• 59:16
  Speaker 2: It can't just take away time for their family or
• 59:18
  Speaker 2: their kids or things they want to do. It's two
• 59:21
  Speaker 2: hours of their life, So what is the gift? And
• 59:25
  Speaker 2: I've always been driven by that. I don't want to
• 59:27
  Speaker 2: waste people's time. I want to make sure that there's
• 59:30
  Speaker 2: something that they can take away from this that is valuable.
• 59:33
  Speaker 2: And with Billy Preston's story and with the witnesses, we
• 59:36
  Speaker 2: found that. With the witnesses testimony, we found a gift
• 59:40
  Speaker 2: to the audience, a gift that sort of points them
• 59:42
  Speaker 2: in a new direction, which I think is really wonderful.
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: That's what makes it all worthwhile to me. And that's
• 59:48
  Speaker 2: what I didn't really quite expect. I didn't know what
• 59:50
  Speaker 2: the gift would be. I didn't know what would be
• 59:53
  Speaker 2: in the end of this movie. The feeling that made
• 59:55
  Speaker 2: people a little bit different from when the story began.
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: Okay, if you're a fan of music from that era,
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: you know Billy Preston's story, you may not remember that
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: he was a band leader on a TV show for
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: a while, but you know that. Yeah, he played on
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: Abbey Road and he worked with the Beatles and then
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: he was a concert for Bangladesh and he you know,
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: he had hit records in the seventies. But the Genesis
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: you didn't know that. You didn't know that he went
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: on the road as a teenager. Where did you find
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 1: all about footage? And how did you get that information?
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: It was shocking because you know, I think people sent
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: me these documentaries all the time, and a lot of
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: these people, you know, I don't want to diss some documentaries,
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: but like in the Nicky Hopkins, they don't have any footage,
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 1: and in this movie there's so much.
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 2: But in his mind blow you should speak to that
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 2: because you've got the research department of the Angel there.
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 5: So yeah, we do we have. I mean, Patrick Ryan
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 5: is our archival producer and he is he is a gift.
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 5: He is a gift and he is incredibly uh you know,
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 5: he just knows where where everything is. I don't know
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 5: how he does it. You know, we work with Global
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 5: Images g I W. Chris Robertson, Jessica Berman, Bogden. Uh,
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 5: you know that team out of New York. We work
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 5: with a team called Archival Ninja. We work with that.
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 5: Our long standing relationship is with Reeland in the Years,
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 5: David Pax Reelan in the years. He's a co producer
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 5: of this film. He is archival Library is absolutely uncanny,
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 5: and he's like a He's like an oracle. I always
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 5: called I was whenever I'm thinking about doing a doc
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 5: and we usually call him up obi Wan. I ask
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 5: him for like what he have? What what we have?
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 5: Enough archive? So there's certain tests and litmus tests that
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 5: you go through before you before you then go dip
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 5: into your your very loyal you know, investors. So you
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 5: have to have the tools and the colors on the
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 5: palette of which to paint with.
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 4: And we also had Olivia Harrison. Oh yeah, Olivia Harrison
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 4: was a fountain of information, photographs of.
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 3: Music that he had boarded. Yeah, it was.
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: It was.
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 2: She helped us get to Peter Jackson and helped us,
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 2: you know, basically get footage, not just the footage that
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 2: was in Get Back, but some outtakes and Peter Jackson
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 2: was generous enough to share those with us, which allowed
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 2: us to tell that story from Billy's perspective which people
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 2: have seen get back really kind of enjoy that because
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 2: it's buried in the eight hours and it's only fragmentary.
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 2: But when we just put it together in front of them,
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 2: focused on Billy, it's very very effective for our purposes.
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 2: So we couldn't have done that without Peter Jackson and
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 2: Apple Ringo.
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 4: Who I got to interview because Paris and Jail were
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 4: gone that day we were shooting.
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 1: I have a busy career. Yeah, Okay, is this anomaloust
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: that there's so much footage about Billy or if you
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: have the means in the connections, does there tend to
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: be all this footage of people from that era.
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: I think it's different with Billy. I think Billy was
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 2: so all over. I mean, Billy is on Shindig. You know,
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 2: Billy is in a movie when he's you know, ten
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 2: years old. You know that not every artist is on
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 2: the Netkin Cole ship the.
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 4: Zones are recording their concerts.
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 3: He is the Zelig like where we you Go?
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 2: So I think he's somewhat unusual. I don't think if
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 2: you picked anyone out of the hat, you know that
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 2: you could find this kind of material because he had
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 2: so much hair, so many different hairs processed, afro your
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 2: short and they are all these different time periods, and
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 2: we had footage, but there are limitations to that. For instance,
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 2: we wanted to say more about Waretha Franklin. There's Harry's
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 2: little footage of Billy with Franklin and that's a thirty
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 2: year relationship that some people noted that it is not
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 2: paid a great attention to in the film. But because
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 2: we didn't have the movie, we didn't have anything to
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 2: show you. We could only play the music and maybe
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 2: show some stills of Beretha Franklin. That wasn't how we
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: were crumpeted, you know, that wasn't how this thing was gone.
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: So it's unfortunate there were some holes there.
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 2: In Billy's life that we couldn't get to just because
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 2: we didn't have the stuff to show you.
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 5: Very true and we have those, you know, we did
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 5: have his his actual you know, book of memories. He
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 5: had his whole, that whole and we.
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 2: Start with Billy's actual scrap book. Billy in his scrap
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 2: book even kept articles about his assault, his in his
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 2: scrap books. So when you're seeing those in the movie,
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 2: those are coming out of Billy's scrap book, which I
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 2: thought was fascint.
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 5: You know, you're we're lucky when you find things like that.
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 5: Part of my part of that's, you know, when when
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 5: when we were when I was doing research for Lucy
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 5: and DESI and I went to Luciernez's house for example.
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 5: You know, people can say, oh, I put everything here,
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 5: this is where I put everything in these two rooms
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 5: or something, and you're you and this happened at Lucy
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 5: Ernez's home. I literally was stretching my back and I
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 5: looked up. I was literally bending my back like that,
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 5: and I said, Hey, there's a something that looks like
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 5: a lock box that's up on this top shelf. Does
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 5: you think that's anything? And she said, oh my god,
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 5: I think you're going to really love this. I forgot
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 5: I put that up there, and we pulled it down
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 5: and this is the lock box at the very very
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 5: beginning of the movie that has recordings that no one
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 5: has ever heard. You know, it's so these are it
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 5: was it was a gift, like all these recordings that
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 5: and what was so great and what we could what
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 5: we do for a lot of what we've did, we
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 5: helped Olivia organize, help her organize her, you know, with
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 5: with with that George Harrison Mature World, and and you
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 5: could help people wantit. What you don't use in your film,
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 5: you can monetize for them later, you know. So Lucy Arnez,
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 5: for example, came out with this book about the love
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 5: letters because she took out this giant I couldn't believe
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 5: it and started opening up these love letters from Desi Arnez.
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 5: And she was like, don't you want to open them up?
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 5: And I said, I do, but I don't want to
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 5: touch them. I don't want to break them. So let's
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 5: go to a professional and have somebody, you know, photograph
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 5: these properly, which she did, and that movie could have
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 5: been like, you know, two parts as well, Les, this
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 5: could have so, yeah, those are the yummy and delicious
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 5: things you find when you're going through an archive.
