The Sundance Institute and Cinereach recently announced a $1.5 million, three-year grant to form The Cinereach Project at Sundance Institute. The program, underwritten by Cinereach, will support a unique and flexible resource pool for documentary and feature film projects with themes that evoke global cultural exchange and social impact. The partners anticipate that at least 12 films will have been supported through this initiative.

The Cinereach Project at Sundance Institute will consist of a discretionary fund that can be used towards projects that are participating in Sundance Institute's existing Feature Film Program and Documentary Film Program, and are in need of emergency support. As a result, Sundance program directors will be more equipped to bridge gaps at critical stages of its Fellows' projects.

Additionally, the project will establish a special Fellowship for emerging directors committed to global cultural exchange and social impact. The Fellowship, for both documentary and fiction filmmakers, will provide the Fellows access to the multitude of Sundance Institute resources, as well as special funding and support from Cinereach. Fellows will be chosen from existing Sundance Institute Lab Projects as well as projects specifically recruited by both organizations.

"For nearly 30 years, Sundance Institute has been discovering and developing emerging independent artists," said Philipp Engelhorn, Cinereach founder and executive director, in a prepared statement. "This long record of nurturing diverse and authentic stories that foster empathy and understanding dovetails directly with the Cinereach mission."

Cinereach, founded in 2006, supports and produces artful films that depict underrepresented perspectives, cross-cultural boundaries and promote dialogue through three focus areas--Grants & Awards, The Reach Film Fellowship and Productions.

"We have long admired the work of Philipp and his team and commend them for their vision and dedication to promoting storytelling and awareness," said Jill Miller, Sundance Institute's managing director. "Their long-term commitment comes at a crucial moment as the current global financial crisis threatens to constrict film artists' possibilities of connecting to audiences."

For an article about Cinereach and Chicken&Egg Pictures that appeared that appeared in the Spring 2009 Documentary, click here.

The Sundance Institute also announced this week the expansion of its Creative Producing Initiative designed to nurture emerging independent producers in both narrative and documentary fields. For 2009-2010, the Initiative will include the re-conceived Creative Producing Summit (formerly the Independent Producers Conference), the Creative Producing Lab supporting six Fellows from the Feature Film Program and, new for this year, four from the Documentary Film Program, as well as Sundance Industry Meetings to connect filmmakers with industry members at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival. 

The Creative Producing Initiative is designed to support producers with project-specific support through Labs, grants and long-term advisor relationships and to also reinvigorate dialogue within the independent producing community. 

Fellows and projects attending the Documentary Film Creative Producing Lab and selected for the Documentary Film Creative Producing Fellowship are:

¿Dónde Están? / Kaye Pyle
El General / Daniela Alatorre
Give Up Tomorrow / Marty Syjuco
Match+ / Ann S. Kim

Producers Jennifer Fox (Love & Diane; On the Ropes) and Tia Lessin (Trouble the Water) will serve as creative advisors to the Documentary Creative Producing Lab.

by Peter Knegt

Capitalism: A Love Story has been unveiled as the title of Michael Moore's latest documentary feature. The film examines "the disastrous impact that corporate dominance and out-of-control profit motives have on the lives of Americans and citizens of the world."

On why he chose to make a 'love story,' Moore stated that it was time for him to make a 'relationship movie.' "It will be the perfect date movie," said Moore, in a statement. "It's got it all--lust, passion, romance, and 14,000 jobs being eliminated every day. It's a forbidden love, one that dare not speak its name. Heck, let's just say it: It's Capitalism."

Overture Films will release the film domestically on October 2, 2009, and Paramount Vantage will handle international distribution.

Related:

See the trailer for Capitalism: A Love Story here.

See filmmaker Michael Moore talk about a plan to get more documentaries into movie theaters at the IDA's DocuDay 2008 event.

See filmmaker Michael Moore and producer Meghan O'Hara talk about their Oscar-nominated film Sicko at the IDA's DocuDay 2008 event.

This news item is brought to you by a special partnership between the IDA and indieWIRE and SnagFilms.

When I was a little girl, I used to watch my parent's videotape of Whoopi Goldberg's solo Broadway show over and over. In one her routines, she plays a six-year-old girl who puts her t-shirt over her head so she can pretend to have long, luscious locks. I could relate. My own Jersey Girl hair was of the curly, frizzy variety, and I used to spend hours in front of the mirror, wishing for smooth, straight tresses. I truly believed that if I just had Barbie hair, life would be much, much better.

