Hello ladies and gentlemen, your pal Muldoon here from the middle of SXSW. While the festival boasts a wide display of solid films, an assortment of motion pictures that range from no budget to mega tentpoles, one thing SXSW does exceptionally well is feature films that mean something, films that leave you looking inside yourself, movies that aren't just eye candy. CLAIRE IN MOTION is very much one of those films. I had the fortune of seeing the film just a few days ago, and consider myself very much a fan. As the movie makes its World premiere this week at SXSW, I had the opportunity to chat briefly with the film's directors, Annie J. Howell and Lisa Robinson just this morning and Betsy Brandt as well. In fact, as you'll see in the chat below, the two directors pop up near the end (which are more than welcomed). If you're at the festival, think about checking out the movie!
Screening times/locations for the film during SXSW:
Monday, March 14 4:00PM - 5:23PM Vimeo Theater
Tuesday, March 15 10:45AM - 12:08PM Alamo Lamar C
Thursday, March 17 8:30PM - 9:53PM Alamo Lamar C
So it’s your first time in Austin? I hope you are enjoying it.
Betsy Brandt: I am.
It’s a tad hectic at the moment, but given you’ve worked quite a bit in New York and LA…
BB: (Laughs) I think this is pretty mellow. I love it here. Good food, good drinks…
Good people, hopefully. So let’s jump right on into CLAIRE IN MOTION. Specifically with this film, what attracted you to it in the first place?
BB: The script came from a casting office in New York, Jen Houston’s office. Honestly, it’s funny… This is just one of those, and I love this about life, so I had just booked a television show called LIFE IN PIECES with a really wonderful cast. I was really excited about this project and to do a sitcom, because I haven’t done much of them. I did one season of THE MICHAEL J. FOX SHOW. I like always mix it up, so I knew I was doing this comedy and I was like “I’d love to do some drama while we’re waiting to hear if the show’s going to go.” So my team got the script and it was called CLAIRE IN PIECES. (Laughs) They just thought, “That’s a sign! We have to look at this!” We looked at it and it was just such a great script and I knew I’d be out of town and away from my kids, so at first I really didn’t want to like it, but I thought the script was amazing. I saw the film that they had done previously and I just really thought I wanted to work with these women. Then when I talked to them on the phone, it was a done deal. I was packing my bags and getting ready to go.
Given the film covers so many emotions and handles multiple levels of a person’s evolution via a tragedy, I can only assume there was quite a bit of rehearsal. Was there?
BB: No, and you know… I’ve done a lot of plays and I continue to do plays and I love rehearsals. Rehearsals are almost my favorite part of the process, but there are some things where I don’t want to rehearse it. I do it and I want them to get it and I want… Sometimes I feel like certain situations, especially when it’s something emotionally charged, my first reaction I feel like can be golden. Sometimes that’s not the case. Sometimes you need to go through it and figure it out to find stuff that you maybe didn’t think you would want to use, but I felt like it was perfect, the way they went about shooting it. I love the way it came together.
As you’ve acted in a massive amount of projects, you’ve worked with great directors, good directors, and possibly directors you didn’t care for, but would never say publicly. With these two directors, Annie J. Howell and Lisa Robinson, what was the dynamic like on set when you’ve given notes or feedback?
BB: (Laughs) I’m trying to think of any directors I hate and I can’t think of any.
Good, that’s great. I’d much rather hear that.
BB: I’ve been really lucky. Knock on wood. With Annie and Lisa, they… well most of the time there would be two actors on set, so one of them would come give me direction. They would talk about it, come up with a plan, and then… I mean I was definitely directed by both of them, but you know usually it was one on one. I think that’s how they like to work and it was really… It was so fun for me as an actor, because they are so open, yet really particular. Sometimes just the smallest change can make a world of difference and especially with a quiet movie like this. We got to this stage where I was “Okay, so as far as intensity, that for me was like a 6. Would you like it higher or lower?” And she would be like “let’s go…” (Laughs) So we would start doing these numbers, Lisa and I, and I know it sounds totally silly, but it just worked and it would be like “just a tiny bit more” or “a little bit less” and I just completely and utterly trusted them and I was totally right in that, now that I see the film. I feel like I was totally right in that and they just knew how to just tweak things a little bit. It was so much fun working with them.
Not to just shower you with complements, but you did an incredible job with “Claire.” Even aside from yourself, but across the board… Even your child in the film, played by Zev [Haworth].
BB: Isn’t he? He is so special.
The movie felt very much grounded in reality, not like a Lifetime movie in the sense that the emotions feel earned. It very well could have been that way. It felt genuine.
BB: It’s like a slice of life. I know it’s funny how some times you are working so hard to make it look like you’re not working and like “This is just happening, it’s natural.” I know, for me, those scenes with Zev… and he and I have a really good connection… (Laughs) I get the best TV kids… I just wanted it to seem like this is just a twelve year old kid and I’m his mom. It was easy to love him and I just wanted it to be honest. That was actually my biggest goal in the movie; I just wanted to be honest and do Claire justice.
[Directors Annie J. Howell and Lisa Robinson arrive at the table.]
[To Howell/Robinson] We were literally just singing your praises!
BB: With Zev, I feel like he seems so grown up now, so I can’t just call him a kid.
Annie J. Howell: I know. He’s a very mature person.
BB: He’s a “tween,” I guess. He’s not a young man, but he’s like….
