ESSENCE FEST IN REVIEW
ON DUTY WITH
ACTIVE ENTERTAINMENT
THE ADDAMS FAMILY TAKES CENTER STAGE
before the scene
JUSTIN CHATWIN
Mary J.
BLIGE
Soul Queen of the Screen
CINEMA CHIC
THE OUTSIDERS
S
VOL. 2, ISSUE 4 | August/September 2011 EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Micah Haley CREATIVE DIRECTOR Erin Theriot STAFF WRITER Brittney Franklin EXECUTIVE ASSISTANTS Elizabeth Glauser Jon Vail DESIGN ASSISTANT Amanda St. Pierre SALES David Draper, Brinkley Maginnis, Care Bach, Polly Bibb, Bill Staples, Tabitha Miles
EDITOR’S LETTER
W
e approach each issue as an opportunity to rethink and re-invent. To take what we’ve hopefully done to some level of success in the past and make it better. In this issue, Scene premieres three new concepts: Scene On, Center Stage and Cinema Chic. Hopefully you were lucky enough to discover HBO’s excellent new show Game of Thrones. Did you know that Khal Drago himself, Jason Momoa, is currently filming in New Orleans? Or that Friday Night Lights star Adrianne Palicki is in Louisiana now too? Scene On is a new feature that will let you know which familiar faces are currently filming in your back yard. Our Center Stage interviews with the producer and writer of The Addams Family are no accident. Theatre is poised to grow in Louisiana in the same way film has. But unlike film, there’ll be no wait to see the final product: national Broadway
8 | August/September 2011
tours will premiere their shows to Louisiana audiences before hitting the road. And in time for September, we’re excited to launch Cinema Chic with The Outsiders! More than just an attempt to emulate what Vogue and other publications do so well, Cinema Chic seamlessly unites film and fashion in a way that our entire audience will hopefully enjoy. Some of our first style choices are inspired by characters in film and television. Our goal is to inspire great fashion choices while paying homage to some of the greatest films of all time. With all of our new offerings, we’re eager to hear your thoughts so we can keep making things better. Summer will soon be at an end, but the fun we’re having has barely begun.
COVER PHOTO BY Chad M. West
CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS Chad M. West, Michael Tran, Johnny Nunez, Rosemary Phillips, Andrew Goetz, Tyler Kaufman, Eliot Brasseaux, Joan Marcus, Jeremy Daniel, Mark St. James, Eric Lacour, Saeed Adyani, Paul Schiraldi, Jeffrey Niera, David Giesbrecht, Patti Perret, Gus Bennett, Jr., Edelman GRAPHIC ARTIST Burton Chatelain, Jr. CONTRIBUTING WRITERS AJ Buckley, Susan Ross, Jacob Peterman, Mark St. James, Alexis Nicaud FASHION STYLIST Melissa Naccari Scene Magazine At Raleigh Studios Baton Rouge 10000 Celtic Drive • Suite 201 • Baton Rouge, LA 70809 225-361-0701 At Second Line Stages 800 Richard St. • Suite 222 • New Orleans, LA 70130 504-224-2221 info@scenelouisiana.com • www.scenelouisiana.com Published By Louisiana Entertainment Publishers LLC CEO, André J. Champagne Vice President, AJ Buckley Controller, Jessica Dufrene Display Advertising: Call Louisiana Entertainment Publishers for a current rate card or visit www.scenelouisiana.com
MICAH HALEY EDITOR-IN-CHIEF editor@scenelouisiana.com
All submitted materials become the property of Louisiana Entertainment Publishers LLC. For subscriptions or more information visit our website www.scenelouisiana.com Copyright @ 2011 Louisiana Entertainment Publishers. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be used for solicitation or copied by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording by any information storage or retrieval system, without the express written permission of the publisher.
CONTENTS ON THE COVER
Mary J. Blige
Canal Corner at St. Charles Ave. New Orleans, LA 70130 504-581-6666 www.rubensteinsneworleans.com Complimentary Valet Parking Facebook: RUBENSTEINS | Twitter: Rubensteinsnola 10 | August/September 2011
SCENE ON GAME OF THRONES Some were nervous when JASON MOMOA was set to fill Arnold Schwartzenegger’s shoes in the remake of Conan the Barbarian, but the former Baywatch star proved his might portraying Dothraki warlord Khal Drogo on HBO’s Game of Thrones. Now Momoa is in New Orleans with Sly Stallone filming Bullet to the Head.
Jason Momoa as Khal Drogo photo courtesy of HBO
THE LINCOLN LAWYER MATTHEW MCCONAUGHEY returned to form last march with The Lincoln Lawyer. Now Scene’s March/April coverboy is back in New Orleans starring in Precious director Lee Daniels’ latest film, The Paperboy. Check out www.scenelouisiana.com for our extended interview with the A-lister.
Matthew McConaughey as Mick Haller photo by Saeed Adyani
Jon Seda as Nelson Hidalgo photo by Paul Schiraldi
TREME
THE GOOD WIFE
JON SEDA joined season two of the post-Katrina drama Treme as a slick dealmaker from Dallas. He’s also well known to fans of the sci-fi thriller 12 Monkeys and recently starred in the HBO miniseries The Pacific. He’s back in New Orleans now filming Bullet to the Head.
It’s been a busy year for Miracle at St. Anna star MICHAEL EALY. His familiar face has appeared in For Colored Girls, Takers, Californication, FlashForward and The Good Wife. Now he’ll be spending much of his time in New Orleans shooting the USA Network’s new series Common Law.
Michael Ealy as Derrick Bond photo by Jeffrey Niera
12 | August/September 2011
MORE SCENE ON
FILM |
RABBIT HOLE Academy Award winner NICOLE KIDMAN was again nominated for her role, playing a mother-in-mourning in the drama Rabbit Hole. After shooting Trespass in Shreveport, she’s returned to Louisiana to shoot The Paperboy with Matthew McConaughey.
Nicole Kidman as Becca Corbett photo by David Giesbrecht
THE MECHANIC More than just another action star, JASON STATHAM’s are the rare fists that can carry a movie. After shooting January’s remake of The Mechanic in New Orleans, he returns to the Crescent City to star in Parker for director Taylor Hackford.
Jason Statham as Arthur Bishop photo by Patti Perret
Adrianne Palicki as Tyra Collette photo courtesy of NBC
FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS
TREME New Orleans native and veteran of The Wire, Treme star WENDELL PIERCE is keeping busy during his hiatus from the acclaimed HBO drama by working with Taylor Hackford on Parker in New Orleans.
Alum of the talent showcase called Friday Night Lights, ADRIANNE PALICKI is a beautiful 5’11” bombshell determined to have her own action figure. After beating out stiff competition to be cast in the title role of a Wonder Woman pilot that was not picked up, Palicki comes to Louisiana to star as Lady Jaye in G.I. Joe 2. Wendell Pierce as Antoine Batiste photo by Paul Schiraldi
14 | August/September 2011
BEHIND THE
SCENES S WEATHER WARS Jason London, Stacy Keach and Treme’s Lance Nichols star in Weather Wars, a Syfy original produced in Lafayette by Active Entertainment. all photos by Eliot Brasseaux
Louisiana native Wes Brown and Erin Cahill
JASON LONDON
“I play the oldest son of this mad scientist who is working on scientific projects
to manipulate weather. His program gets shut down by the government, and of course it pisses the guy off, so he goes a little rogue on him. My character’s become a cop, so I’m put in this position of being pulled from both sides, but also understanding the importance of stopping him from doing what he’s doing: setting out to kill these politicians who killed his plan.
”
Stacy Keach as “Marcus” with Steadicam operator Nicholas Davidoff
MORE BEHIND THE SCENES 16 | August/September 2011
FILM |
JASON LONDON ON WEATHER WARS:
“The crew works so well together, the timing is there. It’s like
working on a TV series. We’ve made our day, every single day. I’ll knock on wood, because I don’t want to jinx it, but we’ve been able to fit in extra scenes on some days because we’re moving so fast and efficiently. It’s a producer’s dream.
”
Lance Nichols and Jason London
Jason London, Wes Brown and Erin Cahill on set
18 | August/September 2011
by AJ Buckley
Before the Scene is where we all start. In a small town with our families. In front of a mirror with our friends. The days spent sleeping on a couch. The nights working at a bar. Living with the unknown and surrounded by uncertainty. It’s about the times that define us. It’s about the darkness just before the limelight.
JUSTIN CHATWIN What made you become an actor?
Money. I’d say, to be completely honest, it was money. I was raised on the American dream and I received validation from my parents for always being an entrepreneur. So it was definitely the promise of beautiful maidens and buried treasure that’s kept me going all these years! But now it’s a different thing. I think that happiness is what drives me, and the journey: the ups and downs of this rollercoaster of a business. But to be frank, it was the promise of buried treasure and fair maidens that got me into it. And also being encouraged as a young kid that money will bring you happiness, which is a false myth that we’ve all been led to believe in these days.