Apparently, Chris Rock's daughter was having hair issues of her own. His response was to make the HBO Films documentary Good Hair. Hilarious, informative and at times alarming, the Sundance Special Jury Prize winner provides audiences with an entertaining education about the contemporary world of Black hair.

The seed for the film was planted about 15 years ago when Rock was doing a stand-up gig in Atlanta and stumbled across some interesting characters staying in his hotel who were attending a hair convention. The project came up again when he was shooting The Chris Rock Show for HBO, which ran from 1997 to 2000. Rock and his creative team talked about the possibility of doing a movie together, but when the show ended, everyone dispersed to work on other projects and the idea fell into the void. It was only in 2006 when his little girl Lola asked, "Daddy, why don't I have good hair?" that he decided it was finally time to commit to making the film.

Luckily, Rock was able to assemble much of the team from The Chris Rock Show to work on Good Hair. Alums include executive producer Nelson George, director Jeff Stilson and writers Chuck Sklar and Lance Crouthier. Reuniting with previous collaborators was a key reason George decided to sign onto the film. Says Rock, "It was cool. We'd done these remotes [on the show] and Stilson had directed most of those. So we kind of had a shorthand already."

To prep for the film, the Good Hair team went back to Atlanta to the scene of Rock's original inspiration for the film: the Bronner Bros. International Hair Show and Battle, the largest African-American hair show in the United States. Part trade show, part live competition, the event was instrumental in educating the filmmakers about the business and culture of African-American hair. 

The "battle" itself becomes the spine of the film, as the audience follows an array of eclectic stylists while they ready themselves for competition. The larger-than-life characters range from a stylist who cuts hair underwater in a fish tank, to Tanya Crumel, who attempts to cut hair while hanging upside down, to the flamboyant, portly Derek, for whom custom-made boots are a key part of his cutting strategy.

Surprisingly, the champion stylist everyone wants to beat is not the one the viewer might expect. His name is Jason Griggers, and he's a laid-back white guy from Atlanta who sports floppy blonde hair and polo shirts. By including Griggers, the film is able to subtly explore racial issues organically through a story rather than a lecture or history lesson. The mostly white audience for the film at Sundance was intrigued by Griggers' background. At the post-screening Q&A, an audience member asked him how he built his business. He responded that it had been a struggle in the beginning, but ultimately he succeeded by simply being really good at what he does.

Between the hair show segments, Rock and his team explore the multi-million dollar business of Black hair. Their journey begins at the local beauty shop and takes them all the way to India, which is the source for the hair used in many of the weaves worn by African-American women. Each year, more than 10 million people in India sacrifice their hair in a religious ceremony called "tonsuring." The hair is then processed and sold to hair dealers, and eventually makes its way to salons and stores from Beverly Hills to Atlanta.

"The business of hair was shocking to me-how it ran like Apple or General Motors," Rock says. "It's like sugarcane or something; it's really no different."

George was also surprised by the extent of the "international hair economy," a phrase he coined during shooting. "Hair goes all over the world," he notes. "If we had had more money, we would have actually gone to China to the big processing plants. We went to London and there are huge streets with scores of hair places. This is a vast business with many, many tentacles."

Another big surprise for the filmmakers was how hair issues can translate into intimacy issues between men and women. Due to the high price and time commitment of hair maintenance, women protect their hair at all costs, which often means that they won't let men touch it.
"I'd never really thought about what a hair weave meant to a woman, and that, in fact, it would stop her," Nelson admits. "I knew they wouldn't get into the water, that it was water sensitive. But this whole thing about not touching-what does that really say about how intimate you can be with someone when you can't touch her hair?"

Rock, too, had been in the situation where he hadn't been allowed to touch. "I'm so used to not touching!" he jokes. "But the flip side is, if you've been with a girl and you couldn't touch her hair, the day you're with a girl and you can touch her hair, you don't take your hands out of her fuckin' hair! You're just like ‘Oooohhhh.'"

To help audiences get up-close-and-personal with Black hair, Rock recruited a number of successful actresses to appear in the documentary and share their experiences about straightening hair, weaves and product. Political and cultural figures such as Maya Angelou and the Reverend Al Sharpton also offer commentary.

