Tamar Halpern

We welcome award-winning filmmaker, director, writer, and Professor Tamar Halpern to this episode of “Arts and Craft.” Tamar shares her experiences directing the feature documentary, “Llyn Foulkes One Man Band” (now streaming on Amazon Prime and others), stalking the “STOMP” cast through South America, and the challenges she’s faced as a woman in a male-dominated industry. We also dive into her transition to academia, where she’s shaping the next generation of storytellers. Tune in for our convo with a creative force who’s paying it forward. https://www.tamarolandpictures.com/

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Produced and Edited by Arts and Craft.
Theme Music: Sound Gallery by Dmitry Taras.

Transcript

It took me a long time to really own being a director I think because I don't know I mean I don't want to turn this into a therapy session she has written and directed 10 features six female driven Thrillers she did a two book deal recently she's done a whole bunch of stuff and she's a freaking professor she is giving back my name is Nancy Magarill I'm a singer songwriter composer performer graphic and web designer and I'm Peter Michael Marino and I'm a writer producer Creator performer and educator we are new york-based artists you may or may not have heard of and we are here to introduce you to other artists you may or may not have heard [Music] of when somebody asks you what do you do how do you describe yourself that is such a loaded question Nancy and here's why it took me years and years before I told people I was a writer and it took me many many more years before I told people I was a director or a filmmaker I think some of it had to do with being a woman in this business I I felt that I would be maybe judged or or more like prove it if I said that so I kind of really needed to build up a large body of work so that if I needed to I could prove it oh interesting even when I met my now husband 20 years ago he always reminds me that that night he asked me what did I do and I said I'm a writer but I had already directed three features at that point had a master's in Film Production well I mean there's something about like what you aspired to be 20 years ago and I think I've known you long enough to know that 20 years ago you were like well I'm going to make these Independent films because I'm a director and now you're doing it for other people and and branching off into other areas I think that was the big shift was um it wasn't that I green lit myself it was other people greenlighting myself as a director I think as a writer it just when it became such a true practice for years that it's the main part of my focus right so like getting the contract and the paycheck it gave you the freedom and the confidence to say I'm a writer yeah I waited until someone gave me permission through a contract so you go to a party a Hollywood party tonight sorry that you have to go to that and someone says uh what do you do uh what do you say now well I've found a new love I'm now a directing professor at Chapman University in the film school Dodge College wow nice I was just giving notes on shot list to one of my directing students right before I tuned in to this so yes I'm a writer director but I said yes to a twoe full-time teaching contract so I'm a professor now yeah writer director Professor I love that that's wonderful so what does success as an artist mean to you do you consider yourself an artist yeah now that you're a professor I always feel like as long as I carve out time to write then I am an artist because I think writing is my primary love so while I'm getting my sea legs with school I sold a a second book I have a book that just released in October in in in the German language only because it was a Swiss publisher that picked it up I I didn't write it in German uh they translated it so I'm hoping that they figure out um other markets like an English speaking Market to sell to sell it to but we'll see but in the interm I sold another book but I have to write it so that's what I'll be focusing on mostly maybe this summer I'll do another movie but um I I really want to write this book do you think you'll be able to write and teach at the same time yes are you able to do other projects or is that all you have time for well I can only Direct in the summer because I accepted full-time employment there's a fairly generous winter break but you could barely barely barely get a movie in the can in that time I would rather write right now do you have any students now that you kind of I don't know maybe see yourself in or that you're like specifically rooting for because there's something about them that reminds them of you or that you want to help a specific person because they're so lost I have to say it's sort of funny I I feel a very deep maternal connection to the students cuz they're all younger than my own son and I do remember remember that excitement of being in for me it was grad school I teach grad students and undergrads and film and everything and learning about film yeah I want them to go out there with the best tools and abilities possible so um I'm I kind of mother hand I'm a little bit like a helicopter parent I realize this yeah I'll be angry if I see a scene I'm like where's your coverage what happened you can't do that you know I'm talking to them at a level like yeah I've done 12 movies and I I've already completed my Master's Degree and I've been studying film for 30 years and you know they're great because they're sponges but sometimes I'm like I kind of need to let them mess up and I think I'm a little afraid of letting them mess up that's amazing that you know that about yourself and I also having known you for a long time you are maternal you not only take care of people but you want to fix things you know I feel like I'm not saying you're a fixer that's a very different type of personality but yeah this all makes sense to me now looking back