Rashaad Ernesto Green

P.S: [We originally published this last January, when Rashaad Ernesto Green had learned that GHR was accepted into the Sundance Film Festival. Motion Film Group are releasing Green’s debut film on August 5th.]

We love ringing in the New Year with our IONCINEPHILE of the Month feature because the feature which puts the spotlight on new voices coincides with a film festival that breeds talented new filmmakers. This month we profile Rashaad Ernesto Green, and his feature length directorial debut Gun Hill Road which was selected as one of sixteen films featured in the U.S Dramatic Competition at the Sundance Film Festival. Featured in this year’s batch of 25 New Faces in Filmmaker Magazine, this Bronx native and NYU Film grad makes his second trip to Park City — he was there in 2009 Sundance with his four-minute short, Choices. This year he brings what the festival calls, “a complex family drama, told with gentle humor, sensitivity, and a deep understanding of the environment that defines its inhabitants.” Her is his top ten films of all time.

Eric Lavallee: During your childhood…what films were important to you?
Rashaad Ernesto Green: There’s too many to name! Do the Right Thing, Boyz in the Hood, La Bamba, A Few Good Men, Rocky, Rudy, Karate Kid, Glory, A Bronx Tale, The Five Heartbeats. I loved them all.

We were a family that grew up on films. When we weren’t in school or on the baseball field, we were watching movies. Dad had taped tons of films on those old Betamax tapes. Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing was a big one for us. My brother and I grew up with my father after age 9. I’m not sure why, but there was a time when Dad would always play Do the Right Thing as he fell asleep. The volume was up high, too, and I’d hear Rosie Perez’s “Mookie!” piercing through the walls. Our rooms were close together, and I’d yell over to the next room to lower the volume so I could sleep, but he never heard me.

Boyz in the Hood was another one. We must have watched it a hundred times. My brother and I always had favorite lines from films that we would even come to repeat to each other throughout our adulthood. “You got one brother left, man” is one that rings out.

We have every line in La Bamba memorized as well as the songs, and we both wanted to be Esai Morales. We kept yelling, “Ritchiiiiieeeee”! Now we text each other phrases and lines from the film to make each other giggle. I’m really happy we got a chance to work with Esai on this film. Our casting process started in 1987, though.

Lavallee: During your formative years what films and filmmakers inspired you?
Green: Coming up as kid of color in New York, Spike Lee could do no wrong. I didn’t know anything about filmmaking at the time, but I knew that Spike had a style and unique way of telling a story. What I admired most about him is that he always made you think. I remember walking out of Spike Lee’s Malcolm X as young adult all of a sudden having a dire need to read the Koran.

I have also long admired John Alvidsen. When I look back at some of the films that had a profound effect on my childhood, like Rocky, Karate Kid, Lean On Me, Mr. Alvidsen was often at the helm.

Lavallee: At what point did you know you wanted to become a filmmaker?
Green: I was sitting in a black box theater in St. Louis reading The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. I was a stage actor at the time, having recently graduated from NYU Grad Acting program. Although very new to the industry at the time, it didn’t take me too long to realize that there was a severe lack of roles for actors of color. And many of the roles I did audition for lacked the depth and complexity that I wished to portray. In chapter 2 of the book, it said to view your life from the prospective of your funeral. I let it inspire me. When I imagined myself in the casket, listening to what others would say about me, I heard them speaking about someone who did not wait for others people to write the stories, but rather took the bull by the horns and created the stories I wished to see. I wanted more creative control. I decided right then and there that I wanted to go back to school to learn the craft of film making. I went back to where it all started: NYU. I snuck into Spike Lee’s class for 2 years before officially registering for it in my 3rd year, as the class is only intended for 3rd year students. He kept asking me year after, “Didn’t you graduate already?”