The actresses are honest and funny, and their candor adds depth to the film. "A lot of them I'd known awhile," Rock explains. "I tried to pick people I thought had diarrhea of the mouth."

Tracie Thoms (Cold Case, Rent) talks about the pressure she faces in keeping her hair natural, and questions why her decision to do so is considered revolutionary. For Nia Long (Big Shots, Big Momma's House), hair is something she likes to have fun with. She says, "It's like a character for me; it's different in every movie."

While the actresses' opinions about hair are as diverse as their hairstyles, almost all agreed upon the importance of hair to one's self esteem. So it doesn't matter if you're Whoopi Goldberg portraying a six-year-old, or if you're a famous TV actress; almost all of us at some point have stood in front of the mirror and wished for hair different from our own.

During the Q&A, Thoms said that she was grateful to Rock for doing the movie because it finally gave her a chance to talk about her hair. She eloquently summed up the paradox surrounding African-American hair: "The mystery of our hair is almost perpetuated by the reluctance to talk about it. People don't see it, so they're curious about it. They want to touch it, and we get offended. But they so rarely see real Black hair."

Good Hair goes a long way in quenching that curiosity, doing so with a light touch. Rock dons wigs at stores, jumps into an assembly line at a relaxer processing plant, and gently calls out the absurdity of putting a product on one's hair that causes soda cans to disintegrate. Rock says that these moments occurred spontaneously during shooting, but they feed into his general philosophy about coupling knowledge with comedy.

"There's a lot of great information in the movie, but you will digest none of it unless there is laughter," Rock maintains. "So if the movie's not funny, we're not even here right now. People are just like ‘OK, that was interesting about black hair; what's next?'"

What's next for Rock may be another documentary. He had such a good experience with Good Hair that he'd love to find another idea for a nonfiction film. "In a weird way, I think this is the best movie I've done," he admits. "I think I'm more natural, and I'm getting laughs in a weird, unforced way. I would love to do this again. I do a stand-up special every three or four years. I would love to get one of these into the rotation."

Good Hair will be released to theaters this fall through Roadside Attractions.

Tamara Krinsky is associate editor of Documentary. She is still searching for the perfect hair product.

DOC SHOT is an exclusive online feature by Documentary magazine associate editor Tamara Krinsky. Through this mix of questions (some serious, some sassy), each DOC SHOT provides a glimpse into the work and lives of those creating and supporting nonfiction film.

Editor's note: This DOC SHOT originally appeared in the July 2009 e-zine, prior to the screening of Prodigal Sons at OutFest. The film opens February 26 in New York City, through First Run Features. Filmmaker Kimberly Reed appeared on Oprah today, February 11, to promote the film.

Kimberly Reed
Director/Producer, Prodigal Sons
Playing at Outfest 2009

In Prodigal Sons, filmmaker Kimberly Reed returns home for her high school reunion, ready to reintroduce herself to the small town as a transgender woman and hoping for reconciliation with her long-estranged adopted brother Marc. Things are complicated by the shocking revelation that Marc may be the grandson of Orson Wells and Rita Hayworth, forcing Kim and her family to explore questions of sexual orientation, identity, severe trauma and love.

YOUR FILM

Your role/credit on the film?
Director/Producer

This is a personal documentary. What was the impetus for you to begin the project?
I started this film when I got up the nerve to return to my high school reunion, after much had, um, changed. The project really began when it became clear that there was a remarkable story about identity — with both my brother’s and mine having changed — and I had no choice but to follow that story wherever it led.

If you had had an extra $10,000 to spend on your film, what would you have used it for?  
I would repay the tremendous support many others have shown our film. So many people worked for much less than they’re worth that it stuns me.

What excites you about playing your film at Outfest?
I didn’t want to make the transgender version of Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?. I’m excited that at Outfest our film will find an audience that wants to see trans film take steps beyond that.

YOUR WORK

What's the first film you remember seeing as a child?
I remember seeing The Great Waldo Pepper, starring Robert Redford, with my dad. It was the first PG-rated film I’d seen. Someone said “shit.” It was scandalous.