at our relationship and our you know our times that we spent together you are a cheerleader for other people and you care deeply about other people and their art do you think you got that from your own mom oh yeah wow this is a therapy session thank you see how he wo that in there so cleverly I can't I can't believe you hadn't already thought of that that's great that was the opinion of my mom I mean when people were creative and if she was around them she was so interested in what they were doing and I mean really she's the reason I know you PM your mom she had seen stomp at Royce Hall And she said Oh you gotta go you gotta go and you got to take Jordan oh my gosh yeah Nancy and I were at a cabaret show last night and she was introducing me to an artist that I had never seen before she said oh so are you and Tomar friend or something and I was like Tamar was like a groupy but then like she kind of became part of the family and then like she became part of my family yeah and I heard you like toured all over with them that's a crazy story do we tell that story stalked them yes of course we do I mean you got to you went to South America for crazy sake when my mom told me to go see stomp afterwards I bought my son two drumsticks because you guys had swag and I said do you want to get the performers to sign it because of course I was in fil school I had a Sharpie I had Sharpies everywhere and so we went I guess there was like a meet and greet outside in the back that anybody could go to and we went around to all the performers to get them to sign and one of the performers I met we we got a tiny bit flirtatious and I said my full name and he had a photographic memory and and after months and months of phone calls from him I was with my best friend Jenny and we were up in Vancouver we went camping and then we were going to go down the coast it was like a summer trip besties with their kids on no budget and so we were staying with friends in Vancouver and stomp was there yep so we went but at that point I was like I don't know if this guy I don't know good good instincts good instincts I thought they would be better because she had recently been dumped like in a really bad way and she needed kind of a boost and I thought here you go I found a guy for you and then you just befriended all the gays yeah well and then and then he of course he invited me to South America on tour and I was like Jenny you need to come with me because I think you guys should hang out because I don't really wna I'm not interested in him romantically and um so yeah she was like okay and we had one credit card we came and met you guys in Brazil and we thought Brazil was really poor and it would be super cheap and it wasn't so sometimes we'd stay with you guys and a lot of times we were on our own taking buses catching up while you guys flew around the country right so wait where were the kids when all this was going on with their Dads we were like seea I don't think I ever thought wait a minute why are these moms here I never thought of the kids yeah I never thought of the kids right no you were just two young chicks that were [Music]

controversial we're going to talk about um your um documentary but I remembered you like saying to me I really want to do a documentary on this guy and then I remembered you taking me to his studio and you know leaving and going oh my God this is fascinating this is you have to make this happen and then I don't even know how long it was later that you made it happen but like you want to tell it you want to tell the listener about this documentary yeah I did I I mean obviously I was enamored with Lynn FS the artist who at the time was 70 I think and I asked him in my third feature as an actor he played a character and it was really fun his character was based on him the film was improvisational you know it was an 18-page script but each scene was a paragraph everybody knew where they were starting and where they were heading I could work with nonprofessionals like Henry I cast Henry in that film right he was a fellow stomper yeah what was the film called your name here it's very hard to find I think a friend has it up on Vimeo but it's basically two kids trying to start a band in Silver Lake because Silver Lake was this Mecca of music back then like the Beasty Boys and backck and it was just it was there was something in the water so anyway I was just really motivated to make this really sweet Coming of Age film but yeah so uh Lynn this amazing artist living at the brewery this place my son and I had lived uh prior to Silver Lake downtown and um he he had just seemed like he'd been forgotten by the art world and I couldn't figure out why because his artwork was so interesting and he was so interesting so yeah I partnered with my sound person from my first three films Chris quilty and Chris was really excited to make his first film but also to make it about Lynn he was he had never met an artist in his life so for me when we were filming him in his Studio I had lived at the brewery I knew his Studio I grew up around artists and I just thought he was just another cool artist but you know I got to see him through other people's eyes which is God this guy's amazing and as artist goes he is amazing so and ult and self-deprecating and all the great things that make up a human being and he's a visual Artist as well as a musician artist that's right just super talented so yeah it was a long journey it started he was 70 and finished when he was 77 and you know we never really had an ending we didn't shoot fulltime by any means you could see in the film there's times where it says three years later I remember that yeah or we filmed something we just it didn't end up in the movie I feel like I saw the film at a art gallery in in the New York in yeah in the meat packing District or something yes so it started as a short film yep while he finished that big painting and it went off to New York and it was a