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: Okay, Billy goes on the road to England at a
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: young age. To what degree do you think that change
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 1: his identity personality as opposed to someone who had just
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: been living in their neighborhood going to high school.
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 2: Well, he was fifteen when he originally started traveling with
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 2: Little Richard and as Tony Jones says in the movie,
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 2: there's a lot of things going on there that maybe
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 2: a fifteen year old isn't ready to see. And even
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 2: though he's with the band, he's with the band that's
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 2: you know, guys a bit older and they're quite probably active.
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 2: And so if Billy Preshm were my son at the time,
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 2: you know, I would probably say no. But his mother
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 2: said yes. It was a great opportunity for him, and
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 2: sure enough it opened his horizons. And he says the
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 2: first time he played rock and roll, but also probably
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 2: it was a lot more than a young person should
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 2: have to handle at that point. And I think that
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 2: is certainly somebody that affected.
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 4: And I also think any you know, I remember the
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 4: first time I went to Europe. I was nineteen or something.
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 4: It's it's mind opening.
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 4: I think that beyond whatever was happening or whatever, you're
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 4: in a different country, you're out of your neighborhood, you're
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 4: in a different world.
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 3: It's got to affect you, you know.
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: Okay, being on the road and rock and roll. It
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: is sex drug in rock and roll. Yes, in the
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: era of that really applies if you're a gay guy.
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: I mean, we're doing that in some in sports. Another
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: occasional sports guy comes out and says, yes, I'm gay.
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: Most of them retired, but when we go back to
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 1: this era, no one's going to come out. It must
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: have been really hard for Billy.
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's just not possible. And you know, as we've
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 2: talked about it, because we love Billy Press so much,
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 2: we understand, you know, I get it. I get that
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 2: he wasn't able to do what I was able to do.
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 2: It is I mean, you know, pretty much out in
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 2: my adult life and certainly out in the industry at
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 2: a very early age, you couldn't do that. Then, I mean,
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 2: it's it's not he wanted to have a career. You know, Yes,
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 2: the Beatles probably, you know, we certainly knew that he
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 2: was gay, but they didn't have to make it an issue.
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 2: But not every band is going to be there, and
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 2: not every musician is going to want to play with you,
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 2: and not every record company is going to want to
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 2: have you on their lad And so it's sadly the
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 2: shrewdest thing that Billy Preston could have done is by
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 2: just staying in the closet. But there's a cost, you know,
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 2: the closet has a cost, and you can be open
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 2: with your friends, but when you're not authentic and it's
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 2: all hidden in your songs, like he writes songs about
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 2: keep it to yourself and don't let anybody get on
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 2: the inside story of your love affair. But he doesn't
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 2: actually be able. He isn't able to be his authentic self.
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 2: There is a price, and that's a price that I
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 2: think at the end was, you know, part of his
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 2: unduel the mother.
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: It's established and it's well known there might not have
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 1: been many opportunities for black people in those circumstances. But
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: do you think the mother acted appropriately or.
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 2: She was out of touch? Ladies, what do you think?
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 2: That's a tough question. I think she was taking that
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 2: Billy was a star. She knew Billy was a star.
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 2: He was on TV when he was five or six
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 2: conducting the choir. You know, he had so many opportunities.
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 2: She thought, this is what's best for Billy. You know,
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 2: let's let this star blossom and grow. And you know,
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 2: as one of the coaches, I forget who says, we
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 2: were so proud to see that Billy came out first,
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 2: that Billy was the ship before any of us. And
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 2: so there was a certain. I think for her, from
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 2: her perspective, she was just helping her son. She was
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 2: helping her son get to where he dreamed.
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: He could be. Yeah.
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 5: I mean you look at Judy Garland, you know, and
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 5: you could look at any and you know what I'm saying.
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 5: You could look at any child star and their parents
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 5: did something where you're like, you know, why would you
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 5: give them? You know speed? You know, you know what
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 5: I'm saying. So why you know what I mean? So
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 5: why it didn't and you know, you had this tragic
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 5: ending of Judy Garland. I mean so, and you know
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 5: with with Billy, he's you know you.
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I do.
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 5: I it's it's disappointing that his mom wasn't you know,
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 5: but you know, weird, we weren't there. We weren't there.
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 5: You can't if you're not there present at every moment
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 5: you don't know, we weren't there. I can't judge anybody
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 5: because they just don't know.
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: Okay, you talk about his relationship connection with the Wreath
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: of Franklin. You know, people who were not in this
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: world think that everybody knows everybody, which is untrue. Okay, Now,
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 1: one thing that is well established in the movie because
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 1: if you lived through Let It Be and Abbey Road
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 1: and all that in nineteen seventy, he looked like an opportunist.
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: But it's well established in the movie. They knew him
• 1:11:40
  Speaker 1: from Hamburg whatever. He was just dropping by the studio. Okay,
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: So but you talk about all these other people, were
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 1: they tracking him down or because generally speaking, and I
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 1: know a lot of them, the people behind the scenes,
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 1: studio musicians, they're the best networker the ball talk because
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 1: they got to work well. I think it was just
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 1: juggling opportunities.
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 2: I think they were coming at him, you know, it's
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 2: it's just they were looking for that sound, as you know,
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 2: as Eric Clapton says later, when you wanted someone to
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 2: play the B three, you went to Billy Preston. And
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 2: I think people just once they heard him and his
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 2: distinctive sound is something that I think we break down
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 2: pretty well in the film, and people now will hear
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 2: records differently. I hope because of the film, you realize
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 2: that's such a desirable commodity and not everyone has it.
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 2: So they wanted that sauce, they wanted that funk ca
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 2: dethic sound that Billy was providing, and they also knew man.
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 2: He don't need no sheet music. He just shows up
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 2: and kills you know, he does the rich Hot Chili Peppers.
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 2: I think he was in Arizona them. They send him
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 2: the tape and he plays over and he sends it back.
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 2: You know, Billy is just that way. He was such
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 2: a genius that I think when people said we could
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 2: get Billy Preston, let's get Billy Preston. He played on
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 2: the Monkeys first out. You know, everyone knows the Monkeys
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 2: were studio musicians. Did it with Billy Preston.
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 5: Yeah, back there, the early synthesizer stuff like you know what.
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 5: You know what we talked about in the film. Billy
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 5: was able to do that with his organ, playing with
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 5: his the B three that before anyone else can do it.
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 1: We talked about the sex. Let's talk sex drugs, rock
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 1: and roll drugs. Time for the drugs. He gets heavily
• 1:13:24
  Speaker 1: involved in substances. Now that is not uncommon in this world.
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 1: A lot of it has to do with a lifestyle,
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 1: especially if you go on the road. You played a
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 1: ten thousand people, then you're with the same idiots you've
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 1: known for twenty years, and you got to get up
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 1: you don't get enough sleep, and that leads to drugs.
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 1: Why it was Billy who was a church kid, Why
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 1: did he end up falling off the edge with substances.