What was your biggest fear?
My biggest fear was the fear of failure, and the fear of success. I think that fear of failure is ultimately what drove me and then when I started to have mild success, it was fear of success. What will happen if I get what I want? Which I think is something that a lot of people struggle with.
What was your lowest point?
Waking up out of a blackout in my underwear in a hotel room with six people that I didn’t know (laughs). My lowest point was the disillusionment that my previous dream wasn’t what I thought it was gonna be. My lowest point was realizing that I had bought into a false myth that my career and my pursuit of what I was doing was going to bring me happiness. And that becoming an actor and having a success and having some sort of fame was going to make me complete. When, at a certain point in my life, I had money, I had become a star of a Steven Spielberg movie and I was dating a supermodel and I was more miserable than I was back in my hometown growing up. That was my low point: realizing that I was feeling like I had been duped. Like I bought into a lie. And realizing that maybe my perception of why I was doing this was for the wrong reason.
What was it that kept you from walking away?
From the business or the art? ‘Cause those are two distinct things for me. I walk away from certain aspects of the business every day. But I know that the business and the art both have to work together to actually create these things we make called stories and storytelling is a pivotal part of our culture. I don’t think that many good stories are made a year, I think that our world is lacking in prominent storytellers. So, to answer your question, I think that what kept me from walking away was faith in storytelling and faith in my own creativity and my own path and my own adventure. Rerooting in that. And I guess the part of my journey that I’ve been talking about getting so lost and caught up in the whole scene, is all part of the great adventure called life. 20 | August/September 2011
What did you walk away from?
I walked away from living a simple, moderate life back in Canada. Because I wanted something more. I wanted an adventure. I heard the call to adventure and I answered to it. I listened to it because what I was learning in school wasn’t working for me and I was bored by school and I was much more interested in my own program of reading, thinking and experiencing than the university was likely to provide for me.
Who was your closest ally?
Along the way I’ve met so many people that have become teachers to me. So, I think that the ally has always been the same ally: he just always has a different person’s face on him. I have everyone from you to Shaun Sipos. Had Shaun not come down here and gotten that TV show, I wouldn’t have come down. I wanted to be an indie film actor in Canada. If it wasn’t for him being my only friend in Vancouver, I wouldn’t have come down to the states. But over the years, I’ve had so many allies that have come in and out of my life for certain reasons. I’ve learned certain lessons from all of them and I’m indebted to them for teaching me everything that I know — good and bad — to this day.
What were you doing before the morning of the audition that changed your life?
I was drinking whiskey and coffee and shooting ducks in Saskatchewan with my father. I mean what can I say? I grew up with a kind of barbaric lifestyle. I had come home to Canada because I only had $500 left in my bank account and I was coming back to just regroup with my family. I had just met with Steven Spielberg and Tom Cruise who saw me in an independent film called The Chumscrubber and I had asked them if I could audition for the part. So, I had done all that I had done and I knew that it was my last “cast into the pond” so I came home to fish and go hunting with my father. When I got the call from my agent, I was hammered, running around with a shotgun. She just said, “Um…”and had a long pause. And I was like, “Oh okay, that’s all you need to say.” That was for War of the Worlds, which was an incredible experience for me. It changed my life. A lot of young people think that if you get this job, it’ll make you happy but that’s not the truth. We spend so much time in Los Angeles trying to get work and trying to get that job and once we get that job then we’ll be okay. But it’s actually the opposite: once we get that job, it opens up a whole new web of possibilities and obstacles to overcome on the next chapter of the journey. It was definitely that movie that changed the league that I was playing in and opened up a lot more opportunities and complications at the same time.
JUSTIN CHATWIN
I think I’ve become less driven by ambition and money and more interested in life... What words kept you going?
Back when I was interested in quote/ unquote “making it,” it was Barry Pepper that said to me, “Most people go down to Los Angeles and they say the chances of making it are one in a million, and those are all the people that come to Los Angeles and they don’t study and they’re not interested in storytelling or the craft and they hang out at the bars and they expect for it to be just given to them. Like Los Angeles is a land where they’re just giving out free money and free movie star careers to people. But for me, he said, “If you go down there and you work hard and you study theater and you study the classics, it’s actually really easy to make it. But it’s once you make it that life actually starts because you actually have to look into yourself and that’s where the real adventure is.”
How have you changed?
BEFORE THE SCENE
I think I’ve been, become less driven by ambition and money and more interested in life, people, cultures, myths, ways of living, and humility, and I’ve become more empathetic towards this struggle called human existence.
What words to do you to inspire others?
Stay out of the bars (laughs). I’m serious. That was actually the best advice I ever got. And I didn’t follow it, so maybe somebody else will!
Justin Chatwin
photo courtesy of Showtime www.scenelouisiana.com | 21
STATE OF THE ARTIST
ADDAMS FAMILY MAN by Brittney Franklin The Addams Family’s original Broadway cast
T
photo by Joan Marcus
ony Award-winning playwright Rick Elice stumbled into an King and stayed with the Walt Disney Company for nearly a decade. Elice won a Tony Award in 2006 for penning Jersey Boys with advertising career in the 1980s while pursuing an acting career screenwriter Marshall Brickman, best known in New York. Well-noted for his wit, the for his collaborations with Woody Allen. The thesp was approached by a friend to write writers teamed up again after being approached headlines for ads in the creative director’s summer by producer Stuart Oken, a colleague of Elice’s at absence. Elice nearly turned down the job, Disney, with an idea to create a musical called The thinking he was getting a modest $100 for a fiveAddams Family. Not based on the films of the 1990s day workweek. When his first check arrived, he with the catchy MC Hammer-fueled theme song, realized it was a comfortable $100 a day. Writing but the single-panel cartoons from The New Yorker. funny headlines during the day and acting by One comic in particular stood out to Elice. “It’s night lasted all of three weeks, as he saw the end the mother, Morticia, looking down at her daughter, of his short career in advertising nearing. Until Wednesday, who stares up at her plaintively, holding the creative director asked to meet with him. an empty bottle with a skull and cross bones on it. “I went up and met her and, luckily for me, And she looks very sad indeed. Just beyond her, is we seemed to be kindred spirits and hit it off her brother Pugsley, peering out from behind a door, immediately. She said, ‘I get that you’re an actor, and he looks very mischievous and unrepentant,” and I get that you’re not going to be available all he explains. “The caption is the mother speaking the time but you probably could use the money, to the daughter and she says, ‘Well don’t come so I’ll hire you as a part time copy writer,’” Elice The Addams Family writer Rick Elice whining to me, you go poison him right back.’ And says. “It turns out that writing copy is kind of like you see it and you laugh. It’s just one single frame in two dimensions. being able to write a good postcard. I just had a knack for it and I did that for a few weeks and a month later, she offered me a full time job.” Nothing happens before it and there are no ramifications afterward. If he Working at the theatrical advertising agency opened doors for Elice, poisons his sister, does she die? Does she get sick? Can she get sick? Are who was able to meet theater icons such as Mike Nichols, Trevor Nunn, they human? We were intrigued, as writers, by that particular frame to Tommy Tune, Bob Fosse, Jerome Robbins, Harold Prince, Steven work backwards and forwards from that moment: the idea of a brother Sondheim and Tom Stoppard. He also went on to write, produce poisoning a sister. What might make this particular brother want to and direct for radio and television, eventually becoming the creative poison his sister who seems to be his only friend? And what would happen director. He landed a creative position at Disney Studios because if he did try to poison her moving forward from that point? And from of his work on the advertising campaign for Julie Taymor’s The Lion that exercise, it began to evolve, what we laughingly call our plot.” 24 | August/September 2011
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STATE OF THE ARTIST
Broadway cast members Bebe Neuwirth (Morticia) and Roger Rees (Gomez)
The Addams Family musical made its Broadway debut in April 2010, starring theater vet Nathan Lane (The Producers) and Bebe Neuwirth (Fame) as Gomez and Morticia. In September, a national tour of the comedic tale about the freaky family kicks off in New Orleans. “I loved the cartoons because they were just kind of single frame images. There’s nothing that comes before them, there’s nothing that comes after them and they were funny, dark, inverted—the ‘humor of inversion’ we now call it. She cuts the heads off the flowers and says, ‘Oh, aren’t these beautiful flowers?’ That sort of thing,” explains Elice. “Marshall and I had in our minds to write them secretly as sort of a slightly exaggerated version of the type of real left-winged, idiosyncratic, odd ball, Upper West Side New York family. That is why we set their house— which in the TV show, just kind of exists somewhere in America—right in the middle of Central Park in New York: so that we could write them as a New York family that, through the circumstances of our little story, comes in contact with a family about as different from them as could be.” “We wanted to write our story as the shortest distance between three points: family, ritual and continuity. And this was important to Stuart, I think. The operative word in the title for me, secretly, wasn’t Addams: it was family,” he said. “Life is good for the Addams family: continuity. Only one thing has changed and because it’s a cartoon family, we were able to stipulate as writers that only one thing has changed, and the one thing is Wednesday is eighteen years old. Everyone else is exactly the way we’ve always thought of these characters.” 26 | August/September 2011
photo by Jeremy Daniel
The age change of Wednesday Addams set the main plot in motion as the young girl has fallen in love with a boy from Ohio. The lovestricken teenager begins to behave in ways deemed unusual to the family entranced by the dark and twisted. “Of course, this being the Addams family, the strange ways that she begins to think are not necessarily the strange ways that would happen in your family or my family. That is our simple premise. Wednesday is in love and what does that mean for the family? That’s what our show is about. It appears at first glance to be a pretty bizarre family but of course if you peer through the crack in the window into the gloom of their house, you discover that their family is a kind of perfect, normal on their own terms. And when the parents of Wednesday’s new friend arrive, they’re forced to face certain things about themselves and their belief systems for the first time. Opposing concepts like pleasure and pain, and light and dark, and youth and age, and happy and sad, and normal and bizarre are the opposites that our show tries to look at and mime comedy from. What’s normal for the spider is a calamity for the fly. At The Addams Family, it’s important to think about the spider and the fly.” The Addams Family premieres at the Mahalia Jackson Theater in New Orleans on September 15. For tickets, visit www.ticketmaster. com. “I have to tell you the cast is fantastic. I’m so looking forward to starting rehearsals in August because they’re so good, I can’t believe we have such a good cast,” says Elice. “I have a good feeling in my bones and I think it has something to do with The Addams Family.” S
THEATRE |
THE BEGINNING OF BROADWAY by Jacob Peterman
The Addams Family original Broadway cast
“C
harles Addams’ world seems to live comfortably in the environment of New Orleans,” says Stuart Oken, producer of The Addams Family. “Even though he is a New Yorker, I think of that gothic, romantic, dangerous feel…he would have loved the things that are exotic about New Orleans.” After a successful run on Broadway, the musical based on the famous cartoons of Charles Addams kicks off its tour in New Orleans this August. It is the first Broadway show to participate in the State of Louisiana’s live performance incentive program. “When you launch a show in a city, even though you are not sitting down there for a long time, there is still a relationship between the city and the production,” Oken continues. “And there is something about bringing that kind of life and activity into a city like New Orleans that is reclaiming itself and fighting for its own identity and economic strength that makes that an attractive thing to be part of. And then there is a tax credit that literally draws us down there and says, ‘Spend money in the state and you will get a rebate on thirty percent of what you spend.’”
