On February 10, 2011, Arts Engine Co-Founder and Senior Director Katy Chevigny was the Keynote Speaker at the Media That Matters™ Conference which we co-sponsored with American University’s Center for Social Media. Below is a transcript of Katy’s remarks for those of you who missed the conference.

The Genius of Collaboration

Good afternoon, everyone. I’m delighted to see you all here. Thanks for coming out this afternoon for this great conference. I hope many of you had the opportunity to attend the Fair Use Workshop that preceded this – if you didn’t, it was really fascinating, I’m sorry you missed it! I am a proud born-again devotee of the Fair Use movement, as Pat and Peter and some of you know. Before the folks here at American University’s Center for Social Media did all this work to help create the Documentary Filmmakers’ Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use, I, like many filmmakers, wallowed in ignorance and just squirmed and suffered and caved and censored myself in the face of the high costs associated with licensing copyrighted footage for our films. It was a misery, not to mention painfully expensive. But now, fueled by my zeal to practice fair use – I really ascribe to the “use it or lose it” school of exercising this right – I now practically look forward to opportunities to make a fair use claim. As I always tell filmmakers who are wary of exercising their right to fair use of material in their film: It’s not every day that you get to invoke the Bill of Rights in your work. To stand on the ideals of free speech and free expression. So when you get to do it, it’s pretty invigorating. So, kudos to all of the folks here who continue to champion fair use and educate all of us about it. This effort is a real slam dunk in the field. And hats off too to all of you who are using fair use in your work, or are challenging the legal counsel at your network to be more open to it. I know you’re out there – you don’t have to identify yourself – but please keep up the good work.

The theme of the Media That Matters conference this year is storytelling across platforms. There’s going to be a lot of incredible examples of using media in interesting ways, from radio, to web-based media efforts, to old-fashioned documentary film, and I have no doubt that we’ll hear a wide array of successes and challenges associated with multi-platform approaches, which really is the new world order. I know that’s why most of you are here. At Arts Engine, a multi-platform model is something we’ve promoted for years, and modeled through our Media that Matters film collection, which is released annually online, on DVD, through broadcast and offline screenings. The shift from the “less is more” theory of distribution – where you sharply control the distribution of your film and ancillary projects in order to keep the price point up and possibly the prestige, is officially over, in my opinion. The “more is more” approach of releasing your film and getting your work out there in multiple and overlapping ways is increasingly the only way to survive financially, as well as the most effective way of making an impact with your work, whatever platform you are on.

One more comment about platform and then I want to talk about collaboration in mediamaking. At the beginning of your project when it’s just an idea you’re kicking around, thinking of turning into a radio piece or a documentary film, it’s important to really think about choice of platform. There’s something you want to get out there. Is it best suited to radio? Perhaps if you have a scoop that involves an anonymous source who can’t reveal their face, but you can use their voice. That would be a good one for radio, not so much for film. Is it a timely project that draws upon existing electronic information and is extremely fact-heavy and action-based? Maybe this is best-served by a initial launch from a multi-media web-based platform. Is the story incredibly visual and lends itself best to sync sound and image to make an emotional impact? One compelling example that comes to mind for me is the documentary Prodigal Son, by Kimberley Reed, which we featured at a Docuclub screening. This film tells the story of Kimberley’s transition from a man to a woman and includes footage from her high school football games when she was a boy and a quarterback, no less, and also includes footage of herself now, as this blond bombshell of a female. The contrast between the masculine nature of the visuals of her as a quarterback with her now as this feminine woman? This is for television, ladies and gentlemen, not radio. Before we at Arts Engine set out to make a film, we ask ourselves, what makes this a movie? And not a radio piece, or blog entry, or maybe, really this material lends itself to a op-ed. Or maybe this story is none of those things – it’s the story you will tell to explain why you started this advocacy organization. Stories can be used for all these things. At Arts Engine, we work across many platforms, increasingly including podcasts in our e-newsletters, we were one of the first organizations to show a film festival exclusively online ten years ago and we’ve been documentary filmmakers before that. So I’m going to focus on filmmaking but I hope my comments apply to other disciplines, platforms, forms of storytelling.

Today I’d like to talk about how we work when we make media that matters to us: our methodology in storytelling, in production and in getting the media out into the world. My operating assumption is this kind of work is deeply collaborative, at its best and most effective. I know collaboration is a buzzword at conferences, but I want to get really granular about it, and talk about how it plays out on more levels than first meets the eye. I should point out that my preference for collaboration is part of the reason I’m a filmmaker – if I didn’t enjoy collaboration, I’d be a poet or maybe a painter. So, it’s a personal preference and one you may want to consider as you choose your platform or your discipline – they’re not all equally collaborative.

