Gerrymandering

Yet another set of long days that have left me far too weary to blog.  We’re now a full two weeks in, and I think we’re hitting some kind of stride as a trio, but the flipside of that tends to be more stops, more shooting, longer days, fewer meals.  (I’m sure our investors would be pleased to know this.)

Much of the difficulty inherent in this particular shoot derives from the fact that we’re trying to do two essentially contradictory things at once: (1) create a verité portrait of the conflict over California’s Proposition 11 (the Frederick Wiseman part) and (2) schedule a host of in-depth, well-produced interviews that discuss the verité portion as well as the larger context of redistricting reform in this country (we’ll call this the Errol Morris part).  Doing this simultaneously has brought up all sorts of questions of tenses, structuring and timelines that will surely drive me nuts in the edit (more on this soon—this stuff really fascinates my puzzle-inclined brain), but for right now, the key thing is really to just grab as much as we can.  Here’s what we’ve been up to the past few days:

Day 11: More fun with maps in which we test out pressing backlit maps up against a piece of glass, and then distressing them in various ways (drawing, cutting, wetting).  Cool results.  Still rough, though, and I wish we had more time to work on this.

Day 12: Six hours with Chris Swain of the Redistricting Game, then six hours on the road to Sacramento.  I’m not looking forward to the drive back, especially given that our route runs right through an immense cattle stockade which stinks about as bad as anything I’ve ever encountered.

Day 13: Afternoon shoot outside of the governor’s office in the Capitol while the “Big 5” (governor and party leaders in both houses) meets.  Lots of Capitol B-roll.  I like that most state capitols share certain kinds of commonalities (massive rotundas, blinding whiteness, marble) and I think as we rhyme the redistricting situations in various states, being able to buttress these echoes visually is going to come in handy. 

Day 14: (Yesterday?  Seems like ages ago.)  Drove to Santa Cruz, picked up a speech my new favorite former legislator, Fred Keeley, gave to a group of medical professionals.  After that, back to his office for a wide-ranging two-hour interview.  Then, to our surprise, Fred took us out to dinner.  This, however, is not why he’s my new favorite government official.  If Obama doesn’t appoint Fred to something and make him a household name, I think his performance in Gerrymandering just might.

Day 15: Two Schwarzenegger events; in one I get up the nerve (prompted by Susan) to ask the Governor a question.  In each of these sessions thus far the press has mainly wanted to talk to him about budget shortfalls, education and the like, and he seems genuinely excited to answer on Prop. 11 and redistricting.  During magic hour we shoot some nice landscapes with lines (more on this later).  In between shoots, I schedule interviews for Friday.

Will it be five days before I can blog again? I’m not even sure exactly where I’ll be in five days…

 From Msnbc, questioning the future of race-based redistricting if Obama wins.  Choice quote: 

“Assuming that he is elected, Obama will be the first U.S. president who has taught a course on voting rights, and he will realize not only the implications for minorities of adverse Supreme Court decisions in these two cases [Bartlett v. Strickland and an upcoming case from Texas involving Section 5 of the VRA], but the effect on the Democratic party, as well”

Over the past few days I had the chance to sit down for lengthy interviews with California’s last two governors: Democrat Gray Davis (1999-2003) and Republican Pete Wilson (1991-1999).  I had the chance to talk about a wide range of topics with both. After we discussed their roles in the reapportionment and subsequent redistrictings of 1990 and 2000 we spent some time discussing governance, democracy and ideology.  Good stuff all around, and I think we’ll have plenty of material to choose from for the film. 

Mini-anecdote: Before Davis walked into the office where we’d built our little set, I sat going over the questions, thinking, “This will just be another interview, just another subject.”  As soon as the (very famous) former Governor walked in, I totally froze, started stammering and entered a mild state of panic.  At Magnolia I dealt with major celebrities for years and never felt especially starstruck, but somehow Davis hit that button.  He turned out to be a really nice guy, but a bit of an intimidating interview.  He’s practiced, posied, and on message, in short, a real politician and it’s hard not to feel a little humbled by that.  Yet, he hung around with us for about fifteen minutes post-interview chatting politics and even validated our parking for us…

If we continue to have this much luck with our interviews, we’ll have to try especially hard not to mess up Gerrymandering.  We’re assembling a real cast of heavy hitters from across the political spectrum and I can’t think of a recent doc that’s put this much political firepower on the screen.  Fingers crossed.  Still have Schwarzenegger to go…

I’ve been so exausted at the end of the last few days (jet lag + poor diet + carrying heavy stuff all over = bone weariness) that i haven’t been up for adding to the record.  Tonight’s not much of an exception, but for the purposes of continuity, perfectionism and all that, here’s the last few days of Gerrymandering in brief. 