28 | August/September 2011
photo by Joan Marcus
“This is a completely brand new financing model for Broadway tours,” says Philip Mann, director of live performance for the State of Louisiana. “This is the first time this has ever happened. It is important that New Orleans rolls out the red carpet and shows them a lot of that hospitality that the city is known for.” Prior to its premiere at the Mahalia Jackson Theater on September 15, The Addams Family will spend six weeks in New Orleans rehearsing, building sets, making costumes and preparing for a national tour. While here, the production will receive up to a 35% tax credit on everything spent in Louisiana, including the hire of local labor. “The incentive is to do business with Louisiana,” says Oken. “If we could print our brochures for the tour in Louisiana and take them around the country, then we will do the printing in Louisiana. We are looking for every opportunity we can to do business in the state. Every bit helps with the business we are in today has very small margins.” “Broadway has been back in New Orleans now for two years, including the massive success with Wicked last year,” says Mann. While Wicked did not begin its tour in Louisiana,
| THEATRE
Original Broadway cast members Jackie Hoffman (Grandma) and Adam Riegler (Pugsley)
photo by Joan Marcus
Broadway cast member Brad Oscar as Uncle Fester
photo by Jeremy Daniel www.scenelouisiana.com | 29
THEATRE |
Broadway cast members Brad Oscar (Uncle Fester), Jackie Hoffman (Grandma) and Roger Rees (Gomez)
the success of the musical indicated that there is indeed a local audience hungry for theatre. “The success of Broadway back at the Mahalia Jackson Theater was also a tipping point for the [theatre] industry as well. The concern was, ‘When Broadway comes back to New Orleans, is there still going to be a market there?’ Well, Wicked sold out for three weeks, which is just nuts.” For both the production and the city, the musical’s subject matter could not be a better fit. “I think our time in New Orleans is going to be a very creative time,” says Oken. “It is going to be a time when our whole creative team is together. Following a month of intense rehearsals in New York, we are going to come to New Orleans and finish our show.” “Our job creatively is to both give people what they expect and what they don’t expect, so that we don’t disappoint,” Oken says of The Addams Family. “We think the people who are coming to see our show are likely be the people who are predisposed to want to see our show. When you think of New Orleans or anywhere else we might go, our mission is to give the audiences a good portion of what they want and a surprise with what they didn’t expect. We managed to get a fantastic cast. I’m startled at how wonderful it is. And the quality! We have four Tony nominees in our tour.” “The great thing about Addams Family is that there is going to be a ton of local employment on the labor side of this thing because it’s huge,” says Mann. “The big picture for me is that I want to make New Orleans the next big theatrical market in the country. On par with places like Boston and Chicago.” To purchase tickets for The Addams Family, visit www. mahaliajacksontheater.com. For more on the State of Louisiana’s live performance incentive program, visit www.louisianaentertainment.gov. S 30 | August/September 2011
photo by Joan Marcus
Original Broadway cast member Kevin Chamberlin as Uncle Fester photo by Joan Marcus
scene NOVATOUR DE FORCE
A
fter years of success catering Louisiana’s film incentive programs to producers, entrepreneur Will French is expanding into the music industry with Novatour, a joint venture between his Film Production Capital and SMG, one of the world’s largest stadium and arena management companies. “We have been utilizing the tax incentive structure in Louisiana to provide financing to films since the very early days,” says French. “So when the live performance tax credit, which was originally called ‘Broadway South,’ came into the scene, I was curious to see what was going to be done with it, if anything.” Though the live performance incentive program’s original moniker suggested Tennessee Williams and Sweeney Todd, the scope of the offering would soon encompass live musical performances as well theatrical productions like The Addams Family. “Honestly, when the law was enacted, it just didn’t make a whole lot of sense and I didn’t see a way to use it. Then, they changed it in 2009 to have it apply to live performances and touring live performances, and so that caught my attention,” says French. “I started thinking, ‘If there is a way that we can get national concert tours to originate in Louisiana, to rehearse in Louisiana and use Louisiana vendors to service that tour as it goes around the country, then we can provide a good bit of funding for those tours just like we do for film.’” While French’s Film Production Capital had many connections in the film industry and could offer both an understanding of Louisiana’s tax incentives and substantial amounts of financing, he needed allies in the music touring industry. “The problem that I had was I knew that I could put these deals in place, and I knew that I could provide a substantial amount of funding for a concert tour using a program like this, but I didn’t really know how to get to all of the decision makers on the concert tours,” says French. “So, in December of last year, I sent an email to Doug Thornton with SMG.” SMG manages many of the major properties in Louisiana that serve as venues for major live music shows, including the New Orleans Arena, Louisiana Superdome, Bossier City’s CenturyLink Center, the Baton Rouge 32 | August/September 2011
River Center Arena, The Shreveport Convention Center and more. “I sent him a note that this may sound like a crazy idea,” recalls French, “But here’s something that I’m contemplating: providing this funding to concert tours using this incentive program. And, I got an email back very quickly, within twenty minutes or so, and his response was, “Your timing is uncanny. We’ve been talking about this internally for several weeks and the one thing we can’t figure out is how to do the tax credit financing.” The partnership that emerged was Novatour. “What we can bring to the table, as Novatour and as the state of Louisiana, is a method by which the touring industry can access another pool of revenue,” says French, noting that the industry has been hard hit by the recession. “What we do for the tours are a couple things: first, we provide financing for them, so every two or three or four times during the tour, we will write them a check that is their portion of the tax credit dollars that they have been earning. We make it really simple for them. We handle everything…the state applications, the independent audit… everything that has to be done for the tour to qualify, we do it and then write them that check that they use to offset tour costs. Second, and this is just as important as the financing side of things, is that we are a mechanism for sourcing the goods and services that the tour needs from Louisiana vendors. If they need trucks, or buses, or sound equipment, or video equipment, or anything like that, we go out and find a Louisiana vendor who can do it. And if we can’t find a Louisiana vendor then we do it ourselves and we go out and find a national vendor to come down into Louisiana. That is where the economic impact [for Louisiana] really is going to come in.” “We were able to sign up two tours within our first month or two months of operation and now we are undertaking the servicing of those tours,” says French of the company’s early success. “The two tours are Josh Groban and Avenged Sevenfold. The Josh Groban tour was planning to rehearse in an SMG facility in Pensacola Florida and because SMG got the call about rehearsals in that facility, they were able to then reroute the rehearsals into Louisiana.” For more information on Novatour, visit www.novatour.com. S
MORE SCENE EXTRAS
SCENE |
SECOND LINE’S BIO-BLEND by Alexis Nicaud
T
he nation’s first independent green studio facility, New Orleans’ own Second Line Stages has been hosting extraordinary motion picture projects since opening in 2010, all the while honoring a vow to remain ecofriendly. The environmentally conscious cutting-edge facility recently began offering biodiesel to the state’s thriving film industry, selling the alternative to traditional diesel to film productions. For those crews shooting on-locations within 75 miles from SLS, delivery is also available. Green maven Diane WheelerNicholson, director of sustainability at Second Line Stages, is excited about the new offering. “With the biodiesel program, we’re not limited by who comes [to Second Line Stages]. We can get an entire fleet and essentially the entire southeast region of New Orleans on biodiesel, so we’re excited about that,” Wheeler-Nicholson says. “It’s convenient and top notch because we arrive at your location and deliver fuel to your vehicles or fuel truck.” An alternative, clean-burning fuel, biodiesel is produced from renewable resources such as animal fats and vegetable oils, including cooking oil. Though it contains no petroleum, it can be mixed with standard petroleum diesel to create a blend compatible with any traditional diesel engine. Blends include B50 - a blend of 50 percent biodiesel with 50 percent petroleum diesel - to B2. The American Society for Testing and Materials recognizes B5 to be interchangeable with traditional diesel in the typical on-road vehicle. The quality-controlled biodiesel used by Second Line Stages is locally manufactured from spent cooking oil, and the manufacturing process of these blends seems to be drastically cutting emissions. While some may be skeptical, according to The National Biodiesel Board, biodiesel blend emissions are considerably smaller than those of tradition diesel. The growing popularity of biodiesel blends has not only struck a chord with green enthusiasts, but the alternative fuel also happens to be very cost competitive