Tell me about a film that affected your profoundly or changed/inspired the way you do your own work. The gravity of Tarkovsky’s The Sacrifice, combined with its so-beautiful-it-hurts cinematography, has been a driving force for me ever since I saw the film. His audacity to create film worlds that exist unto themselves inspires me.

What would surprise people the most about your job or the way you execute it?
I’m an editor, but the first thing I did was hire an editor.

When you are feeling creatively stumped or burnt out, what do you do to get the creativity flowing again?
Nothing like watching a film that almost nails it to get me going.


YOUR LIFE

What do you want more of in your life?
I think there’s plenty of love in the world for all of us. I wish we knew that.

What do you want less of in your life?
Hate is the easy way out. Less of that would be a great start.

What do you want for your birthday?
A pony, of course! (Still!)

Editor's Note: The Beaches of Agnes airs June 29 on PBS' POV series. This article ran in the July 2009 Documentary Online in conjunction with the film's theatrical release through The Cinema Guild.

Agnès Varda earned the moniker "The Grand Dame of the Nouvelle Vague," in part because she was the only female in the highly influential French New Wave. Her marriage to fellow Left Bank filmmaker Jacques Demy and their inevitable distinction as French cinema's power couple certainly contributed to the reputation. But Varda's import to film is unrelated to either her gender or the import of her colleagues.

Varda's work has spanned decades and genres and is a favorite of film classes. Like most of the New Wave filmmakers, her films challenge formal assumptions. Her particular interest is the assumption of truth that tints the documentary aesthetic.

The Beaches of Agnès is her most recent film, and a cinematic self-portrait. She carries us from beach to beach, introducing us to the people who made her, both literally (her family) and metaphorically (her colleagues and the art that inspired her). Poetic logic and daydreams are all over the film, as they are in every one of her films; it's just that this film is about her. So here, as the protagonist/filmmaker, she is, as she's said before, "the other than me" and via a travelogue through beaches, clips from her films, photographs she took and whimsical dialogues with those people who have influenced her, we can piece together the puzzle of her life and career.

Documentary: Your documentaries tend to involve you as a character and tend towards a travelogue format. What do these two tendencies have in common?

Agnès Varda: It's not a tendency. It's a choice. It's an auto-portrait--self-portrait, but mostly, I would say, it's "the other than me." It's not really me...Me or me. Just to give an example, the first few seconds of the film are on the Belgian beach. I use mirrors because the mirror is the tool of the self-portrait. You don't have to be so self-conscious to make a portrait of yourself; it's an artistic act. If I were very coquette, I would have done it earlier and would not have waited until I was 80 years old and almost broken to make it. So, the travelogue is more [about] going through my life. I like to take your hand and take you with me, meeting again or visiting some pieces of my life. Like bubbles, what came out came out. I missed parts and certainly forgot very important meetings and stories. I made it very simple: I divided my life in beaches. It was obvious. I'd been in Belgium near beaches, in the South of France during the war, in beaches in Los Angeles and in that island at Normandy. Now for Paris there is no beach, so I had to make it. It became a gag to throw sand in the sidewalk in the middle of the road. My production team was nice enough to wear swimming suits to type and make phone calls. You need the complicity of people around you to do that.

D: It seems to me that you earn their complicity with your respect. The people in your films are always subjects. You, however, are often an "other."

AV: Well, a little. With Beaches, you can say it's about me, but it's about me and the others and the others and me. I think it was important to show the people who made me-- not only my mother and father who construct my spirit and my mind, but people I met and paintings I loved. I made a puzzle with my friends.

D: You allow people to critique your films while you're in editing--

AV: Yes! Not neighbors--different people, including professionals. During editing I take advice because I want to see how much I share, how much is understandable and pleasant. But I'm not obliged to follow [the advice]. "Okay, that's their point, that's mine." It gives you a key of how this film can be accepted or loved or what. But then, after the editing, I don't [touch it]. This is it and the critics can say what they want. People write me a lot of letters.

D: Getting input from your friends and colleagues must be challenging, and finishing this film, this movie about your life, must have felt pretty heavy.

AV: I didn't think it was more important than another film; it just came on time in my life. Maybe it was my last film, maybe not.

D: The film dances between family photos and reenactments. You say that you don't know what to make of the reenactments. Playing with these reenactments and photographs and old footage foregrounds the subject of representation, yes?

AV: Representation is the main subject. My life is how it is, but how to represent it, how to make it a film, how to find cinematic set-ups.