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 2: Well, I'm the alcoholic expert here, so my theory is
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 2: not everyone becomes an alcoholic or drug because they use
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 2: alcohol and drugs, and not everyone who used it a
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 2: lot necessarily becomes alcoholic or drug act. Billy was probably
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 2: born an alcoholic. His father was an alcoholic. I think
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 2: he had that alcoholic gene and I also have, which
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 2: just excites you. When you get a drink, it does
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 2: something different to your body, and that's part of the
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 2: reason why you start to crave it. And when you
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 2: start to crave it, and when it's then around you
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 2: the way it is, then the addiction becomes a growth
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 2: of that. It also didn't help that he had a
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 2: lot of secrets and part of the reason why you know,
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 2: they always thought about drowning your sorrows. But part of
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 2: the reason why we love drugs and we love alcoholics.
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 2: It lets you forget for that time being. It releases
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 2: you from whatever agony is going on in your mind,
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 2: and if you're not really dealing with that agony, like,
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 2: Billy is not going to therapy, he's not really talking
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 2: to anybody or sharing with his friends what he's going on.
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 2: What he's doing is masking it, and then the masking
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 2: on top of the addiction becomes something that gets out
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 2: of control. Now, he did recognize it later in life,
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 2: and you see in the movie he got over at
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 2: different periods and try to pull himself together. He recognized
• 1:15:03
  Speaker 2: that this was damaging to him, but he wasn't able
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 2: to pull the deep.
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: Okay, this is another thing you touched on just now,
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 1: that no one really knew this guy. Okay, being gay
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: is one thing, but there were and that's a lot
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 1: of stuff, but this guy was not a lot coming. Okay,
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: why do you think he was so internalized?
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 2: Well, his friends really talk about Billy not wanting to
• 1:15:34
  Speaker 2: go there, and Billy didn't want to go there, and
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 2: he just in interviews, we went through all of his interviews,
• 1:15:41
  Speaker 2: he rarely said anything of any personal nature at all,
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 2: other than to say how much he loved his mother
• 1:15:47
  Speaker 2: and how gratefully he was to God for his talent.
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 2: And it seems like he's someone who's reticent to share that.
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 2: And I think it's because he doesn't want to be vulnerable,
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 2: and he doesn't want to be judged, you know, and
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 2: therefore he is not going to put it out there.
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 2: He didn't recognize that the releasing of it, by releasing
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 2: the secret is empowered, and that message never got to him,
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 2: and so the secrets were safer with him if they
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 2: were hell. And I feel bad for him because I
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 2: think that's something that you know, alcoholics can recover learn,
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 2: you know, when we say you're only as sick as
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 2: your secrets. Billy didn't get that message, and so he
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 2: just kept going. And I think he's naturally reticent, and
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 2: he's naturally but every once in a while he slips.
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 2: Every once in a while, like in that Beatles film
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 2: when in Justic's Hey, there's a piano over there, and
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 2: if you want to sit in, there's one shot at
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 2: billion he does this, guess this great lab of genuine excitement.
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 2: The Beatles have just asked him to play on their album,
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 2: The Biggest Band in the World, and his giggle is
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 2: is as close as he gets to saying, this is
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 2: the most joyful offer I've ever had in my life.
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 2: And that does make him a difficult subject. But if
• 1:16:56
  Speaker 2: you talk to enough people he's talked to, you can
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 2: get a picture it, which is where I think we're
• 1:17:01
  Speaker 2: able to accomplish. We unveiled a bit of the mystery,
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 2: not the total man. We weren't inside of his head,
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 2: but we got as close as we could get with
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 2: the friends and the family that we talked to.
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 1: Okay, the arc of his career once hems successful is
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 1: not uncommon. It's very rare that someone has hits beyond
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 1: their little period. So what makes you know he has
• 1:17:23
  Speaker 1: these gigantic kits in the seventies and then they dry up?
• 1:17:28
  Speaker 1: They try up for everybody? Okay, what makes the aftermath
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 1: of his story different from everybody else's. That's interesting, I.
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 4: Think because I think because and I credit Nigel with
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 4: getting the judge to speak on Billy's behalf, because we're
• 1:17:49
  Speaker 4: always you.
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 3: Know, he he.
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 4: Did something, some not great things, you know, and what
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 4: And I think during the film we hear our director ask,
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 4: how do you square it? You know? How do you
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 4: square all the things that he's done with like how
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 4: much people love him? And I think the ultimate love
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 4: was the guy who sent him to the penitentiary even
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 4: felt something for this man. It was part of the
• 1:18:19
  Speaker 4: thing we heard over and over again from all these
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 4: interviews that he brought joy, and he brought love into
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 4: the room. His love for music was infectious. And I
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 4: forgot the question, but well.
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 1: I do remember. I think it's really interesting.
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 2: You know a lot about the record business and the
• 1:18:39
  Speaker 2: way that it does work is you do have that
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 2: hot streak. You have those records that come out. They're
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 2: co written with him, with Bruce Fisher, and that was
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 2: a partnership that was working for a time. But then
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 2: when he goes to A and M, he sure leaves
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 2: Bruce behind and he's generating his own material, some of
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 2: which is working and some which isn't, and then he's
• 1:18:59
  Speaker 2: kind of dry. Then he's told the stories he could tell. Now,
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 2: a modern recording artist gets new producers, they find different songwriters,
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 2: and they say this is where I want to be,
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 2: and suddenly they make a change and they can keep
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 2: the same sound, but now they've got another contemporary groove
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 2: going on. They stay fresh. That didn't happen with Billie,
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 2: But they didn't find even at Motown. Well, the example
• 1:19:21
  Speaker 2: is with you on Board again. That's not a song
• 1:19:23
  Speaker 2: he wrote, you know, that's a song that was given
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 2: to him. That was A and R to him by
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 2: Suzanne de pass and it's a hit. He really needed
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 2: at this point to have someone who is really doing
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 2: the A and R work to get him the songs
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 2: that he could kill with that, and then he would
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 2: have extended his career. And he could have still continued
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 2: to write stuff, but that would extended his career.
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 4: I remember what I was going to say, I'll forget again.
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 4: So which is he says, and this is his testimony
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 4: that the best toy you ever had was with Eric
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 4: Clapton after jail. And so the story's different, our stories
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 4: different because he did spiral down, but he came back
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 4: and I think that does not happen that often. And
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 4: from talking with Joyce at length and Sam, those final
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 4: years of his life were really great until you know
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 4: that last moment when he when he apparently went off
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 4: the wagon.
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 3: But but he was.
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 4: Able to redeem himself, I think, And that's what we
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 4: tried to leave the audience with.
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 5: Okay, I was saying for forgiveness.
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 5: A lot of people, a lot of artists, you know,
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 5: they need somebody. It was said in our film actually
• 1:20:42
  Speaker 5: by Sondra Crouch that an artist needs somebody to love
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 5: them and come home to and and and just let
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 5: their hair figuratively, let their hair down. That's what an
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 5: artist needs, and we all do essentially. And I think
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 5: that a lot of this had to do with his
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 5: lack of trust and his lack of ability to let
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 5: his hair down. And I'm saying this figuratively of course,
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 5: and then and the lack of and you know, the
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 5: lack of a good drug prof that you know, AA,
• 1:21:17
  Speaker 5: we didn't have AA alcohol synonymous, and you know, it
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 5: wasn't it wasn't so prevalent, so a lot of people
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 5: didn't know how to help. And you know, Robert marger
• 1:21:28
  Speaker 5: Leaf says that they, you know, we watched a lot
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 5: of people spiral out of control that we didn't know
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 5: how to help. And that had a lot to do
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 5: with that as well.
