Directing a Golden Age: A Conversation with Xan Cassavetes

XC: It wasn't my choice to be my first movie, but it ended up being my first movie and I'm really glad it did.

Reel: Your first movie was going to be The Sky is Green?

XC: Right. It felt like I made it, but I didn't.

Reel: Tell us the story behind what happened with The Sky Is Green.

XC: The Sky is Green is this movie we were going to make. It took three years, and all these people were working on it: the greatest musicians, Vince Vaughn, Steve Buscemi, Michael Rapaport, and Mos Def. All these people were in it, and it was going to be perfect. Everyone on the artistic side was really into it, and it took a long time to raise the money. When we finally had the money all raised and…were all set, about two weeks before shooting, one of the investors admitted, "We put the money into a horror movie because we thought this was too un-commercial." That day was filled with vomiting and hysterical crying. It was a bad, bad, bad, bad, bad scene. Very disappointing. It was on the heels of that when we said, "We can't even look at this film again. We can't even have a hope to start again. It's too painful." We resigned ourselves to taking a breather, and we started watching films and talking about films that we loved because one of the big jokes about the [people who dropped out of] financing for The Sky is Green was they would say, "It's sorta like this movie or that movie," which it wasn't, but they'd say that. We would think, "Ok!?!" Don't you know All That Jazz or Shampoo couldn't get made today because no one would finance it because it wouldn't make any money? So we started thinking about all the films that wouldn't get made today, some of the greatest movies ever made—not that I think The Sky is Green is one of the greatest movies ever made. It was at that moment that I thought, God, everyone one of these movies that we're thinking of, I saw for the first time on the Z Channel. Then, we were at a dinner party and I went to Rick and Marshall, who were my producers, and I said, "We should make a documentary on Z Channel," because you don't know what it is, but it was the greatest thing in the world. And I had an epiphany at that moment that this was exactly what I wanted to make, and submerge myself in [it] and be working with those films and that story, and figure out why it was forgotten. Then it came together pretty easily. I had a friend who was head of documentaries (Alison Bourke) who I had worked with on some other stuff at IFC, and it was a matter of weeks before we got approval to make the documentary. That was unbelievably easy compared to what we had just gone through. Everything about the documentary—the way it was made, the things we had got, the clips we had got, and the participation we got was great in a way that we just attribute to, I don't know, the spirit of Jerry Harvey, because it was a real sharp contrast to what we had just been through. It was a pleasurable, pleasurable experience.

Reel: What year was this?

XC: 2003.

Reel: Just curious, what horror film got produced instead of your film?

XC: You know, I didn't ask. The fastest thing I could do was just scream at the phone and hang up, and go drinking. I kept my eye on the good ones, looking for their names, and it was never on them. I'm glad about that.

Reel: I hear comments about Steffi Graf and Andre Agassi that their kids are going to grow up and be amazing tennis players. So, when your parents are making movies—and your brother is a filmmaker—did you feel that it was predestined for you to make a movie?

XC: No, I had no desire…. [Didn't] want to think about being a filmmaker until I was about 31. I was a serious musician; I was in a band. When I was younger and hanging around my Persian and Euro friends, we would write scripts and have readings. After that I felt I was getting into this weird pseudo-intellectual scene. We were pretentious and young, and I'm still really good friends with all of them, and they all know they were full of shit just like I was. But I had a backlash. I went through this period of time where I had a sort physical state of mind and believed that only things that were primordial or physical had any credibility. Everything else was stupid and pretentious. So I went into this whole other mode of thinking and became a musician. I had a band and we toured, and it was not commercial, but it had a local and big-city following. I was very committed to that until I was about 29. Then I got married and had a few kids, and I started going up to my bathroom to write, just to get a [break]. It can be nerve-racking raising a child. In that time, I started writing The Sky is Green and bunch of short films. It was not meant to be a career. It was therapy to get away from the pressures of being a new mom for a few minutes instead of getting your nails done. I got really attached to it, and the things I wrote were strange enough that I knew that no one else would either want to direct or be able to direct them—the way I had envisioned it. So I wanted to be a director.

