<< PREVIOUS
| Erin: Because
no one knew who Erin Kelly was, and the investors wanted someone
with a “name.”
Diane: (shaking her head)... I
hate that. I REALLY hate that. It happens all the time, and
people really believe that the same four people have to be
in every film or they’re not going to make their money
back—and that is just bullshit. I think it’s really
important, if you don’t mind my saying, for film-goers
and film-lovers to express that they want to see someone new.
|
|
When I go to a film, I want to see someone new—not the same
people who are in every other movie. I think often times when that’s
all you do and all you’ve done forever—acting—and
you’ve become a “star”, you lose humanity. You
lose all that human reality—at least some do. For this film,
if anybody else had played Annabelle, it just wouldn’t have
worked, I don’t think. Anyway that’s my soapbox! I work
a lot in independent film and I work with film makers, and …
myFandoms: Actually, let me ask you about your work in
independent films. One of the fans on our sites asks--I love what
you and your husband Jacques are doing through the Filmmakers Alliance.
Are there any upcoming projects that you are going to be producing/directing/acting
in? What's next on your agenda as far as films go? What was the
inspiration behind Filmmakers Alliance?
Diane: I have a bunch of projects in the works.
One is with my husband, Jacques. We’re hoping the funding
will come together, and we’ll do a feature film this fall
called “Rust”. It’s a beautiful script.
We’ll be shooting that in Buffalo, where I’m from. It’s
set in autumn, so if we don’t do it this year, we’ll
have to push it to next year.
Also, I’ve been developing a project for many years—four
years—with ten writer/directors from Filmmakers Alliance called
“Red, White, and Blue.” There are ten short
films, each of them taking one of the rights guaranteed in the Bill
of Rights and creating a story around it that in this country we
have let some of those rights go. I’m producing that and acting
in one of them. And we hope to begin shooting two or three of them
this summer.
A good friend of mine has written a pilot. It may be an Internet
series. We’re going to shoot the pilot and see how it all
works. It’s called “True Colors.” It’s
about a man and woman who are married, and they both realize after
15 years of marriage that they’re both gay. They have kids,
and they have to deal with each other still, and they have new relationships.
As for the inspiration for Filmmakers Alliance – it was started
14 years ago. A lot of friends of ours would say, “Someday
we’re going to make films…”, trying to wait for
the industry to acknowledge our existence. Then, no one ever did.
This was before digital technology, so it was harder. We needed
to come together and pool resources. Since then, it’s just
amazing. You’ve got the Internet, you’ve got these amazing
digital cameras that you can get for just a couple of thousand dollars
and Final Cut Pro. We didn’t have that back then in the dark
ages—14 years ago. Everything has changed.
|
|
I had an experience where something
told me we had to do this. Something washed over me and showed
me an image of people working together. I don’t know
how I knew what it was, but Jacques and I were in the middle,
and I knew there were filmmakers, and this image that they
showed me … and they said “Do it now” …and
I was like “Ooookaay” (skeptical laugh),
but I went home and I told Jacques. He was like, “That’s
nice honey.” I said, “No, no, no, no—they
said we have to do it now.”
|
So he said, “All right, you call all our friends, and I’ll
run a meeting. We’ll see if anything comes together.”
And 14 years later…
myFandoms: Erin—bouncing back to you—You
say that when you play a character, you “are” that person.
How does this affect you on a mental level once the cameras are
off, where is the line drawn? Do you have any concerns about this
while filming Waking Madison?
Erin: I actually had a really neat experience
with that—it doesn’t relate to Annabelle—but I
had an audition about a week and a half ago for a character whose
mother had just tried to kill her, and the mother was then sent
to a mental institution, and the girl starts thinking she is going
crazy. And I was having trouble “going there”, and my
mother and her group of friends—they’re like a bunch
of witches—and they do energy work. That’s what I grew
up with. So I called one of my mother’s friends, who has sort
of been another mother to me, and she talked me through this thing—I
can’t believe I’m telling you this! You’re going
to think I’m crazy!—of “seeing” an aspect
of myself that can relate to that, and then having me break off
into different parts of me and holding this space for that aspect
of myself to go through that and experience it. And then be aware
of me standing behind and being supportive and saying, “I’m
allowing you to experience this and I’m here to support you
in that.”
I think acting is like when you’re dreaming—your brain
really thinks you’re doing those things—so it’s
really important to stay present. Because your physical body thinks
you actually go through whatever it is you’re going through
(in character) to work it out and be aware of that—and my
Mom is very helpful with that.
myFandoms: I imagine the impact on you when you’re
filming Waking Madison is going to be a lot harder to let
go of when the cameras are off than when filming Loving Annabelle.
Erin: Yeah, definitely. And for me, it’s
doing the energy work with my Mom. My Mom’s really worried
about it. We were talking about it earlier…there are a lot
of “sleeping people,” especially in the United States
right now, and Hollywood is sort of the voice. And movies need to
wake people up, so I think it’s really important to make films
and TV shows that will wake people up.
myFandoms: Diane, back to you. How do you view Simone's
relationship with her Aunt, Mother Emaculata? What do you think
the underlying story is?
NEXT>>
|