I'll give you an example: I did some shots in 16mm for my first film, La pointe courte--tests. Then I made the film in 35 and, by the way, I imitated my test. But these tests had been made with a couple, my friends, and the man died of cancer, so I dedicated the film to him. He had a wife with two kids, three and five [years old].

Ages pass, and when I find the 16mm film, I say, "Oh, I should put this in the film [Beaches] as my test." [Then] I realized that the family had not seen the test. So, at that point I can just be normal and say, "Come in my editing room and see your father," but I decided to make a real cinematic set-up. I took the carriage that was in the final film, La pointe-courte, and organized a screening on it and projected it on it and I had the kids push that carriage and screened the film in 16mm. Their father, whom they had never seen in motion, is pushing that carriage in the 16mm footage. And it's like a second burial. It's like a very nice way of pushing the memory of something they didn't have, because they had not seen him like this. You see, it's sophisticated in a way to try to find that cinematic thing, but it is touching, much more than if I just say, "Look at your father here."

I felt it very true, very good, you know? It's a way of presenting what I felt and what I wanted to show them instead of just showing it. So, it's a cinematic act. And in many places in the film I wanted to make it pleasant. Not because I want to please everybody, but because I think they deserve to get something for their money when they pay for the theater. So, I could tell very true things and moving [things] sometimes, but also pass from one thing to another, like we all do, zap all the time.

D: That's such an artful way to live. How intertwined are life and art in your view?

AV: My whole life as a filmmaker was [dedicated] to finding representations. I changed my way of filming according to the subject, according to the evolution of equipment, of material, of stock. And, you know, when I made The Gleaners and I and had to approach people who were very poor, I was so glad that I had these little cameras and not a big crew. Now I use this very small HD camera so I can do things that can be integrated into films. The technique is very important because it opens you to new worlds of filming and representation. You have to find [a different means of] representation for every film, every scene, every opinion you want to express. You can't just say, "I will write a line," and that will just illustrate it. Representation is the main string of what we do.

I was in Sete, in the South of France, and I didn't like the idea of living outdoors in the canals, so we had to go to Paris. But in my mind, I was not leaving Sete--I was still there. So I decided to write that scene where I sail that little boat from Sete down the River Seine near the Tour Eiffel. La Tour Eiffel means Paris. But this is a choice of representation, because this is not true. I didn't come in the boat; you cannot even sail on the River Seine. This was a dreamy approach to what I felt. In the film I represent my life and reality, but I [also] represent daydreams, impressions, desires, showing something that is not part of my exact life, shot after shot.

D: The real world includes the imaginary world.

AV: We have to love that. Like the way I love the surrealists; I make some images and put myself in the belly of a whale to create the feeling that I was really inside that.

D: It was a darling office in the belly of that whale. Very well decorated.

AV: The belly of the whale was made from paper, so we had to decide if we would represent the whale with glossy black paper--this is not redoing a real whale. Again, there is a décalage: It is not exactly on the side of the representation, it's not reality all the time; it's playing with reality.

D: So art is playing with reality?

AV: Sure. Playing with truth, too. Even if you are true, you play with it. You know, the way you decide to say one thing, not another thing? You decide what not to say and then you say it. The film is also about losing memory. In the film I appear all the time with these old ladies--which also says that I am losing my own memory. I am glad I made the film. This saves me from forgetting everything. I think that is my freedom. I can decide if the film can be true or vaguely away from the truth. Imagination has the power to show this and that. At the same time, I will film my family that I see as a dreamy concept. I think it is like a surrounding group protecting me.

D: Protecting you from what?

AV: I don't know. I love my film; it protects me. I feel loved by my audience, even though I don't know their names, I feel their protection is there.

The Beaches of Agnes, currently screening in New York and Los Angeles, will roll out to theaters across the country through October. For more information, click here.

Sara Scheiron is a writer based in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Robert S. McNamara, the Secretary of Defense under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, died today at 93. McNamara earned notoriety for his mishandling of the Vietnam War, which would be his internal struggle for the rest of his life. McNamara was the subject of Errol Morris' Academy Award-winning documentary The Fog of War, in which he reflects on the decisions he made, from World War II through Vietnam, and the consequences of those decisions.

