5 Questions with...Tom Scott, co-founder of The Nantucket Project (TNP)

NFF:  Mr. Tom Scott: co-founder of Nantucket Nectars; co-founder of TNP; Chair of the Nantucket Film Festival board.  I think it’s safe to say you love this place!  Where does your love for Nantucket come from?

TS: I grew up going to Cape Cod; went there every summer of my life. In college, I wanted space from my family and went to Nantucket and fell in love with the place.  It’s an inspiring place and one of the things about it is everyone is enterprising; so many work both for themselves and a variety of jobs. Being surrounded by that was inspiring to me. On Nantucket you have to perform and that spirit of enterprise relates to how I’ve grown here.

NFF: TNP operates across three separate platforms: (1) the annual September event on Island, (2) TNP IdeaFilms, in partnership with Harbers Studios, and (3) TNP Scholars.  Can you give a thumbnail portrait of each and describe how it evolved into this configuration?

TS: TNP is like this ‘message co-op’; all these curious people who want to be in a beautiful place are together.  People who are trying to impact the world and be the beneficiaries of what we do and grow year round in Nantucket.  Holly [Gordon, of TNP Scholars] is the galvanizing force of all the co-operative efforts.  At the September gathering, the best ideas from the Scholars are taken and shared, or are the basis for Films. Ideas become Talks that become Films.

NFF: TNP/Harbers Studios Presents is a new event at the Festival, marrying your TFF and TNP roles into the Ideas/Talks/Films Program.  Talk about how this program emerged.

TS: Mystelle [Brabbee, NFF’s Executive Director] brought it up and The Nantucket Project’s IdeaFilms notion is ideas from TNP scholarship that lead to talks at TNP that yield films which hopefully galvanize the entire effort. In conversations with directors, you’re often defining what it means as you discuss it; ultimately it manifests in different ways. But at the Festival, as at the September conference, the setting is perfect--a theater, short films--and it may or may not be obvious what we’re doing, but we hope that the TNP experience is preserved and NFF audiences will get a sample of what we do each year.  I’m glad Mystelle planted the seed!

NFF:  The Nantucket Project had its 5th Anniversary last year; looking back, what are you most proud of about its accomplishments so far and where would you like to see it in 2020?

TS: That’s a good question. It’s an unwieldy thing, what we’re trying to accomplish, but behind it is an ethos--we believe in cultivating things. People with a good spirit, working hard to create open communication are valuable and necessary. It doesn’t always work, but by and large it does, and in order for it to do so, it takes work. There’s a nuance we can directly appreciate, and hopefully others can too. All that I’ve said here can be best utilized and actualized through our films which are the most shareable aspect of our work. All the work we put into the in-person experience can’t be captured but for film. All the world can feel an impact through it. We did a film with Larry Lessig [Harvard Law Professor] seen by 5 million people, and it’s the one film that is the best distillation of the TNP talk experience [see it here]. It’s meant to give you the experience of being there. And if you get the right film, people, and director, you can make these transcendent pieces.

NFF: In your own words, why should people attend TNP/Harbers Studios Presents Ideas/Talks/Films?

TS: I think it’s efficient, valuable, enjoyable storytelling and you can’t separate enjoyment from learning...or, you shouldn’t!

The inaugural TNP/Harbers Studios Presents IDEAS/TALKS/FILMS takes place on Thursday, June 23 at 7:45pm in Dreamland Main. Tickets are available here.

Clay Tweel's GLEASON, a story of Steve Gleason's heroism

Spotlight documentary, GLEASON, is part tale of courage, and part love letter to his young son. Straight from a 'Best Documentary' win at Seattle Film Festival, Director Clay Tweel brings his latest documentary to Nantucket. Read a profile of Tweel's unforgettable film.  

GLEASON plays the Nantucket Film Festival on Friday, June 24th and Sunday, June 26th.

5 Questions with...Jedd and Todd Wider, directors of GOD KNOWS WHERE I AM

Our latest interview with talent from this year’s Nantucket Fest is with the directors of the feature documentary, GOD KNOWS WHERE I AM, which just won a Special Jury prize at HOTDOCS.  Veteran documentarians, Todd and Jedd Wider are brothers and creative collaborators on this powerful film which tackles the subject of mental illness through the personal journey of its subject, Linda Bishop. We recently got to chat with Todd and Jedd.

NFF:  The New Yorker did a profile of Linda Bishop’s story, but yours is a much more artful approach than one might expect from a documentary.  When did you first learn of Linda Bishop, and how did you decide to approach telling her story?

