Under 20 Q’s with Jeff Campagna
This marks the first of many AnnieG Under 20 artist interviews. This first interview is with filmmaker extraordinaire Jeff Campagna. He writes, shoots, directs, and edits movies; and as if that was not enough he`s even founded his very own film festival. If you don`t already know of him you very soon will as he`s making leaps bounds in filmmaking history. It`s every indie filmmaker`s dream to get a Hollywood actor to star in their ultra indie movie—this dream is a real life accomplishment for Jeff Campagna.
I`m very proud to introduce you to an accomplished individual and one hell of a nice guy: enjoy AnnieG`s Under 20 Q’s with Jeff Campagna.
Q1 You’re a director, a writer, a producer, an editor, a film festival founder…. How do manage all this with out clones? And more importantly how do you take off one hat and put the other on–because they all have very different roles to play and contribute to your
projects? It’s a mixture of sleep deprivation and efficient time management that allows me to be so productive, I guess. It only really gets crazy the few days leading up to a shoot or an event of some kind, probably due to my knack for procrastination. I still have days where I am staring at my iMac with nothing to do and no new emails are hitting my inbox – hopefully not for long though. I find that I switch from project to project quite easily but if I’m having trouble getting into the groove for a particular script or something, I usually turn to my iTunes library for some help focusing.
Q2 Do you think given the circumstances faced by young and independent filmmakers in Canada that taking on so many roles is the only way to be seen and heard as an artist? Yes. I have always been a proponent of the mentality – "if you throw enough against the wall, something has gotta stick". But I don’t think this is a problem felt by only Canadian filmmakers, I think it’s just the nature of the entertainment industry. You just have to get yourself out there, regardless of the project. Half of me thinks there is no room for artistic integrity on the road of success, but then the other half of me spends all his time hunting the first half down to teach him a lesson. At the end of the day, being able to write, direct, produce, camera-op, edit, colour-time etc… makes you somewhat scary to people in the Hollywood studio system because if they ignore you, one day you might be the one taking over their studio and signing their cheques.
Q3 What is your opinion on the current status of Independent Film in Canada and where do you see it over the course of the next decade? I think the film landscape in Canada is pretty lame, and unless the ‘old boys’ start to recognize the ‘new boys’, the future looks pretty grim. And with the major public funding organizations in the country handing over grant after grant to the ‘old boys’ (who don’t really need the grants anyway because they can acquire independent financing anytime) the ‘new boys’ are constantly swimming upstream on their own. That’s why initiatives like MIFF are so important – there needs to be some ‘in-doors’ for the underground talent in the country to walk through and be a part of the industry here. Right now, most of the talented and creative filmmakers in the country are still stocking shelves at Sobeys or sweeping the change rooms at your local hockey arena. Canada needs to start producing globally marketable content. Instead of movies about snow and crying, we need to make films like "Grindhouse" and "Appaloosa".
Q4 What is your role and how do you see yourself making an impact on the Independent and Mainstream cinema in years to come? As a writer and director my role is quite simple: to entertain. If I am directing a music video, my role is to breathe a whole new life into the song by pairing it with motion picture. If I am writing a screenplay, my role is to create characters that people can love or hate and situations that they can laugh or cringe at. As an Indie Film Festival founder/director, my role is to open doors for other underground filmmakers so they don’t have to break the rules and ignore the laws that I had to.
Q5 MIFF (Mississauga Independent Film Festival) received a lot of press and support in its first official run. What do and your Co-founder/brother Matt have in store for its supporters in the follow up of its debut? The festival will be even better the second time around. In its first year, we really didn’t want to launch the same way most first year suburban film festivals do, which is pretty lackluster. We wanted to go big with red carpets, live music, theatrical environments, cash prizes and even throw some celebs in the mix. It’s this sort of world-class experience that will encourage attending filmmakers to keep pushing the rock up the hill. MIFF’s best interest is the Canadian Filmmaker, whereas some other film festivals are concerned first, with the festival itself.
