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Interview With Donna Deitch

When Desert Hearts was first released theatrically in 1985, it was still an anomaly to have a lesbian film with a happy ending. Though The Hunger (1983), Personal Best (1982) and Lianna (1983) all brought lesbian relationships to the mainstream big screen in the early 1980s, Desert Hearts was the first one to end on a positive romantic note. The two lovers in Desert Hearts, the tomboyish Cay (Patricia Charbonneau) and divorcee New Yorker Vivian (Helen Shaver), essentially ride off into the sunset together – something quite extraordinary for the 1950s, when the story is set.

This week, Wolfe Video is rereleasing the classic lesbian film on DVD with new features including interviews with Charbonneau and Shaver, new commentary from director Donna Deitch, and never-before-seen footage from shooting the film’s love scene. I recently sat down with the director to talk with her about the new DVD, how making the film changed her, and what’s going to happen in the long-awaited sequel that she has finally begun to write.

AfterEllen.com: So this is the second DVD release for Desert Hearts. How does this version differ? Donna Deitch:Well, it differs in some very entertaining ways. First of all, I regrouped with Helen Shaver and Patricia Charbonneau, the two stars, flew them into L.A., and I interviewed both of them. I had certain subjects that I wanted to discuss with both of them, things like: How did you prepare for this character? What was it like to do the love scene? A lot of the chatter and laughing is about the shooting of the love scene.

And their memories are so specific – I mean, considering we shot this 21 years ago, right? And the stories that they tell about what friends of theirs – personal friends and their agent and the manager and businesspeople – said about why they should not get into this movie, how it was going to destroy their careers, you know. And their specific memories of shooting this love scene and how hilarious it was.

So there is this interview – that’s one of the really great special features of the new DVD. Then, because over the years so many people have asked me so many questions about the love scene and how I shot it and all of that, I decided –

AE: It seems like that’s the only thing people are interested in when they talk to you about this movie! [Laughs]. DD:Well, and that’s OK too, you know. Because it works. It’s a scene that works sexually and emotionally … and it works as a scene, so I think that is a compliment. So … I decided that a really good special feature would be to get the dailies – you know what the dailies are, the film comes straight out of the camera, uncut – and … put together a special feature which were the dailies of the love scene.

These have a lot of the stuff hasn’t been seen before, because … when you see a film, you only see what’s been cut, but when you’re shooting, when the camera begins to roll, sometimes actors are still talking, sometimes the focus person is still getting focused last minute, and all that stuff is going on until the director says “action,” and then suddenly they’re acting.

So in this [feature], what I call “anatomy of a love scene,” you see all these dailies – stuff that’s not in the film itself, some stuff that is, some that isn’t – brand-new footage. And it’s very illuminating about how the whole thing was shot.

AE: That sounds really interesting. I know a lot of people want to know whether you’re directing people to put their hand somewhere else. DD:And there’s some of that. You hear me talking to them and telling them to do stuff. [Laughs.]

AE: That’ll be fun. DD:My special job, aside from directing in that scene, was that I was the spritzer. That’s the person who in all love scenes or fight scenes, there’s always somebody around who’s gotta spritz them, ’cause you gotta have that sweat, some little bit of sweat. So I took that job on for myself because I thought it would be fun to spritz them, and also I didn’t want too many people in the room; we had to keep it down.

So there’s that special feature. … Then there’s a slide show. These are production stills from behind the scenes throughout the entire making of the movie, so you see the actors getting made up, you see them getting spritzed – like when they come back from the lake and they’ve been in the rain, you see them getting spritzed down. You see all the crew people, you see them riding around on horses. And then the other special feature is that I have a brand-new voice-over commentary.

AE: This is different from the other one. DD:Totally different. ‘Cause when I did the first one, somebody from the distribution company was kind of interviewing me, and I was very disappointed with the way it came out initially. So what I did is I really spent some time thinking about the making of the movie because I wanted it to be informational and give people a real idea of the process of how this movie was made from beginning to end. So I watched the movie over and over again, and I just really wrote down all my thoughts and really thought it through, so this new commentary really tells you the whole story of the making of the movie.

AE: So is that why you decided to put out another DVD? To do more background on it? DD:Well, what happened is that the rights came back to me after 20 years, and so I had an opportunity to put out a brand-new DVD, and I thought, since I was now going to go with Wolfe Video — because I had previously been with MGM — that it would be a good opportunity to reach out to an existing and new audience with a brand-new DVD.

