How did you get into filmmaking?
I always loved characters and stories. I wanted to be a cartoonist when I was eight years old. I used to draw figures all the time and make animations. I worked for Time magazine for a summer during college as a photojournalist too, but that didn't really express what I wanted.
When I was finishing up at University of Chicago, I went to one of my favorite professors to talk about what I should do next. She said, "Well, you obviously want to be a filmmaker." I said, "I do?" She said, "Yeah, it's all you ever talk about." I applied to film school after that.
How do you do what you do? Describe your process.
If I'm lucky enough, I fall in love with a character who has a really profound life need that drives their story forward. Then my whole life becomes about their life--figuring out who they were, what they wanted and how they went about getting it. So with Brandon Teena (in "Boys Don't Cry"), I went to the city where she died, I interviewed her mom, the police, the kids, etcetera. Then, with my screenwriting partner, we try to translate the underlying emotional truth of the character into a dramatic story with a beginning, middle and end. We try to understand: What's the dilemma and how do they overcome it?
Simultaneously I'm thinking about where we will get the money, how we will find actors who can play the part, who I'd like to work with, what locations we should use... And that's not even going into actually directing on set.
How many people are involved in the films you make?
Hundreds of people. There are my keys: writing partner, producer, cinematographer, editor, sound designer, composer, costume designer and production designer. And then those people have people under them. They help me carry out the job and bring the movie to the next step, because they all know a certain part of it better than I do.
Then there's the cast. With my actors and actresses, I feel like my job is to pass down the emotional truth of the story, and then to let them find it in their own way. That's how it becomes more real. Everyone is completely interdependent.
What do you like/dislike most about filmmaking?
I don't know if there's anything I dislike. I think the hardest thing about making a movie is that you're trying to move the world. People are unpredictable and can act out on you. And the days end too quickly when you're shooting.
What was high school like? Were you into filmmaking?
There was no filmmaking in my high school--but I think all the seeds were being planted... I felt really out of place at times. I was into comic books, I was into drawing, I was into debate. I didn't really fit into any categories.
What other kinds of things do you do? What else would you like to try?
I think I want to charter a boat. I grew up on the water, and I think there's such a primal relationship I have to the ocean. I would just love to listen to Neil Young while floating on a boat, seeing the endless ocean.
Tell us about your "Boys Don't Cry" sides.
This is a side from the shooting script of "Boys Don't Cry"--a page of the script with my director's notes on it. It's at the beginning of the car race scene, which was about one and a half minutes in the movie but took three days to shoot. The side helped me set up the architecture of the scene...