Reel: Do you think it's interesting that what you're doing when you want to escape is writing scripts?

XC: You mean in correlation to being my parents' child?

Reel: Yeah. Is it genetic?

XC: Maybe; it's hard for me to say. I know that certainly, you mentioned the tennis baby being raised by tennis parents. My parents didn't raise us to be filmmakers or even try to educate us about film. They were really busy. And it's funny that you said Hollywood royalty, because I really do think of them as royalty. They were so beautiful and so articulate and passionate. But they didn't have the royalty kind of life. They didn't hang out with the famous—they weren't into that. They didn't have time for that. They were always working. Around the house, the things they talked about, the things that were important to them, their observations about people, their mental process was something we were exposed to, and it's something that we picked up on. But they never put cameras in our hands, or told us they wanted us to be an actor or a director.

Reel: What did you learn from your family about movies?

XC: That the European ones were better. [Laughter] No, they really loved a lot of different movies, but I wouldn't describe my parents as being film buffs. The time where they were going to all these theatres and seeing all these films was before I could remember. By the time I had memories of my parents it wasn't of them being film fanatics as it was about them working, and being on the phone, and screaming, and laughing, and having readings, and making posters and putting up posters, and taking people out for beers to try to get their films into theatres, and mom in a fur coat, trying to make it all fun. They had a strategy about how they were going to be able to make their thing be able to live. It was a full-, full-, full-time job. They were great parents in between, but they weren't studious about film, or giving us screenings or taking us to art houses. They were way too busy, and we were allowed to be kids and do cartwheels and play ball, and listen to disco, and things that aren't very impressive that children do. They weren't dogmatic about film at all.

Reel: This is a good transition, because seemingly, everything your parents weren't, Jerry Harvey was. Jerry was a film buff. Did you ever meet Jerry?

XC: I didn't. The only mention I ever heard of Jerry was when Z Channel disappeared. I didn't really notice the day it disappeared, which was a shame. I remember having a conversation shortly after that. I said, "What happened with Z Channel?" and [this person] said, "It's this terrible thing. The programmer, who was responsible for everything…who was an incredible genius, killed himself." I didn't hear his name. I didn't hear the rest of the story. No one really did. I guess whoever took over the channel didn't want to publicize it too much. I don't know how it never got out. I guess if it did get out, a lot of people didn't know who Jerry was. He wasn't really a high-profile guy. I doubt my mother ever knew his name. I just know it wasn't sensationalized as much as it could have been. By the time I got around to thinking about the documentary, nobody knew his name—nobody except the core group of people.

Reel: When you're working this long with someone you're feeling passionately about, without really ever knowing them personally, what's that experience like?

XC: It wasn't just about researching a person and learning about them right off the bat. I think I brought with me the gratitude and admiration and personal relationship I had with him through his programming on Z Channel, which meant more to me than I can tell you. I spent a lot of time watching that channel. I watched it obsessively and I loved it so much. What he presented to me on that channel, I took it as a personal gift. By the time I heard his name, and by the time I wanted to make the documentary, I already had a relationship with Jerry because of how much I valued what he'd given me. So I started with that. And my first reaction upon hearing about the murder-suicide was one of horrible dismay. Not only was it a horrible act, but because people who love films have a real darkness about them. How could you not make that correlation in this documentary? How someone who was disturbed in this way was also inspired by being disturbed to do what he did. That made me depressed. Then I got into his story and it was fascinating, although it was sad and depressing. I can't say I was ever enraged, because I was looking at it in a very human way. It was a guy who was marked from the beginning to be violent and unstable, and desperate. It was a guy who sought out all the medical attention he could and it didn't help him. I'm the kind of person who doesn't question. I don't approve or disapprove, and I don't question what happened. People have been mad at my father, and they say, "Why did you drink so much? And you died so early. It's not cool. It's not fair. I hate you." I've never felt that way about my father. I've never made a judgment on someone's life as it's gone because I think fate has a lot to play into it. It was an incredibly interesting and touching and sad and fatalistic story. I felt much compassion for Jerry and much compassion for his wife, and for the people who were left behind to try to make sense of their feelings of love and anger, and their feelings of loss for an era, and [the loss] of everything that was important to them. I related to it. I don't know why. I don't know on what level, but I related to it very strongly. I never for one minute felt frustrated in trying to make this story fit.