Day 5: After a few hours of shopping for supplies, Susan and I set up a little studio in my room and shoot maps of the U.S. under various lighting conditions, stages of duress, etc. for a few hours. I want map stuff in this movie to have a very specific look, one that will likely need to be created outside the confines of a hotel, but if we mess around in the off time, hopefully I can save days on the back end by sketching this all out now. 

Day 6: Early drive to San Diego for another Schwarzenegger “presser.”  The campaign people seem more comfortable with us at this point. At least we didn’t get yelled at.  On the way back, we stopped in La Jolla and checked out an antique map store which provided a wealth of visual ideas.  Later, spent over three hours picking up a horribly exhausted Gary from the airport.  The trip should have been quick, but a gas station pump and our rental car company intervened. 

Day 7: Back to City Hall to film the Prop. 11 resolution showdown.  Great stuff on the steps and inside Council Chambers.  After that, we had to run to the Chamber of Commerce to build the “set” (a mottled gray backdrop I’m insisting we use for our big sitdowns because I think too many docs feel it’s okay to just plop their subject and camera in front of a dumb Target bookcase or desk with highly reflective photos or open window or something else equally idiotic) for interviews with our Executive Producer, Bill Mundell, and founder of independentmovement.org, Jim Mangia.  Both go well, and I feel a little better with these under my belt.  Background looks seriously great.  With Gary and the “real” camera in, I start to feel as though this thing is happening. 

Day 8: With nothing on tap for today, I expected a light one.  Instead, we end up shooting with Kathay Feng and Vincent Jones of Common Cause for five or so hours.  Time well spent as both are passionate about and eloquent on redistricting politics, but we nearly missed striking the set from the Chamber, and completely missed picking up more tape stock.  Also drove up into the Hills to get a good shot of Los Angeles from above. 

Tomorrow: Gray Davis.  Friday: Pete Wilson.  Two governors in one week ain’t bad.  Sunday, we stop in with The Redistricting Game creator, Chris Swain.  More to come…

I’ve found over the first four days of the shoot that documentary filmmaking (in actuality, probably all filmmaking except for the more expressive and gestural extremes of the avant-garde) is a constant game of balancing practical logistics versus concepts and aesthetics.  Thus far, logistics (labeling tapes, calling interview subjects, prepping binders and contact sheets) have been winning out pretty regularly—moving the shoot up about a week left me far less prepared than I’d have liked.  That said, the date change was completely the right decision, even if it has left us scrambling. 

Though, in some ways, I’m actually a bit thankful for the logistics.  Choosing the proper formatting for tape labels is a decision much less fraught with consequence than picking the right props for an interview set, camera placement, or where to be and who to cover at any given time.  (I’ll make a broad generalization: doc filmmakers who are not Errol Morris have less control, and need to be more responsive in relation to their subject matter the feature filmmakers.)  So far, picayune office-type concerns have provided a nice respite from larger choices—when I’m working at the lapton on my checklists, I feel like I’m in control and accomplishing tasks, even though I don’t have a camera in hand. 

That said, we’re still making a film.  Things need to be shot, decisions need to be made.  More for myself than anyone else, the below is an attempt to wrestle my original right brain idea (thanks, Lance Hammer) of a film about gerrymandering back from the numbing organizational hurdles presented by the real world.  In (generally) descending order of importance, here’s what I think we need to do to make a successful film:

1. Explain to viewers what gerrymandering is, how it works, why it’s dangerous, and where claims for its efficacy are being exaggerated. 

2. Tell the local gerrymandering stories of seven states (California, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Iowa, Florida, Pennsylvania, and Texas) and balance them against a broader national and historical view. 

3. Use points #1 and #2 to springboard into bigger questions of representation, democratic organization and power in this country and how those have changed (and haven’t) over time.  If we can re-read the U.S.’s history against (or between) the lines, while forcing voting viewers to consider their relationship to our government beyond trips to the ballot box, we’ll have accomplished something pretty major. 

4. Per an idol of mine, Thomas Pynchon, poke at the idea of borders and boundaries (both aesthetic and conceptual) and see what comes out.  This is an area where we probably won’t be able to make grand conclusions, but I hope to at least get viewers on the path towards wondering what lies behind the broader impulses of line drawing, ownership, property, etc. 

