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Hedwig and the Angry Inch
John Cameron Mitchell.
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What indie film was on the frosty lips of every rider from the Yarrow Theater up to the Egyptian? The very same one that snared both the Audience Award for Dramatic Feature in Competition and the Best Directing Award: Hedwig and the Angry Inch.
Directed by DGA member John Cameron Mitchell, Hedwig was developed [with songwriter Stephen Trask] in New Yorkarea rock clubs for four years before its critically acclaimed off-Broadway debut in 1998. Under the watchful scrutiny of industry advisers in the Sundance Feature Film Labs, Mitchell transposed his stage play into a film directing debut. The result was a wildly imaginative genre-busting fable, replete with daringly conceived animation sequences and a star performance by Mitchell himself. DGA Magazine was lucky to track Mitchell down in New York, where he's preparing Hedwig's sound mix for a July release, to talk about how his rock 'n' roll cult classic became a runaway Sundance hit.
Was this your first time at Sundance?
As a director. I was in a short Sundance film as an actor called I Remember about four years ago.
What's it feel like to win two awards at Sundance?
I've been working on this project for seven years in one form or another and my approach has always been to keep it fun. I view it as moving on from one new gig to another. To me, Sundance was just the next gig - a fabulous one to be sure - but I approached it like another theater or a rock club the show was playing in, albeit on a larger stage. When it became so popular, my feeling was more relaxed than exhilarating - like a release as opposed to a heart-stopper. It just felt really good to have this character accepted by so many people in yet another medium.
This movie defies easy stereotyping. It has animation, rock 'n' roll, and even live concert footage. What other films, if any, had an influence on your creative choices?
Some films that helped with the tone of acting, which was a very realistic style despite some of the film's flights of fancy, were Being There, All That Jazz and Nashville. I encouraged a lot of improvisation in Hedwig. But only after we had rehearsed the scenes verbatim. I developed the screenplay and the visual tone at the Sundance Labs. I wasn't sure if I had it in me to both direct and act and, Michele Satter, at the Sundance Labs, was really instrumental in helping me to sort that out.
In what way?
I was considering a co-director for the film and Michele Satter suggested I direct myself in a scene and then have someone else direct me in the same scene to compare. I knew the piece so well and had such strong ideas about how to film it, that I realized having a co-director slowed things down. Also, acting the part was not the fun challenge because I had grown bored with it over so many years. All the discoveries in this film came from directing. Of course, it was fun singing the vocals because it was a release. Most indie directors don't always get to have that kind of release on the set.
What was the process with directing yourself? You appear in heavy makeup and costume in an ambitious, yet low-budget independent production.
I'd rehearse to set the blocking and videotape that. I'd look at the rehearsal and, if it needed adjustments, I'd use a stand-in with the other actors to tweak the scene. I'd often shoot a few takes in a row without looking at them, so as not to slow things down. If I knew the camera was OK and the scene was small - my close-up or a two-shot - I might not even look at it at all. Usually only if it was a big camera move, or a complex vocal scene with a lot of actors, would I stop and look at it.
Did you lip-synch the vocals?
Never. I can't stand that look for songs that are in concert. The band in the film is on a tour of a chain of seafood restaurants and I wanted a live feel to those performances. It was difficult because we often had to use multiple cameras, and a very fast [1500] film stock. We'd light the whole room with practicals, and that would be our only lighting setup for the whole day. This was the approach with the sound as well, to capture that live feeling as much as possible. When we did have problems we were able to mix in some studio tracks with the live vocals. The end result is seamless so some of the trickier aspects of camera and lighting were well worth it.
-David Geffner
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