And it was exciting to me to revisit it, you know, with the actors. We’ve never had occasion where we sat down in a room and specifically talked about the making of this movie. And this was opportunity to do that. … It was like a little trip down memory lane. … Sometimes you see actors or hear actors talking in a DVD with the director, but that’s usually like a year or so after the film has come out because that’s when the DVD comes out. So these are conversations with a 21-year perspective.

AE: So, we’ve already talked a little about the love scene. At the time, obviously there hadn’t been any love scenes quite like this in a film. Why did you decide to go for it at that point? It was very early in your career; did you think it was a really risky thing to do? DD:No. I thought it was the normal thing to do. I mean, basically I did it because I wanted to see it. Everything came from that motivation. What I did in the film was what I wanted to see in the film. And I wasn’t really thinking about risk or — it seemed natural, that this is how these people would be in bed, and that’s what I wanted to show.

But I also knew in order to get that chemistry and get that heat and all of that, that I’d have to cast for it, and I needed to see two actresses in the room together, reading. See, this is something that never happens in a Hollywood film, because stars don’t read together. It’s very, very rare. A star might read with somebody who’s not [a star] to test them out, but even that is fairly unusual, because stars don’t come to casting sessions.

AE: I’ve read that the casting process was difficult. DD:The casting was difficult, yeah. Ultimately, I still feel I found the perfect people to play those parts. In the beginning, it was difficult because in that era … a lot of people didn’t want to be in the film. And these were people who were not necessarily just [there] to audition for the two lead parts. There were other parts that people refused to come in to audition for because they just didn’t want to be in a film with this subject matter.

AE: You’ve said that you’ve gotten a lot of feedback about this movie over the years, and a lot of women have told you that it inspired them to come out. How do you feel about that? DD:I love that! We all like to do our part, you know. [Laughs.]

AE: How many toaster ovens do you have? DD:[Laughs.] Well people used to say to me, when it first came out, when it was running in the theaters … that those were the best pickup lines in town. So that was all, of course, quite thrilling to me. For instance in New York, at the Third Avenue Cinema —that’s where it first opened, that was a great pickup line. Or in Los Angeles at Goldwyn where it showed in West Los Angeles, people were cruising the line, and it was great!

AE: Obviously, Desert Hearts jump-started your career, but what’s one thing that the film really changed for you? DD:What it did for me, I think, was that it gave me a 21-year yearning to get back to it. [Laughs.] And that’s only just beginning to manifest now, because it’s been sort of like a back-burner project all of these years, to do a sequel to Desert Hearts. The experience of making a film that comes from you as opposed to directing a film for hire — it’s just quite a different experience, and so I’ve had this yearning all these years to get back to it, but I’ve been otherwise occupied, working, and I’m finally onto it now.

AE: Onto the sequel? DD:Onto the sequel. Writing the sequel.

AE: Really? So the long-rumored sequel is actually going to happen? DD:It’s actually going to happen.

AE: Can you tell me about it? DD:I’m a little reluctant to talk about the story and the setting, because when you’re in the middle of writing something like that, it’s kind of hard to talk about it ’cause you’re not quite certain, you know.

But it’s going to be some time later, and it’s going to not only be about … these characters, it’s going to expand into new characters as well. I envision actually more than one Desert Hearts sequel, ’cause I’m thinking about making several of them. Since this one was in the late ’50s, I have some room to move around here, right? And I think it’s time for me to get off my day job and get on with doing this, because I can see several sequels, and then I can see sort of a sci-fi [one].

AE: Really? DD:Yeah, I think that’s all doable. That’s kind of how I’m envisioning it, but at the moment I’m just writing the next one.

AE: So will the original actors be in it? DD:Well yes, the original actors will be in it, but the sequel is not meant to simply follow those two characters, though they will be in it. There are going to be others in it. It’s going to have an organic branching out into the era and geographical location in which it’s going to be set.

AE: Do you think you’re going to go back to Nevada ? DD:No, it’s not going to be Nevada; it’s going to be elsewhere.

AE: New York? DD:Yes.

AE: It’s going to be in New York in the ’60s? Seventies? DD:Well, you’re getting close. It’s going to be late ’60s, early ’70s.

AE: That’s an exciting time. DD:And that’s why I’m doing that. That’s exactly why I’m doing that.

AE: Great. Do you have any sort of idea when you’ll be finished with the screenplay? DD:I think my screenplay will be done by the end of the summer.

AE: Before you did Desert Hearts, you did a lot of very creative fundraising. How are things now for getting money to make a lesbian film? Is it better? DD:Well, I think for me it shouldn’t be too difficult to get the money for this movie. That’s my perception, because — I mean, here I have this movie that is 21 years old, OK? And when the rights reverted back to me, I had several companies that wanted to buy it. Right there, that’s unusual.

