Oscar Talk With Erin Faith Young
Adam A. Donaldson: Do you have a preference for fiction or non-fiction?
Erin Faith Young: Nope, I like them both. I just have an interest in film and television and I just want to be involved in all of it. I'm working on everything from dramatic film to lifestyle series, television series and documentaries; so, the whole gambit.
You've done Hardwood, Chicks with Sticks and Lipstick Dynamite, do you have a particular love of sports stories?
It's funny, I didn't notice, they were just good stories and I wanted to help make them happen. The stories intrigue me because it’s sports and there's a lot of dramatic tension, there's always some kind of climax and a good story, so maybe that's why I have an interest in it. My first feature had nothing to do with sports; it actually had to with ballet, so I don't consider that really a sport. But no, sports aren't a regular theme.
Did you know Hardwood was going to go big?
We just wanted to make our first project, and Hubert [Davis, the film's director] told me the story and I thought it was fascinating because it was somewhat about a celebrity, a Harlem Globetrotter. So I thought that was a great hook but it just had more of an in-depth story and then I thought, well this already intrigues me, I'm sure other people will want to watch it as well. We didn't know until we finished the film, and we started getting responses. People left the theatre in tears, and came up to us and told us how much the film meant to them, and we still had no idea that it would go to the Oscars until we were nominated.
Tell me about your road to the Oscars.
They don't call you to tell you, we had to find out online. At 8 in the morning we were refreshing the screen and checking every five minutes; then at 8:30 they posted it and we had to scroll down all the way to the bottom, and that's where we saw Hardwood. Then there were a couple of days of screenings and non-stop phone calls, and press interviews. It was a huge whirlwind. Between those times we were down to LA three times, we went down for the nomination luncheon, where we're given certificates and got to meet everybody. We went down again for another festival and to do some campaigning. Then we down a week before the Oscars and in between this time we were trying to find outfits and doing more interviews—it was pretty crazy.
On the actual day, it felt like the whole day was an event because there's the whole getting ready process. When we got there I had my family there and Hubert had his family, so we felt we had a lot of support with us and that didn't make us as nervous. We sat in the main orchestra but in the very back corner. They came to get us two categories before we were announced but we were actually on stage not sitting in the theatre. You would think that for short documentaries they'd stick us in the back, but they took us all the way backstage, and then we got to actually walk out on stage.
I hate to ask, but were you star-struck by anyone?
Clint Eastwood, Jamie Foxx, Hilary Swank, Laura Linney. I was sort of star-struck by everybody. (Laughter) Oprah! My head was kind of spinning because I was face to face and shoulder to shoulder with all these celebrities and they're real people but they've always seemed untouchable in this other world and there they were, right beside me.
How do you multi-task your various projects?
Very carefully, Producing is all about juggling different projects and hoping that one takes off at anytime. So you have to have your hands on different projects and just keep working on them. I have a schedule in the day. I have about 12 projects and I touch upon half of them everyday, updating them by making some phone calls, sending e-mails, doing follow-ups, all that. So you really have to stay on top of it.
Are those skills learned, or is it a talent?
Hopefully someone has good organization skills and is able to multitask. So, how do you create your schedules and how do you create your to-do lists? You have to have the confidence to cold call people and write up proposals, do graphics and find a team. There are so many things that are involved. I think you can definitely learn how to do it. But not everyone likes and enjoys all the paperwork and hard work you’re doing sometimes without seeing a paycheque for a long time; so it’s not for everybody.
All in all, what do you think of the current climate for filmmaking and filmmakers in Canada?
There's a lot of opportunity, but you have to be dedicated and really stick with it and find how to make a living at it, which is what a filmmaker wants to do. There are a lot of different funding avenues out there, but there's also a lot of problems right now with a lot of public funds, which makes it hard to break into as an emerging filmmaker.
Any advice then?
My best advice is that if you're independent and you can develop your own projects and if you have a camera and have an editing suite then go ahead and do it. Make a really good first film and let that be your calling card, like Harwood was our calling card and that really helped to open doors. It's not always the most fun or easiest way to do it, without any money and doing it on weekends and on the side. It's really challenging, but now with the cheaper and more accessible equipment it can be done.
I think it's an exciting time for documentaries, feature ones are getting into theatres, however it is also hard to make them because there are not a lot of Canadian funding avenues for those theatrical documentaries. The industry's slowly starting to change that though. As for features, we've done one dramatic feature film but we got it done for basically nothing and now the hardest part is trying to get that second feature film made for funding. There are a lot of brick walls up there and it has to do with Canadian content requirements, your experience and your eligibility. There's just a lot of red tape and it's funny because I think they make it hard for a reason, they want people who are in this for the long run and are willing to put in the time and effort and have what it takes to deliver a good film.
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One of the things that I think is bad about our industry is that there are no marketing and distribution funds out there. Our biggest problem is getting Canadian films to a Canadian audience and filling the theatre and we're really not that successful at that yet. I don't know exactly how to change that, but maybe we need government sponsors or something like that to do a big marketing campaign and not just call them Canadian films because I think if we do that people don't actually run to the theatres. We just have to market them as great films and I think we have to find a way to put people into the theatres. It's a great time, but it's still not fantastic. |
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