My bias towards collaboration is I think influenced by the fact that I’m a humongous basketball fan. Since I was a teenager my favorite physical activity has been basketball – not that I was ever very good at it, but I loved playing it and watching it more than anything else, except for maybe movies. And one of the things I love about it is the way that teamwork is an integral component of what makes the sport graceful and magical, the prowess of individual achievement notwithstanding.

What do I mean by collaboration in documentary? For the purposes of our conversation here today, I am taking this term broadly, and I’m essentially referring to teamwork in all its manifestations. I am talking about every time that multiple people are involved in making things happen, either on the screen, in the story depicted, or off the screen, working to get it on the screen and out in the world. I see links between the kinds of stories we choose to tell, and way in which we work with others to tell those stories. We live in a society where individual success is celebrated in artistic endeavor as well as social advancement, and I am going to attempt to counterbalance that with a perspective that could be summarized as: it takes a village to tell a story about a village.

And most stories are deep down about villages, metaphorically speaking, about collective behavior, action and reaction, not about individual heroic actions alone. These are my opinions based on working in documentary for the past fifteen years, but I hope they will help you to consciously frame your method of making media as you move forward with your projects.

Let’s start with common examples of collaboration in filmmaking. To do this, I’m going to go backwards in the lifecycle of filmmaking, and start with the film’s release into the world. This may be your theatrical release, or you selling the DVD off your website, or launching your civic engagement campaign via social networking tools, or your broadcast on television. Ideally, all of the above at once, right? A robust outreach campaign. This part of the process is the one where there is no argument about whether or not to collaborate; you must if you are to have success. It’s collaborative by its very definition.

Once you are engaging with your audiences using the finished film, in any way that’s interactive, you’re exposing your film to the oxygen of the outside world, and this changes your relationship to your film. This can be challenging if you have felt like your film was “yours” until now – more on that later—because there’s a relinquishing of control as others see your film and use it. If you are very, very lucky and successful, the film will have a life of its own, having been taken up by the audience, by the distributor, and ideally by several partners who care about this film or this cause as much as you do and they are getting the film out into the world in meaningful ways. Any of you who have been had the opportunity to participate in the BAVC Producers Institute or other workshops like that know what I’m talking about.

So it’s definitely involves teamwork to bring a film to audiences and leverage your well-told story to bring about public awareness and possibly social change.  I’m not going to get any argument about that, right? Going back one step earlier in the film’s lifecycle, to its production, I would argue (and likely not get a lot of opposition) that teamwork is an essential component of the film’s success. This can be a big team of fifty people working on various aspects of the project, or a team of three, but either way, a functioning collaboration is at the heart of the effort. And a strong collaboration is what makes film as a medium so powerful. And it’s one of the reasons that film has the power to reach such wide audiences. It is tapping into the vision of a group, albeit sometimes a small group.

Documentary is sharing the perspectives of several if not dozens of individuals – the “real” people whose voices we’re hearing in the film as well the vision of the director, the choices made by the editor in shot and scene selection, which are already informed by the cinematographer’s choices in what to shoot. Often the producer helped shape the direction prior to shooting. Even in the cases where one person shoots, directs and edits, as I’m sure many of us have done in school and perhaps beyond, you need help from someone at some stage of the process. As you grow as a filmmaker, you will expand into more collaborative filmmaking. This is inevitable.

And even though we know all this is true, we as filmmakers can be blinded by a fantasy of ourselves as individual artists working on our own, independently of others. Our entertainment culture revels in the triumph of the individual will, and that bias causes many of us to tweak the storylines of our own careers to fit it. The classic example of this is the notorious Question & Answer session where the filmmaker takes sole credit for the film, as if they had made it entirely on their own. Occasionally, I will hear a filmmaker speak after a screening and say something like: “This was a film I made entirely on my own for the last seven years…” and sure, there are some exceptional cases where that filmmaker did do it all their own, but it’s rare. And we feel that way some of the time, like we’re all alone. Taking creative and financial risks is hard, and can give you feelings of isolation, if not sheer panic. Most often when a filmmaker says that they made a film on their own, they are playing into some vague but persistent notion of the rugged individualist as filmmaker. This is a uniquely American spin on the French notion of the auteur, the artistic genius who brings something into the world out of thin air.

The first films I worked on was as a producer and then I made a film as a director, DEADLINE, which was a hit on the festival circuit and got a lot of media attention. I was struck by the contrast in the attention Kirsten Johnson and I got as co-directors compared to when I was a producer. As a producer on the road with the film, you are pretty much operating under the constant odd fog of “What am I? Chopped liver?” whereas the reality was that I put my heart and soul into those films I produced. But our system of credit sharing and acknowledgment of film roles didn’t accommodate the reality of the teamwork behind how we make films at Arts Engine. I used to watch DEADLINE and think: “that shot is there because our editor Kate insisted on it, that scene is there because Angela loves it, Kirsten stayed late to get that shot, and that whole section of the film is only there because one of our advisors told us to film it when we didn’t really know what story we wanted to tell….” And it’s the directors who did all that? No. We do a lot, as directors, it’s a heavy lift and creatively challenging, but it’s not that simple.