last minute decision to for me to go and film The the art opening but we were done we had pitched this idea to him and to the gallerist and they said we'll play it on a loop in as part of the art show this movie about him finishing this piece it was I think it was like 14 minutes long or something and um just on a lark I decided to go film the opening which I assumed was going to be filled with people and he was you know the B of the ball and all the things talks about wanting and um honestly I of course invited all my friends in New York to come and family and everybody and that was about 60% of the people that showed up like no one really showed up this is so surprising but Lynn called it he didn't think they were going to come and reasons I needed to explore and that's what opened up the bigger documentary is has Lynn been knowingly erased from art history did or did Lynn piss off too many people and that's why no one came like people have personal vendettas or is it just a tough Art Market right now or is an LA artist never gonna have a good time in New York you is that's that whole La New York art World scene still a thing you know we just had so many questions and so that's what embarked US like we spent six months filming the short and then we spent six and a half more years filming trying to get the answers to those questions and we never got the answers but the journey was really fascinating and in the end he was rediscovered spoiler alert so we quickly finished the movie and rode his coattails and and it's funny because some places like the LA Times and some other places credit our movie for the reason he was rediscovered but that's not true at all and in the film we make it very clear it is really Ally sobotnik this woman um from New York who had relocated T and was asking around what are some interesting artists in town that I should know about somebody said you should check out Lyn fs and when she went for a studio visit she just was like how is this sitting is this artist in his work just sitting here right under our noses and the hammer Museum's not why aren't we doing anything so she convinced the museum to put him in to a show that had I think eight artists and he had the first room and it just everybody was blown away because it was the first time people saw his work over 40 50 years span so then the hammer thought what we got to give him a retrospective so that happened so he just uh he became you know a momentary International art star and he was happy and he's still making artwork he's 88 now he became famous became famous we're gonna get to that don't you worry he was Art world famous in art school he dropped out of art school and you had LACMA LA County Museum of Art Chicago Institute the Pompa in Paris and a couple other museums I'm not remembering right now buying his work when he was in his early 20s and the 60s do you think that you I mean this was a lot of work for you a lot of money do you think that you were attracted to making a documentary about him because a part of you wanted to share his work with with the world like you felt somewhat what's the word not responsible but like you were just called to like kind of amplify his voice or did you find that he was the perfect subject for your type of Art and the kind of film making that you wanted to make that's such a good question that's why I'm here I think because we became close when I cast him in this other project that was very personal project for me we had this connection and I was scratching my head like why is this guy not a household name you know why is he why are all the people that he came up with huge multi-millionaire artists and he's still scrapping to make his rent I just didn't understand because he certain it was not for a lack of talent so yeah but the thing is for me I went through a very rough period personally as an artist while I was filming and what was great is every time I would walk into a studio with with my partner CQ to film I'd always come away with this feeling of like it's okay to work in a vacuum and have nobody know what you're doing the TR the true Artistry is doing it anyway because that's what Lynn was doing he was in there working every day like frantically but not without like anybody breathing down his neck like you've got to show and you got to go and he just was selfmotivated to make art because he was compelled and it always made me feel like oh you know I don't have to be depressed or angry or sad that no one's calling me okay do you want to come direct this movie for us you know do you want to write this thing for us we want to hire you like that I went through a lot of really dry periods and I just kept he was like a touchstone for me um and also not being able to find an ending dragged it out but I I'm really happy because he got me through a really rough time in my life personally as an artist when I felt like working in a vacuum was exhausting and um a failure of some sort we were going to ask you or we're talking to artists so this is one of our questions because we've both been in we're basically asking all the questions of things that we ourselves have experienced or noticed our friends experiencing something about you know being stuck and like what helped you get unstuck and it and it you were just talking about you were stuck right but you were making this film do you feel like completing the film was the thing that unstuck you because it gave you that like I am capable of doing something or or some one person who was influential said you're really good and then it gave you permission to keep going what do you think it was were you even stuck at that point I wouldn't say I was stuck I turned out a lot of work it's just I had no place to to take it I had nobody to really share it with um I'm not saying that 100% but that's what at my darkest worst moments I definitely was very upset that I didn't feel like I had access this is all before the me too and times