And then, here we are, it’s May the 12th, and it’s in pre-sales at Wolfe Video’s website. It’s already climbed up to number one. And it’s not delivering until June the 5th, and it’s moving at Amazon. So I think because the film has done well all these years … I should be able to get the financing for the film for the sequel, and people have already approached me about it.

So I don’t think I will be on that grueling [laughs] fundraising circuit again. That was tough, that was very hard, because it went on for … two years, and I don’t think it’s what I’m best suited for even though I did manage to raise it. It wasn’t the part I most enjoyed, and I think others are better at that than I am, but I think I won’t have any trouble getting the financing for the sequel.

AE: Obviously Desert Hearts became a huge touchstone for a whole generation of women. Are there any recent lesbian films or films about lesbians that you can see having that kind of appeal to a younger generation these days? DD:I’m probably the wrong person to ask about other people’s movies, ’cause I think that’s the job of a critic, so that’s hard for me to comment on.

AE: That’s interesting that you say that, because I remember reading an article in the LA Times in which they asked you whether you thought a gay director, rather than a straight one, would have a different perspective on directing a film like Desert Hearts rather than a straight one, and I think you said a similar thing, like that wasn’t your realm of expertise. DD:I think what I said was — cause people do ask that, and they also ask the question, “Is it different being a woman director than a man?” And it’s like, well, how would I know? I mean, I don’t really know.

First of all, directors typically have very little contact with each other. Directors have a lot of contact with everybody — actors, writers, cinematographers, editors, producers, everybody but other directors. And the only time that you are really in contact with another director is on series television: You might be prepping and somebody else is shooting. But other than that, it’s very rare to be on a set with another director.

When people say, “Well what’s it like being a woman director?” You know what, I don’t know what it’s like being a man director. I don’t even know what it’s like being a man! And in the same way, you know, is it different being a straight director, well, I don’t know. I’m not straight. So it’s hard for me to know.

AE: Did you ever do a coming-out interview? DD:I don’t know if I did or not.

AE: Was it always something you were just comfortable talking about? DD:Yeah, I mean, I was out from the beginning.

AE: Did you get asked about your sexual orientation a lot when you were being interviewed at that time that Desert Hearts was originally released? DD:Desert Hearts crossed over really well between straight and gay and lesbian audiences. There was always a mixture in the theater, and … I had a tremendous amount of straight, establishment press. And I think that in all the gay press … they just spoke about me as a lesbian director. And in the straight press … they didn’t seem to address that. I think they assumed I was, but they didn’t write about that much, but the gay and lesbian press just spoke about me that way. It was normal.

AE: Why did you go into TV after Desert Hearts? DD:Oprah Winfrey saw Desert Hearts, and through my agent I got an offer to direct a four-hour miniseries called The Women of Brewster Place, and that was a huge, huge job. It was right in the heart of the network. It was like entering another world, and I read the screenplay and I thought, well, this is a fantastic job. … It’s about these two African-American lesbians who move into a ghettoized black community, and so it was sort of right up my alley at the same time as being very, very mainstream. And it was Oprah Winfrey, and I was actually gonna get paid. [Laughs.]

All that was very appealing, and then … that miniseries had a huge amount of visibility for the obvious reasons, and suddenly I had a lot of offers to direct, from NYPD Blue to ER — all the really good one-hour dramas. I did a bunch of pilots, I did HBO and Showtime movies, and it was just irresistible, I guess I have to say. They were very good projects that came my way. At the same time, it’s very hard to get a film off the ground. And so from time to time I would try, but you can’t get a film off the ground while working a 14-hour day.

AE: I don’t know why not. [Laughs.] DD:[Laughs.] Unless you have a really terrific producing partner, which I don’t. So I guess I would say I got caught up in that world, and I guess [I was] fortunate to have been a part of it and learned a lot doing it and have had some really, really great projects with wonderful actors. But as I said to you earlier, it’s that yearning to do my own films, because I have been writing screenplays and I really want to make these movies. I’ve now come to I guess a crossroads where I’ve decided to really cut back on the other [jobs] and really focus on getting my films written and made.

AE: I was recently at the Queer Media and Entertainment Conference in L.A., and I was at a panel there on lesbian filmmaking. Someone in the audience said that they felt that for women who are directors, it’s much easier to direct when you’re a woman in television as opposed to film. For some reason it’s still very hard to get a film off the ground if you’re a woman director. Do you think that is still true? DD:Absolutely true. Oh yeah, the numbers are only going down. Part of the reason that it’s easier to work in television is: It simply has to do with quantity.