Q6 Could you explain the environmental awareness aspect of the festival? There’s no denying the environmental predicament we are all facing and whether you’re Al Gore or Bjorn Lomborg we all have to do our part. It was a logical component for the festival when we were building the program. If we were going to launch this multiple day, multiple venue event on an annual basis, we figured we might as well incorporate an eco-friendly aspect from day one. We try to print only what we need to for marketing campaigns and on post-consumer paper products with eco-ink. The MIFF administration is 100% digital right down to film submissions and volunteer applications. And the official MIFF mobile is a Smart Car, until electric cars are made more accessible and cost effective, then we will be going the EV route.
Q7 Your festival offers something I find to be essential for Independent Filmmakers and that is an opportunity to get together with Independent Musicians. Tell us how this came to be and why it’s so vital to create this sort of environment? I am a believer that 50% of any film is made up of sound and music. Just like the army of undiscovered filmmaking talent in the country, there are so many insanely talented musical artists just waiting to be discovered and what better way then to feature some of their work in a motion picture. As great as "Myspace" is for scouring band sites for cool songs, MIFF allows these acts to perform live in front of the same industry that could ‘break’ them and have open dialogue with directors, producers and editors about music in film. Not only that, but with any great festival comes great parties;and any great party needs great music, so again, it seemed like a very logical step for MIFF.
Q8 I understand that you’re a classically trained chef-how does one go from searing fillet mignon to taking off to Ireland and making a feature length documentary (Roots of A Man) that gets into international festivals? Great question, and I’m still not
exactly sure how it happened. I am a creative person, I suppose, and whether it was cooking or movie making I always avoided conventional education and just dove in way over my head until I could splash my way to the surface. It may seem like a drastic career change but it actually felt very natural.
Q9 What was your first experience like with the festival circuit? The first big festival that "Roots of a Man" was accepted into was the "Foyle Film Festival" in Derry, Ireland. It was a crazy experience; we were so green and had no idea what we were doing. I was working in a hot-table kitchen at the time and had to fight tooth and nail to get time off to fly over for the festival. We saw as many of these cool ‘festival’ films as we could, hit as many workshops as possible and anxiously awaited our own screening. I remember seeing one of the Documentary judges walk into our screening room for the show and half way through Roots I looked back at her and she was sound asleep. I started to laugh; I was probably already half in the bag.
Q10 You finish up with the festivals and distribute 900 copies worldwide. What is it after this experience that made you say, " I want to make a western"? I watched "Once Upon a Time in the West" and thought it was the most exciting thing I had ever seen. Part of me wanted to quit making movies right there because I had seen quite possibly the greatest thing ever made with motion picture. A lot of indie filmmakers were making horror, thriller or cheesy zombie movies at the time, because they had the resources for that sort of picture. We knew we had to do something that would stand out amongst all the other no-budget films. Even though we had no ‘western’ resources at hand, we went down that road anyways. It’s a great genre… a glorious genre and it deserves either a proper burial or a tasteful resurrection. I prefer to give it the ladder.
Q11 People remember the T-shirts from TIFF
and probably saw you on ET Canada, but up until that point making "Six Reasons Why" was a real labor of love for the Campagna brothers. What was it like making the film and how did Colm Feore get involved? The film was an amazing experience from start to finish, mainly because I had never done anything like it before. My blood, sweat, tears and life savings (which wasn’t much) went into Six Reasons. Even after last years TIFF, when we got our sales agent, it was still a constant effort to keep the deals alive and keep the sales wheels turning. click for trailer
THE COLM STORY: Coming back from the "Foyle Film Festival ", with ‘Roots of a Man’, I was on a 12-hour stopover in Heathrow airport in London with little money and an iPod shuffle with no battery life. I was waiting at the gates to board the plane when I saw Colm and his wife walk in. I had just seen Colm in ‘Exorcism of Emily Rose’ at the film festival, so his face was fresh in my mind, and my brother and I had a convo about how cool he is. So there I was, right in front of him, starring awkwardly like a freshman would at a sophomore cheerleader. He boarded the plane first (he was traveling first class) and I ran to the internet stall at the back of the terminal, put in my last few pounds to hop onto IMDb and memorized his filmography and bio.