up movement happened and I just had it wasn't until times up did I realize like H what I was up against calling myself a writer director as a woman especially of comedy by the way my first three features are comedies that I just was like just like a fart in space like it did I I didn't you know I'm not saying nobody did there were a couple people out there you know um who women who who did break through and did have careers um but for the most part it just wasn't a welcome place for women and I didn't realize that I just thought if I'm talented someone will notice do you feel that no one noticed or that they just were not giving you the opportunities I thought no one was noticing and I felt like it was my fault that no one was noticing let me clarify that and why that I either wasn't good at self-promotion that I didn't know the right people that I wasn't pushing my work I was only doing the work but I wasn't then pushing the work you know there's that whole of side of being an artist of you know being the loudest voice and and raising your hand every place that is a tactic and I don't know if it's a tactic that works but it's not one I ever really made space for because I was always too busy working on what I was working on and so yeah if I got into a film festival great if variety wrote up one of my films and called it great wonderful I just still didn't like then like hire a publicist to Echo it or make C calls and say I'm the person that was written up in variety this week or I'm the person who won this Film Festival I just was like oh cool thank you and but I was always in process on something else and then I'd lift up my head and be like what nothing happened like I was on the first Blacklist you know which is a huge deal now to be on The Black List for scripts I believe I was the only unrepresented writer on that list wow and one of the few women and um people were like oh that's like people Insider people were like oh that's a big deal like your phone's going to be ring off the hook and they said the same thing also when I was written up in variety and when I won certain film festivals and it just didn't happen and I felt like oh I'm not yelling loud enough I'm not yelling at all from the Mountaintop I'm supposed to also somehow have time to do that on top of trying to be financially okay and carve out time to express myself and do my art I'm also supposed to be a promotion machine and I would go to I I think at one point I even went to like a couple seminars by different people about how they promoted and it just sounded [ __ ] exhausting and it's just a different skill it's a whole different animal we when you're a creator that we're expected to do that it's not natural for me either yeah and people hire people to do it for them I just didn't have the financial like that if I had the money that wasn't some place I wouldn't want to put it or I thought I I just didn't think about it so yeah I don't no and I'm not saying that everybody who does well it's because they had a great PR machine behind them but I don't think it hurts and I also think there's a large element of luck of like being in the right place right time so I never really was aware of How Deep The Struggle was it really this really moves me to hear that you're talking about this it it says a lot about your drive you know and very moving that's really kind of you that's been something for years my husband said to me when I've been at my darkest moments he's like everyone thinks you're okay yeah yeah everybody thinks you're great so why would they think of you when they're like oh we have this opportunity and I was like well what so am I being like weirdly punished for making my own opportunities I don't I just like I I don't know how to tell people I'm hurting I'm in trouble I need help because that's sort of also I mean it it could feel like it like diminishes you as an artist right like I'm not good enough so that's why I feel bad about myself when we know now that most of the most successful people have very big problems with themselves are constantly struggling with themselves well the most creative certainly have that sure sure what did I say the biggest people I think so yeah I think so too that's like such a weird fraudi and slip but I do I do think that there is something about how we're taught to especially as women to project ourselves we want to maintain this I'm really cool to work with Vibe and not sort of project a confidence that you can trust in me to do whatever work I need it's like why can't we be like anybody else that it's like we're artists we're crazy we we're volatile we're everything and that's part of who we are and what makes us the artist that we are it makes me think of this dangerous word pushy you know right like absolutely especially women like I was gonna say then always right forever right you don't want to come off as being pushy because then you're going to be difficult right um and so you're constantly like protecting yourself by not sharing yourself and so of course you're thinking I'm not sharing myself because you literally are not well we're also in a world of image where image matters and how you project yourself matters it's very much part of the entertainment world no matter what all of us are [Music]