Morris spoke today about McNamara on the radio program Here and Now, originating from Boston-based station WBUR. To listen to the interview, click here. And for Morris' recent essay about McNamara in The New York Times, click here

And here's an essay about The Fog of War by David D'Arcy that appeared in the 25^th Anniversary issue of Documentary magazine.

And here's the trailer for The Fog of War:

:

Finally, here's an excerpt from the film, in which McNamara discusses the notorious Gulf of Tonkin incident that served as the dubious pretext for entering the Vietnam War in the first place:

Food, Inc., Robert Kenner's searing indictment of the US food industry, passed the $1 million mark after less than a month in the theaters. The film joins Earth, Waltz with Bashir, Valentino: The Last Emperor, and Every Little Step in the seven-figure club of 2009.   

With such festival crowd-pleasers as Soul Power and The Cove scheduled for theatrical release this month, the total number of million-dollar grossers this year could very well exceed the total for 2008--six.

Here are the top grossing documentaries of 2009, so far, according to BoxOfficeMojo.com:

1) Earth:          $31,800,598

2) Waltz with Bashir:               $2,283,849

3) Valentino: The Last Emperor:        $1,533,077

4) Every Little Step:                $1,477,126

5) Food, Inc.:                           $1,286,693

6) Tyson:                                  $ 857,488

7) Cross: The Arthur Blessit Story:     $ 741,557

8) Anvil!: The Story of Avil:    $ 623,642

9) Outrage:                              $ 246,649

10) Enlighten Up!:                  $ 153,148

Editor's Note: Yoo Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg comes out on DVD August 24, through New Video/DocuRama. The following article was puiblished in conjucntion with the film's theatrical release in July 2009.

In Aviva Kempner's latest film, screenwriter Margaret Nagle recalls, "There was a list every year of the most respected women in America. Eleanor Roosevelt was first and Gertrude Berg would be second. There was also a list of the highest wage earners in America, and Gertrude Berg was first and Eleanor Roosevelt was second." And who, exactly, was Gertrude Berg, you might be asking?

Most people really have no idea of the impact this first-generation American Jewish woman had on the face of national television entertainment, literally connecting to millions of households across America sending "greetings from our family to your family" from the set of the Goldbergs' Manhattan apartment. Gertrude Berg was a force of nature--a media mogul, a brilliant screenwriter, the first woman to win an Emmy.

You could also describe Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg's director as a force of nature, for to make this feature-length documentary (or any of her other projects, for that matter), Kempner was as persistent and resourceful and determined as her subject ever was in her own work. She is on her way to realizing her dream of saluting this amazing woman and telling her story to as wide an audience as possible.

Gertrude Berg, born Tillie Edelstein in 1898 in Harlem, was the creator, principal writer and star of The Goldbergs, a popular radio show that ran for 17 years. The show became television's first domestic sitcom in 1949, making its star a national icon. This was at a time of severe economic depression (the radio show premiered a week after the stock market crash of 1929) and the TV show about a middle-class American Jewish family was becoming hugely popular as Hitler was rising to power over in Germany.

Also, by the time the TV show had reached its zenith in popularity, Senator Joseph McCarthy had cooked up his blacklist and The Goldbergs experienced the fallout from this devastating political movement first-hand when Berg's co-star, Philip Loeb, who played Jake Goldberg to Gertrude's Molly, was targeted by McCarthy. After holding strong, Berg, under intense pressure and threats from sponsors, finally settled with Loeb in 1952 and he left the show; sadly, he killed himself three years later, and the show was cancelled in 1956.

Among those interviewed in Kempner's beautifully realized film are actor Ed Asner, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, television producers Gary David Goldberg and Norman Lear, CBS anchor Andrea Roane and NPR commentator Susan Stamberg. As for Kempner, her goal for the past 30 years has been to make documentaries about little-known Jewish heroes and heroines, celebrating a positive legacy when so much negativity is part and parcel of Jewish history and culture. Another goal of Kempner's, of which she is adamant, is that of exhibiting her work in the cinema.

I spoke with the award-winning filmmaker by telephone about her latest work as she took a break from a post session at Du Art in Manhattan. Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg took six years to make (a bit of an improvement over The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg, which took her 13). We talked about the never-ending grind of raising money for documentary film projects and why she feels compelled to release her works theatrically.

