MAKE IT IN MASSACHUSETTS FOR NOW: An interview with Boy George Michael Jackson Browne director Memo Salazar Part 1 of 2 By: Warren Curry 8/12/02

The self-described filmmaker with "a weird name," Memo Salazar has been making movies for close to a decade now and with his latest effort, Boy George Michael Jackson Browne, has established himself as a truly original cinematic voice. The film is nearly impossible to categorize; satire, social commentary, sci-fi, animation and even a musical interlude all coalesce into one ambitious, unforgettable whole.

A graduate of the world-renowned Fitchburg St. College film program (and so am I, therefore I feel justified in my sarcasm), Memo has written and directed two features and several shorts, and edited many projects for other friends and filmmakers (I'd imagine your buddy list of independent filmmakers must grow exponentially when you land a job at Avid!). Memo's current home base is in the greater Boston area, although as you'll read, that may change soon.

Memo, to me, is a person who makes films for the right reasons, not motivated by hopes of commercial success or dreams of some day being granted membership into the Hollywood establishment. It's still an all too rare occasion when I meet a writer or director who does it purely for the love of the art form, and one can only hope that Memo's sincerity and perseverance will be rewarded by achieving his personal definition of "making it" as a filmmaker (which you'll read about).

I spoke with Memo via phone recently and here's what he had to say.

How did you become interested in cinema?

Well, one thing I should mention is that I didn't grow up watching much TV or movies. My parents were very much not into the TV thing. I would watch a show here or there, but they were very strict and would say, "Go play, go do your homework." The same with movies -- my parents are not cinema lovers. I read a lot, but I didn't really watch movies or TV, and it wasn't until high school that I found a movie that spoke to me. In high school you're at that impressionable age where you're so open and are questioning things. That's when I started seeing movies as a creative platform. Even then, I wasn't aware at all that there was an independent movement. I was a little more aware of foreign films only because I was born in Mexico and lived there a few years, so in Mexico everything's foreign because they don't really make any movies. The idea of reading subtitles has never been that weird to me. I went to Fitchburg St. College to do film because I really didn't have anything else. I love to write, but I didn't want to go to school for writing. I just didn't see what that degree would give you. I looked into Emerson and other schools in the area, and Fitchburg looked good. Filmmaking attracted me but I wasn't a cinema expert, so I went to Fitchburg and kept developing from there.

So college definitely helped shape your passion for film?

Well, I got a job at a video store after my first or second year of school, and it turned out to be very instrumental to my career as a filmmaker. The store is called Video Signals, and they're a great video store because they have a really great selection of foreign films. That's where I got my education. I had free access to their catalog and I was constantly just eating up everything. I was there for a total of five years, including a few years after college. I just don't watch that many movies anymore, and I'm glad I had that opportunity.

What were you doing between college graduation and starting production on Boy George Michael Jackson Browne.

I finished school in December of '95 and for my internship I made a film. I had to fight to make a film, because they wanted me to do an internship at a company, and they finally let me do it. I wanted to do a feature, and I had never done anything like that, so it was a learning experience. It ended up being an hour-long film called Nothing Romantic, and it was basically a two person dialogue. Their car breaks down, and it's two people talking on the side of the road for the hour. Given that premise, I think it came out pretty well, in the sense that it could've been really boring. It's full of technical flaws, the acting isn't that great -- it's definitely a student film. At the time, I just did it and I thought, "Can I get this seen at festivals?" After I finished the movie I was like, "Now what?" I was still living at home, working at the video store and trying to figure out what to do. I saved enough money and thought that I could shoot a feature on 16mm. I knew I could get the equipment through a friend of mine at Fitchburg. He would get the equipment for me on weekends, and Kodak had this special first time filmmakers offer for buy one, get one free film rolls. I blew all my money on the film and shot a movie called The Tragedy of Tonsil. That was still a learning experience. Technically, I didn't have a viable sound person, it was a whoever was around sort of thing, which was a big mistake because sound is so important. That movie's like a fly on the wall look at a guy who acts likes he's seven, but is in his mid-20's. There's not really much of a plot. I've always shied away from plots, because they don't interest me that much. As much as I like watching movies with plots, when I start writing, that's not where I go. The movie has merit in certain ways, but it's amateurish in other ways.

What happened with Tonsil?

I took it to IFFM in New York in the fall of '97, so I actually blew the rest of my money on making a film print of it. That was another big experience where you are with a million other people just like you, who poured their life savings into their own feature. Everybody was trying to get noticed and to get the money people to look at you. It was a great experience; a week of insanity. Nothing happened, but I met some really cool people and got a good education about the indie business.

Then it was back to facing real life.