So even though teamwork is at the very core of how films are made, this myth of the genius author in filmmaking persists. It is up to all of us working in film to remind ourselves, each other, the public, how creativity is truly a social product. It’s an amazing mix of ideas, the origins of which we can rarely if ever clearly identify. In my mind, this is what makes art magical, and when originality is lodged in an individual I find it less amazing.

In thinking about collaboration, I noticed something interesting. This attachment we have to the idea that films are a product of brilliant individuals manifesting their vision on screen, is paralleled by the stories we see and tell – frequently about individuals who triumph over adversity. Don’t get me wrong, I love these stories, they are inspiring and uplifting and have happy endings. They are fun to watch. Often I feel a wave of relief that all is right in the world when I see one. And certainly, individuals can make a difference in our society. To say otherwise would be ridiculous. What I am noting here is a preference on the part of gatekeepers and leaders and teachers, a leaning towards stories that fit into the celebration of the individual. And the reason it’s important to be aware of this, is because we as filmmakers are living in a world in which these kinds of stories are expected of us. This pull towards this kind of storytelling is hard to withstand, for those of us making the films, as well as those of us granting entry to those films to festivals, broadcasters, etcetera.

I can give an example from a recent film that we produced at Arts Engine. PUSHING THE ELEPHANT is the title, and the title itself embodies the story of this tension. The film is right in the crosshairs of a story of individual triumph and a call for collective action. In brief, the story is about a Congolese refugee named Rose Mapendo, who was separated from her daughter for 13 years. We started filming when Rose was re-united in the United States with her daughter Nangabire. So the film is a mother-daughter story and also a story of Rose’s increasing role as a spokesperson on behalf of women in Congo and refugees more generally.

The title sheds light on the problem. The film is called PUSHING THE ELEPHANT, because at one point in the film, Rose says, “One person cannot push an elephant. But many people together can push an elephant.” So it’s a metaphor for collective action. Which was all fine and well until we had the very good luck to have the film be acquired for broadcast by the public television series, Independent Lens. We heard that PBS wasn’t crazy about the title; they were concerned that viewers would think it was a nature documentary and then be disappointed when there weren’t any actual elephants in the film. And we kind of got on our artist high-horse and started grumbling, “Well, you know, it’s a metaphor.” And PBS came back and said, “Yes, we know it’s a metaphor. We would rather have a title that really tells viewers what the film is about.” They wanted a title that described our protagonist, because that’s a familiar draw and it’s how we “read” the idea of the film we are seeing.

And as a team, we were conflicted about how to proceed. On the one hand, we liked a title that referred to the spirit of collective action which is so much at the core of Rose’s work, and on the other hand, we also wanted people to watch it. We didn’t want to make it so difficult to approach that no one would tune in. The folks at PBS had a point. Without the strong protagonist to hang our hat in, to pull viewers in, it would have been more difficult to make a film about collective action, about the complications in Congo today. We ended up keeping the original title, but my point here is that it was, and is, a balancing act.

(Showed a clip of the women’s meeting in Burundi here.)

Frankly, we would have had an even harder time raising money without a strong protagonist who had an extraordinary personal story and whose story was characterized by uplift, redemption, salvation. These are the same values that drive Oscar nominations, and whether or not projects in Hollywood are greenlighted. Oddly, these values were determining the survival of our fledgling project three and four years ago when we were getting started.

Just the way there are many people who helped bring this film to fruition, there are dozens of people who have helped Rose survive the trauma in Congo and make her life meaningful today. And one of the purposes of this ensemble scene in the movie to suggest the power of the group in creating social change.

We are told the public doesn’t connect with issues, groups or institutions, but that they connect with people. This is a fair statement. But it is also an artificial constraint, and if you let it become a doctrine then it will limit your imagination and hinder your storytelling. In real life, individual moxie and grit doesn’t always triumph over adversity, right? Sometimes there’s a group that achieves something and the relationship of how the group comes about is complicated, and no one individual stands out. But these kinds of stories are worthy of being told. And you should tell them, if those are the stories you want to tell. But it’s going to be a tough sell in the so-called marketplace of ideas, not to mention the marketplace of film distribution. So you need to be aware of that reality and think about how you position the film when you speak about to different audiences. I believe that PUSHING THE ELEPHANT is a call for collective action, but I don’t say that to everyone. Some people wrinkle their nose a little bit when they hear “Congolese refugee mother and daughter story” – ugh, depressing – and truly I don’t blame them. To those folks, I tell them it’s a uplifting story that will leave them feeling inspired by Rose Mapendo’s deep faith and big heart. Because that is also true, and I’m speaking their language.