Documentary: What really impressed me about this piece, among many things, is that really fine balance you strike between all the superb archival material you've gathered and your live interviews.

Aviva Kempner: Thank you. That's actually an MO of mine, something I strive for.

D:  It can be a difficult balance to find, particularly when one doesn't have the wealth of material you've gathered and pieced together to tell the story of not only Gertrude Berg, but also the timbre and mood of a distinct period of time in America. You also had great access to some of her family members. How do you weight those things over the course of constructing a feature-length doc? 

AK:  I decided to do this film six years ago this month, which is seven years less than it took me to make Hank Greenberg. This, you understand, is all due to financial reasons. In fact, the Washington Post did a story on me last month called "Documentarian's Tenacity Pays Off in Fundraising," about how I raise money. I have a 501(c)(3) and, of course, I depend on "the kindness of strangers." 

I work as a director first. I go for all the great shots that will fit in with the narrative. I don't like using narration. I wanted Gertrude Berg herself and her family and her biographer to tell her story. Then I find the footage. Even though it costs me thousands upon thousands of dollars, I firmly believe that using feature footage from that time is key. If you're talking about the suffering Jewish mother, then you have to use The Jazz Singer. If you're talking about struggling in the hotel business, you use Cocoanuts. If you're talking about the whole immigrant experience, you use Charlie Chaplin. 

However, as a producer, I'm responsible for raising the money to pay for all this stuff; it's about $200,000 in rights and clearances. This is not fair use material; I'm using this footage to tell the story, so I have to cut deals left and right. I got Lucille Ball footage and Honeymooners footage gratis from CBS, which was really great, but everything else cost me. That Edward R. Murrow interview with Gertrude was key; I had to have that.

D:  And you negotiate all of this yourself?

AK:  Oh yes. I have a post-production coordinator that makes the initial contacts, then I go in for the kill. I raise the money for what I have to pay, and I'm still thousands in debt. I'm sitting here at Du Art, and thank goodness for Irwin Young [who heads the lab], who lets me pay off in time. Every independent filmmaker should have Irwin Young in his or her life.

D:  Why is a cinema release so vital to you?

AK:  Because I grew up loving the movies, going to the big Mercury Theater in Detroit, seeing things like Lawrence of Arabia on the screen. I love cinema. I make documentaries that, hopefully, are entertaining and moving, and I want to continue to make them to be seen, first and foremost, on a big screen, which is why I've always shot on 16 [mm] and blown it up, or why now I use the highest-end HD for the interviews. I know a lot of people just want to get their film out and have it be available on demand, or use other distribution scenarios that will get it out there quickly. I just don't believe in that. I believe in that collective movie experience. The natural audience for this is older people, and they'll go with their families. I think there's a strong appeal for a female audience as well.

Now this means I will probably lose something equivalent to about five years worth of salary. I also hired a distributor to book the film theatrically. [Hank Greenberg] played Film Forum in New York and all across the country. I've upped the ante, and this film will open on July 10 at Lincoln Plaza--I feel like a musician going to play at Carnegie Hall. There's also a theater I helped save in Washington called The Avalon where it'll play [opening July 17], and Landmark Theatres will exhibit it all around the rest of the country. It's something that takes careful planning. 

I said to Wendy [Lidell of International Film Circuit, Inc.], Listen, my natural audience is dying every day; I've got to get it out there even before I've paid for it. I also need to exhibit this summer because it's great counter-programming for all the big action blockbusters that come out.

D:  This month, the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival is honoring you with its Freedom of Expression Award.

AK:  Yes, I'm the first female and the first American director to win this, and I am so honored. That festival inspired me to start one of my own in Washington 20 years ago. I respect their programming so much. It's more like a career award, at this point. But I still have my "bucket list" of films I need to do. You know, I could have done ten more films by now?  It's all about the dollars and the struggle for every one of them. Norman Lear helped me raise first money, and then [Jeffrey] Katzenberg and the David Geffen Foundation came in with some. The Righteous Persons Foundation has been great. The NEA [National Endowment for the Arts] was wonderful this time around.

D:  It's a small pie, getting smaller and smaller.

AK:  Well, I've just hired Melissa Silverstein to help with blogs and other non-traditional media outlets. I have a bunch of interns who are going to divide up the country by region and hit Twitter and Facebook. The website has to look and function a certain way. I want to use part of the outreach money I've received and go into old folks' homes with the film. It's like a political campaign. In fact, I've been hired to do grassroots work for other films.