34 | August/September 2011
in the business world. “I’ve been tracking the prices of biodiesel versus traditional diesel and they have consistently been within pennies of each other,” WheelerNicholson says. “The higher the biodiesel blend, the more cost efficient it is because biodiesel is currently cheaper to manufacture than traditional diesel, especially when diesel prices rise.” The biodiesel-distributing program at SLS targets different aspects of production, ranging from cat cars and forklifts to generators and big trucks. “Whether it’s generators that cool makeup and actor trailers or catering trucks that power ovens and freezers,” says Wheeler-Nicholson, “[there are] just tons of opportunity for environmental improvement.” Hollywood Trucks has already teamed up with Second Line Stages in their effort to go green. The full-service Louisiana film fleet now utilizes a B5 blend in their trucks as opposed to traditional diesel. Wheeler-Nicholson cautions, however, that the process of switching a vehicle over to a biodiesel blend should be done over time. “The approach is to go slowly, not to put a vehicle on B50 on day one. The higher the blend, the more quickly it will flush out the old crud that traditional diesel leaves behind. Switching to higher levels of biodiesel requires more filter changes,” says Wheeler-Nicholson. “At our fueling program, our manufacturer of biodiesel is providing the filters for the fleets.” Second Line Stages hopes that the biodiesel program, along with their environmentally conscious state-of-the-art facility, is creating healthy competition throughout the region and will attract major business opportunities. “Hollywood is still on the track [of going green]. Location work is the hardest to achieve it because they have so little control when things are off campus,” Wheeler says. “I see competitive opportunity with our crew going green. We’re at the beginning but I want to get people thinking in terms of ‘Why not?’” For more information on implementing environmentally friendly practices in the film industry, visit www.secondlinestages.com. S
5 MYTHS
ABOUT BIODIESEL
1
BIODIESEL IS BAD FOR DIESEL ENGINES.
2
BIODIESEL IS EXPENSIVE.
3
BIODIESEL IS NOT A QUALITY PRODUCT.
4
BIODIESEL CONTRIBUTES TO THE WORLD’S RISING FOOD PRICES.
FACT: Biodiesel can be used interchangeably with traditional diesel in blends comprised of up to 20% biodiesel. FACT: Low level blends with 5% biodiesel are on par with the cost of conventional diesel. Higher blends are only marginally more expensive on average.
FACT: Commercial biodiesel must meet or exceed the same quality standards as traditional diesel.
FACT: Biodiesel is created from a variety of renewable resources, including plant oils, fats, recycled grease and algae.
5
LAND IS CLEARED TO GROW CROPS FOR BIODIESEL, INCREASING GREENHOUSE GASES.
FACT: Creating new cropland is not needed to produce biodiesel because it is largely produced from the “coproducts” of crops already being grown. For instance, biodiesel may utilize the oils from soybean, leaving the protein to be used in soy food products.
For more information on biodiesel, visit www.biosustainability.com.
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SCENE | ENTERTAINMENT DAY AT THE CAPITOL
W
ith film legislation before the state House and Senate, LIFE organized members of Louisiana’s entertainment industry gathered at the state capitol to show their support. As the 2011 fiscal session drew to a close, it was clear that the State of Louisiana’s industry-leading incentive programs would remain stable. S all photos by Rosemary Phillips
Producer Lampton Enochs organizing lobbying efforts
Auditor Clint Mock with Swamp People star Bruce Mitchell
36 | August/September 2011
LIFE vice president Andre Champagne with lobbyist Markey Pierre
Actor Spud McConnell hosts his WWL radio show from the capitol
TODAY’S SCENE
SHERRI MAC AN INTERVIEW WITH THE OUTGOING EMPRESS OF ENTERTAINMENT
by Micah Haley
A
s executive director of Louisiana Entertainment, Sherri McConnell was instrumental in taking a promising film incentive program, nearly stunted in its infancy by the indiscretions of one employee, and helping it grow Louisiana into an entertainment empire. We spoke about the work she began in the public sector, and how she’s planning to continue it in the private sector.
Q: There were rumors immediately that the program was going to get shut down overnight. A:
It was almost that close. I came to work there in February of ‘07 and I got subpoenaed during the legislative session of ‘07. When we were sitting in the grand jury waiting room - we weren’t a target, they just wanted information on how the program is run – [economic development secretary] Olivier threw it out there that we were going to have to suspend the program. So, yeah it was very, very close. And you can do that under the extenuating circumstances that we were facing, and he felt there was justification.
Q:
It came that close?
Q:
What do you plan on doing next?
A: I’m going to go back into the consulting world where I began. My focus will be on creative industries development. I’m going to focus my efforts in New Orleans; I’m going to base my operations there. I do think it is the center of the creative universe. But I also recognize that every area of the state has its unique opportunity, particularly if they focus on their native talents. That is where the key is and we should figure out ways to nurture that so that those very talented Louisianans can do business. Q: Even though New Orleans, Baton Rouge and Shrevepor t sometimes seem so culturally far apar t, it’s remarkable how the enter tainment industr y brings them together. A: Totally, but that is the beauty of it. I do think entertainment is bringing those areas together better then anyone else or any other industry. I’d like to focus on those regions and help the development of their entertainment industries. I’d like to help businesses connect the dots, help them see where the opportunities lie. I love doing that. That was the fun of the job: connecting people and connecting businesses to opportunities.
I’d like to help businesses connect the dots, help them see where the opportunities lie. I love doing that. That was the fun of the job: connecting people and connecting businesses to opportunities.
A: It came that close. That was a Friday and that evening was when they went to [LIFT’s offices] and confiscated all their computers. And so over the weekend, I actually worked on talking points and invited Olivier over to the house and I said, “Look you can’t shut this down” and these are the reasons why and these are your talking points. And he let us move forward.
Q: It is amazing to see how you brought that program from a ver y dark place into what is now an industr yleading program, with the help of an absolutely amazing group of people. A: It is about the team, totally. I had an amazing group of people who worked with me. Chris Stelly was solid as a rock and putting him as director of film and television was one of my best moves. 38 | August/September 2011
I was fortunate to find people who are passionate and caring and Olivier gave me the freedom to reorganize and restructure. It was a complete team effort.
Q: And nationally, there’s this diaspora of native Louisianans who have historically had to go elsewhere to utilize their talents. It would be great to just keep those people here.
A: People want to come home, and they come home when they can work, so we’ve got to create programs that are molding these talented people and developing their skills so that they can be professionals in the industry. The fact is that until we have our own editors, directors and filmmakers, many are always going to go home to L.A. [without the incentives]. And so what keeps them here? What is going to keep them here? When I decided to leave LED, it was like mission accomplished for me in many ways. Are the programs sound? Are they on solid ground, are the rules in place, are they stable, are they easily used by the client? All those things we have established. We have branded the Louisiana name. There is an amazing staff that can take this to the next level. But there are a few things that I feel like I wasn’t able to do. One is… I regret that I was never able to convince the administration
poster design by Tilt
www.scenelouisiana.com | 39
TODAY’S SCENE the importance of the music industry and the potential there. They don’t see it as a growing industry. There is a lack of understanding for the development of the music industry.