Todd: My inspiration came from an encounter with a homeless man in New York.  I would see him in the neighborhood, and called the Police to help him and they asked me why I kept calling.  It led to a discussion around social services for the mentally ill who fall into this gap where they’re not under medical treatment, aren’t necessarily criminal, and may only come into light if they’re being considered a public nuisance.  I also came across Rachel Aviv’s article (from the New Yorker) and she was a great resource.  She’s listed as a consulting producer on the film.  As to the approach to telling the story, that came in the filmmaking.  Our thought was we should show Linda Bishop’s state of mind in depicting her story, because that would be the best means for gaining empathy from the audience.

Jedd: We are documentary veterans and are attracted to stories with socio-political relevance and we like to shine a light on under-discussed topics to, hopefully, inspire people to do something. For this topic, treatment of the mentally ill and homeless is lacking in our society. Linda’s story should be a cautionary tale for us as a society; she fell through the cracks and suffered an experience no one should have to go through.

NFF: The photography of the film has a weightless feel; almost trippy.  Can you describe how you developed the look with your cinematographer?

Jedd: Our Cinematographer, Gerardo Puglia, is so gifted and was a brilliant creative partner. We wanted to make an experimental type of documentary, lending the viewer Linda’s perspective as she lived in the house, so the film was crafted to put the viewer inside the farmhouse.  Linda’s food writings and recipes were written in great detail and we shot all of it. Her writings are so descriptive, it’s clear she wrote from memory, but her fixation on food was around the time that she was actually running out of food and beginning to starve.  So we used 16mm for the food shots to give it that aged patina look.  And the floating camera that’s used throughout is meant to convey ‘the eye of God,’ or an omniscient viewpoint.

NFF: Linda Bishop’s journal gave you this rich resource of her voice.  Did you know you wanted to have the entries performed from the start?  Talk about your casting of Linda’s voice.

Jedd: We always knew we wanted to incorporate the journals because it’s Linda’s voice, but we also wanted to have a window into her state of mind which evolves and eventually disintegrates. The matter of how it would be used evolved during the making of the film.  We considered using passages or doing a dry read, but it soon became evident that the best use would be a performance read; that it would the best way to pay respect to Linda.

Todd: Lori Singer, an accomplished actress and musician, was who we cast as Linda’s voice.  She approached the performance in a lyrical, almost musical way.  She examined how Linda wrote, the impression of the pen on the page and if more words were squeezed into a line. Lori created a character of Linda in her head, then translated it. As a form of rehearsal, she recorded performances in the closet of an abandoned house and didn’t eat, to get into character. Many of her original rehearsal recordings would up in the film. We want you to feel something for the voice, and towards the end of the film, when the voice disappears, we want you to feel the loss.

NFF:  This is clearly a personal film—about Linda, her family and their journey with her illness—but of course there’s an issue at its core.  What sort of an engagement with that issue do you hope audiences will have?

Todd: People often ask for an “action plan” from documentaries, as though we’re expected to provide a blueprint for activism, but as much as we care about issue impact, we’re filmmakers first and we want you to have a cinematic experience. The film is photographed on different film stock to provide photographic texture; Lori’s performance creates a narrative, and Rashomon was an inspiration for story structure: the same question is at the beginning--there’s a dead body in the house; who put it there?  We want the film to linger with the audience.

NFF: In your own words, why should people come to see your documentary at NFF?

Jedd: See it to go on a journey and if you join us, your mind will be blown away in a beautiful and elegiac way. It’s a worthy way to spend 90 minutes and worth forgoing the beach!

Todd: Linda Bishop is from New England (NH), much of what she writes is about living there and will be familiar to the community, and this is a major issue, not only there, but throughout the nation.  

GOD KNOWS WHERE I AM plays Nantucket Film Festival on Friday, June 24th and Saturday, June 25th. Jedd and Todd will be in attendance at both screenings.

Watch a trailer for our 2016 Centerpiece Film: NORMAN LEAR, JUST ANOTHER VERSION OF YOU

Norman Lear, arguably the most influential creative force in television history, changed the face of the small screen—and American culture—through a string of hit shows in the 1970s. Topical series such as All in the Family, Maude, Good Times, and The Jeffersons tackled taboos of race, class, and gender through humor and prodded audiences to confront longstanding prejudices. Masterfully crafted characters like Carroll O'Connor's Archie Bunker and Bea Arthur's Maude Findlay introduced progressive ideas into living rooms around the nation. Acclaimed filmmakers Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady compose an artful portrait and appreciation of the incomparable Lear. Present-day interviews with the writer/producer, now 93 years old and still professionally active, underscore the thoughtfulness he employed first as he crafted his groundbreaking television series and later in his activist work, including the founding of the progressive advocacy organization People For the American Way.  

