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AE:
What do you think of The
L Word?
JB: I love it. I just think it’s really
fun to watch a lesbian soap opera. I love a lot of the characters.
As flawed as the episodes may be sometimes, I think it’s
just amazing to watch a bunch of different lesbian dramas unfolding
on television. I’ve also known many of the people involved
for years--Guin Turner
is a friend of mine, Angela
Robinson, Rose Troche I know, Leisha
Hailey I know. It’s just great to see my friends working
on something they really enjoy.
AE:
So serious question here: should Dana choose Alice or Lara?
JB: Alice.
AE:
Is that just because Leisha Hailey is your friend?
JB: (laughing) No, it's because they’re
both series regulars and that would make for better drama. And
they’ve been friends for the whole season, so they would
obviously make a good lesbian couple – since we all seem
to go out with our friends.
AE:
Do you prefer film or TV?
JB: My goal has always been to balance independent
film with TV. I’m on maternity leave now, and then I’m
shooting an independent film in October called Dot, starring
Thora Birch and Elisha Cuthbert from 24. It’s a
kind of suburban, American Beauty-type friendship story
between the two girls.
AE:
Why independent film in particular, rather than studio films?
JB: They're the kind of films I like to watch,
as a viewer, and you have a lot more creative freedom with independent
film.
AE:
Although you have a lot more budget constraints with independent
film…
JB: You do, but I still prefer more creative control over more
budget. In television, I have no budget constraints and no creative
freedom. I mean, I have some creative freedom, but very little.
I have a lot more power in film, which is a lot more exciting
creatively: I can design the set, I can cast who I want to cast
in the lead roles, I can make the final decisions on the costumes,
whereas in television these are mostly writer-producer decisions.
AE:
Is it getting less expensive to make films because of digital
video?
JB: I suppose, if you shoot in digital format,
but how many people are doing that? If people are shooting in
digital format and it looks decent, they’re shooting in
24p, which is almost as expensive as film. Maybe a little bit
less.
You
can still make a good film with a million bucks, but less than
that, it gets challenging. Although of course it depends on the
material – Blair Witch was obviously perfect for
DV because the medium matched the aesthetic. But a sort of classic
American story like Dot shot on DV doesn’t work,
unless it’s done like a home movie, but that’s not
the style of the writing.
 |
AE:
But I'm Cheerleader was your first feature. What was
that experience like?
JB: That was a great experience, a big
step up for me. I had a great cast, and my girlfriend Andrea
[Sperling], who is producing D.E.B.S.,
produced it. She’s producing Dot as well.
AE:
How did you get such a great cast and distributor for your
first feature film?
JB: It was a long process. I directed three
short films, all of which went to Sundance. The financier
who was VP of Prudential Insurance at the time went to Sundance
looking for a project. I met him and gave him the script
for Cheerleader and showed him a short film and,
very much like D.E.B.S. was made into a feature
film after Angela made the short, my short film gave him
confidence that I could do a feature. Independent films
are usually made with no distributors, which is what film
festivals are all about, and we made Cheerleader
without a distributor, just with $1 million of equity from
his bank account.
|
We got
the cast based on the script and the short, and through friends.
Clea Duvall was the lead in the short and the lead in Cheerleader,
and Natasha Lyonne was a friend of Clea’s, and Melanie Lynskey
was a friend of Clea’s, so I was able to get a lot of the
cast through Clea.
When
I finished making the movie, I submitted it to the Toronto International
Film Festival, which is a really good acquisition festival. One
of the top people who sells movies to distributors agreed to sell
the film at Toronto, and then at the festival I got an agent to
represent me. Once you make an independent film, it has to be
good enough to get into an A-List festival, which is pretty much
Toronto, Sundance, Cannes, that’s it. If you don’t
get into those, it’s really hard to find a distributor.
AE:
How did audiences react to the film?
JB: Younger people liked it, women liked it across
the board, older gay men tended to not like it as much, which
was unfortunate because some of them were reviewers. I think a
lot of the older generation, especially older gay men, were just
offended by the comedy, because for them these were sensitive
issues. I think being a younger-generation lesbian, I’m
at the point where I can make fun of my community, but I think
a lot of people were offended by that. I was pretty across-the-board
making fun of people in the movie, though, not just gay men or
gay women. Ultimately, it is a female love story, so…I don’t
know, it seems like most people who hated it were just offended
by the humor because it seemed like the subjects were too serious
to make fun of, but I actually think it’s a sign of progress
when a community can laugh at itself.
The
movie ended up being the highest-grossing film for Lions Gate
that year in terms of profit, and it has continued to be incredibly
successful on DVD, because I think a lot of teenagers can’t
see an R film but can rent the video. (laughing) If I meet a 13
or 14-year-old girl, most of the time they’ve seen Cheerleader.
AE:
I’ve been hearing from a lot of different directors that
actresses appear to be less bothered by the idea of playing lesbian
characters on screen now than they were even five years ago...
JB: I think that’s true, because they now
see they don’t get pigeonholed, they see that Charlize Theron
and Hilary Swank continue to make films, that you can win awards…
AE:
Did you have any problems with this in casting for Cheerleader?
JB: We did, actually. My first choice for Megan,
the lead girl, rejected me on the basis of being too Christian.
I was just irritated that she came into the audition and then
rejected me, it was a waste of my time. Although she cried when
she told me she couldn’t do it, she was clearly very torn,
she just couldn’t have her family see her face on this poster.
AE:
Dot doesn’t have any lesbian content in it, right?
JB:
Right. It’s a female-empowerment story, though. We’re
actually making the movie through a new program at the University
of Texas at Austin, which finances independent films. I’m
starting pre-production on it in August and then shooting in October.
AE:
What do you see yourself doing five to ten years from now?
JB: The same thing, really. If I can continue
to balance directing TV with independent pictures, I’ll
be really happy. And balancing it out with the birth of my new
baby daughter, of course!
Get
But I'm a Cheerleader on
DVD
/ VHS
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