I’ve always loved to dance. Just before the pandemic hit, I started to look into local dance classes. I experience filmmaking as a form of dance. Movement, stillness, rhythm, pacing, emotion, sound, color, shapes, textures, imagery, form, story, surprise, universal truths, sleight of hand, illusion, light, shadow, nuance, shock, calm, insight, humor, music, sound effects… collaboration. It’s all there and that mysterious alchemy that happens when these combine, well, that’s the magic part. I was lucky enough to be able to major in dance when I was in high school. My focus was choreography. My studies culminated in a showcase of three pieces that I choreographed. One was an intricate jazz piece, another was a modern dance homage to Martha Graham the dancers moved in a large stretchy cloth tube shaping it into various forms like a moving sculpture. I was lucky to have a group of marvelously dedicated dancers, my fellow students, who went above and beyond. The third piece was an improvisational dance to Rachmaninov inspired by Isadora Duncan which I performed. I was extremely nervous about that piece because it was an improvisation. Gratefully, the performances were well received. Unknown to me, the actor/director/philanthropist Robert Redford was in the audience that night. He found me once the curtains were drawn and blessed me with praise extolling my talent. Moments like this are “shots in the arm” that affirm a young artist’s vision. Perhaps my roots in dance explain my love for making music films…I don’t know. Out of all my films, the making of “Fandango at the Wall” comes closest to that pure freedom of expression that I had the privilege to get a taste of when I was seventeen. I credit my Producer Kabir Sehgal for providing me with this rare and precious gift of creative freedom which I accepted as a great responsibility and strive to harness and make use of in collaboration with so many talented artists —all in service to the creation of what was our film and is now yours.
