Moderator David Schwartz, actress Emily Watson and director Alan Rudolph Photo by Elisa Haber

Trixie, director Alan Rudolph's new film, is a contemporary spin on the Alice in Wonderland story. Emily Watson plays a deadpan neophyte detective who is trying to prove that a dissipated senator (Nick Nolte) killed a singer. Nobody takes Trixie seriously because she spews malapropisms and mixed metaphors like bullets, and doesn't make sense. The senator, a comic creation of Mark Twain-ish dimensions, doesn't make sense either because he makes long-winded, pointless speeches. It's a clever ploy on his part because no one presses him on any issues because they can't understand him. In fact, most of the characters speak jabberwocky and can't communicate with each other. 

The corruption of the English language is a big crime to Rudolph, who, with his star, Emily Watson, delighted the audience gathered for the June 13 screening and discussion at the DGA Theater in New York. The occasion was a joint American Museum of the Moving Image/DGA event, moderated by David Schwartz, Chief Curator of Film and Video for AMMI. It was the culmination of the retrospective of Rudolph's films which began at AMMI in May. The day before, Rudolph completed shooting of his next film Investigating Sex.

Rudolph, the son of the director Oscar Rudolph, began his film career in the Directors Guild training program for assistant directors in 1969. When he worked as an assistant to Robert Altman on several films, Altman recognized a kindred spirit, became his mentor, and produced his breakthrough directorial effort Welcome to L.A. (1976). Altman also produced Trixie. Altman, he says, is the best kind of producer because "he encourages you to be yourself." Like a psychologist, Altman wants the director to fully comprehend the implications of the material and make independent artistic decisions. "It empowers you," says Rudolph.

Rudolph deflected any discussion of his directorial technique by stating that he was not conscious of his technique. However, he is definite about his working methods. As Schwartz pointed out, Rudolph casts the same stars over and over because he shapes his films around their personalities. His films, which he also writes, are character-driven rather than plot-driven. Rudolph allows his characters to develop their own personalities and follow a natural course. "The characters always tell me what to do."

As opposed to directors who storyboard every emotion and who act out each part for the actors, Rudolph uses his material as a springboard for the inspirations of his performers. His favorite male actor, Nick Nolte, who plays the dissolute senator, has starred in Rudolph's last four movies. Rudolph is still amazed at the truly experimental aspect of acting, which is at the core of Nolte's creativity. 

Nolte wrote his speeches himself, one of which, Rudolph says, is a direct crib from a press-conference speech by President George Bush. He encourages the actors to expand upon the characters and astonish him. "The scripts are basically to attract the actors and the actors seem to respond to the author's sympathies, having a character that has enough motives to become dimensional. For me the movies are always better than the screenplays." 

Watson said that only Rudolph thought of her as a comedienne, to which Rudolph riposted that Watson made the verbally challenged character of Trixie believable because she didn't stress the absurdity of her speech and had a natural, instinctive delivery. "You believe her. No one will ever find Emily's acting technique because it's invisible." 

Asked about how he chooses his visuals, he states that the visuals are background for the actors. Schwartz commented that most movies have one tone, but not Rudolph's. "You always know how you're supposed to feel." Rudolph "mixes it up," he says. 

Trixie has a tightrope tone which alternates between comedy and humiliation. "The best films I've ever seen have been uncomfortably humorous," Rudolph says, and he added that he wants to astonish audiences. "Audiences are ready for anything. It's just that they don't know they are. I've never understood why people will wait in line to see something they've basically already seen."

 -Kevin Lewis