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 1: Okay, so after his hit period and he starts to
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 1: fall off the edge, he burned a lot of people. Okay,
• 1:21:51
  Speaker 1: we experienced this maybe times five or ten with Kanye
• 1:21:55
  Speaker 1: right now, once he's trying to come back, is everybody
• 1:22:01
  Speaker 1: warming fuzzy or are they saying they have to stay
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 1: away from this guy?
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 4: According to Bill Maxwell, Yeah, according to Bill Maxwell, people
• 1:22:09
  Speaker 4: he came and played great, and people people wanted him, wanted.
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 2: And he kept playing with Ringo's All Star Band. He
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 2: kept recording with John Lennon. He kept recording until his
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 2: death with George Harrison. He toured with them and so
• 1:22:22
  Speaker 2: people came back.
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 4: Many people said he was high and he played amazing,
• 1:22:26
  Speaker 4: you know what I mean.
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 3: So it was his gift.
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 5: Will never missed a show. Yeah, well, Olivia says that.
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 2: He fell his last recording of Here we Go Again
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 2: with Ray Charles. It's the last time he played with
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 2: Ray Charles. That becomes record of the year. You know,
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 2: he's still there. He's still doing the do and he's
• 1:22:44
  Speaker 2: still getting it done, but it's you know, it's less
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 2: frequent and it's not you know, the kind of glory
• 1:22:49
  Speaker 2: hits that he had. Behind the scenes, he's playing Alton
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 2: John's album and he's doing you know, Barbara Streiss and
• 1:22:55
  Speaker 2: Johnny Cash. So he's still doing his thing. It's just
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 2: not as prominently out and solo as it was.
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 1: Okay, film is done. Did you get it?
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 5: What do you mean?
• 1:23:08
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean? You got a thing, you
• 1:23:11
  Speaker 1: go in and then when it's done, you say, you know,
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 1: I wish I had a little of this, or I
• 1:23:18
  Speaker 1: wish we could have done that, but you can't.
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 2: Yet.
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 5: We got it. And I'll tell you how I know
• 1:23:22
  Speaker 5: we got it. We got it because to sit to
• 1:23:26
  Speaker 5: watch this film over and over again when you feel, God,
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 5: I wish I had that, you can't watch it again
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 5: and again again. So we and our executives would say
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 5: that that this is a film that we got.
• 1:23:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, this is the best condensation of everything that was
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 1: given to us. Yeah. And sure, I mean there's never
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 1: been a thing that I've worked on that I haven't felt, Oh,
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 1: I wish I'd done this, I wish I cut the
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 1: air and blah blah blah.
• 1:23:49
  Speaker 2: You're always gonna knit it. But emotionally, we were in Philadelphia,
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 2: who was it yesterday? The days fly by yesterday, days ago,
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 2: with the sold out crowd, you know, in tears, clapping
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 2: at the pay of the bell moment that you know
• 1:24:02
  Speaker 2: always brings them down, uh, and just loving the film,
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 2: and we realize what we've made is connected with people.
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 2: It's connected with people so much so that it's still
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 2: the film for him. It was there for three days,
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 2: it's going into his fifth week week that never happened. Yeah,
• 1:24:18
  Speaker 2: So it's awesome that it's actually touching people. So I
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 2: just I have to believe we got something that's a
• 1:24:23
  Speaker 2: value and that people are My inbox is still with
• 1:24:27
  Speaker 2: people we can film with different parts of the world
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 2: is saying this movie is amazing and has taken them
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 2: to a different place.
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 4: That does not happen that often. No, it does, I
• 1:24:36
  Speaker 4: can I can count on one hand.
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 2: Well, definitely, it's happened every single time I've directed a documentary.
• 1:24:43
  Speaker 1: Which is one exactly one hundred percent of the time
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 1: that I've directed to This is great about about it.
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 5: You know what's great about all these q and a's
• 1:24:56
  Speaker 5: that we have is that how many people just have,
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 5: Like Paris said, there it sparks hope, It sparks dialogue,
• 1:25:04
  Speaker 5: It sparks you know, discussing uncomfortable subjects. It sparks you know,
• 1:25:12
  Speaker 5: to the you know, the the bridges that bind us,
• 1:25:17
  Speaker 5: everything that binds us, that brings us together. That's what
• 1:25:20
  Speaker 5: this movie can spark. And it reminds us that we
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 5: have way more in common than we do not, and
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 5: that's very important in these times that we're living in
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 5: right now.
• 1:25:31
  Speaker 1: Paris, you mentioned knew how to plethora of the material
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: had a Winnow down, what are two things you had
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 1: to leave out because they didn't fit the film?
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 2: Well, one thing that comes to mind, I was listening
• 1:25:43
  Speaker 2: to this morning in my car. There's a song Billy
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 2: wrote in two thousand and one called Father Forgive Them Yeah,
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 2: and I wrote down the lyrics here. When you look
• 1:25:51
  Speaker 2: at the church, does it hurt you too, how the
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 2: people of God are representing you? I mean, it's on
• 1:25:58
  Speaker 2: the notes and we just had no place for it.
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 2: It was it was so overtly. I mean, it would
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 2: have been great, but we had no film. And it's
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 2: just sometimes things just don't belong in there, even though
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 2: they are saying somebody that's really interesting. It has to
• 1:26:12
  Speaker 2: be part of the woven texture of what we're doing.
• 1:26:15
  Speaker 2: And I you know, we just stefaniely I especially, I've
• 1:26:17
  Speaker 2: talked about this. We really wish there was a way
• 1:26:19
  Speaker 2: to have this movie be just as long, but even
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 2: more music, because we love hearing Billy Preston play and
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 2: there's so much joy and the seeing the styles change
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 2: and the fact that he can do anything. I would
• 1:26:31
  Speaker 2: love to have had film with him with the Retha playing,
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 2: film with him with Johnny Cash. I'd love to see
• 1:26:36
  Speaker 2: him live with these performers at the time, So it
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 2: could be there could be a whole second, you know,
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 2: second album of just musical performances by Billy Preston, which
• 1:26:46
  Speaker 2: I would certainly watch.
• 1:26:49
  Speaker 1: Okay, people in Hollywood, the unsophisticated sake. Content is king.
• 1:26:55
  Speaker 1: Content is not king. Distribution is king. If people can't
• 1:27:00
  Speaker 1: and see it, doesn't matter how good it is. When
• 1:27:03
  Speaker 1: you get the documentaries, when you get the inny type things.
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 1: You know, there's the endless film festival circuit, then the
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 1: rs you know, the sun Dance which the studios are
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 1: buying less from. The film is done, you're happy with it.
• 1:27:23
  Speaker 1: What is the distribution plan and how do you maximize
• 1:27:28
  Speaker 1: the film such as those who are interested have access
• 1:27:32
  Speaker 1: and can see it.
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 4: That's one word, and that's a brama rama. I mean
• 1:27:36
  Speaker 4: this distribution company led by Carole and I can't pronounce
• 1:27:42
  Speaker 4: his last name, but is I have been so impressed
• 1:27:45
  Speaker 4: with how passionate this team is, how knowledgeable this team is.