Q: Ten years ago, if you asked which sector of the enter tainment economy in Louisiana is best poised for growth, you probably would have concluded music. A: If you look in all fairness, the music industry has completely taken a nosedive. And so it is reinventing itself. My point is, no matter what, they still have to come back to the people who are creating the music and we have this amazing depth of talent in this state. If we focus on giving them the skills to become businesses, now is the time for that. It is not about signing with a major label as much as it used to be. Empowering individual musicians on how to become businesses themselves by learning how to distribute their property, on copyright and sync licensing and so on. I believe that because of this revolution, the music industry in Louisiana has a unique opportunity that it’s never had before. I was never successful in convincing the administration of that, so they never gave me the resources to make that happen. Q: Do you feel there has been a dispropor tionate focus on the development of digital media?
A: Absolutely. It is an industry that supports and recognizes talent. But at the same time, what is an attraction to that talent is often those sorts of institutions. Now they may choose not to stay here, but ultimately it is a catalyst for growth and to attract those talented individuals on so many levels. So I feel very strongly about the need to have an environment that is developing that ecosystem. And education is not necessarily all higher ed. It could be developing mentorship programs within the film community or the recording community or workshops. Whatever it takes. Our conversation is focusing on film but when you are talking all things entertainment, especially on the interactive side, it really does require some formal education. The talent needs to be there too but knowing how to write code and all of these things are important to a technology-based industry. I very much want to see a signature entertainment conference established in this state. That is something I want to continue to work on with Scott Aiges. His work on Sync Up is towing the water trying to figure out how do we create something between the two Jazz Fest weekends and in a certain point in the future, it is time for the state, the city and the industry to buy in and really focus on developing a really world class signature entertainment conference. And I think the timing is now for that. That is something I wasn’t able to accomplish. Most regrettable was that I was never able to convince the administration of the importance of getting in the music industry and it’s potential.
And so it is reinventing itself.... the music industry in Louisiana has a unique opportunity that it’s never had before.
A: That’s certainly been a focus for Secretary Moret and the governor’s office. I think that there will be recognition in the near future that all things are digital media. And if we are going to hit those targets, they are going to have to recognize that film is also digital media. There is still a very old school philosophy about jobs and that jobs are defined as people who are full time employees. That’s not the case in the entertainment world. In fact, continually it’s not the case in corporate America: they are all going to outside shops. They are contracting. I think that is a fundamental shift, and [that way of thinking] we will need to change. Q: And beyond just educating through excellent organizations like the Jazz & Heritage Foundation, there needs to be more oppor tunity offered at formal institutions. A: We need an educational institution that really steps up to the plate. I fear that the bureaucracy of our higher ed system is too slow to accommodate the industry. It is incumbent upon the State and on the private side to maybe lure a private institution. Let’s get a Full Sail or SCAD to the state and plug them in. That is another thing that I would love to see happen. That’s an initiative we began while I was at LED and I hope we will figure out a way to continue it.
40 | August/September 2011
Q: At the same time, the film industr y in par ticular is unique because it operates on an apprenticeship system. Someone without a high school diploma can work his or her way into a career that pays well in a shor t period of time.
Q:
What’s the name of your new company?
A: Mac Consulting Group. The concept being that I have deep relationships within the industry that are consultants. I have somebody out in L.A. who is in the music world and clearly has amazing connections in music, so I know any opportunity to help grow that industry, I’ll be able to bring her to the table. Somebody in the film world, particularly on the film financing side, that I have relationships with that I can bring in on a project-byproject basis. So it is really going to be project-by-project, helping businesses take advantage of opportunities and helping regions, if that is the City of New Orleans or the New Orleans Business Alliance or whoever that wants to develop an entertainment initiative, hopefullyI can help contribute to that. S
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ABOVE THE LINE
SOUL
OF AGES by Susan Ross
Mary J. Blige at Essence Fest 2011
M
photo by Tyler Kaufman
ulti-talented falls woefully short of describing a wrenching, beautifully inspiring song from director Lee Daniels’ Mary J. Blige. In her nearly two-decade career, the film Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire. “I was damaged, versatile soul songstress has received ten Grammy in a good way,” she said of the creative process. Attempting to Awards and recorded eight multi-platinum albums. She has pull all emotion possible into her performance, Daniels said to her, “If you’re about to cry, just cry.” Daniels appeared in numerous films and television is now in New Orleans shooting his followshows, and last summer, she launched her up to Precious, a film entitled The Paperboy. first perfume through Carol’s Daughter. As for the soul queen of the screen, Blige Still an active performer, Blige followed is currently filming Rock of Ages, Hairspray Trey Songz and the newly reunited New Editon director Adam Shankman’s adaptation of to close out Essence Music Festival 2011. “I’m the jukebox musical of the same name. “I’m excited just to be here at Essence Fest,” she super excited about it!” she told Scene at told Scene of being in New Orleans prior to Carol’s Daughter in New Orleans before taking the mainstage. “It’s always fun. Though, taking the stage at Essence Fest. “I’ve been I don’t think I can remember a time when practicing my acting.” Blige’s blowout [visiting New Orleans] wasn’t for business.” performance at Essence Fest occurred just Blige has had a steadily increasing presence before she was to begin work on the film in the world of film, like many of her music with co-stars Tom Cruise, Alec Baldwin generation. The soul singer/songwriter’s and Russell Brand. When asked how her first Grammy came for “I’ll Be There For Mary J. Blige with Precious director Lee preparations were going, she said, “I don’t You/You’re All I Need To Get By,” her 1995 Daniels in Toronto know…I won’t know till next week!” duet with Method Man, who stars in the photo by Michael Tran Blige plays gentleman’s club owner Justice forthcoming New Orleans-shot supernatural thriller The Mortician. And in addition to playing small roles in Charlier. “She’s probably the person with the most problems that film and television, she has an excellent track record of performing they never see,” she said of her character to ScreenRant. “She has to music for films. Her song “Not Gon’ Cry” helped make the keep everybody lifted up. That’s the inner work. The inner work is Waiting to Exhale soundtrack a phenomenon in the mid-1990s. that she’s been through hell, she can’t find love, so she ended up in More recently, Blige penned and performed “I Can See in Color,” a strip club. But, she’s fun. She’s funny. Most funny people have 42 | August/September 2011
ABOVE THE LINE
Mary J. Blige at Essence Fest 2011 in New Orleans photo by Andrew Goetz
www.scenelouisiana.com | 43
ABOVE THE LINE
Mary J. Blige at Essence Fest 2011 in New Orleans photo by Andrew Goetz
44 | August/September 2011