At first, the faculty didn’t know what to expect from me, as I had never directed a film in my life. I didn’t know what to expect from myself, honestly. All I knew was how to talk to actors, and how to spot truth in their performances. It wound up being the key I needed to make my films effective. PREMATURE was my first big festival film about a pregnant teenage girl, and I never could have imagined in a million years that 3 years after I made it, I would still be receiving emails and Facebook messages from Nairobi, Kenya, England, France, Germany, Poland, Japan from folks who were effected by it. I never thought a 15 minute film would have that sort of reach.

As I was editing Premature, I was still taking classes, and I waited until the last minute to hand in a directing exercise that was due the next morning. I ran over my brother’s apartment with an idea and asked if I could tastefully film he and his girlfriend simulating lovemaking. He gave me an hour. I woke up the next day, edited it in 20 minutes, slapped a voice-over on it, and ran to class to screen the 4 minute film which wound up being selected for Sundance in 2009. It was called CHOICES.

I shot another short later that year entitled CUTS, which premiered on HBO in 2009. It was about a teenage boy who tries to prove his manhood to his father by pursuing a girl from school.

Lavallee: This is your second trip to Sundance, I’d like to first now how you look back at your first experience, and now, before your world premiere, how do you process having Gun Hill Road be one of 16 chosen out (in the U.S Dramatic) of a whopping 1102 submissions?
Green: I look at the first experience in awe. I had put all of my money and effort to making a film that did not get accepted, and wound up premiering a film that I shot the night before it was due and cost me the price of a DV tape. I’m still shaking my head. It was such a valuable learning lesson for me that it’s not about all the glitz and waving a magic wand. Sometimes, it is the simplest of stories that people respond to. I wouldn’t change it for the world, either, because I got to be there with my bro who stars in the film. He’s my best friend in the world, and will someday be my producer. We had such great time that year, and plan to make the most of this year as well.

As far as GUN HILL ROAD is concerned, I’m not sure if I’ve even had time to fully process all the excitement. We shot this past July and August, and here we are about to premiere in January. It all happened at the speed of light. It’s been nuts. I had a wonderful cast who rose to the occasion, so we were able to put it together pretty quickly. Now we’re putting the finishing touches on it as we cross the finish line. I knew we had something special, but I didn’t know it could happen this quickly.

Lavallee: You’re very familiar with the film’s backdrop…I was wondering if strained relationships featured in Gun Hill Road are emblematic of the family units in this corner of the Bronx?
Green: Funny you mention that. I have a close family member who went through something similar as the lead character Enrique (played by Esai Morales) who returns home from prison after three years to discover his teenage child exploring a sexual transformation that tears at the very core of the father’s belief system. The Bronx has shaped Enrique’s sense of machismo pride and defined what it means to be a man, failing to provide him the tools necessary to understand his child’s sexual revelation. I watched my family deteriorate over a period of three years due the conflict that arose between the love he has for his child and his inability to accept their differences. I believe Enrique’s struggle is emblematic of many families. And although these strained relationships may be clear in the Bronx, it is not something unique to this region alone, but actually is quite indicative of our culture as a whole.

Lavallee: What kind of characteristics/features were you looking for patriarch (Esai), matriarch (Judy) and what kind of casting process was involved when you came across first-time actor Harmony Santana?
Green: For Esai’s character of the father, I needed him to be tough enough to believe that he had served time, but vulnerable enough that we would have compassion for his struggle. I wanted the mother to have a strong sense of herself, a little sassy, sexy but real, and someone we believe would have stayed in a relationship with Enrique for all these years.

For the role of Michael, it was a bit more difficult. I knew from the start I wanted to cast the role non-traditionally, because I had little hope of actually finding her through the normal channels. In order for the film to be successful, I needed to find the genuine article. The search was absolutely grueling. I pulled my hair out for weeks and kicked myself for writing myself into a hole. We stumbled in and out of 18 and over nightclubs at 3am, attended every youth organization and function you can think of. And eventually, we found Harmony. Newcomer Harmony Santana was working at a parade booth in Queens. She was the right age and type, showed up on time to the audition, had that special something I had been looking for, and was dedicated to learning the craft of acting.