• 1:27:50
  Speaker 4: We are in theaters through the end of June. This
• 1:27:53
  Speaker 4: is a this is a black music doc that is
• 1:27:56
  Speaker 4: playing sold out across the country. So many things have
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 4: sold out. We're having to repeat requests like it's coming
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 4: back to LA to the Lenley Theaters because people still
• 1:28:08
  Speaker 4: want to see it, Like you said, this is our
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 4: fifth week in Film Forum.
• 1:28:11
  Speaker 3: It's sold out in Austin. It's going back to Austin.
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 4: So the way that we're unfolding the film gives people
• 1:28:18
  Speaker 4: a chance to see it as they should in a
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 4: theater with other people, Like he was saying, people clap
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 4: after the performances, like you're actually in a live music joint,
• 1:28:28
  Speaker 4: you know, And that's when we know we got them.
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 4: And I think Paris, on the last pass of the
• 1:28:33
  Speaker 4: edit really said, let's let's extend.
• 1:28:36
  Speaker 3: Let's shout out.
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 4: Our amazing editor, sah D Hansen, who elongated the music
• 1:28:42
  Speaker 4: scenes so that you really felt like you were in
• 1:28:45
  Speaker 4: a Billy Preston concert. And I think that's super satisfying
• 1:28:49
  Speaker 4: for people.
• 1:28:50
  Speaker 1: So yeah, there's a way, I mean, people stiff around it,
• 1:28:54
  Speaker 1: but it's I think it's so.
• 1:28:55
  Speaker 2: Sparred for us. And this wasn't a decision that I made,
• 1:28:58
  Speaker 2: but this came with our producers to just stay in
• 1:29:01
  Speaker 2: theaters and be in theaters as long as we can
• 1:29:03
  Speaker 2: be in theaters and not just jump to you know,
• 1:29:05
  Speaker 2: the distribution on you know, the netflixes and whatnot, and
• 1:29:09
  Speaker 2: then we'll get there at some point. But right now,
• 1:29:11
  Speaker 2: the experience in the theater is so good and I
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 2: just I just encourage everybody to jump out when it
• 1:29:17
  Speaker 2: comes to your town. And I guess you can find
• 1:29:18
  Speaker 2: it on Billy prestonfilm dot com, he said, doing the
• 1:29:21
  Speaker 2: plug you can find out the dates and it keeps changing.
• 1:29:23
  Speaker 2: I'm looking every day, and so now we're in Louisville
• 1:29:26
  Speaker 2: and how we're normal, Yes.
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 1: Assess and Detroit. You know, it's just so much fun.
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 1: You know obvious. We have studio releases in thousands of
• 1:29:35
  Speaker 1: theaters and it's everywhere. They last for ten minutes and
• 1:29:37
  Speaker 1: they're gone. I wrote about the movie and people say, hey,
• 1:29:43
  Speaker 1: I can't see it. I can't find it. No, I
• 1:29:45
  Speaker 1: don't want to talk about internet stuff people connecting with
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 1: the information. But what is the plan in terms of distribution,
• 1:29:54
  Speaker 1: I mean, what's the strategy there.
• 1:29:57
  Speaker 4: The strategy is to build an audience for the film.
• 1:30:03
  Speaker 4: People these a lot of people come back more than once,
• 1:30:06
  Speaker 4: by the way, because they and the experience of seeing
• 1:30:08
  Speaker 4: in the second time is different because you know where
• 1:30:11
  Speaker 4: you're going. You can relax into the show, you can
• 1:30:13
  Speaker 4: relax into the music. We will sell this, we will
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 4: license this to a streamer, and people will have a
• 1:30:19
  Speaker 4: lot of access. But once that happens, you cut short
• 1:30:23
  Speaker 4: your theatrical run. Because if people know they can just
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 4: go to Netflix, or know they can go to Apple
• 1:30:27
  Speaker 4: or HBO Max, that's what they will do.
• 1:30:30
  Speaker 3: That's the world we're living in.
• 1:30:32
  Speaker 4: So I think the strategy is quite brilliant because it's
• 1:30:36
  Speaker 4: building up the cachet for the film.
• 1:30:39
  Speaker 3: It's building up like the.
• 1:30:40
  Speaker 4: Reviews to I mean, I don't think we've gotten a
• 1:30:43
  Speaker 4: bad review. This is a film that you can't get
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 4: a review in the New York Times. We got three
• 1:30:48
  Speaker 4: articles in the New York Times about this movie. So
• 1:30:51
  Speaker 4: I think it takes to build it up as a
• 1:30:53
  Speaker 4: prestige pick that you should see in theaters and hopefully
• 1:30:57
  Speaker 4: when award season rolls back around, will be in the mix.
• 1:31:01
  Speaker 1: Okay, how many towns or theaters is it playing in simultaneously.
• 1:31:07
  Speaker 2: I think it's about thirty now, yeah, thirty different theaters?
• 1:31:10
  Speaker 5: Yea, yeah, I think it's more.
• 1:31:12
  Speaker 3: I think it's forty yeah.
• 1:31:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:31:14
  Speaker 4: And like I said, maybe they would be a one
• 1:31:16
  Speaker 4: day stand, but that would sell out so they come
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 4: back and make it three days or four days like
• 1:31:20
  Speaker 4: That's what's happening is that people are telling their friends.
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 4: The word of mouth on this movie is spectacular, amazing.
• 1:31:26
  Speaker 1: Okay, film is done. It's playing theatrically. Ultimately you'll be
• 1:31:31
  Speaker 1: on a streamer where it will live forever. All those
• 1:31:34
  Speaker 1: always licensing issues things disappear. What do you want people
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 1: to take from the film and to what degree do
• 1:31:44
  Speaker 1: you think about the legacy of the film.
• 1:31:48
  Speaker 4: Paris?
• 1:31:48
  Speaker 2: I start, well, you know William Alford and my playgrinding
• 1:31:53
  Speaker 2: Teacher says what's the gift? And what I really want
• 1:31:56
  Speaker 2: people to take from the film is, yes, it's an
• 1:31:58
  Speaker 2: expiration of fame, of faith, of you know, family. But
• 1:32:04
  Speaker 2: what I hope you'll take is summarized kind of in
• 1:32:07
  Speaker 2: that very last line in the movie where she says,
• 1:32:10
  Speaker 2: how do we let this boy get away from this?
• 1:32:13
  Speaker 2: And I hope it'll make people think about there are
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 2: other troubled people in your life, and they may not
• 1:32:18
  Speaker 2: be geniuses like Billy Preston, but they're they're having their
• 1:32:21
  Speaker 2: difficulties and ask themselves have they done everything they could?
• 1:32:25
  Speaker 2: You know, so many of the witnesses say I wish
• 1:32:26
  Speaker 2: I could have done this. I wish I would have
• 1:32:28
  Speaker 2: shared this. I wish you would have shared this with me.
• 1:32:31
  Speaker 2: And you know, now Billy's no longer with us, but
• 1:32:33
  Speaker 2: there are a lot of people living and struggling with alcoholism,
• 1:32:36
  Speaker 2: and living and struggling with drug addiction, living and struggling
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 2: with secrets of their past life that they can't they
• 1:32:42
  Speaker 2: can't get passed.