ABOVE THE LINE sad, sad stories. So, she’s the light in the dark place.” While filming Rock of Ages, another big screen effort featuring the music of Mary will open in theaters on August 10. Starring Academy Awardnominee Viola Davis as Aibileen Clark, The Help is the story of three African-Americans women employed as maids in 1960s Jackson, Mississippi. “The very first time I saw The Help, I just started typing down ideas and different things that jumped out at me in the film, and I think that was the day I actually got the title…it was stuck in my heart,” Blige recalled while talking to Blacktree. “Those words, ‘living proof,’ came out when I saw Aibileen walking down the street.” From The Help’s soundtrack, “The Living Proof ” parallels the film’s themes of perseverance, respect and hope. “The song is definitely written from Aibileen’s point of view, because when it was time to speak, she didn’t have any fear,” she says. “The beautiful thing about these women is that they were very smart. And they chose to walk in love and forgiveness.” “My personal connection to the film The Help is the fact that my aunt was a maid who worked for a very wealthy white family. And they love her to death and she raised their children,” says Blige. “To speak for so many women with this song, it means a lot to me.” After finishing Rock of Ages, Blige is set to return to the screen, this time in a starring role as jazz legend and civil rights activist Nina Simone. Playing a well-known historical figure is a challenge. Despite acting experience that has spanned thirteen years, it’s one that the soul singer is not taking lightly. “I’ve been taking a lot of acting classes,” she says of her preparations for the iconic role. “And dialect classes, to get the bottom in her voice and how she said things.” Simone’s famous low tenor is somewhat below the vocal range Blige commonly works in. “And piano lessons as well,” she says. “There’s a lot that comes with this, and I’m not a trained pianist!” Simone’s skill as a classical pianist was as imposing as her voice. Blige began her acting career in 1998 on The Jamie Foxx Show, whose namesake went to on win an Oscar for portraying Ray Charles in the Taylor Hackford biopic Ray. Though that film told much of Ray Charles life story, Blige says that her film will be more limited in scope. “It’s not a biopic,” she tells Scene of the Nina Simone film. “It’s a piece of her life. It’s supposed to be shot in October. I think we’re shooting in Los Angeles.” While music and film keep Mary J. Blige busy, her perfume, named “My Life” in reference to her album of the same name, has been selling well since its debut last year. On August 13, Blige will launch her new fragrance, “My Life Blossom.” It will be available exclusively through Carol’s Daughter (in which Blige is an investor) in Louisiana and across the country at Macy’s. S
Oscar nominee Viola Davis in The Help photo courtesy of Disney
Mary J. Blige with Carol’s Daughter founder Lisa Price photo by Johnny Nunez
Mary J. Blige at the Essence Fest press conference
Mary arriving to promote her new perfume at Carol’s Daughter in New Orleans photo by Chad M. West www.scenelouisiana.com | 45
ABOVE THE LINE
Carol’s Daughter
Makes My Life Blossom
by Brittney Franklin
C
arol’s Daughter, a business homegrown by entrepreneur Lisa Price, has been steadily picking up steam since its formation in the 1980s. For the past eight years, the beauty line has been a staple at the Essence Music Festival, setting up shop in the heart of the French Quarter. “It initially was just a hobby of mine to create fragrances,” said Price. “I started playing around in my kitchen making different recipes of creams and lotions, and eighteen years ago my mom encouraged me to sell at a church flea market. I was able to sell out of the creams that I had had with me that day and I got a flyer for another event coming up a couple weeks later and did that one. Ended up spending my whole summer that year selling at different flea markets and craft fairs and that developed into me having a customer base that started shopping in my home because once the weather got to be too cold, I didn’t want to go outside and do street fairs anymore, but people wanted to get product. So they would come and shop with me in my living room.” Price founded Carol’s Daughter while she worked in production for The Cosby Show, a gig that allowed her to make connections with make-up artists and hair stylists. “I started my television career on The Cosby Show— the last two seasons of the original Cosby Show,” she said. “I did script coordinating and production coordinating. But I did have access to hair and make-up artists and I was able to send them my products when I first started making them. That’s how it got to the hands of a lot of different celebrities. In some ways, I miss that type of work environment, but I don’t miss that career in exchange for the career that I have. And I’m extremely grateful for having had that experience. It makes it so much easier for me to do television when I do it now.” Carol’s Daughter has been featured on the Home Shopping Network and will be launching a new fragrance by Mary J. Blige on August 13. The R&B superstar made an appearance at the pop-up boutique during Essence Fest for 46 | August/September 2011
Trey Songz poses with Lisa Price after an interview at Essence Fest
a special preview of the product, called “My Life Blossom,” which sold over six hundred bottles in just a few days. In addition to Blige, a number of celebrities have supported the company, making appearances in stores and helping to get the word out about the products. Price considered the endorsing very beneficial early in the brand’s existence, a boost that led to other opportunities for both parties. “At the very beginning, I was very fortunate to have a number of artists who appreciated the brand and actually used it and it was great for me to
photo by Chad M. West
have that network of people that I could go to,” she said. “I could call up Jada Pinkett’s assistant and get a quote from her on her love of the product. That was always a great asset to me and to the brand. When I partnered with Steve Stoute, he was able to leverage some of those early relationships with people who were fond of the brand, as well as those relationships that he had with different artists, and bring them into the brand in a way where they would assist us even further by becoming investors.” Though Carol’s Daughter is marketed
ABOVE THE LINE
Lisa Price with the Braxton Sisters at Carol’s Daughter
Soledad O’Brien and Lisa Price at the Carol’s Daughter pop-up boutique photo by Chad M. West
as a natural beauty line, the ingredients used are not limited to those she used making product in her kitchen. “We do use natural ingredients whenever and wherever possible, and our goal is to always use a natural ingredient when we can, but there are certain times where you have to use synthetic ingredients and there are some ingredients in our products that are organic,” Price said. “The product started in my kitchen and everything that I used was what I could get my hands on, some sort of food item or natural butter or oil. As the brand has grown throughout the years, there is a need to have some synthetic ingredients because the products have to be safe for customer use, they have to have proper preservative systems, et
photo by Chad M. West
Trumpeter and Treme star Kermit Ruffins poses with Mary J. Blige’s new perfume photo by Chad M. West
cetera, but we’ve never really sacrificed the beauty of the product. Anything we do to it is to either enhance its performance or to make it that much more safe for the customer, and that is something that still goes on today.” “We’re just continuing to launch great products, looking forward to our holiday launches and we have some hair styling products that are coming up,” she said. “We debuted some of those products at the Essence Music Festival at our pop-up store and they weren’t even available on our website yet.” For consumers ready to get their hands on Carol’s Daughter products without having to wait for shipping, items from the ever-growing brand are available for purchase in Macy’s, Dillard’s and Sephora. S
Mary J. Blige’s new fragrance, My Life Blossom, will be available August 13. www.scenelouisiana.com | 47
MUSIC |
essence fest 2011 in pictures
KANYE WEST ERIC BENET
JENNIFER HUDSON
photos by Andrew Goetz, Gus Bennett Jr. and Tyler Kaufman
DJ JAZZY JEFF
IRMA THOMAS
TREY SONGZ 50 | August/September 2011
CHAKA KHAN
BOYZ II MEN
MUSIC | FANTASIA
NEW EDITION JILL SCOTT
REV. AL SHARPTON USHER
SOLEDAD O’BRIEN AND STEVE HARVEY MACY GRAY
52 | August/September 2011
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FASHION |
The Outsiders B
ased on the novel written by a fifteen-year-old S.E. Hinton, director Francis Ford Coppola made his 1983 film in response to a letter from a class of schoolchildren. They plead for him to adapt their favorite novel Like the clothes worn by its young cast, the story’s themes transcend its setting in the mid-1960s. Denim is timeless, like loyalty to family and friends. Catch a glimpse of a young Tom Cruise, Rob Lowe, C. Thomas Howell, Matt Dillon, Ralph Macchio, Emilio Estevez and Patrick Swayze in The Outsiders. We recommend watching Coppola’s 2005 director’s cut, featuring an additional twenty-two minutes of grease.
Photos: Eric Lacour Hair/Makeup: Paul Eastin & Josh Chataignier for Paris Parker Stylist: Melissa Naccari Greasers: Garrett Hines, Felipe Fuentes, Marcel Shihadeh, Morgan Roberts, Brett Lapeyrouse, Caleb Michaelson, Ben Castoriano
56 | August/September 2011
| FASHION
www.scenelouisiana.com | 57
FASHION |
58 | August/September 2011
| FASHION
To see the photo that inspired this shoot, go to www.scenelouisiana.com/theoutsiders. www.scenelouisiana.com | 59
FASHION |
The Outsiders Get ready for a rumble with local denim, cotton and leather options that will stay gold for years. And don’t forget the Dapper Dan, man.