NORMAN LEAR: JUST ANOTHER VERSION OF YOU plays Nantucket Film Festival on Thursday, June 23rd and Saturday, June 25th.

Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady will receive the  Special Achievement in Documentary Storytelling  at the Screenwriters Tribute on Saturday, June 25.

Thursday's screening will include an extended conversation between director Heidi Ewing and Facing History and Ourselves' Marc Skvirsky. 

5 Questions with....Steph Ching and Ellen Martinez, directors of AFTER SPRING

We continue our interview series with filmmakers in this year's Program with the directors of AFTER SPRING, Steph Ching and Ellen Martinez.  Profiling the lives behind Syria's refugee crisis, Martinez and Ching immerse viewers in life at the refugee camp, Zaatari, by introducing viewers to two families and several aid workers attempting to make the best of the present while facing an uncertain future.  We recently caught up with the directors at their DUMBO office.

NFF: You’ve referred to AFTER SPRING as being a ‘tool for putting a face on the Syrian refugee crisis.’ Were there any faces NOT in the film that stood out in particular to you personally?

Ellen: That’s my favorite question!

Steph: Yes! As you know, making a documentary, there’s so many interesting stories you come across and not everything can make it into the movie. One of the people who we met who we were so impressed with was this teenager named Mezon who lived not at Zaatari camp, but a different camp and one of her focuses was education. Access to education is an issue at the camp, so a lot of kids end up not going to school. She took it upon herself to encourage her peers to attend school, and she set up girl study groups for her friends and she’s been called the “Malaala of Zaatari.” And when Malaala visited the camp, she was kind of her guide there -- there’s a shot of them together in the film.

Ellen: The reason she didn’t make it in the film was she ended up moving camps and we didn’t see how we could make it work to still include her since we were focused on Zaatari. But since then she’s actually been resettled to the UK and works with the Malaala Fund to help raise awareness and increase access to education for girls.

NFF: How did you choose the Zaatari Camp as the one to focus on?

Ellen: When we were researching the subject, the majority of the refugees lived in the neighboring countries, and started reading about the Zaatari Camp and how the people from these countries came to the camp and started building a whole community in this transitional space.

Steph: Instead of moving around we stayed there to be able to provide a more personal story. 

NFF: How did you become creative partners?

Ellen: We attended NYU together and were friends in documentary class. After school we both worked in different capacities for a while…I worked on set, and--

Steph: …I mostly worked in postproduction. So together we made a great match because our skill sets complimented each other.

NFF: What were the most challenging and rewarding aspects for you both in making AFTER SPRING?

Ellen: The most challenging was the languages; the language barrier. The film is in Arabic, Korean and a little bit of English and we don’t speak those languages…

Steph: …barely English…!

Ellen: …so we had to put all our trust in our translators. And we were lucky to have some great translators both on location and in post, in NYC. Overall we had about 26 different translators. We translated and edited at the same time, and it took longer than six months to fully translate.

Steph: And also staying true; we wanted an Arabic speaker to watch it and for it to make sense and a Korean speaker to watch it and for it to make sense.

Ellen: And it was important for us not to have a narrator, which would have been easier, because we wanted to preserve the voices of our subjects and have them tell their own stories.

NFF: In your own words, why should people come see AFTER SPRING at NFF?

Steph: We want everyone to see it!

Ellen: We hope it offers a different perspective into the crisis from what you see on the news-- masses of people where you don’t get to know them. In our movie you do get to know them on a personal level. Also it’s not a depressing film; we want people to know that. You get to see what people do to overcome being in this horrible situation.

Steph: We couldn’t help but fall in love with the people we met there and we hope that translates to the screen…

Ellen: …and we’ll be there!

Steph: Yeah! Come see us!

AFTER SPRING plays the Nantucket Film Festival on Saturday, June 25th and Sunday, June 26th. Ellen and Steph will be in attendance at both screenings

See the trailer for EQUITY, the first female-driven Wall Street drama

Check out the trailer for Meera Menon's debut drama, EQUITY.  Starring Anna Gunn, it's a film featuring what Variety calls, "the She Wolf of Wall Street...." Rounding out the cast are: James Purefoy, Craig Bierko, Nate Corddry, and Sarah Megan Thomas and Alysia Reiner, whose Broad Street Pictures produced the film.