At that point I was like, "Now I have no money and I'm still living at home." I was against the idea of getting a job working on commercials, which is what Boston mostly is. I don't like commercials, what they do, what they represent and I don't want to be a part of that. That didn't leave me much of an option in Massachusetts because what else are you going to work on? I had to do something soon and after applying a few times, I finally got a job at Avid, which opened a few doors. The thing that attracted me about Avid wasn't working at a big company, but learning the Avid and working with it. Then at the beginning of 2000, I knew I had to make another movie.

And that leads us to Boy George. How did the project come about?

The origins of Boy George are that there was a website that was looking to put out original serialized stories. They had some money, and they asked me if I would be interested. I had some short films on their site; throughout I had done a few short films just to stay busy, but they told me they had a budget and asked if I had a script or treatment. I didn't have anything that was serialized, but I sat down and started writing Boy George. It was the easiest script I'd ever written. It was like an episode a day for two weeks. It totally came out of me -- no rules, no limitations. It was really playful and so easy to write. It was a culmination of everything I learned technically. I knew I could do a little animation and I knew if I shot it on DV instead of film, I would be able to do so much more through the computer. DV allowed me to think bigger on the script and allowed me to become more ambitious. I started writing the film, I finished and then the money wasn't there anymore. When weeks turned into months, I could tell that it wasn't going to happen. But I had this script that I liked, so I knew I could just do it myself.

How long did it take you to complete the film?

I shot all summer of 2000 and into the fall a little bit. It took me a year to post it. It was such a massive project to do post-production on, especially with my full time job. I had to do a lot of ADR and the animation frame-by-frame. I basically did it all myself, with the exception of some help with the effects. That brings us to last fall. It was done and I had to try to figure out how to market to the Internet, which I had never done.

Why the title Boy George Michael Jackson Browne?

I came up with that title a long time ago, just playing with words. It's always difficult to come up with a title that isn't pretentious and isn't too obscure or too stupid, and I remembered that phrase and it just came to me. To me, it totally embodied the film. Just like the title goes from one name to another name by linking a certain word, although there's really no connection, the movie worked in the same way. It goes from one thing that goes to another thing that goes to another thing; kind of a surreal pastiche of things. It all sort of ties together, but if floats around -- there's not really a linear structure. There's no meaning in the actual words, aside from that they're names of pop stars. But the structure of the title mirrors the structure of the movie. It's a fun title that makes sense in a way.

Since the film plays in episodes, did you shoot it like a television series or was it just one continuous production?

I made it just like a film. This movie, to me, is a feature. It's definitely a complete work. I see it as a feature where the fact that it's a serial is part of the story, rather than a literal serial that's being collected. There's a definite beginning and an end, and a definite structure to the whole thing. I wrote it like a feature, shot it like a feature and, logistically, there are certain things at the beginning of the film that we come back to later, so I had to shoot (different scenes that take place at the same location) on the same day.

The movie is advertised as a film in 24 episodes, yet there are really only 14. Why is that?

It's an adventure in 24 episodes, because it goes from episode 1 to 24it's just that it skips 10. I definitely advertised it that way because that adds to the twist. If I didn't say that, when it goes from episode 12 to 23, there's not much of a shock there. Since it's on the cover and since it's on the website, people know that it's going to take 24 episodes, so you're setting limits. It's like when you listen to a CD and it's 60 minutes long, you know the beginning and the end because you can see it. But then to all of sudden be watching episode 12 and be thinking, "How much longer is thing going to take?" and then all of the sudden it jumps. When I've watched it at screenings, where I really get to watch the audience watching it, it definitely hits them and there's a big laugh. It's just another playful, sort of surreal element where you're playing with the audience. That's something I've done in everything I've written. I like to push the audience and play with their expectations and go where they don't want it to go or expect it to go. That's just very much me. In a way, it's just a very complex joke.

Why the decision to use the Internet as the primary distribution outlet?

The first reason was because of the history of how it came to be, which was the people at the website I mentioned. I had done the film festival thing, and it's like banging your head against a wall. There's a billion people all submitting films and only a few get in. You're at the mercy of someone else to either like or not like your work. I thought the Internet -- there are good and bad things to the Internet, but I still love the populist idea of what the Internet is. It's there; anybody can watch it, although it's hard to get noticed because it's such a big place. But it's there; anyone can go to it and at any time can watch a movie. All they need is a modem and a fast enough connection because it's video, but that will go away soon and it'll be just left with all you need is a computer. I love that idea. I can probably accomplish a lot more doing that than going through the film festival thing. It was an exciting thing to try. Back when I was writing it, the Internet was still perceived as this exciting, up and coming medium rather than the big bust that happened as I was making the film. By the time I got it out, there were a lot less websites showing films. At first there were hundreds of film and video websites, and then they got consolidated into just a few. I didn't have the splash that I was hoping to have, but it still made a little splash. Another thing I like about the Internet, and it still happens, is that people still watch (the movie). Every week, I'll get a couple of e-mails and if I check my stats, people are still downloading it. You can let something build and spread on the Internet. It's not like a timely thing like with the opening weekend of a movie.

Click for Part Two

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