• 1:32:43
  Speaker 1: So now we have no excuse.
• 1:32:46
  Speaker 2: You know, after you see this movie, I've said, boy,
• 1:32:48
  Speaker 2: I would have dealt with Corey Monteeth on Glee a
• 1:32:50
  Speaker 2: lot differently after I made this movie, because I was
• 1:32:53
  Speaker 2: very shy about approaching him, even though you know, he
• 1:32:56
  Speaker 2: was struggling to get to said and everyone knew that
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 2: he had a problem, and I just didn't really step up.
• 1:33:02
  Speaker 2: And I would not do that today. Today I would
• 1:33:05
  Speaker 2: step up. And today this film has sort of inspired
• 1:33:07
  Speaker 2: me to take that chance. As Sandra Krout says in
• 1:33:09
  Speaker 2: the film, you may lose a friend, but save a life.
• 1:33:12
  Speaker 2: And I think that's what I'm hoping people take away,
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 2: not just the joy in the glory that is Billy
• 1:33:17
  Speaker 2: Preston and the music, and get excited about it and
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 2: build your on playlist and do all those things. I
• 1:33:22
  Speaker 2: also think you'll think more about how I can be
• 1:33:25
  Speaker 2: useful and can I be more useful to people that
• 1:33:28
  Speaker 2: I love, and if so, can I extend their the
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 2: joy that they bring to me or to other people
• 1:33:33
  Speaker 2: in the world on earth by just being the key
• 1:33:37
  Speaker 2: that gets them to wellness. So I mean, that's my
• 1:33:40
  Speaker 2: big hope for the film. It's not just that I'll
• 1:33:42
  Speaker 2: be an entertainment, but it also will you help here
• 1:33:45
  Speaker 2: in their save a life?
• 1:33:47
  Speaker 4: And I think now we feel like we got to
• 1:33:50
  Speaker 4: know Billy a little bit, and I am very proud
• 1:33:53
  Speaker 4: of the fact that we are reintroducing Billy to a
• 1:33:56
  Speaker 4: whole new generation of music lovers who also old music
• 1:34:01
  Speaker 4: lovers who didn't even know they were listening to Billy.
• 1:34:04
  Speaker 4: Now they will now you can now when you hear
• 1:34:06
  Speaker 4: that that organ, you go, that's Billy. That's Billy in there,
• 1:34:10
  Speaker 4: you know. And so I think about the legacy of
• 1:34:13
  Speaker 4: Billy and how his very sometimes difficult life has you know,
• 1:34:24
  Speaker 4: transcended in a way, and that his joy and his
• 1:34:27
  Speaker 4: music will live forever.
• 1:34:28
  Speaker 5: So I'm very proud of that.
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 1: Amen. Okay, I think what Paris say is the main takeaway.
• 1:34:36
  Speaker 1: But going to Billy himself. Geenie, you've made a number
• 1:34:41
  Speaker 1: of these movies. A to what degree do you find
• 1:34:46
  Speaker 1: that the subject penetrates the culture at large? Like you said,
• 1:34:51
  Speaker 1: to involve no direction home, I could tell you exactly
• 1:34:54
  Speaker 1: where I saw it. I could tell a different name of.
• 1:34:56
  Speaker 5: It wasn't involved. That's the company that Nigel that was.
• 1:35:00
  Speaker 1: Okay, we'll leave it.
• 1:35:01
  Speaker 5: I can't take credit.
• 1:35:02
  Speaker 1: I'm going to give you the credit anyway. Okay, White
• 1:35:05
  Speaker 1: Oors Pictures. I mean there was Score's whatever had impact
• 1:35:13
  Speaker 1: when you make these films. To what degree is it
• 1:35:18
  Speaker 1: palpable that it changed the national consciousness or the international
• 1:35:23
  Speaker 1: conscious on the subject.
• 1:35:26
  Speaker 5: Look, I think that I think that it's what in
• 1:35:31
  Speaker 5: the mirror, what what Paris just said, and what I
• 1:35:33
  Speaker 5: said a few mill mimuentes ago that when you confront
• 1:35:37
  Speaker 5: uncomfortable truth in a subject matter, that it reminds us
• 1:35:44
  Speaker 5: that we need we need to reconnect as the human beings.
• 1:35:48
  Speaker 5: We need to reconnect. And I said this earlier. Forgive
• 1:35:52
  Speaker 5: me for pitting myself, but I really, really really believe this.
• 1:35:55
  Speaker 5: It will help build these bridges back that have been faltering.
• 1:35:59
  Speaker 5: And the weird news cycle, I hope it's a cycle
• 1:36:04
  Speaker 5: that we are going through right now, and we need
• 1:36:07
  Speaker 5: to reconnect with each other on a deeper level and
• 1:36:09
  Speaker 5: forgive and love more. Love has got to override it
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 5: and forget it.
• 1:36:14
  Speaker 2: And men and Bob, just to use a Genie example
• 1:36:17
  Speaker 2: that they did work on that changed. You know, I
• 1:36:19
  Speaker 2: know a lot of peoples the Begs documentary how do
• 1:36:22
  Speaker 2: You Help? Can You Mend a Broken Heart? I thought
• 1:36:24
  Speaker 2: I was going to see a story about you know,
• 1:36:26
  Speaker 2: the Saturday Night by you know Fever soundtrack and blah
• 1:36:30
  Speaker 2: blah blah. But what you saw was really a family
• 1:36:32
  Speaker 2: drama and a family that was broken and trying to
• 1:36:35
  Speaker 2: find its way back to love, which transcended the story
• 1:36:39
  Speaker 2: of the music. So the music was there and it
• 1:36:41
  Speaker 2: got you in, but the family made you look at
• 1:36:43
  Speaker 2: your own family and say, oh my god, should I.
• 1:36:46
  Speaker 1: Call my brother?
• 1:36:47
  Speaker 2: I mean, I have a lot of brothers to call,
• 1:36:48
  Speaker 2: but should I reach out to them now? I mean,
• 1:36:50
  Speaker 2: we're they're still here and some of the pain of
• 1:36:53
  Speaker 2: that are not being there, And the Begs is something
• 1:36:56
  Speaker 2: you can take. So I'm hoping that there's a little
• 1:36:59
  Speaker 2: bit of that too. The Fellow challenge people when they
• 1:37:01
  Speaker 2: look at the story and say, how can I write
• 1:37:03
  Speaker 2: my story better, you know, where can I take a
• 1:37:07
  Speaker 2: take a new path? And that's that's really beautiful.
• 1:37:10
  Speaker 5: Yes, yes, yes, man, You've lived through this.
• 1:37:14
  Speaker 1: Five or six year project. As Stephanie said, it's not
• 1:37:18
  Speaker 1: like a traditional film everybody goes assuming you're out of town.
• 1:37:22
  Speaker 1: It's like summer camp, long hours and you may never
• 1:37:26
  Speaker 1: see each other again. So you've made this one very
• 1:37:31
  Speaker 1: successful movie. Is the nature of the business that you
• 1:37:34
  Speaker 1: did it or the three of you think, well, this
• 1:37:36
  Speaker 1: was so successful, maybe there's another idea we can work on. Absolutely, yeah,
• 1:37:41
  Speaker 1: there's always another idea.