EQUITY plays Nantucket Film Festival on Saturday, June 25th, and Producer/Actor, Alysia Reiner will be in attendance.

See a teaser of Werner Herzog's LO AND BEHOLD, REVERIES OF THE CONNECTED WORLD

"Legendary master filmmaker Werner Herzog (Grizzly Man, Cave of Forgotten Dreams) examines the past, present and constantly evolving future of the Internet in Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World. Working with NETSCOUT, a world leader in-real time service assurance and cybersecurity, which came aboard as a producer and led him into a new world, Herzog conducted original interviews with cyberspace pioneers and prophets such as PayPal and Tesla co-founder Elon Musk, Internet protocol inventor Bob Kahn, and famed hacker Kevin Mitnick. These provocative conversations reveal the ways in which the online world has transformed how virtually everything in the real world works, from business to education, space travel to healthcare, and the very heart of how we conduct our personal relationships. In the words of Herzog himself: “It is one of the biggest revolutions we as humans are experiencing.”

The Playlist's Nick Schager calls Lo and Behold, “A masterful inquiry into technological evolution. Herzog’s profound inquisitiveness comes across as natural, sincere, and infectious."

Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World plays the Nantucket Film Festival on Thursday, June 23rd and Friday, June 24th.

Todd Solondz's WEINER-DOG just released a trailer

From director Todd Solondz (WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE, HAPPINESS), WIENER-DOG is a dark, starkly funny story of a single dog and the many different people she touches over her short lifetime.  Man’s best friend starts out teaching a young boy some contorted life lessons before being taken in by a compassionate vet tech named Dawn Wiener (Greta Gerwig). Dawn reunites with someone from her past and sets off on a road trip. After leaving Dawn, Wiener-Dog encounters a floundering film professor, as well as an embittered elderly woman and her needy granddaughter—all longing for something more.  Solondz’s perversely dark comedy offers an appallingly honest look at the American experience, brought to life by its all-star cast.

Rounding out the cast are: Danny DeVito; Zosia Mamet; Ellen Burstyn, Kieran Culkin, Tracey Letts and Julie Delpy.

WEINER-DOG plays the Nantucket Film Festival Thursday, June 23rd and Saturday, June 25th.

5 Questions with...Penny Lane, director of NUTS!

Every year we give our patrons an introduction to some of the talent behind the films in the current year's program, and today begins our line-up of talent from the NFF16 feature films. We caught up with director, Penny Lane, whose second feature, NUTS!, is in our documentary section. NUTS! retells the tale of eccentric John Romulus Brinkley, an early 20th century physician who made a fortune curing men of impotence using goat testicles, built the world's most powerful radio station, invented junk mail, and nearly became the governor of Kansas.

NFF: As a documentary filmmaker, lots of potential subjects must come into your orbit on a regular basis; apart from its truth-that's-stranger-than-fiction appeal, what made you decide to tell this story?

PL: I stumbled on a book about Brinkley in a public library in 2008, and that was it; I knew I had to tell this story.  It took somewhere between 7 and 8 years to finish.  I felt he was such a master of his craft that I wanted to be as good a manipulator as he was, except in nonfiction form. Most of the time when watching documentaries, I feel over-manipulated, but in my storytelling I try to be subtle.  Since I was, in a sense, mimicking Brinkley's manipulative tactics, I went all out in that style, and it was quite a challenge since it's such a departure from my normal style. Aesthetically it was an interesting collage because everything we did was so manipulative from the outset.

NFF: This film has an unexpected...trajectory which I won't spoil by detailing too much, but can you talk about how you decided to construct the way the story would unfold?

PL: I knew the big picture structure early on.  I was telling a story about a con man and wanted the movie to, to some extent, perpetuate a fraud or pull a con itself.  'How to do it' was the issue! There are a lot of movies about interesting people or subjects, but an exciting marriage of form and content holds my attention.  In this case, Brinkley was a 'media maestro,' as am I; and I wanted to show how documentaries can also engage in the tactic of sleight of hand, or fooling people.  Documentary ethics is something I always think about, and this film was a kind of exercise of playing with those issues in a way.  Early on I knew I had to be a con man to tell this story the way I wanted to, but I'm too nice to pull it off, so I had to tell the audience that I was fooling them!  The takeaway is, when you're using the communication tactics of documentary, it's not that hard to fool people if you want to.