Now let’s go back to the very beginning, when you are pondering an idea which is in its infancy. I think there are some very interesting decision-making processes going on at this early phase. Let’s look at it closely for a minute. I want you to go back to the stage that is pre-pitch. Can you imagine it? If there’s no pitch, is there a project? Why, yes. We are in the Petri dish of creative inspiration. This is a weird place that we don’t understand very well and don’t talk about much.

Many people assume that here is where the individual genius is at work; I would argue that there are many voices and influences at work in this stage, as there are in the later stages we’ve already talked about. At this point of shaping the story, we are making choices all the time, some of them unconscious, about how we want to represent the reality that we have chosen to document. In my experience, these choices almost always reflect your own philosophy, your own attitudes about society, about people, broadly, and about your subject more specifically. But most of the time, we’re stumbling around unconsciously, unaware that our own bias and subjectivity is at work in the choices we’re making. There’s nothing wrong with that stumbling around, it’s an essential step in the process. However, often when we haven’t consciously formed an intentional approach to our subject, and we’re feeling a little bit at sea, our unconscious approach will reflect the typical mores of society, and the conventions of films that have influenced us. And this might not be the best approach, or the one we are most interested in. Some of these unconscious influences are the clichés of storytelling. Things like the “narrative arc” and “where’s the conflict?” and “balancing views” and “three-act structure”. We bandy about these terms without giving much thought to their inherent value. I am calling them clichés, but we are taught them as if they are fundamentals, like how you need to square up in the front of the basket before taking a shot. They are more conventional wisdom than actually fundamentals, but they can have pernicious effects on our thinking. I don’t know about you, but a lot of these clichés have colonized my unconscious. When I make a film I walk around wringing my hands in worry about the lack of arc, conflict and three distinct acts. Do I have a third act? I think I have four. Which one will I take out so that I can have three? Now, just because these are clichés, doesn’t mean they are all meaningless or ineffective devices. But it’s important to know that they are just rules, just conventions, and there are countless effective documentary stories that abandon these rules completely and the viewer doesn’t even notice because it’s just a damn good film. So if you can listen to these other voices, and identify them as rules that can be broken once acknowledged, you’ve maybe opened yourself up to a different way of approaching your subject right at the very beginning. And then you are in a position to ask yourself, what is the story I’m seeing before me? Am I asking myself the hard questions and not just the conventional questions? What do I really believe about this story? What’s my bias? What’s my philosophy of how the world works? How does that jibe with the story I’m trying to document?

A final example that encapsulates many of the ideas I’ve talked about today is HOOP DREAMS, one of the films that inspired me before I was a filmmaker. How many of you are familiar with HOOP DREAMS? Gordon Quinn is one of my heroes, but I swear, I was going to talk about this film before I knew he was speaking today. OK, HOOP DREAMS is a film that is driven by the high stakes of two individuals, two teenage boys who are competing in a contest, called basketball. They are also competing in a larger meta-field, called “making it” in basketball – and boys competing in contests makes for watchable, sellable movies. The contest doc has exploded in the years since HOOP DREAMS, as I think you all know. In HOOP DREAMS, these kids’ individual journeys through basketball were compelling enough that lots of people went to see it. I for one saw it in a crowded movie theater with about ten of my friends who all played basketball and we were riveted. We all went to see a basketball movie, and we got what we paid for. But we also saw a film about the starkly limited choices faced by kids raised in the public housing projects in Chicago. But it wasn’t a film “about the public housing projects in Chicago.” That film would be hard to get made and get seen. The brilliance of the filmmaking is that it had both the addictive plot of a game with win/lose stakes, and a deep understanding of the context in which that game was taking place.  However, if the filmmakers at Kartemquin were not governed by their own personal philosophy, then the film might not have had that depth. The team at Kartemquin was operating with the conviction that the world in which these talented basketball players live is as much the true story of HOOP DREAMS as the games themselves – who wins the game, who makes it to college ball and beyond. And I don’t think it’s a coincidence that this multi-layered film was made by one of the most famous documentary film collaborations in history, which is the forty years of filmmaking efforts at Kartemquin. 

So why does all this matter? Because it can be a long arduous process to tell a story well, and there are ways we can tell better stories from a less isolated perspective and with more thoughtful attention to what really does matter to us. We can tell stories that have more variety and surprise if we can tear ourselves away from certain storytelling formulas. We can make a film that may resonate more strongly with the public if we embrace collaboration from the very outset. And lastly I would challenge all of you to consider that our desire as individual artists for expression can often be more profoundly fulfilled if we can channel it into a project that has the investment and dedication of a team. We will thrive as creators and our projects will go deeper and further into the world.