Reel: I thought the fact that you put the murder-suicide at the beginning of the film was brilliant, because by the end of the film you got to know all these people talking on camera. So when they were moved talking about it, by the end of the film, I found myself very moved. How did you come up with the idea of putting that huge piece of information in the beginning of the movie?

XC: A lot of people had a problem with that, and wondered why I did that, but the reason was that I didn't want anyone to be manipulated by anything good they heard through the course of the story, and then, "Wow. He killed somebody?" I wanted people to have that information from the beginning so that they knew what this movie was about. They knew that this man committed this act. The rest was all filling in the story. I didn't want them to feel unfairly brought into the story and thinking it was going to a different level only to be hit behind the knees and realize they had positive feelings for this person without that information.

Reel: I felt I had more of an emotional connection to both him and the people on the screen because I knew at the beginning what had happened.

XC: Good. I'm glad to hear that. It seemed if you got this information up front, and then you got into the story, and you're not thinking, "How did it end up like this? What happened?" To me, it didn't give away the story. It wasn't about a guy who killed his wife and killed himself. That's part of the story, but there are many parts to the story. It's not weird to me that there are different truths that add up to something not easily understood. The fact that there's not a lot to understand, to me, is intriguing about it. Where some people have said, "Well, you didn't tell us exactly why Jerry was crazy," I think, "It made sense to me why he had mental problems." People like a lot more detail with blood and gore and crime scene reproductions and peanut gallery guys from psychic wards. Those aren't real answers to me. They don't answer anything.

Reel: You can't answer those questions anyway.

XC: Yeah. Who the hell am I to answer those questions? People who know him best can't answer those questions. I'm sure he couldn't answer those questions.

Reel: Your instincts in this film are really good. It's hard for me to believe it's your first film.

XC: Thank You.

Reel: Z Channel is a film that's 50% about the history of Z Channel and Jerry, and then 50% of the film is really a celebration of counter-culture films. There are documentaries out there like A Decade Under the Influence, which is just Seventies maverick filmmaking in America, and there are documentaries that are just biographies. Did you have an idea about how you were going to balance this? It's a lot of information to fit into a two hour film.

XC: My editor, Iain Kennedy, when we were still out shooting, was in the editing room, and he's a big, huge film fan—I guess the BBC in London, when he was growing up, resembled Z Channel. He's very knowledgeable. While I still going out, still doing interviews, he was just messing around and playing with things. I came in, and he would be like, "Here! Let me show you something!" And it wouldn't be anything that would have anything to do with the story. It was just 15-minute segments of the films intercut with interviews, and they were completely captivating. He had, I think, a half hour on Once Upon a Time in America. He was just playing like that out of pure joy, without trying to create a story. They were beautiful and made me feel excited just to watch it. It made me feel something similar to how I felt watching the Z Channel, which was the excitement—and it was so beautiful. I knew he really had a handle on how to reproduce that feeling. Those segments were really inspirational on how we wanted to make the film a roller-coaster ride through these films. And the films we showed didn't really show the right proportion of what was shown on Z Channel. Z showed a bunch of Hollywood films, a bunch of teen films, a bunch of whatever, but film clips were so costly. We weren't going to be putting those in as much as the ones that were obscure or had great stories about them in correlation with Z Channel. We went nuts. It took about four months and there were about 40 more films cut in like that for one of our cuts. Then we had to buckle down and do the story, which was just a story. I didn't think it was rocket science. I guess everyone would do it differently, but to me, that was the story. That's what I thought. People said meaner things, things where they lost more control. The story just seemed to be clear to me, and to Iain, and we put it together and it was really great. I guess the first part of the story—Jerry was very open about his illnesses with the women in his life. [He] had this girlfriend, Doreen Ross, who was able to speak to that. In the second part he had his ex-wife, Vera Anderson, who was able to speak to that, but in the third part, the woman who could speak to that was dead by his hand. There was an absence of a woman there who could tell you want was going on internally with Jerry, but the film had been so established that you could use film clips to really mirror his psychological state because he quoted and copied so much from films. It might have even been literal, like in the case of [his] wedding vows that were taken from Ride the High Country. A lot of times the film just merges with life. That was really fun to do. It was beautiful and a gift.

