Richard
Shepard is the acclaimed director of THE MATADOR (2005) and DOM
HEMINGWAY (2013), which gave, respectively, Pierce Brosnan and Jude Law
the opportunity to deliver shape-shifting performances, and THE HUNTING
PARTY (2007) with Richard Gere. He is one of the most underrated of
modern directors, making films that cross genres and mix tones
successfully, and make you laugh as well as move you. Shepard is also
one of TV's most in-demand directors of television, directing the pilots
for such hit shows as Criminal Minds, Rosewood, Salem and Ugly Betty.
He is also a regular director on Lena Dunham's TV series, Girls. Shepard
travelled to Tokyo to make the short film TOKYO PROJECT, an
unconventional love story starring Elisabeth Moss and Ebon Moss-Bachrach
available to see on HBO, and in the final part of our three-part
interview, I spoke to him about whether the film rejuvenated him, what Japanese audiences thought of the film, his upcoming projects and his thoughts on BLADE RUNNER 2049 (2017), given he is a big fan of the 1982 original.
Parts one and two of the interview.
Did TOKYO PROJECT rejuvenate you?
Parts one and two of the interview.
Did TOKYO PROJECT rejuvenate you?
I direct television
pilots for hire, and I write and direct my own movies every couple of
years, and any time I do anything creative, it's a real kick in the
ass. It's a solitary life when you're writing a script, and it's
hard to get a movie going, so I've always been lucky in that I've
always been able to make enough money to allow me to do other
projects I want to do, whether it's a documentary or a short. It's
very invigorating, and oddly in Hollywood, very powerful. When people
ask you what you have been doing and you answer ''I've been making a
short film in Tokyo with Elisabeth Moss'', it makes you sound much
cooler than you really are! It makes you more valuable in a way
because people think ''Let's hire him. He doesn't need us. He goes
off and does these other things. '' It's a psychological thing.
Creating new projects also creates more work opportunities. Both
TOKYO PROJECT and my John Cazale documentary were done on spec before
being bought by HBO. I didn't wait for someone to start financing
either of them. I just started financing them myself based on
residual checks I had received or whatever. I'm lucky to be able to
do this. If you do good work and you're lucky, someone will pay for
it in the end.
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Exactly. 110%.
What projects are you
working on now?
I'm loath to talk about
projects before they happen but I'm in prep on a new movie called The
Perfection. Allison Williams from Girls is starring in it, and it's a
very twisted thriller unlike anything I've done. It's a real swing.
It's certainly influenced a little bit by Korean cinema. I also just
did a pilot for a show called Sweetbitter, and I've been writing
scripts for feature films that I'll hopefully get to direct. My
confidence level is always high after I finish something, and a lot
of work always ends up coming in afterwards. This was definitely the
case with TOKYO PROJECT – making it and then showing it, and having
people respond to it was a real boost.
Have you had any
feedback from Japanese audiences about TOKYO PROJECT?
We haven't shown it yet
in Tokyo or Japan but we invited the Japanese people that worked on
the film to the Tribeca Film Festival screening and they really liked
it. I mean I suppose you could say it's just another story of two
white people in another country but that was the story I wanted to
tell. I wanted to make sure I was being as culturally sensitive as
possible and the Japanese crew was integral in making sure I was. I
would like to think that I showed Tokyo in a romantic way but not a
fake way. There's a sense of sadness to the film that I felt was
important, partly because that is true to big city living. It's easy
to get swallowed up and lost in any city.
It's my experience
that Japanese people enjoy seeing their own country and culture
through foreign eyes. I showed the film to some Japanese friends and
they said it made them look at Tokyo in a different light. They
really wanted to find out where the restaurants were! Interestingly,
they also enjoyed the American GHOST IN THE SHELL remake (2017) and had no
problems with Scarlett Johansson being the lead and not a Japanese
actress.
That's great to hear.
GHOST IN THE SHELL probably only got made because Scarlett Johansson
was in it. I saw it on an airplane whilst listening to Radiohead.
It's such a visual movie, and it was a really surrreal sensory
experience, especially since I obviously wasn't focussing on the plot
too much.
I love the first one
and I recently showed it to my ten year-old. He loved it too. It was
a lot to talk about and think about, and it really held up. I feel
like with the sequel, Denis Villeneuve stayed true to certain things
and it did legitimately feel like part of the same world, which is
not easy, but I just felt that he lost some of the pulpiness of the
first movie. I guess I was disappointed. I do love his films though.
He's a visionary. ARRIVAL (2016) is great and SICARIO (2015) is one of my favorite
movies of all time. I think I need to see BLADE RUNNER 2049 again. I
do feel that the hype affected me, and I did watch it waiting for it
to impress me, which isn't the best way to watch anything. I just
bought tickets for THE LAST JEDI. Opening day. I can't wait.
TOKYO PROJECT is available to watch on HBO. Here is the trailer.
Money Into Light's previous interviews with Shepard: Part One , Part Two and Part Three.
Interview by Paul Rowlands. Copyright © Paul Rowlands, 2018. All rights reserved.
TOKYO PROJECT is available to watch on HBO. Here is the trailer.
Money Into Light's previous interviews with Shepard: Part One , Part Two and Part Three.
Interview by Paul Rowlands. Copyright © Paul Rowlands, 2018. All rights reserved.
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