• 1:37:43
  Speaker 5: There's just another idea. Absolutely, really.
• 1:37:45
  Speaker 4: I mean, we had had a difficult time, we had
• 1:37:50
  Speaker 4: a lovely time, we had a fun time. We had
• 1:37:52
  Speaker 4: COVID time where we're all in masks. You know, when
• 1:37:57
  Speaker 4: you make a movie, you are a family, and you
• 1:38:00
  Speaker 4: do go through familial you know, joys and struggles and
• 1:38:05
  Speaker 4: you come out of it. And I think ultimately the
• 1:38:08
  Speaker 4: plays the thing. The movie's the thing, and we all
• 1:38:12
  Speaker 4: love the movie and we all put our heart into
• 1:38:14
  Speaker 4: this movie and the fact that it's connecting with people
• 1:38:17
  Speaker 4: is a reflection of that connection that we have.
• 1:38:20
  Speaker 5: Absolutely.
• 1:38:21
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 1:38:21
  Speaker 2: And during this time we were all doing different things.
• 1:38:24
  Speaker 2: I mean, during the making of this movie, I did
• 1:38:26
  Speaker 2: Dahmer and the Menendez and the Watcher and Doctor Odyssey
• 1:38:30
  Speaker 2: and the Night Agent. I mean, we do other jobs
• 1:38:33
  Speaker 2: at the same time, and then we pop back in
• 1:38:35
  Speaker 2: and so part of the reason these take a while
• 1:38:37
  Speaker 2: is because a lot of us are very busy and
• 1:38:39
  Speaker 2: have a lot of other lives to lead. So I
• 1:38:43
  Speaker 2: think it's all to its benefit too. We weren't sort
• 1:38:45
  Speaker 2: of in a hothouse for very long, you know, two
• 1:38:47
  Speaker 2: weeks here, shooting, two weeks here, editorial or just groups
• 1:38:50
  Speaker 2: of times. But mostly we were out in the world
• 1:38:53
  Speaker 2: trying to pull everything together, to keep food on our
• 1:38:56
  Speaker 2: respective tables and keep by boys in college, which is
• 1:39:00
  Speaker 2: Benson very expensive one hundred grand, yeah, one hundred grand
• 1:39:05
  Speaker 2: and no like woof.
• 1:39:08
  Speaker 1: So Paris, I have to ask you, how did you
• 1:39:13
  Speaker 1: end up with the name Paris. Yes, it's a very
• 1:39:17
  Speaker 1: simple story. Uh, it's my mother. She was inspired to
• 1:39:20
  Speaker 1: name me after Paris of Helena Troy than you know,
• 1:39:24
  Speaker 1: so I'm basically named not after the city, which she
• 1:39:27
  Speaker 1: had never been to until I took her to it,
• 1:39:29
  Speaker 1: you know, later in life. But she thought that was
• 1:39:31
  Speaker 1: a really cool name and all my other brothers and
• 1:39:34
  Speaker 1: sisters have nice normal names, William, Robin, Brian, Mark, Monica.
• 1:39:39
  Speaker 1: And in the middle there there's Paris. So I was
• 1:39:42
  Speaker 1: destined for something different. Who whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa whoa.
• 1:39:45
  Speaker 1: You're the middle child. Well, I'm close to the middle
• 1:39:49
  Speaker 1: I was actually the third of seven. Okay, I'll leave
• 1:39:53
  Speaker 1: it at that. So as we go forward in the
• 1:39:57
  Speaker 1: immediate future, what's keeping you busy?
• 1:39:59
  Speaker 2: Paris in the immediate future, Oh my gosh, I am
• 1:40:04
  Speaker 2: doing a lot of work with Dan Fogelman, who's the
• 1:40:06
  Speaker 2: producer in the creator of This Is Us and Paradise.
• 1:40:09
  Speaker 2: I just did a new show for him called The Land,
• 1:40:12
  Speaker 2: which won't be out until next year, which is fantastic
• 1:40:14
  Speaker 2: as succession in a football team, the Cleveland Browns. It's
• 1:40:18
  Speaker 2: got Bill Macy edit who is unbelievable, Mandy Moore, and
• 1:40:21
  Speaker 2: Chris Maloney. And then I'm gonna go and do the
• 1:40:24
  Speaker 2: end of Paradise, the final season, a lot of the
• 1:40:26
  Speaker 2: two episodes of that. Yeah, it's been announced that this
• 1:40:29
  Speaker 2: third season will be the last season, so we'll find
• 1:40:32
  Speaker 2: out what Sterling K. Brown can do to save the
• 1:40:35
  Speaker 2: world or even its possible.
• 1:40:38
  Speaker 1: So those are the things that I'm in the middle of.
• 1:40:41
  Speaker 1: And Stephanie, what's keeping you busy?
• 1:40:44
  Speaker 4: I have a movie called Otis and Zelma, which is
• 1:40:48
  Speaker 4: about Otis Redding and his wife Zelma, and it's a
• 1:40:53
  Speaker 4: ghost story.
• 1:40:54
  Speaker 3: It's a love story.
• 1:40:56
  Speaker 4: Otis died at twenty six, she was twenty three, and
• 1:41:00
  Speaker 4: it's really how love kept him alive and keeps him
• 1:41:02
  Speaker 4: alive today. She's an amazing woman. It's Daniel Deadweiler and
• 1:41:08
  Speaker 4: our our Otis is John Boyega. And that'll be my
• 1:41:13
  Speaker 4: next movie. It's a narrative. And and I'm raising my granddaughters,
• 1:41:21
  Speaker 4: which is a new thing because my my grand my
• 1:41:25
  Speaker 4: daughter in law, had a massive stroke and she is covering. Yeah,
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 4: And so I've got a little three and five year
• 1:41:31
  Speaker 4: old that I'm helping raise with my son and the
• 1:41:35
  Speaker 4: village that is the family. It's been quite a life lesson.
• 1:41:42
  Speaker 1: Really, I'm so fortunate to have you guys.
• 1:41:47
  Speaker 5: So I'm fortunate to have them, Are you kidding?
• 1:41:49
  Speaker 3: They're like the joy?
• 1:41:51
  Speaker 5: They are the joy?
• 1:41:52
  Speaker 2: And you didn't mention that Stephen bray Is. I think
• 1:41:55
  Speaker 2: you alluded to the fact that he's one of the
• 1:41:56
  Speaker 2: composers of the color purple, but he also wrote those
• 1:41:58
  Speaker 2: great hits for Madonna back in the day, so he's
• 1:42:01
  Speaker 2: known in the music world, and I'm sure he's busy
• 1:42:04
  Speaker 2: doing something awesome.
• 1:42:05
  Speaker 1: Same.
• 1:42:06
  Speaker 3: Yes, we're actually writing a musical together, a musical, that's right.
• 1:42:14
  Speaker 1: So that I got to ask you if you could
• 1:42:15
  Speaker 1: tell us what's the subject of the musical.
• 1:42:18
  Speaker 4: It's called Vintage, and it's a story of a diva
• 1:42:21
  Speaker 4: who was like a Millie Jackson in her day, and
• 1:42:24
  Speaker 4: she's got a little bit of revived fame because her
• 1:42:27
  Speaker 4: signature song is in an ed commercial and.