doing was there ever a moment that you were like this is the one everyone's going to know my name I will be financially stable people will understand what I do did you have that moment yeah my first feature Memphis bound and gagged I won a bunch of awards my lead actress who I plucked out of the theater scene in the Pacific Northwest is now a huge star actually before that when I was in film school or my thesis film that I wrote and produced and my friend Patrick lamb directed we cast Lucy Lou in that she was an Undiscovered actress also so she thought she thought this is the one this is the one right that this wasn't the one because like she already kind of knew more than we did um but I remember we had this great moment with Lucid like she was supposed to play this heroin addict she was this junkie who had pawned her baby's um jade bracelet and then lost her child it's very uplifting Pro yes and uh and we so when she comes back she's supposed to look greasier and crappier we had like this jacket and we had to make it look crappy so we dragged we were shooting on Santa Monica Boulevard back in the in the '90s and a pawn shop it's still around Elliot Salters but anyway we dragged the jacket through the gutter and then mushed it around you know and then sunbaked it and then we gave it to her we're like Tada you know here's wardrobe and I remember we're getting ready to roll sitting there like in her position again with her back against the wall getting ready you know getting psyched into being a junkie and she was like did someone piss on this jacket oh no no one would piss on that oh my we're like oh my God what did we you know I mean it was a student film you know it was like classic but um so yeah we thought that film was going to do really well I don't even think we ever got it into a festival my first feature I thought I was going to you know do well then when it got into festivals I was like here I go I I was winning festivals I was like here I go and no and nobody called or and I didn't care because I was doing doing my second feature then that one that variety blah blah nothing third feature kind of didn't get as much love as the first to I had huge technical problems on that film and then then the documentary I was just like this is you know I will get work in in docu series maybe you know doing something I'll be able to use this to pitch to get an agent something no nothing and then oh sorry I forgot in between my big break Jeremy think of the meaning of life 2010 sure big stars working yeah right big my entire crew no none of the men had ever had a female director I was their for on a Goodwill tour oh my God that's unimaginable in this day and age we're cool we don't we're not shrill you know I was like basically like teaching them that that female we're not yeah so I mean and I put up with some crazy stuff on that one I had a producer like literally Pat me on the head a couple times no God was rough and um and I also you know it's like it's one thing you're making your own movies on a small budget but this at the time was like a 1.2 or $.3 million budget and yes I was directing Academy Award winners and also bringing in my people I got to bring in Michael Yuri and at Betsy Brandt I got to work with Mary and selis I asked and they gave me Mary and selis like I was like she got to have a scene that was a big deal for me and um and I worked with a bunch of actors who are just working working actors and so it was great and a lot of respect and it was you know between me and the actors well that's not true I think there's one actor who's mad at me and I'm I don't really care so it was his doing but not anybody I listed and Mar Sarina was amazing she took a look around and saw we were having some problems like we were having some art Department problems and stuff and and timing problems and she pulled me aside and she was like you know next week when we shoot my bedroom seeing this the set you know all the art Direction everything needs to be there like I need that for my character and she and I already developed this relationship where we could have side talks because the whole reason we got her was I met with her and she said I'm not going to do this role it was based on a book as written why is the female character always just like the frumpy librarian but the male character is like magical and big and she said why can't the librarian character be magical and big and she lives through books and she just open up this whole door to allow me to rewrite a character differently from the book and allow this female Spirit of like living through you know I got to talk about the giving tree and the Little Prince and you know all my favorite books and so so it was so we already had this nice Shand and I remember I said to her um I said Mera it's gonna be what it's gonna be I I really can't I can only make so much happen on this set and she was like you need to grow a pair and she meant it nicely and she was right she was absolutely right because I also was like trying to make sure everybody knew that female director is not a difficult person right in a weird way it sounds like that was the one because of everything that you learned from it and the confidence that it gave you and the amount of um collaboration that you had on that project I guess there's something different from the one that's going to make you never have to look for work ever again it always comes to you one the one like when you're young and we were then right the one that at that time makes you say you know what I know what I'm doing and I'm willing to continue to learn from the people around me I I'm curious to know if on that set you actually did grow a pair uh I could not get full backing from my team about what I wanted until we were shooting pickups about six months after we had done principal photography because it was that was the only time that I was really truly heard about the problems that I was up against wow and and they they actually handed me a real baton of like you are the director so what has changed since the MEO movement as far as how you feel as a woman in the business I was fortunate in that I guess in 2016 lifetime put out a mandate that we're making films for women why do we not have female directors and so a former manager of mine Kyla York called me up she's like I'm producing a lifetime movie and I want to put you up as director are you available and I said absolutely and I got the to yeah and so and then once I did one just like if I gone into episodic once I did one it was like oh call for more call for more call for more yeah so those are also like extremely stressful