When the plane landed in Toronto I approached him at the baggage claim with plenty to talk about. He was as nice as a guy could be at 2:30 am after an 8-hour plane ride. I spoke with him and his wife briefly, we took a photo together and that was that. Six months later my brother and I went to the Stratford festival to watch ‘Coriolanus’ which he was starring in. As soon as he walked out of the stage doors after the show we approached him once again. He remembered me as we opened our laptop on the stairs of the theater. We had already shot Six Reasons Why by this time and had cut together the opening credit sequence and put his name and face in it as if he was already in the film. He loved the follow-up. After talking with his agent, unionizing the production and finding an opening in his crazy schedule we shot our last few scenes with Colm and cut the final movie together. He’s now a good friend and will be in my movies from here on out. Feel free to shorten that epic tale however you wish…
Q12 After the two years was over, and after the film was finally complete-what did being approached by THINKfilm mean to you at the time and what has the purchase of your film meant for your career? Having major distribution companies chomping at the bit for North American rights to Six Reasons meant a lot. First, I remember thinking "we might have actually made a good movie" then I remember thinking, "this might mean I can pay off all my loans and credit cards." The first offer we had was $25,000, which was already almost twice the budget (which is a success in itself). The last offer before we cut a deal was a quarter of a million dollars, so needless to say all the crippling debt I incurred due to the film was paid off. Having a DVD on the shelves around the world means a lot for my career, now if I open my mouth in a room of 50 people, only 49 of them ignore me, as opposed to all 50.
Q13 The music video "Klooch" has had great success in MTV Europe rising to number #9 on the MTV Rock Charts. The budget for that video was $1200.00; you seem to have a gift at taking very low budget projects and propelling them to success. What do you attribute this ability to? My family didn’t have a lot of money growing up. I had to get a job when I was 14 at a printing press so I could buy my own things. Money has always been tight, so when it’s even tighter in a budget I function naturally. You always have to have more resourcefulness and creativity than you do money, that’s often the difference between a good and a bad movie. I never went to school for film or video, my parents weren’t successful film producers and I wasn’t raised in Hollywood so I have never had any preconceived notions about how all this is supposed to work – which really means there is nothing to slow me down or hold me back.
Q14 Moving away from the independent and a little closer to the commercial tell us about the biopic "Allenbury" based on Darrin "Snow" O’Brien and how you became involved with that? I was in a limo one night, and Snow happened to be in the same limo. He heard that I wrote scripts for a living and we began to chat about the " Allenbury" project. He’s a fascinating character and I am a lover of urban dramas, especially ones with a musical influence, like "Hustle & Flow" or "Harder They Come", so Snow and I were a perfect fit. Now I am also directing a few of his music videos, one of which we are shooting in Africa. But "Allenbury" is a few years away yet.
Q15 From biopic back to Western you and your brother Matt have also teamed up again to write another western "Roll The Hard Six"? What can audiences expect from this follow up? If "Mad Max" picked up "The Notebook" at a bar one night, got drunk and had an unprotected one-night-stand, their love child would resemble "Roll The Hard Six".
Q16 What’s this "looking for a million bucks" I see in your brother’s v-logs all about? Yes, we are looking for $1,000,000 for "Roll The Hard Six". Know anyone?
Q17 When you look to the future what do you hope lies ahead? All I can hope for is the ability to keep doing what I love to do and being able to make a living at it. I feel so fortunate that I can sit at home in my tighty-whities and write scripts, edit movies and
get paid for it. And at any point, the rug could get pulled out from under me; no matter how hard I try to hold onto it. I just hope the work keeps coming, people keep taking me seriously and nobody realizes that I have absolutely no idea what the hell I am doing.
Q18 In a distant future when it’s all said and done what do you hope to say and feel when looking back on your life and career as an artist? I hope that in the future I can look back at my body of work and my career and contently smile to myself… and then keep going. I am never satisfied with where I am at. I am always 8 moves ahead and I constantly want more from myself and the world. Art is never finished, it’s only abandoned.
Q19 In that same distant future what do you hope will be said and felt about you and your life’s work by others? I hope people say there’s a guy who never gave up, who never compromised. A guy who wasn’t afraid to rebel when the time was right or to break a rule that no one else was breaking. A guy who spoke his mind and drank excessively from time to time. And regardless of whether or not people like my work, I hope they say there’s a guy who knew what he wanted and went for it.
To learn more about Jeff Campagna and his upcoming projects visit his website www.jeffcampagna.com