Vintage Denim Vest by Wrangler $45 at Denim Library Gray Tee by Velvetmen $54 at Denim Library
Metal Jeans by Stitch’s Texas $171 at Denim Library 60 | August/September 2011
Plaid Button-Down by Shirt by Shirt $141 at Denim Library White Tee by Velvetmen $54 at Denim Library
Harper 5 Pocket Straight by Hudson at Jean Therapy
Vintage Utility Belt by Bill Adler $70 at Denim Library
Normandie Slim Fit at Jean Therapy
Davidson Straight Leg by Kasil Workshop $180 at Denim Library
FASHION | top local picks
Late
Summer Looks Sunglasses $380 at kiki
Cuff Bracelets $130-150 at kiki
Purple Tank $45 at Merci Beaucoup
Kami by Kate Spade $298 at Park Lane
Knit Dress $78 at Merci Beaucoup
Wristwatch $495 at Aristocracy
62 | August/September 2011
Raoul Top $525 at Park Lane
Plaid Button-Down $69 at Aristocracy
Wallet $65 at Aristocracy
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JERRY GILBERT & MICHAEL BAIRD OF POST DIGITAL SOUND
by Brittney Franklin
photos by Rosemary Phillips
S
oundmen Jerry Gilbert and Michael Baird stepped away from Hollywood to be part of the bustling film industry in Louisiana. Though the pair has worked together off and on over seven years, but it was director Peter Hyam’s Beyond a Reasonable Doubt that first brought them together in the South. Scene spoke with them over sushi at Rock-N-Sake in Baton Rouge about their early careers and working in Louisiana. Gilbert began his career in sound as a musician in high school, performing in two symphony orchestras before graduating college and heading the classical department of MCA/Universal for three years. He moved on to mastered CDs by such artists as The Beatles, Steely Dan, Queen, R.E.M, Pink Floyd and B.B. King before transitioning from the music industry to film. “I realized I wasn’t quite talented enough as a musician to make it professionally with any reasonable amount of success. So, I got into recording with bands and all kinds of other sound things that you get into when you’re young. As I evolved professionally, I went from music recordings to working in television to working eventually in film. I’ve been doing audio for film for about fifteen years now,” said Gilbert. “I’ve had my own studios in Los Angeles now for about twelve years, then came out here from Los Angeles about five years ago to set up a post facility to take advantage of all the work that’s been created here by the tax credits. At first I traveled between here and Los Angeles to my studio in Culver City several times a month, balancing a full calendar of projects in Hollywood with the startup here. Sooner than ever expected, I moved here full-time, bringing my wife and son with me.” With comparisons between Louisiana and California a natural part of the business, Gilbert notes the ability to be fully involved in a project as an advantage the southern state holds over its western
Rock-N-Sake, Baton Rouge
64 | August/September 2011
Jerry Gilbert
Michael Baird
counterpart. “One of the advantages of working in Louisiana is that you get to see the entire workflow, whereas in L.A. I would rarely ever meet a production recordist. You didn’t even know who that was by the time you got the show...there was no relationship with anyone from production,” he said. “But being here I’ve been able to be involved in both production and post-production, dailies, workflow, the whole process.” While even the largest studio films will often shoot in Louisiana, it is uncommon for a very large film to do the majority of its post-production sound work here. “It’s really difficult to get a studio film to land anywhere else [other than Los Angeles]. Once you’re over a hundred million dollars, they are going to go back to Universal, Warner Brothers, whoever’s shooting it. They are going to do it in their own place and thirty percent [saved] is nothing. That’s a whole other world.” says Gilbert. The majority of the work in sound is in independent films, both those shot here and outside of the state. “It’s difficult on a big studio movie. You may need to be approved by ten producers. They can’t all come out here. That’s just realistically not going to happen. What we’re looking at in the market is the kind of mid-to-upper level indies or the kind of indie studio pictures where they are not tied into the system all the way through.” “Mixing sound for films is a very subjective and emotional process. Much of what people look for when they come in is the ability to be confident that you’re doing the right thing, be it sound, picture or anything else,” says Gilbert. “When clients walk into a ramshackle kind of place, all of a sudden they’re like, ‘Well, if you can’t afford a nice projector, are you really good enough to know whether my dialogues are at the right level? Is this room really tuned by Dolby?’ And once the confidence level starts unwinding, it can be very hard to re-gain the trust. I’ve been doing this for a long time now, working with some of the most respected directors in Hollywood, and have gone to great pains and expense to have clients’ experiences here rival their best experiences in Los Angeles and walk away with a great mix and excited about coming back for the next one.” Michael Baird began his career at a music and sound company in post-production commercial work and was discovered by sound designer Claude Letessier, who brought him into the world of film, starting with a job as sound effects editor on the Wim Wenders-directed drama Land of Plenty. He’s since worked on a series of films shot in Louisiana, including The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call, The Last Exorcism and Dylan Dog: Dead of Night. Traveling the world with his trade, Baird was exposed to the creative differences in film standards in Europe and California. “We traveled to Germany to work with Wim Wenders. We went to Hong Kong and Thailand to work with Wong Kar Wai, and to Denmark for Thomas Vinterberg,” he said. “But then I sort of went to Hollywood for a little bit and there’s a very different way that Hollywood movies are made versus European art movies—what’s expected, the scale of it. Hollywood is all about exaggeration and making everything big and bold and those art movies are all about realism and being tasteful. I feel like right now I have a pretty good grounding in both, but it wasn’t an easy transition. You’ve been taught one way how to do something aesthetically and so you take that 66 | August/September 2011
approach to a Hollywood movie and you feel like it’s correct because you had it validated beforehand in the movies and then it’s blown out of the water.” Though confident in his skills with sound, Baird still had to work his way up in Hollywood, along the way realizing he had what it took to master two sides of the business. “I learned by being thrust into movies before I was really ready, as many of us are - by muddling through and learning through mistakes and adjusting quickly,” said Baird. “The process was difficult. It takes a long time to learn how to make a film. It’s actually not something that is intuitive. When you make it intuitively, you fail.” Through their company Post Digital, Gilbert and Baird have both relocated to Louisiana, and are currently working on several projects for MPCA while wrapping up work on Adam Christian Clark’s Carolyn and Jackie and starting on New Orleans-shot thriller The Courier, starring Jeffrey Dean Morgan. After working in Los Angeles for years, the sound masters are a constant presence at Raleigh Studios Baton Rouge. S
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CREW UP
BAYOU FX by Mark St. James
Duncan Graham, Patton Tunstall, BB Wirtz & Huck Wirtz in downtown Covington
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early seventeen years ago, Louisiana native Scott “Huck” Wirtz took his sketchpad of drawings and moved to the West Coast. With no formal training, he landed a job only a couple of years later as animator on Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace for Industrial Light and Magic. Since, he’s worked on over twenty-five major motion pictures, including Pirates of the Caribbean 1 and 2, Galaxy Quest, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and most recently as animation supervisor on Disney’s Mars Needs Moms. He recently made the move to go independent and continue his career in Louisiana as head of his own digital effects company, Bayou FX, now based in Covington.
Q: I remember when you were a young guy who loved music and art, and you were always carrying around your sketchpad. What were your early artistic inspirations and what were the first things you did for money as an artist? A: When I lived here in Louisiana, the thing that I really thought I wanted to do as an artist was to work with bands – drawing bands, creating album cover art, band posters. Then, when I was nineteen, I made this really intricate drawing that I spent hours and hours and hours on. I put it up in a gallery in Abita and sold it for $20.
Q: What actually led to working for George Lucas and thus to professional animation on big budget movies? A: I had been making jewelry here and the women I worked for knew a jeweler in the San Francisco area. A friend of mine had come back for Christmas and said, “Hey, we have an open room in our flat in San Francisco. Do you want to move out there?” And I said, “Sure, why not? I’ll give it a try.” So I went out there and while I was on the jewelry job, I met someone who had worked on Nightmare Before Christmas. She said I should go down and apply with a company called Danger Productions, 68 | August/September 2011
photo by Mark St. James
which was about to start on a new Saturday morning cartoon show using puppets called Bump In The Night. They were going to build puppets and then animate them. She thought since I was a jeweler I’d probably be good at making puppets. So I went there and the guy who was in charge had been a jeweler for twenty-five years. So based on my experience as a jeweler, he hired me and they taught me how to build puppets. After work, I would do stop-motion animation tests on 35mm film with the puppets and they eventually hired me as an animator. When the show got cancelled after the third season, the producer invited Industrial Light and Magic to come and interview all the animators. I was one of the four out of about twenty who got hired. I was one of the least experienced too, which was unusual. But I worked at ILM for over eleven years. That’s where I learned about digital animation.
Q: So almost all of your training came from ILM? A: When I was interviewed by ILM, they saw what I had learned in
a year doing the puppet work and thought I was a natural. That I’d do well learning this new digital media, so they hired me. They taught us everything about computers in-house, including nine weeks focused just on learning the Unix language before we worked on any movies. And the first one I got on was Mars Attacks. I was animating the little aliens going around blasting everything. I got very lucky in finding the path to where I am now, but when the opportunities were given to me, I worked very hard at making sure I took advantage of them. Now it’s much, much harder because there are so many colleges teaching digital media – that same story would not repeat with me right now. It can still happen though, and it will be probably happen here in Louisiana. That’s one of the things I want to do is to take some of what I learned out there and bring it here to help make that opportunity available to local people which was not available before.
IN THE MIX Q: What made you decide to give this a try in Louisiana and why did you choose Covington in particular? A: Of course having grown up here, I’ve always wanted to give something back to the community. My brother lives here, I have friends here, I think it’s a great place to live. There are also a lot of talented artists here. And with the amount of film productions increasing here people were asking about post-production services so that was one reason. But the tax credits finally let me know it was possible because then I knew people would send the work here from California. Q: Can you describe the working relationship between the animation crew and the other departments on major films? A: What generally happens is you’ve got your client who is the director. He comes to us and says, in this scene we need, maybe, monsters jumping around doing something crazy or whatever. First they give us all the plates they shot, maybe they shot a city scene, backgrounds or there may be people running around. You do a match move of the scene, then the animators put the monsters in. On the back end comes the lighting effects, which make the surfaces look real, then the compositing of everything into the final image. It’s way more complicated, of course, that’s just a super quick breakdown.
it maybe that someone forgets to move the craft services truck: they have this high paid director, high paid actors, and a hundred people involved – they’re not going to wait to move the truck and reshoot: it’s cheaper for them to pay me to paint the truck out. This type of thing is done in every single movie nowadays. I’ve even heard of cases where there’s an extra looking right at camera and they’ll have their eyes painted to look somewhere else. And then the other thing is called ‘camera match moving,’ which is when anything digital is to be put into a live action plate, that plate has to be matched with a digital camera so the two can be meshed together. The reason that I want to start with those two things is that for Bayou FX to really get a strong workforce going, they need to understand it from the ground up. So once we get these two most base level things under our belts and really solid, and I feel that the people I’ve hired here have really got that down, then we can start branching out into other more specialized areas knowing our feet can never get swept out from under us.
