INTERVIEW WITH CHERYL DUNN
Interview with Cheryl Dunn, Film Maker, Photographer and the director and producer, editor of Everybody Street.
Cheryl Dunn is a brilliant film maker. We reviewed her“ must see” film, Everybody Street in this issue simply because it’ s a great movie about street photography, and also because I’ m not sure it’ s as well known in the community as it should be. I reached out to Cheryl and asked if she had a few minutes to talk about the movie and what might come next...
Thanks for talking to us Cheryl, first up what inspired you to make Everybody Street?
I was asked by a museum in lower manhattan to come up with a film idea that could play within an Alfred Steiglitz exhibition. i wanted to make a film about photographers who had followed in his foot steps and gone out and created substantial bodies of work about the streets of NYC. after showing the short at the museum and then being invited to show it at the Tate modern i went back into the project to expand it to feature length because there was so much more to say.
How difficult was it to book interviews with the photographers?
As I said The film was initially a commission from a museum to make a short My total production time for that short was just 3 months. Some of the people I approached had timing issues but I would say I got most of the photographers I reached out to. Joel Meyerowitz was a family friend of one of my producers and he was my first interview.
I knew Bruce Davidson’ s gallerist and went through those channels.. they were both so lovely but you have to remember if you are approaching someone, and asking them to give you their time you shout think about a few things: why should they care, what can i ask them that they haven’ t been asked numerous times before. so i really did my research and because i am a shooter myself, i focused on more insider questions or the psychology of street shooting... I also shot 16mm of all the photographers. Many of them have made films themselves and I think they appreciated that.. I asked Bruce to go into the subway with me, and he watched me labor over loading a 100 foot load in my beaulieu 16mm camera. He gave me more of his time maybe because he acknowledged my efforts and was he cool with me.. when I went back into shooting for the feature I was able to get more people because I had the short to show and timing was better for some.
Who was the most interesting person to interview? Our guess would be Bruce Gilden, but we could be wrong..?
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