NFF: Let's talk about that title!  I like the choice of punctuation which takes if from being fairly straightforward and literal to tongue-in-cheek.  How did you arrive at NUTS, exclamation point?

PL: Hilarious story.  I brought on my writer, Thom Stylinkski, two years into the project.  We were emailing back and forth in our discussions about the drafts, etc., and we start talking about the title.  And he says, "why isn't it 'Nuts'?" And I'm like, "I know.  It has to be a really great title that's catchy and will grab people...I've got to figure it out." And in a later chain he goes, "but why not 'Nuts'?" and I say, "yeah...exactly.  It's got to be something out of the ordinary, you know, something really strong." And after a few times he's finally like "No. Like LITERALLY, why isn't it literally, 'NUTS!'" and I go "ohhhhh!!!"  

NFF: Animation is quite popular in modern documentary storytelling, and you use quite a lot of it here.  I was particularly drawn to the style of animation in NUTS!  Can you talk about your creative collaboration there?

PL:  Seven different animators' work is in the film.  The film is told in 7 chapters, and there's an animator for each chapter. For me, having different artists do different parts was appealing in two ways: (1). Production-wise, for one animator to do the 55 minutes of film that NUTS! required would have taken forever and been super expensive.  This way, we were able to have several people working simultaneously and it was way cheaper; (2) Artistry-wise, I liked the idea of overtly or unconsciously underlining the idea that a story is different depending on who's telling it.  So I worked with one animator early on to develop the general look of Brinkley and the other main characters so as to have some continuity in their look, and apart from that, everyone had the freedom to create as they liked.  As far as how I paired which animator with the chapter they were drawing, I looked for animators whose particular strengths matched with the themes we outlined, so, for instance, we gave the sepia section to someone I knew was strong in sepia animation.

NFF:  Last question, in your own words, why should people come see NUTS! at NFF?

PL: It's super fun! And most of the the time people don't associate documentaries with fun. But smart can be fun, or fun can be smart...however you want to look at it!

NUTS! plays Nantucket Film Festival on Thursday, June 23rd and Saturday, June 25th.

SPECIAL OFFER - Patron Pass - Memorial Day Weekend Only!!

PATRON PASS SPECIAL OFFER!!

Buy a Patron Pass, Get a FREE BUDDY TICKET with Priority entry to one In Their Shoes...® program

The Patron Pass provides ticket-less access and priority entry to: In Their Shoes... With Molly Shannon and In Their Shoes... With Oliver Stone. 

The Buddy Ticket will provide Priority entry to your choice of one In Their Shoes... program, so you can share the NFF Patron experience with a friend!

If you've been waiting to buy your Patron Pass, now's the time...

CLICK HERE TO BUY YOUR PATRON PASS TODAY!!

 

As a reminder, here's what's included in your purchase of a Patron Pass:

* Priority Entry to ALL films and Signature Programs, including: Screenwriters Tribute, Late Night Storytelling, In Their Shoes...®

* Ticket-less access to ALL films and Signature Programs, including: Screenwriters Tribute, Late Night Storytelling, In Their Shoes...®

* Reserved seating for: Screenwriters Tribute and Late Night Storytelling

* 1 invite to Opening Night Celebration on Wednesday, June 22 (10pm - 12am)

* 1 invite to Filmmakers Party on Thursday, June 23 (9pm - 11pm)

* 1 invite to Saturday Night at the Museum Party on Saturday, June 25 (8:30pm - 10:30pm)

* 1 invite to Closing Night Party on Sunday, June 26 (8:30 - 10:30pm)

* Access to Legacy Lounge: enjoy exclusive programming (including Virtual Reality!), grab a snack, and relax with other festival guests in the Harborview Room of the Dreamland Theater

* Complimentary gift bag

Offer details:

* From 5:00pm, Friday, May 27 through 11:59pm, Monday, May 30 EST

* One (1) complimentary ticket per Patron Pass purchase. Choose between In Their Shoes... With Molly Shannon and In Their Shoes... With Oliver Stone.

* Ticket may be selected and picked up when you pick up your Patron Pass in person at Festival Headquarters (Greenhound Building, starting June 19). You may also email boxoffice@nantucketfilmfestival.org or call us at 212-279-4200 (12 noon to 8:00pm, daily) to select ticket before your pick-up. 

* Ticket may not be transferred to another screening or program.