Q: What are your early goals for Bayou FX? A: Our first biggest goal is to create an awareness
in the film community here of what we’re doing. Also I’m taking local people and training them, so I want to develop a staff that can move fast on any project that gets thrown our way. It’s going to take a while and I don’t want to grow too quickly because I’ve seen so many companies try to double in size, then one project falls through and they go bankrupt. I want to take it slow. Be smart about it. Personally, that’s my most important goal, getting to where I know that the people I do hire will have steady jobs.
Q: Is your new company Bayou FX going to start off with jobs coming through your pre-existing relationships in California or are you already talking to potential clients from Louisiana as well? Animation and puppetry combine A: I’ve been talking to both. I’m currently Q: So you’re working with mainly local to complete a sequence for the working with two clients in California, films that people so far? animated short Cicada Princess. were made there but they’re sending the work to A: I’ve got four local guys and one from Canada, Louisiana. But I have some work lined up from a Duncan Graham, who worked with me at client here in Louisiana as well. I’ve been talking to so many people, ImageMovers Digital and came down because he liked the idea. Patton getting out there and networking, and there are a lot of projects that Tunstall went to school at Full Sail and he’s really good. My brother, are very close to hitting. Hopefully they won’t all hit at one time BB, had been working for TurboSquid. They sell 3D models and plugand we can’t take the bandwidth. But if they do, then we start hiring ins. After that he was training to do the Roto/Paint and making a reel. more people in. My wife, who still works at Industrial Light and Magic, showed the reel to her boss and they hired him to come in for a three-month contract. Q: What type of work does Bayou FX offer? So he just came back from that, working at ILM for George Lucas, A: I could conceivably be doing work on games or on TV [in which was good preparation. They wanted to keep him on but he addition to film]. Most games use cinematics, so if they need that wanted to come back to Louisiana and help me here. type of work done or animation, sure. But I’m actually starting at one of the base levels in the industry which is doing Roto/ Q: What’s some advice you have for those who’d like to Paint: something every film that gets made today needs. This is work in professional animation? like when they see someone’s holding a can of whatever cola and A: The thing I’ve always said is just stick with it. People might put their they didn’t get the rights to use that. They need it replaced and we work out there, apply to big companies, and get no reply, but really if you paint it out in every frame. Or there may be some restaurant sign just stick with the art, do what you love and do it for yourself, eventually in the background, they can’t use it in the shot so we change it. Or that shows through. People are going to see that and it will come to you. S 70 | August/September 2011
FILM |
Daniel Lewis introduces his daughter, Avery, to Ken Badish and Griff Furst
STAYING ACTIVE “F
photo by Eliot Brasseaux
by Jacob Peterman
ilm was never on my radar,” says Daniel Lewis. After graduating from LSU with degrees in finance and psychology, he started his career. “I was working at JP Morgan Chase,” he says. “I was a banker there. I didn’t know what direction I wanted to go. I didn’t know whether I wanted to stay in Louisiana or move out of town. I had no idea.” Then in 2007, some local producers came into his branch to set up accounts for their new, local companies. Lewis developed a rapport with his customers and “it got to the point where those businesses were off the ground and they needed to hire some local people to help them run the business,” he says. “They offered me a job, and I made the decision to take the opportunity when I was young rather than kicking myself twenty or thirty years from now.” With no formal training in film, he began to learn the ropes just by working on films. “To understand the business, you’ve got to just do it and you’ve got to be thrown to the wolves, and it intimidates a lot of people,” he says. After working in Baton Rouge for a production company, he was asked to begin working with Active Entertainment
72 | August/September 2011
in Lafayette. “I had a pretty good handle on the production side of things, but when I went to Lafayette and hooked up with Ken [Badish], I started to understand about the business side.” While Lafayette has seen its share of major productions, including hosting Disney’s Secretariat, Active Entertainment and Daniel Lewis have been producing independent films in Lafayette for years. “Being in Louisiana, it is interesting because as a producer, I am twenty-eight years old and I’ve been in the business for four years and I’m about to executive produce and produce my twelfth movie,” says Lewis, appreciative of the opportunities his home state has afforded him. “If I was in California, I would still be picking up cigarette butts for free on the Warner Brothers lot and nobody would even speak to me. It is the same for the talent here. A lot of people are starting to recognize that those opportunities exist here. There is this girl Stacy Asaro from New Orleans. She read for us, the director liked her so we casted her. She had a good look, she did a great job, and she probably has sixteen minutes of screen time as Jeff Fahey’s daughter. She is having scenes across from Kari Wuhrer. All of a sudden she is on a movie that the world
FILM | is going to see. Yes it is a SyFy [Channel] film, but this is a business. Tens of millions of people are going to see this film internationally on their television station and boom. I am going to hire someone from Louisiana before I hire someone out of state. That is just the way it is, especially at this budget level cause at this price, you’ve got to try to keep as much money directly on the screen and keep costs down because you are not getting the same returns as you used to get.” Many major production companies have folded during the recession, but Active Entertainment has opened corporate offices in Baton Rouge at Raleigh Studios at the Celtic Media Centre. “The whole purpose of expanding to Baton Rouge was that we would create a corridor between New Orleans and Lafayette, with Baton Rouge being in the center of that,” says Lewis. “A lot of the crew that we work with is out of New Orleans. A lot of the crew comes out of Lafayette and Baton Rouge. So by having a presence in Baton Rouge, it allows us to not only deepen the relationship between vendors and crew across the state but it also allows us to tap into bigger resources.” Along with its newly expanded operations, Active Entertainment is expanding its creative brand. “We are going to start being involved in some bigger pictures, which aren’t necessarily Syfy driven. Active Entertainment’s brand right now is seen globally as one of the leading producers of Syfy movies but I think our involvement with Dirt Road to Lafayette and a couple of other things on the horizon will allow us to be seen differently and it will be good for the company.” With a stellar cast that includes Sam Shepard, Blythe Danner, Dougray Scott and John Hawkes, who was Oscar-nominated earlier this year for his standout performance in Winter’s Bone, Dirt Road to Lafayette will begin filming this fall. “It is cool to continue doing production in Lafayette, because a lot of people viewed our expansion into Baton Rouge as a move,” says Lewis, “but realistically our post-production company is still in Lafayette this is going to allow us to spread our roots into the ground across the state. There is going to be a lot of live music being recorded and the score for Dirt Road and all the original music and the bands for this thing…it is a lot of Louisiana locals and Lafayette zydeco that will be featured in the movie. So it will be cool, but we will spend a lot of time in the post side of things really making sure its right, because the music is almost one of the lead characters.” Next up for Syfy: Active Entertainment will begin filming Haunted High School in early August, with another Syfy title ready right behind it. “You’ll love this title,” says Lewis. “It’s called Arachnoquake and we are setting it in New Orleans.” S 74 | August/September 2011
Producer Daniel Lewis on the set of Alien Tornado in Lafayette
photo by Eliot Brasseaux
Daniel Lewis confers with the production team on set
photo by Eliot Brasseaux
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ON THE SCENE
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PLAYNOLA EAT, DRINK & PLAYNOLA
Photos by Chad M. West Guests of Scene Magazine and PlayNOLA enjoyed music, food and drinks this summer on the rooftop of the Hotel Monteleone in New Orleans.
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THE UNSCENE Press the Issue “If it bleeds taxpayers, it leads” is their permanently negative slant. Theirs is a dying industry, peddling stale words already a day old as “news.” Whether overworked, underpaid or just lazy, the days of Bernstein and Woodward are gone. The great newsmen have retired. Gone, gone is their desire for truth, their sharp wit. Now the tools to grab the attention of an ever-shrinking audience are blunt. Suggest a scandal where one does not exist. Bury the good news a thousand words deep. Find the negative in one of the few positives that shines a light on Louisiana. Pick on an industry that put some of the first people back to work in New Orleans after Katrina. Pick on the only industry that is keeping young talent in state. Finding the truth should be the goal of any honest person, regardless of their profession. Taking national statistics with data from all fifty states and assuming that the collective conclusions apply to Louisiana individually is poor logic at best. Would responsible thinkers really condemn a success with the fallout of failures? Would they condemn Google’s start-up because of a thousand start-ups that went belly-up when the dot-com bubble burst? The institution of entertainment incentives is a vanguard action on behalf of the State of Louisiana. It is an industry that can unite a sometimes-divided state. It is an industry that creates a positive image for a state best known for natural and manmade disasters. Other industries strip-mine our natural resources. Entertainment harnesses the best of our renewable talents. And Louisiana instituted its film incentives in 2002, not 1992. - The UnScene Writer Submit tips to unscene@scenelouisiana.com. Anonymity guaranteed.
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