D:  Outreach coordination is fast becoming a key role in independent filmmaking. The life of a film needs enhancement, some kind of traction to keep it relevant and in the public eye for as long as possible. Without vociferous and constant audience building, you're kind of dead in the water.

AK:  We're just trying to get out to as many people as we can get, aside from the usual suspects of the older Jewish audience. It's a challenge but a wonderful one. It was so interesting when I did the works-in-progress screenings for this film, and so many young people commented on the astounding fact that no one had ever heard of Gertrude Berg. Our tagline, aptly, is, "The most famous woman in America you've never heard of." But it's memory lane for a lot of the population, too, that goes beyond just the Jewish one. That's why I have people like Andrea Roane in the film; growing up, she was watching with her family in New Orleans. You don't have to be Jewish to love Molly, just as "historical" films don't have to be boring. They can be cinematic and exciting.

I think people need to take more risks getting their films out there commercially. You have to go raise the money to make the [film] prints, hire a good publicist, divide up the rights and do it yourself. You do need a booking agent and other reps like that. I can't do that on top of everything else I'm doing. But my fundraising never stops.

D:  If you wouldn't mind sharing, what are some of the other projects that are on your "bucket list"?

AK:  I've co-written a script on a Navajo activist I knew when I was in VISTA in the early '70s. I'm hoping to produce that with my co-writer. It's sort of the Wounded Knee story of New Mexico--again, an important story and a hero hardly anyone knows about. Not a Jewish one, however, but from a different tribe. 

There's also a story I want to do on the Rosenwald Schools and the work of Julius Rosenwald, a philanthropist who partnered with Booker T. Washington to build over 5,000 schools in the South. Another project I'm working on is about the great Samuel Gompers, the labor organizer.

D:  An ambitious slate, to be sure. Thank you so much. I hope, by the end of the theatrical run this summer, many more people will know who Gertrude Berg was.

Click here to see the full theatrical booking schedule for Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg, rolling out nationally this month.

Pamela Cohn is a New York-based independent media producer, documentary film consultant and freelance writer. She hosts a well-regarded blog on nonfiction filmmaking called Still in Motion.

By Brian Brooks

More change recently hit the indie biz with two key departures at IndiePix. Ryan Harrington, who joined the company last summer to spearhead the newly launched IndiePix Studios, the production and filmmaker relations arm of the online consumer film website, left in what he described as an “amicable parting.” The company’s documentary acquisitions point person, Danielle DiGiacomo, also announced her exit in an email to industry colleagues last month, saying, “after four-plus wonderful years at IndiePix,” she had decided to “pursue other exciting ventures.”

Harrington, who joined the company after working at A&E Indie Films and the Tribeca Film Institute’s Gucci Fund, said he was not authorized to speak about rumors that have swirled among some filmmakers and groups that have worked with IndiePix. indieWIRE had received word of an alleged communication breakdown and delayed payments to filmmakers. Emails have circulated among insiders and numerous individuals have contacted indieWIRE to express concern about the financial well-being of the company, but when pressed for details none would speak on the record or provide additional insight.

Yesterday, indieWIRE spoke with IndiePix head Bob Alexander about the changes at the company and its future as well as rumors of a breakdown in communication and payments to its filmmakers. “It is of course a problem, the filmmakers need to get paid, so we’re trying to figure that out,” said Alexander adding that, as per its agreements with filmmakers, IndiePix can only pay when they’re paid by their customers. “We’ve set up [a system] for each individual filmmaker showing each unit transaction for each project. It’s a highly transparent system that perhaps we haven’t successfully communicated to everyone that [it’s available].”

With the departure of Harrington and DiGiacomo, Alexander said its IndiePix Studios venture will continue, with himself and director of acquisitions Jason Tyrrell and COO Sally Ploured pursuing new projects. “We do have a significant new project to be announced, most likely in August, [and] we may have one or two others,” added Alexander. “We’re positioned for a substantial step forward in the second half of this year - we’re expecting a significant uptick.” Alexander said IndiePix will continue its sponsorship next year of the annual Cinema Eye Honors as part of a three year agreement with the event which recognizes documentary achievement.