Reel: There's not just an absence in the film of his last wife. He's absent. There are talking-head docs, like The Fog of War where it's two hours of interviews. Don't get me wrong, I think Fog of War is a great film, but what you did is challenging in a different way. You did a reconstruction without the ability of having them being involved. What's that process like?

XC: The truth is Jerry Harvey didn't like a camera on him. The only person who was allowed to take a picture of him was his wife Vera, who was a great photographer. The truth is Jerry did not want to be documented. To me, the lack of document of Jerry in the film is as Jerry was. It was this [mysterious person] who chose to be that way and not give that part of himself to the world. It fits perfectly with me that he's only shown in a photograph by his ex-wife. The funny thing is the only clip of him on film is from Entertainment Tonight, where they got him outside the Z anniversary party. It's so funny that it's Entertainment Tonight. But, it's a great clip, and in that clip his personality, as reserved as it seemed, brings to life this man for me. The impact of that clip is really the correct vibe for him. But that's Jerry. He wanted to be this invisible man. To illustrate him in the documentary like that doesn't stray too far from reality.

Reel: What would Jerry think about this film?

XC: I have no idea. I've had nightmares where he's like, "Who the hell do you think you are, you little Hollywood debutante, daughter of some genius guy? Do you think you deserve to make a movie about me? Mind your own f**king business, b*tch!" I've had great moments that are—I mean, I'm not a hocus-pocus kind of person, but there have been some very strange things that have happened that have facilitated the making of this film that I feel he hand in, from somewhere, [like he's] glad that his story is being told, glad that people would understand what he wanted them to understand: to share and value these films, and especially right now, in this era of film. Obviously, there are those of us who care about this stuff and make it our business to know and keep it alive, but there are a lot of people who will never get offered this. They will never know they wanted something that they never knew existed, and for all those people that get to have a glimpse into it, it's just like having another Z Channel offering. It's just saying, "Look at all these beautiful things. Look at what you should expect to be exposed to. Isn't this intriguing? Don't you think it should be like this now?" Even if it can't be like this now, maybe, to a certain extent, it could, but I feel like Jerry would be happy to have his legacy of Z Channel keep going and inspire people.

Reel: I read one interview you had done recently where you said, "I shudder to think about this newer generation that isn't exposed to this stuff. Mine is probably the last generation to catch the tail end of the mentality where artists were competitive with each other about their creativity instead of a check that they were cashing. We had interns who came from film school, and we were talking about how film schools don't show the films like the ones on Z Channel because they don't want their students to grow up to be losers. And you think, God, you go to frickin' film school and you don't even see what you're supposed to be? Who's going to save us? Who's going to save the next generation?"

XC: That's embarrassing. It sounds like I'm on some crusade.

Reel: Well, you are. You're really passionate about this. It comes across in the film, and it's certainly not bad, especially to an audience that likes films, but [is] not necessarily either a) aware of Z Channel or b) aware of some of the films in your movie. I found myself making notes of the films in your film that I wanted to see.

