Edit Update - Our Wildest Dreams

This is John today, editing our documentary. We are laying in John Waters' narration while getting nit picky about every shot we use. In other words, it's a good, good day.

John Waters Hangover

We can't seem to shake our John Waters hangover and it appears we're not alone. It's nice to hear from so many John Waters' fans! It's been very, very cool to talk to so many of you who appreciate his genius.

If you want to know what John is up to, don't delay logging on to Dreamland - the ultimate guide to John Waters:

http://www.dreamlandnews.com/

On a separate but related note, I teach documentary storytelling classes and I'm constantly amazed by how many students tell me that they "don't really watch documentaries." Yet, they think they can make one...hmmmm. Anyway, I am constantly suggesting docs and recommending people watch at least one doc a week. And now I'm going global with this assignment. So, for all you aspiring documentary filmmakers out there, watch John Waters: This Filthy World. Watch it and the extras, and then write to me suggesting next week's doc assignment.

One More Photo From the Recording Session with John Waters

For some reason, this photo didn't load for the last blog. So left to right, that's producer John Dehn, Detective Rob Ross (his eyes are open in our film) John Waters, and Susan Marks.

More About Our Date w/John Waters

Susan says:

So, we arrived at Producer’s Studio (which I HIGHLY recommend if you are ever doing post work in Baltimore - they worked on The Wire and Generation Kill) and suddenly we were in the company of legendary filmmaker, author, actor, teacher, etc., John Waters.

Now when you think of John Waters you might not normally think: lovely, charming, sweet, and dashing! But he’s all that, plus smart as a whip, funny, entertaining, and most generous with his time. I’m far from easily star struck, yet I was struck by how he must be the smartest and funniest person in any room he enters.

How lucky are we to have him as our narrator?

We loved hearing about his upcoming projects (movies, a new book and something he’s not at liberty to talk about yet) and we loved showing him a ten-minute clip from our project.

John was kind enough to agree to an impromptu interview. Perhaps it will be a DVD extra for our documentary. We could have interviewed him for hours!

We introduced John to Baltimore Homicide Detective, Rob Ross. Rob is in our film and proved very helpful in our recording session when we need a little expert advice over a bit of homicide-related narration.

When it was all over, I felt a pang of sadness. I couldn’t believe it was really over.

Afterwards we met our homicide detective friends again for lunch at a wonderful oyster bar before we hopped a plane back to Minneapolis. During lunch Detective Ross asked us if we were happy to go home and we spontenously said no.

Our Date with John Waters

John Dehn says:

Last week we made our third trip to Baltimore and recorded the voice for Our Wildest Dreams with John Waters. It was the pinnacle of a two-year experience not unlike Waiting for Guffman. The difference being that John Waters was ready and willing a while back, we just needed more time to construct the program before we were ready for him.

Looking back, the whole experience seems a little surreal. What we got was great, but my memories seems to come in weird flashes.

FLASH: Wow Producers Video is a nice place and it’s stuck at the end of a residential street. Back it the midwest we like to put our production facilities in the middle of bland industrial parks with lots of big trucks rumbling by.

15 minutes later, John Waters walks in.

FLASH: He’s either sucking on a throat lozenge or a jolly rancher from the dish in the waiting room. Which is it?

FLASH: IT DOESN’T MATTER!

He’s watching a ten minute segment of our rough cut. I’m watching him.
He tells the sound engineer to turn up the volume on the DVD. YES!

FLASH: He chuckles at the funny parts. He says he likes the music, and asks who did it. He asks more questions. He says our rough cut is good.

FLASH: HE SAID IT’S GOOD!

He does the read. He takes all our input and uses it. He lets us a record a Q&A session with him.

FLASH: He’s really funny!

After the recording he’s loose and talkative. He let’s us take photos. He’s never in the least bit hurried.

He loves talking about crime and all the current investigations with Detective Rob Ross, who’s come for the recording session. He signs an autograph for my daughter.

FLASH: He’s a really, really nice guy.

FLASH: Susan made all this happen. SHE’S THE BEST!

FLASH: That was fun. Can we do it again?