situations are they not like you have like two weeks of prep time they tell you who your cast is you have very little time to shoot very is this all true or is that is that the um or is that um Hallmark yes that is true I my first uh Lifetime movie was a 12-day shoot in in Serbia 90 minute film yeah I think 87 or whatever they decide with commercials but um and luckily I had two cameras on six in my days so I could get really good coverage and by hooker by crook we managed to get it I believe did go over the very last day but I was like come on I mean we have to go over um to finish the scene out um but it was very intense also I did I already say this it was Six Days on it was Six Days on one day off Six Days on and we had I think we had more like three weeks of prep and most of them are about three weeks of prep and then um 13 and sometimes 14-day shoots which I love 14-day shoot I'm like oh I'm on vacation now but it just really forces you as a director to quickly see W with your DP uh either on your own or they're doing it on their own and we're talking about it but quickly see the potential and how you can maximize and to um get the coverage that you absolutely need to Ed so that you're never I mean I at knockwood I've never been in an edit Bay going oh we don't have that shot you can't you have to it you have to know your minimum um and then you can if you have a little time and there's certain scenes you kind of box out on and you're like this is going to go on my real so or this is a really important scene or it's an big emotional scene for the actor and we need to give them space because we are working with super professional actors for the number ones and twos um and so they can't they need you know they're giving a lot they need to have that respect from us best we can but it sounds though like I mean on the timeline this opportunity was you know you were hired you were you were a hired person to impart your directorial skills on someone else's thing so what was that like going from you know I'm I'm a filmmaker who writes my own films and now I'm doing someone else's and did that make you happy with that or you were like okay from now on I just have to write my own [ __ ] so it's a little bit of all of it um but really great that you you pointed that out one of the big things I learned was how to say sure we can do that you know really pick if there's something that you radically disagree with because the second you start disagreeing it causes problems with your producers it just does they're under a lot of stress and you know trying to figure out how to maximize the budget and you better have a really good reason to be saying Hey I want to change this or I want to pitch something to you that's different than what we discussed most of the producers are very seasoned producers so when it's in the script phase so before I got into the writer's Guild um I would rewrite these scripts so sometimes I did it for no credit um sometimes I even did it for no money but it's collaborative I send the executives or the producers my notes and we discuss them and they either give me a green light or they don't I've never had them wait is the original writer involved in this process thing is is that a lot of these not all these writer are as experienced as the producers and director are and so there's just like kind of at that point we're at a we're going on a speed clip and knowing what will work and what won't what will make it better and we I know I was on one film I think we had more like four weeks but the first week was soft prep where I was giving notes to the producers and they were like oh these are really good points and then they would talk to the executive and the executive would go talk to to the writer and then the writer would turn a draft around and so a week has gone by which is a long time and it you're reading it you're like it's still not and then you write up the notes again and they go oh good idea let's have a meeting same thing get it and now you're packing to go somewhere I did step up and say we're at a juncture where the the writer can't deliver what we actually need and please I need you to trust me that I can deliver that and this particular executive I was working with um he was not a fan of writer directors for some reason the older they are the more weird rules he only liked writers or only like directors which one did they gravitate towards like them to just be that one thing he didn't they did both and I think you know a lot of these weird rules I hear from older producers who have done a lot of films it's because they got burnt I had a older producer who said directors never get walkies and I was like okay and there was a point where I was like I have to have a walkie I need a walkie they're on a boat I can't I'm only I have to be able to talk to them so I'm not on the boat I'm over here so um you know I try to respect it when they say blah directors never or don't or I don't like and I try to stay away from it but at some point if I need it I just have to disregard the the rule that they've created because I have to do my job as well so that particular producer exe executive who didn't like writ or director combos for whatever reason he said well rewrite the First Act and send it to me and I will decide if you'll write the rest and I guess you won yeah I I on the airplane rewrote the First Act and when I landed sent it in and then while I was running around doing locations and casting it was really late in the game he he was like this was great go ahead and write the rest of it and I was like oh no sleep no sleep you know um you're reminding me of uh well you saw U Desperately Seeking the exit and I I quote I quote a very famous uh Tony awardwinning millionaire director who was first attached to the project who said to me very very early on Peter there one thing you have to remember in this process the writer is the lowest man on the lowest rung on the ladder