XC: There have been a lot of people out there who aren't film buffs who wanted to start seeing films like the ones they saw on Z Channel. They had some conception of the fact that they couldn't relate to certain films, but they had seen them there and it intrigued them, and they thought, I could start with this, or I could like that. This one didn't look boring. This one looked great. My background is in music, it's equally as heartbreaking for me. I've lived through a couple of eras now. [And] when I was really young and coming up, I had all those films. I had all the greatest music at my disposal, from when I was 13 or 14 until the tail end of punk rock, through the Eighties with Public Enemy and a bunch of other kind of music—Jane's Addiction or whatever. I was in band and was able to make a little living at that age and have a life that was productive for me [while] not doing commercial music, and having the audience define what they wanted—as opposed to corporations defining it. I watched everything change. Things that were so meaningful to me, both in music and in film, have changed to where everything is about money. Even artists compete about how successful they are instead of how much more inspired they are, or how they achieved something so incredibly realized, as far as a film or a song or a performance, or anything. I remember when rich people were pariahs around the art scene. Now, that's all that anyone cares about (making money). Even if that's not how you start out, you play this game. What recourse is there for you right now? A young director will make a promising first film, and then they are scooped up by the studios. Any production designer, any actor, and director finds it hard to say no because there's all this money. It's hard to say no because if you do, you won't have a f**king career anymore. They get ruined before they are allowed to develop on their own, because no one can stand for [anyone] having any control except for the f**king corporations. [Laughter] Sorry if I sound a little out of control. I'm 40 now, and I feel like an old lady, going, "All these poor children." But what do they have? It's so unfair. We had so much more. We had real romantic, passionate feelings about all this stuff, and we felt like we could do all this stuff, and we didn't have to be humiliated, and we don't have pretend we knew nothing and learn a language of jerks, and cater to all that. We can really have dreams and aspirations. I just don't see it there right now.

Reel: There's nothing out there today like Z Channel?

XC: No, but I really feel things are about to change as far as movies go. Maybe it's optimism, but people have been eating trash for so long, so they're like, "Can I get some grass, or some salad?" [Laughter] It's not working out. People think that all movies suck, and all movies do suck, except for a handful, which are great. I feel sorry for the great artists of today who are scattered across the world who don't get to be in a bigger consciousness of allowing this kind of stuff to be seen. One of your [interviewer James Emanuel Shapiro] favorite movies was Head-On, and mine too. What was the release on that? It won the Berlin Film Festival (in 2004). It was the greatest movie, and would have been a huge commercial success, or relatively a commercial success for what the cost of the movie was, but it never got a chance to be seen here because no one cared to value it, or market it, or put the money or time into it, because they didn't have to. What kind of world is this? It's gross!

Reel: Do you think Z Channel would be as popular today as it was during the advent of cable?

XC: Yes, I do. You had a channel that put these movies together in really cool festivals. Not just by director or by actor, but by themes, or whatever inappropriate things go together to form fun festivals. That's not pretentious. That's inviting. You then throw in some of the films from film festivals that haven't gotten proper releases and create a form of distribution for this channel, as well as showcasing films that are not able to be seen by most people. Do a lot of creative things that merge the present with the past. I think the influence of all those things would be extremely exciting to a whole new generation of people who would start getting ideas, and who would start getting enraged about what they were being deprived of, and start having the basis of a society where they didn't feel like they were just one person. This would be some kind of movement. A movement back to being entitled to having things be good.

Reel: What exists today because of Z Channel?

XC: It's hard to say. Director's cuts on DVD wouldn't exist. Jerry certainly proved there was a market for that, where no one had previously thought so. It's impossible to chart the effect of a generation, or a city like Los Angeles, which has far-reaching effects; the reverberation of being exposed to things that are exciting and beautiful and being presented to you with respect, and love, and a desire to share. I don't know if we are talking about movies or the way a woman relates to her children. I can only know the effect it has is positive and loving.

Reel: Are the internet rumors true that they are trying to resurrect Z Channel?

XC: No. There's always a new Z Channel in the works, but it gets to a point, and it's not possible. It's too hard. I guess there are still a few balls in the air. I'm not actively doing it, but I have had conversations with people who could make that happen, and who want to, but it's a big challenge. The problem with showing a documentary like this is that some people see it as an example of failure, but I think we've shown that there's a goldmine out there, financially and aesthetically, in showing great films. There's no channel out there that shows great films all the time.

Reel: What if it was set up as a non-profit organization, like a museum?

XC: Exactly, but another problem is how much it costs to license movies now. In the Z Channel days, it was all uncharted territory. You could negotiate or charm your way into getting whatever you negotiated on the phone. There weren't set rates. If you knew you how much they were charging us for this—and they did give us good deals in honor of Jerry as his work—it's ridiculous. You'd have to be a huge corporate channel in order to afford these films. It would take such dedication. It would be harder, by far, to do that now than it was then. It takes somebody who doesn't want to go for the easy investment.