5. Create an aesthetically unified piece full of internal rhymes and artifice that’s still a direct, engaging political statement

Should be pretty easy to balance all this.  But first, off to label some tapes…

Even the best laid plans…

Today I’d hoped to spend much of the afternoon on the phone introducing myself to potential interview subjects we haven’t talked to yet and re-establishing connection with those we have. However, at about noon I received an urgent e-mail from Kathay Feng saying that enemies of Prop. 11 on the Los Angeles City Council had scheduled a hearing for that afternoon to vote on a resolution announcing the Council’s opposition to its passage.

So, it was off to the races. Susan and I threw the gear in the car, rescheduled a few meetings, jumped on an overcrowded freeway and arrived at City Hall just after Kathay—just in time for the end of the Council’s conversation. Luckily, enough members voted to table the discussion until Tuesday so as to give the Yes on Prop. 11 folks enough time to marshal their forces for the public comment portion of the debate. (Even though I remain unsure what sway the City Council holds over Prop. 11’s fate aside from the possibility of some symbolic influence.) Oddly, though, there were more than a few opponents of the initiative in attendance with planned statements at the ready…

We talked and taped with a few folks after the meeting, and once we finished we headed down to Irvine for a meeting with Professor Bernie Grofman, one of the nation’s foremost redistricting scholars. I’ve read several of his books (his latest, Redistricting in Comparative Perspective, is a really terrific, readable primer on international electoral systems) and he proved as engaging and expansive an intellect in person as he is in his writing. I expect he’s going to end up occupying a lot of screen time in Gerrymandering.

This is sort of a cursory take on a day that ended up being pretty fruitful in terms of furthering the conceptulization of the movie and the practicalities of execution. I’ll have more on this in the coming days, but for right now I am completely and utterly exhausted. In a good way.

It’s actually Day 2 of the Gerrymandering shoot at this point, but by the end of a long, hard Day 1, I wasn’t in any real shape to sit down at the laptop and type up anything resembling English.  The short version: Susan Bryant, our terrific sound recordist and line producer, and I came out yesterday to catch a hastily arranged press conference with two big ticket figures.

But before I get to that, let it be memorialized here that, in his first act as a paid filmmaker, Jeff Reichert (me) hit the ground running and immediately fell face first to the pavement. After hours of packing, preparation and organizing, and scant few hours of sleep, I hopped in cab to LGA with a huge amount of gear and arrived early for my 6AM flight only to discover that my plane was actually leaving out of JFK. In all my years of publicity travel, never once had I pulled such a boneheaded maneuver, so that I managed it on the first day of shooting the movie I’ve been dreaming about for years seemed particularly ominous. Would Gerrymandering be cursed from the start?

Thankfully, things turned around from there. I squeezed onto the next flight out of JFK, Susan picked me up at the airport, and we made it to the press conference in plenty of time to set up our gear and glad-hand with various politicos that our consulting producer, Sharon Jimenez, pulled in our direction. It’s been a long, long time since I’ve gone out and shot anything, and I think I underestimated how much of a muscle shooting is; getting to that place where you know where all the right buttons on the camera are, where its weight feels best against your body, even working smoothly in conjunction with a tripod is all a learning process and I’m glad our subjects (Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Mayor Michael Blommberg) were largely stationary.

The event was a Yes on Prop. 11 press conference featuring the mayor, governor and several other good government folks, including the fabulous Kathay Feng, co-author of the proposition and terrific friend of Gerrymandering (the movie, of course). We got some good stuff, and both of the headliners spoke in a more nuanced fashion about the issue and the challenges surrounding it than I expected at an impromptu outdoor event. I wish I’d had footage like this when I cut the first trailer—their speeches really sold the big picture in ways that our first round of interview subjects just hadn’t. We’ll try to post a clip or two here soon.

After dinner and the presidential debate, Susan and I retired to our respective quarters and collapsed. As for Day 2, let’s just say it was taken up with the less glamorous side of filmmaking—that one where you work phones, carry binders and spend far too much time trying to get the attention of anyone working in Kinko’s. Still, I wouldn’t trade it. More logistics tomorrow. Our DP, Gary Griffin, arrives on Monday and then the fun really begins.

Physical production on Gerrymandering begins this Wednesday afternoon in Los Angeles.   We’ve moved up the shooting schedule to catch a high profile press conference (we’ll hopefully post a little footage here that evening).  After that, we’re not sure where we’ll be in the state each day, but the crew and I will be in the Golden State at least through the election. 

Stay tuned.