which is so insane that's infuriating is absolutely true I mean it was for me no it is true it is it is true I'm not contributing anything but I'm not contributing any money to the project right everyone else like the producers can override your decisions because it's their pocketbook right yeah it's been an interesting discussion at the film school because one of the things I try to teach my directors is to Pivot be able to Pivot because you just don't know what's going to happen but also um you know that there are times that they're going to be producers are like you can't do this you can't do that you can't this these are the rules and that you should play along and I kind of got a little what for from one of my cohort uh Professor who was a producer in the 90s and he was like tomorrow just because you've been abused by producers doesn't mean that you should prepare the students for that and I was like I've had great experiences also with producers it's not been a straight across thing I just know that when you're in that situation and it's somebody who's difficult there's a way to handle them and still get your job done or you can try to turn it into a war and you will lose what do you want to do next just last summer did my first tub film which was very different than a lifetime film um through with marvista a company I've been trying to work with for years and it was kind of a weird Confluence like I finally get to the company that I really I did a movie with them in 2016 but I didn't really know them the producers were the go between and then there's this amazing woman who runs production there named Maran wch and she and I have a very similar trajectory we finally had lunch it took us like a year to have lunch she's so busy in La yeah and um she's just super smart and she's just she's running and the production arm at marvista and they're doing tons of work with Tubi and I kind of finally got a project with them right after I um said yes to a two-year teaching contract so I feel like I could be doing a bunch more movies with marvista but I also like I said I'm loving teaching I might just stick with it that's wow so great to hear oh my gosh yeah I just feel like your students are so fortunate to have you because you've done all of these different things and you encourage people to stretch and learn and grow and do all the things you serve as a great model I guess isn't that the word we use in education we're modeling um that you are you a living model for them um they're just really fortunate I hope that you keep teaching I love this job at Dodge college so much and I wake up every day convinc some I'm gonna screw it up somehow uh I totally feel you I taught sketch comedy for three years at Pace University and every day I'm like they're gonna figure me out today you're a fraud yep completely a fraud and I feel that way a lot of times um when I really wake up in the morning before I go to set like I have these moments of like uhh God I I mean I I can pull this off I've done this before but I don't know this one feels particularly hard there always each one has their own challenges and maybe it's good for us to have that I think it's inevitable I've seen it on actor Studio like you know when they've been doing theater their whole lives or tons of film do you ever still get butterflies in your summit before you know and and most of them are like yeah yeah as soon as I don't have butterflies I'm done yeah that might mean you're

dead um um Nancy do you want to ask your question no because it almost doesn't matter but the the big question that we want to ask everybody is okay why aren't you famous but it's so it just seems so silly because it doesn't even seem like that's anything well let me ask you is that anything you ever even cared about did you ever care about being famous what does it even mean to you what does mean well you know it's so interesting because that's a big part of the EXP ation of that documentary about Lynn FS well absolutely so I might have more perspective on it just because my subject talked about it a lot you know and how much he felt you know Warhol was famous more famous for being famous and how he killed art and made it flat art and advertising and art kind of vibe and I'm like give the people what they want you know you can't you can't be mad at Warhol for giving the people what they wanted but um I think when I was younger for sure yeah I thought I was going to be like just steeped in constant collaboration um as a filmmaker and when you think about a director that works you think about a director that has some sort of recognition whether it's you know winning film festivals or um being interviewed and things like that Tamar it's amazing that you just said I dreamt that I would be this huge collaborator yeah you didn't say I thought I was going to be this big Hollywood director yeah well okay yeah I I I just thought it would be constant like working with people at the house or out set and there you go there's goes back to the beginning of our conversation of you kind of looking out for other people and that people give you energy and that's where you get your drive from and again God why are you making me emotional how very dare you it's just it's like it's so beautiful to me that like that's you know having a true artist you know I just want would to give me the opportunity to collaborate like no one says that you know all right well and if they say it they might not even feel it you know it's a great Buzz line to say in an interview but I mean it's so beautiful and uh I hope everyone has the opportunity to collaborate with you well I think it's why you're also going to be a really great teacher it's the last day of school tomorrow everyone all the students are you're never going to see them again even though you think you will and they say they will stay in touch what's your advice to them stay in touch

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