I mean, when you think about how much product on a weekly basis comes out of television, there are so many more jobs in television, so that’s the obvious reason that women are able to direct more in television. The other reason has to do with that stigma, the simple fact that women are still second-class citizens. … so this job of director and cinematographer is somehow still relegated to men. It’s thought of as that power job, and that power job, like all of the power jobs in our society, are still the domain of men.

AE: I wanted to ask you a little more about your TV work. You directed a couple of episodes of South of Nowhere, right? DD:I did the pilot.

AE: Are you still doing anything with them? DD:No.

AE: Have you watched the series? DD:No, not really. You know, I don’t watch television recreationally. I’ll watch something if I’m going to direct it, but I don’t watch series television recreationally because I just can’t stay focused; I just can’t stand it. But I did the pilot for South of Nowhere, so that’s something I’m really, really proud of, because I think that show has a look, a style to it that really helps.

I don’t know where it’s at now; I don’t know if they’ve maintained that style that I set. That’s what we do in a pilot: You set a style if you can. It’s probably the hardest job that exists in television, directing a pilot, because what you’re trying to do there is you’re trying to launch it. But at the same time you’re trying to set a style that — you might have 13 days to shoot because it’s a pilot, maybe 15 days — that every director after that is going to have eight days to shoot. And then the other thing is that it’s very hard to come up with a style that’s specific to the content.

I mean when you look at ER … most of it is shot on steadycam, or you look at NYPD Blue, and there’s a certain style to it. When you look at it you think, yes, of course, that really serves the material. But imagine if you were just doing it yourself from the beginning; to come up with that conceptually is no small thing. So … I felt that the style we got going on South of Nowhere really works for that material, and also it’s quite a low-budget little series, so you have to be fairly inventive.

AE: You’ve done all this work in TV as a TV director; do you have any insight as to why there are no lesbians on network television right now? DD:I don’t know, I guess it just reflects that kind of right-wing conservative approach to the network. If you look at network news, for instance, it’s just a pack of lies, right? Well … it’s not reflecting the truth and reality of society, anyway, and that’s I think why that is. If they thought they could sell it and have those sponsors in the form of commercials, there would be [lesbians on network TV], but I think that there’s a fear of that, and so most unconventional programming starts on cable.

AE: You’ve never directed any episodes of The L Word, right? DD:No.

AE: Have you ever wanted to? DD:Well, I don’t know. I did see it in the beginning, but again it kind of falls in that category of, if I’m not working there, it’s series television, and I don’t [laughs] — I’m not gonna switch it on and look at it.

AE: You don’t like to watch TV. [Laughs.] DD: Right. Yeah, my partner never watches TV, so that’s probably part of it too.

AE: Actually, we interviewed your partner, Terri Jentz, last year for AfterEllen.com. She mentioned that she’s adapting her book, Strange Piece of Paradise, into a film screenplay and that you would be directing it. DD:That’s right.

AE: How’s that going? DD:Well, she’s currently on the paperback tour … so she’s in the middle of writing that screenplay, and she’ll have it done by the end of the summer. But anyway, yeah, I’m gonna be making that movie, and that’s also going to be a quite an extraordinary story … a true-crime memoir. … And she’s going to veer off from the book a bit too, or at least she’s going to include things in her screenplay that are not in the book — tossed or unexplored.

AE: You’ve done a lot of directing of police procedurals, actually. DD:A lot. Hers is not going to be a procedural, but I really like procedurals.

AE: What’s your favorite part of directing them? DD:Well, you know, I tend to like down-and-dirty stuff. Like on my director’s reel, I have a lot of down-and-dirty action — you know, people [laughs] beating each other up and slamming each other around and all sorts of people are being thrown around, everybody from Oprah Winfrey to Kim Delaney on NYPD Blue. I like gritty material, so I like that.

Like NYPD Blue was the one — of all the shows I ever did — that really was my soul mate, the show. It was like inside of me or something. I loved that material. Brilliant writing. The perverse and criminal minds at work. People who are struggling … with their motivations and their own personal crises and weaknesses and drawbacks and their own morality and ethics, and I really like that stuff.

AE: So is the Desert Hearts sequel going to be gritty? DD:Yeah, it’s going to be gritty. … I mean it’s going to be gritty in a way that’s appropriate to the place and time in which it takes place.

AE: Are you going to be doing any more TV work over the summer or are you focusing on getting your own projects out? DD: I’m really cutting back … and really focusing on what I really want to do here. And just kind of trying to disappear a little bit and get the writing done.

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