DEEPER TALKS TO TERRY ZWIGOFF
We talk to the celebrated indie filmmaker and screenwriter, Terry Zwigoff
The elusive director of Crumb, Ghost World and Bad Santa gives a rare interview to discuss his love of Blues music, why Robert Crumb is the greatest, his work making the most offensive Christmas Movie of all time, why Marvel Films are big, dumb and loud and David Lynch saving his film.
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: I wanted to go back and ask what drew you to your early documentary subjects like Louie Bluie I know you’re a huge early blues fan but what specifically drew you to Howard?
ZWIGOFF: I found a record he’d made in 1934 that was just incredible. It turned out to be one of only two known copies, and it took on a kind of mystique to me the more I listened to it. I assumed he was dead since half a Century had passed. My original intention was just to do a magazine article about this record. There was a small (now-defunct) British publication at the time called “Old Time Music” and I planned on submitting it to them. I started doing some detective work and discovered Louie Bluie was still alive, living in Detroit! I flew out there to meet him, and he was so funny, charismatic, and talented (as both a musician and visual artist) that I decided more than a magazine article was needed.
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: Do you still collect 78 RPM records?
ZWIGOFF: Oh yes. I urge any of your readers who might have any old 1920s 78s to come to the show and give them to me. They shall receive a hardy hand clasp in return.
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: How did your incredible Crumb documentary come about? Robert is notoriously shy, grouchy, and difficult. Was he difficult to convince?
ZWIGOFF: He was not enamoured with the idea, but we were old friends, and I think he cooperated with it partially because he liked my first film (Louie Bluie) so much, and partly for the sake of art. I think partially because of our friendship as well. We’ve been close friends since 1971. Almost half a century!
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: There’s also a story where you threatened to kill yourself if Robert said no.
ZWIGOFF: That story’s not true. I hesitate to say anything is “fake news” these days, but that was something one journalist got wrong in an interview, and it sort of spread online. (I was suicidal at the time because of unrelenting back pain - had nothing to do with Crumb).
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: The film took 9 years, documentaries are always a long process. What made you keep persisting with the film? What was it about Crumb’s work?
ZWIGOFF: I always had a lot of faith in that film. I find his work funny, insightful, beautiful, and visionary. It’s changed the way I view the world. He’s my favourite living artist, what with Matisse and Picasso having passed. I’ve always collected his artwork and that of his brothers, Maxon and Charles.
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: How did David Lynch get involved?
ZWIGOFF: The film’s producer was a wonderful woman, Lynn O’Donnell. She stuck with me through thick and thin (mostly thin) through the whole damn thing - without her, I doubt the film would ever have gotten made. David kindly put his name on it when it was done - as “Presenter” to help it get noticed. He had recently won the Palme d’Or at Cannes and tried and tried to get them to show it in competition there that year. Despite his clout with them, they refused to consider a documentary. A few years later they opened the festival up to include documentaries.
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: When did you first read Ghost World? I think Daniel is a record collector, too.
ZWIGOFF: I think he collects “vinyl”. A whole different breed than the shellac collectors. We became good friends writing the script together. We had a lot of laughs. I’d read most of Dan’s work as it came out and was a fan of it. After Crumb was successful, I got an agent, and scripts began to come my way. But everything I was getting seemed like false, contrived crap. The protagonist is a 25-year-old rugged heart-throb who’s not only a physicist, he’s a mountain climber, too! And his name is Cody, or Kyle or Arizona or some such shit. I got to the point where I said, ‘ I’m not a writer, but I can do better than this’. My wife around that time encouraged me to make Ghost World into a film. I met Dan, and we really hit it off and we decided to write the script together.
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: This has become a coming-of-age classic. You handle the themes of alienation, outsiders, finding yourself, and friends moving on so beautifully. Can you talk about how you reached that delicate tone?
ZWIGOFF: The thing that helps me the most, the key for me is finding the right music. Almost every good film/film director uses good music. It might not be the music you’d want to listen to at home, but it works to complement the picture. I can usually tell if a film’s going to be good or bad in the first few minutes, just from what music the director has chosen. In the case of Ghost World, the 1920s music of Lionel Belasco was the cornerstone I used to build on. It had a mournful, bittersweet quality to it that guided me.
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: Also, you’ve kept all the classic Daniel's vitriol—it’s cruel, scathing, mean-spirited, and hilarious—which is quite a balance!
ZWIGOFF: Yes, but I couldn’t quite find the right music for our next collaboration, Art School Confidential. Without that, it was tough for me to make it work.
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: I really like Art School Confidential. You manage to combine satire of art school and a murder mystery I really like this movie! Like I do with all your work. Was it too smart? Too weird? Too hard to categorize?
ZWIGOFF: I think, in part, it was a bit too playful in trying to mix genres. (That, and what I said earlier about music.)
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: Bad Santa is probably the most nasty, foul-mouthed, crude, hilarious Christmas movie ever. Now, it's a festive classic. Does that fill you with glee?
ZWIGOFF: Sure, I’m happy about its success - and still living off its residuals. I’m surprised at what an impact it had on the culture. I can’t tell you how many people over the years have told me it’s a Christmas tradition at their house to watch with the whole family. But my greatest satisfaction was a review that said, “…it’s the closest thing we have today to a W. C. Fields film”. That, to me, was the highest compliment I could imagine.
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: I know you made a pilot for Amazon’s Budding Prospects. I was wondering where you have been and what you have been working on. We miss your work.
ZWIGOFF: I’ve been trying to emulate JD Sallinger in that regard ...I don't work much, lay low, and collect residuals on my big hit. I’ve written a few films I still hope to direct, but I’m not getting any younger, and film financing for the kind of adult films I want to make has never been tougher to find.
You were working in the halcyon days of American independent cinema alongside Jim Jarmusch, Tood Solodnz, Whit Stillman, Hal Hartley, Alexandre Rockwell and lots of other smart, interesting and unique voices I don’t see these types of movies made very often now.
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: How do you feel looking back at that time?
ZWIGOFF: I was always a big fan of Todd Solondz’s films - it’s a shame they don’t make films like that anymore, but the box office winners are big, dumb, loud, action films or Marvel films. And money talks. The nuance, character, and dialogue don’t matter. It’s all endless action, chases, fights. It’s so tedious to me. They sell a lot of tickets Internationally where they don’t have to worry about that sort of thing translating. To me, the most interesting things are mood, character, and dialogue.
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: And what are your thoughts on the current state of cinema? Are there any directors or movies you particularly like?
ZWIGOFF: I saw a great film last night, Razzia Sur la Chnouf, by Henri Decoin. But it was 1957, so he’s probably dead by now. I really like David Fincher’s Mindhunter, but it’s a TV series. Most of the directors I really like are dead - [Fritz] Lang, [Billy] Wilder, [Alfred] Hitchcock, [Luis] Bunuel, [Henri-Georges] Clouzot, [John] Huston, Leo McCarey, Norman McLeod…the old masters. [Martin] Scorsese is still alive - I’m looking forward to his upcoming film.
DEEPER INTO MOVIES: Finally - If someone were to give you a cheque to make a movie, what would it be?
ZWIGOFF: I have a script for a drama I wrote, still waiting for financing on that one. I’d also like to make James Agee’s A Mother’s Tale into an animated film.