Lavallee: You shot the film in July/August of this year. What ideas did you have for the style of the film? What inspirations (other films, location, paintings etc…) did you draw upon for the look/style, aesthetics of the film? And could you briefly discuss the working style between yourself and Daniel – who has been your dp for a while now.
Green: I have always enjoyed Paul Greengrass’s work, because watching his films make you feel like you’re inside the story. For Gun Hill Road, I employed documentary-style camerawork, and shot in densely populated areas that clearly reflected the world I wished to portray. I turned to films such as Kids and Raising Victor Vargas for inspiration as both films are New York City based stories that deal with inner city teens in a very authentic way, visually especially. In both films, it feels like we’re watching real people in real situations, which for me, makes the film experience exciting. I love working with dp Daniel Patterson. He has helped me shape my voice as a filmmaker. He has a real sense of what’s visually interesting, and has been able to achieve beautifully cinematic images, even with our loose way of shooting. We improvise a lot, and don’t overly plan. I like to move the camera a lot, so we don’t get too stiff. Daniel always gets a workout when shooting for me. We’ve developed a short hand, and many times he knows what I like before I even ask for it.

Lavallee: Can you discuss the collaborative process you had with your Film Composers?
Green: I think the collaboration with composers often goes over looked. I was lucky enough to have two composers on Gun Hill. One of them has worked with me on every single film I’ve made thus far. Stefan Swanson wrote the score to my first film without ever meeting me. I submitted The Can Collector to a competition at NYU that when selected, a composer from the scoring program wrote a score to my film and a live orchestra played it before my very ears at a packed Lincoln Center. That’s where I met Stefan. I almost cried when the first piano note hit. The only problem I had with him was the fact that he’s a Yankee fan. My Dad raised us on the Mets.

It was my first time working with Enrique Hank Feldman, our other composer. Hank was a great find. He’s the hardest working and fastest composer in the business. Although stationed in Arizona, we would Skype on our laptops and I would listen to him play out and hum his ideas for Gun Hill Road. He worked all hours of the night, and his team of musicians were able to give me many options in a very limited amount of time.

Lavallee: Can you discuss the collaborative process you had with your Production Designer?
Green: Maya Sigel, was able to accomplish so much with so little. I warned Maya before we started that this process would be different from anything she was used to. We had a pretty tight budget with a very ambitious story. We walked around the Bronx and I gave her a general sense of what I was looking for. She then took that foundation and ran. Her attention to detail was remarkable. She and her team dressed the main family apartment from scratch, but you would never know it, because it felt so lived in, so authentic, so real. Outside of the main locations, I asked her to seek out apartments that were already dressed. She did so, but then shifted furniture around, hung up clothing lines, draped clothes over chairs, etc. The locations, although limited to what they already contained, wound up looking as if everything was chosen specifically for the character that resided in that space.

Lavallee: Can you discuss the collaborative process you had with your Costume Designer?
Green: Before this process, I never realized just how crucial a costume designer can be. I had always shot the actors in whatever they had in their closets. Costume Designer Elisabeth Vastola showed me the value of having actors love what they’re wearing. She believed that if an actor felt good, that he or she would perform well. It’s true. Elisabeth stretched our budget to dress over 30 actors with the main characters having over 15 changes. She shopped at stores in the neighborhoods the characters would shop. If she liked a shirt, she’d buy three of them in different colors and text me pictures of the options. She remained flexible through the process, and always held the performer’s opinion even above her own.

Gun Hill Road is having its world premiere at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. Here are the screening times.

Monday, January 24, 5:30 p.m.
Library Center Theatre, Park City

Tuesday, January 25, 12:15 p.m.
Eccles Theatre, Park City

Wednesday, January 26, 6:00 p.m.
Screening Room, Sundance Resort

Thursday, January 27, 2:30 p.m.
Prospector Square Theatre, Park City

Friday, January 28, 8:30 a.m.
Egyptian Theatre, Park City

Saturday, January 29, noon
Broadway Centre Cinema VI, SLC