Reel: What's next for you?

XC: Oh, trying to make a movie. [Laughs] Trying to not to think too much about it, because I'm Greek and I'll give myself the evil eye. I'm trying to make a regular, narrative film. I'm just starting to try, so cross your fingers for me because you know it's not going to be commercial.

Reel: Does that mean you can't get advice from your brother [Nick Cassavetes] about it?

XC: No, I do get advice from my brother. He's my greatest friend and someone I admire so much. He's so smart and talented and warm. He's smart about everything. I'm one of those people who's smart about one thing. It's really good to have him to talk to. My brother and my sister; we all talk about these kinds of things. Even if we don't see each other for the longest time, if it's ever about something creative, we all jump. That's the important stuff for us. I respect both of them a lot. They're the first people [whose] opinion I want in anything I do.

Reel: So what's it mean for you that the DVD is coming out [streets 10/11/05]?

XC: I'm just really excited its coming out. The DVD is so beautiful. Putting together the DVD was a lot of work because we wanted to have all these great extras; basically, things that we couldn't include in the documentary. We fought really hard to get the new clips, and there's original Z Channel footage, interviews. A lot of extras, so we really think we made a good DVD. The people who buy the DVD will be really happy because there's a bunch more stuff on it.

Reel: The Z Channel magazine reproduction is beautiful.

XC: Isn't that the greatest? I lost my mind when I saw that. It's on such beautiful quality paper, and Rick, one of our producers, and Jonathan Montepare, one of our associate producers, put that together. They're from the original Z magazines…[and] most of the stuff is about films that are in the documentary. It really does give you the feeling of what it was like to see that magazine. You would never throw a copy of that magazine away. How great would it be if there was a giant coffee table book of that magazine?

Reel: Can you talk about the process, from where you completed the film to where it started to get film festival releases to its DVD release? Can you talk about what the distribution for the film was like?

XC: We were finishing the editing when one of our producers, Marshall, said, "Let's submit it to Cannes!" We looked at her like she was nuts, and we said, "Ok, go do that, Marshall." And then it was accepted at Cannes, and we weren't really done with the film, so we rushed to lock it all up, and then it was at Cannes, and it was fantastic. It was one of the greatest times in the world. Just to go there with your film, and everyone talking about Jerry. Then it went onto a bunch of other film festivals, but it was always only supposed to be on IFC. It was never supposed to be on DVD. It was never supposed to screen in theatres. But it got a small release in L.A., and then everyone (IFC) decided it was possible to put out a DVD. We never took any meetings at Cannes for the DVD, but Hart Sharp came in and really valued it. But the DVD rights for the clips were going to be really expensive, but another guy came in, an independent guy, who bridged the gap. It was over $200,000 in clips. This is a documentary. Most documentaries don't cost that much. It was complicated, and it took a lot of tight-rope walking. Hart Sharp has been really cool, and made it happen. It's a sigh of relief to have this come out on DVD and live forever so future generations will find out the story of Jerry and Z Channel and start wanting something that they might not be offered.

Reel: When Z Channel went off the air, what happened to all the movies Jerry compiled?

XC: This is horrifying. All the films from the 10 years or so that Jerry was there were transferred to ¾-inch tapes so they could keep the films in a library. The library was very extensive. It was filled with treasures…even today, you might not see a quarter of these films. The buyers came in, the sports guys, and they saw this room that was filled with these ¾-inch tapes and they taped over all of them with their sports programming, except for about 15 that were hustled out of there by the Z Channel staff. That Most Important Thing: Love was saved, and that's the only way we could have used that footage in the Z Channel documentary.

Reel: It would almost be more poetic if it [had all] burned down.

XC: It's appalling what little sensitivity people have. They're not bad guys. They didn't do it because they were Satanist. They did it because they didn't know the value of it. That's something to take into consideration. How is someone supposed to value something they don't know? That's why this stuff should be known.