AH: I think he was sort of born with this maturity. I’ve known him since he was nine, or seven. Yeah, I’ve known him since he was seven, so he’s always been incredibly mature and just such a special kid, and very creative.
That all comes across. Claire is dealing with the loss of her husband in her way, while he has to deal with the loss of his dad in his own unique way. Betsy, you were telling me how much the script excited you, because it was “something different.”
BB: It was good. First I wanted it to be “good” and I really wanted to do a drama. I knew I would be going back to a sitcom, which is really fun too, but I like to mix it up and I felt this was just really good storytelling.
Is there a genre or kind of role that you’d like to do that perhaps you’ve not had the chance to do yet?
BB: I basically have no plan, Mike. (Laughs) I basically have no plan, but when I see it I know! I’m sure there are things I’ve not done. I’ve done some period stuff… Mostly I just look for the essence of that person if it’s someone that I haven’t played yet. That’s always interesting to me.
That makes sense. Is there perhaps a project that’s dear to you that you’re trying to get made? Much like how Annie and Lisa were so passionate about this film, do you have anything like that up your sleeve?
BB: There’s a comedy, a TV project that I have in development, but I’d really love to do more movies like this. It’s like my kids always ask me, and I’m sure you guys too, the hours and being gone are so intense. Like we were living that life for a month, all in the same world… I told my daughter “I love my job and it’s my job, but you also want to do things that feed your soul,” which I felt like this did. There were days when I was playing that character, and I loved playing her, but there were days it was exhausting and then I really couldn’t see, but I didn’t have to worry about that, because I knew they had such a clear vision. I mean they had like laser focused vision. I felt safe.
Trust on a set is almost a necessity for any actor, right? Otherwise, what have you got? Where a lot of times that trust comes during prep, with rehearsals and whatnot…
BB: I mean we’d rehearse before we would shoot, but it wasn’t like “Hey, it’s the week before! We’re just going to rehearse stuff.” We did a fight rehearsal. We talked on the phone a lot.
Lisa Robinson: It just felt like Betsy was drawing from so much of her own stuff or whatever you were working on that we were really excited, like “Okay, she totally gets this character. She’s connected to this character and has so much empathy…” “Empathy” is like too distant even, since you were like in it already feeling it.
BB: I remember crying on the phone with you guys.
AH: Yeah, so we had a lot of confidence that she was bringing so much interesting stuff and it was true. We got there and we would rehearse before we shot the scene…
LR: And then we would try different things…
AH: This was such an unusual setting… I mean I had been living there, but to kind of drop down into this small town that feels very disconnected from any cities… You don’t even hear planes flying above, because it’s not on a flight path. It just feels like a bubble and so I think that also really helped everybody orient toward the work, stay focused, and kind of live the film a little bit. There’s so much that the landscape gives and the work that all of our keys did as well, with design and wardrobe. I felt like we built a really complete experience. It’s really different from being in an urban environment.
It sounds like great insulation. (Laughs) I mean the fact that you had no planes… I’m sure your sound department folks were really happy about that.
[The directors laugh.]
LR: Actually the one night… There was a prop plane, like somebody was just flying it around… Other than that, everything was quite silent, except for birds and crickets.
BB: Nature!
While we begin to wrap up, Betsy I’m curious about your preparation. Granted you didn’t spend much time on a full blown rehearsal, but as the film was prepping, while you were home did you do anything to help get yourself in Claire’s headspace?
BB: Well when we would talk on the phone, they would plant these seeds and I would think about that and then we’d talk again, which would lead to something else. The only thing I really looked up the internet was people [who became lost in the woods] and how long they could be gone and survive, because she just hung on to that. She… I just can’t imagine. She just wanted to hang on to something. I mean think about people who had loved ones on that Malaysian flight… you’re just hoping when it just does not look good… You’re just hoping and also to me, it just showed how much she believed in him. “If anybody could survive it, I know he can.”
And that hope also prevents Claire, and anyone really, from fully moving on.
BB: For me, as an actor, it was so interesting to play her, because she’s dealing with…. [Betsy turns to Lisa and Annie] I love what you did with that. We explored how I, as Claire, was handling it, and then how she can’t help her son. There’s some covering that she does. There are just so many days where you just don’t want to get out of bed and she’s in such limbo. Then as the story develops, it’s even more so, like everything you thought was true was not. It was just such an amazing journey for me as an actor and a woman to see how she discovered herself and all of that.
LR: Yeah, I mean we played so many roles and Claire has so many… She performs so many roles. We get to see that really early in the film with her professional demeanor. She’s really established and then the type of interaction that she’s dealing with, with her son, and then as a wife. Everybody in this film is really pushed to upset those roles and ask her to question all of that.
Playing all sorts of different characters, that balance… it’s like a normal human being as we all kind of play multiple roles. Well great, that feels like a great spot to stop on. I’m sure you’re booked solid for the day, so I’ll leave you be. Thank you very much for taking time out of your day to talk with me and the folks at Ain’t It Cool! Have a great rest of SXSW!
BB: Thank you.
LR: Thank you.
There we have it ladies and gentlemen, a nice chat with Ms. Betsy Brandt, Annie J. Howell, and Lisa Robinson. I hope the interview above gave you some pretty interesting insight into the minds of a great actress, and two incredibly talented filmmakers. If you're at SXSW, be sure to check this one out!
- Mike McCutchen
"Muldoon"
Mike@aintitcool.com