• 1:42:31
  Speaker 3: She just wants to come back, but she doesn't have
• 1:42:34
  Speaker 3: much wherewithal so she ends.
• 1:42:37
  Speaker 4: Up going to an old folks home for musicians and
• 1:42:40
  Speaker 4: she she turns the place inside out, so.
• 1:42:43
  Speaker 1: It's like a sister act. Is this legitimate theater or
• 1:42:47
  Speaker 1: is this a movie?
• 1:42:49
  Speaker 5: It's legitimate theater.
• 1:42:50
  Speaker 3: It's a musical.
• 1:42:51
  Speaker 5: Yeah, it's a musical.
• 1:42:52
  Speaker 1: That's a tough road. Good luck up man. But but
• 1:42:55
  Speaker 1: they're all tough.
• 1:42:57
  Speaker 5: They're all they're all tough.
• 1:42:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah they are.
• 1:43:00
  Speaker 5: Our narrative is tough.
• 1:43:01
  Speaker 1: But musicals are really tough. And Jeanie, what's up with you?
• 1:43:06
  Speaker 5: Well, we've got film that's out right now that we're
• 1:43:09
  Speaker 5: promoting is Lil a fair building on a mystery directed
• 1:43:12
  Speaker 5: by Ali panc And uh, we've got Fleetwood Mac. That's
• 1:43:17
  Speaker 5: U that's gonna that also is coming out probably by
• 1:43:21
  Speaker 5: the end of the year and on Apple. And we
• 1:43:25
  Speaker 5: have got a lot of very very very cool things
• 1:43:28
  Speaker 5: that are that are cooking that aren't announced. And uh,
• 1:43:32
  Speaker 5: and there's a lot of very cool things coming a
• 1:43:34
  Speaker 5: lot of very fun things.
• 1:43:36
  Speaker 1: Little Fear has already played. Weetwood Mac is not out yet.
• 1:43:40
  Speaker 1: That's a little bit my world. I know a little
• 1:43:42
  Speaker 1: bit about it. With an act that universal, that had
• 1:43:48
  Speaker 1: an album that's so old twenty million copies, or in
• 1:43:50
  Speaker 1: the neighborhood thereof what do you do to promote that
• 1:43:55
  Speaker 1: it is a subject. It's unlike Billy Preston, We Are,
• 1:43:58
  Speaker 1: you know, taking the lid off in your looking at
• 1:44:00
  Speaker 1: things that most people don't know. People know a lot
• 1:44:03
  Speaker 1: about Fleetwood Mac. How do you make this into an event.
• 1:44:08
  Speaker 5: Into a one one movie. It's not a two parter.
• 1:44:11
  Speaker 5: That's very difficult to do. That's how very difficult it is.
• 1:44:14
  Speaker 5: We're doing this with Kennedy Marshall. Frank Marshall's directing We Are.
• 1:44:19
  Speaker 5: It's the it is the only film that has been
• 1:44:22
  Speaker 5: authorized by all five members. So we had everybody, you know,
• 1:44:27
  Speaker 5: we had that not pitch this, We had it all
• 1:44:30
  Speaker 5: sign sealed and delivered right before we lost Christine. You know,
• 1:44:34
  Speaker 5: we thought she just had a cold or the flu,
• 1:44:36
  Speaker 5: and sadly she passed away in twenty twenty two, so
• 1:44:39
  Speaker 5: that was a shock and surprise. So it is difficult.
• 1:44:44
  Speaker 5: The answer to your question, It is difficult, just like
• 1:44:48
  Speaker 5: it's difficult to you know, Bob Dylan, No Direction, Home
• 1:44:52
  Speaker 5: and and the Beatles eight days a week. It is
• 1:44:57
  Speaker 5: a difficult subject. Somebody will and even Paul Rotti, you know,
• 1:45:02
  Speaker 5: somebody will say, undoubtedly will say why didn't you cover
• 1:45:05
  Speaker 5: this part? And didn't you know the story? And well,
• 1:45:08
  Speaker 5: we just couldn't fit it into one, uh, you know,
• 1:45:11
  Speaker 5: under two hours. So it's it's difficult, is what it is.
• 1:45:15
  Speaker 5: It is. It is a beautiful piece and well and
• 1:45:20
  Speaker 5: it's not even done yet. So where it's I think
• 1:45:24
  Speaker 5: you're gonna enjoy it?
• 1:45:25
  Speaker 1: I do.
• 1:45:26
  Speaker 5: I hope you're gonna enjoy it.
• 1:45:27
  Speaker 1: Okay, don't you talk about lessons you got from your professor.
• 1:45:30
  Speaker 1: I can't even remember I got this lesson. Sometimes you
• 1:45:34
  Speaker 1: have to leave the best stuff out that it doesn't
• 1:45:37
  Speaker 1: serve the story.
• 1:45:39
  Speaker 3: Yeah, high breaking.
• 1:45:42
  Speaker 1: Okay, ladies and gentlemen, I want to thank you so
• 1:45:46
  Speaker 1: much for this intellectual conversation about a truly phenomenal movie.
• 1:45:51
  Speaker 1: Hopefully this will spread the word. As I say, it
• 1:45:54
  Speaker 1: is the story of Billy Preston, but as Paris certainly
• 1:45:57
  Speaker 1: went into depth about, it is a story worry about humanity, loss,
• 1:46:03
  Speaker 1: how you should treat people. Even if you know nothing
• 1:46:06
  Speaker 1: about Billy, nothing from nothing, Even if you know nothing
• 1:46:09
  Speaker 1: about Billy Preston, you will enjoy it and you will
• 1:46:12
  Speaker 1: come out of fan. You know a lot of people
• 1:46:15
  Speaker 1: you have to their music is not that accessible. But
• 1:46:20
  Speaker 1: in Billy's case, it was one accessible performance after another.
• 1:46:24
  Speaker 1: And these performances by the three of you have been
• 1:46:28
  Speaker 1: very accessible. And I want to thank you for taking
• 1:46:30
  Speaker 1: the time with my audience.
• 1:46:31
  Speaker 5: Oh thank you.
• 1:46:33
  Speaker 4: Everybody reads you so we're so excited to get on
• 1:46:36
  Speaker 4: your show.
• 1:46:36
  Speaker 5: Yeah, thank you.
• 1:46:38
  Speaker 2: You know how to do this interview? I think, Bob,
• 1:46:40
  Speaker 2: you might want to think about doing it for a living.
• 1:46:42
  Speaker 2: You guys, Yeah, you know, I'm.
• 1:46:46
  Speaker 1: Just going to start. I'm and I answer that because
• 1:46:48
  Speaker 1: it's something and I talk about with my shrink I
• 1:46:53
  Speaker 1: find it relatively fruitless to pursue things, even though I
• 1:46:57
  Speaker 1: know that's the movie business. You got to go out,
• 1:47:00
  Speaker 1: can you hear no more than yes? So I usually
• 1:47:05
  Speaker 1: wait until someone's looking for me, because if they're looking
• 1:47:08
  Speaker 1: for me, they know what the act is. They want me,
• 1:47:11
  Speaker 1: whereas if they're trying to sell it, it's like, oh,
• 1:47:14
  Speaker 1: come on, but enough of me, thanks again for doing
• 1:47:17
  Speaker 1: this until next time. This is bombing websites.