Culture in general is important, and people's identify is tied up in it. It's how we connect with others.
A lot of backup singers are really shy and don't want their life documented. They're not pining to be celebrity. They've had a front-row look at celebrity for a long time, and most people find out it's not for them.
Vidal was a novelist, an essayist, a playwright, a screenwriter, and many other things. Buckley started a magazine, hosted a TV show, lead a political movement, and was a master debater. They were multihyphenates in a way that you rarely see anymore.
I came up in left-wing political writing. My first job out of college was working as Gore Vidal's fact checker.
The best music films are not about music... Music is just the language we're speaking to tell a story about culture.
Maybe this is my left-wing conspiracy theory, but the right has re-branded itself as kind of the everyman party: Who's the person you'd rather have a beer with? The Republican Party, even though it's a party of incredible wealth and corporate interests, has hidden behind this everyman quality.
I feel like - like Netflix is great if you've got a project ready to launch itself into the world rapidly.
I think, in the West, we often discount the arts as nice but not that important. Certainly in America when we cut funding for schools, the arts are the first programs to go. But the arts built the things we need more than anything else: collaboration and co-operation and creativity.
I so often doubt how much people on television believe what they're saying. They're playing roles for think tanks or political parties or shills of whatever stripe.
Maybe this is my left-wing conspiracy theory, but the right has re-branded itself as kind of the everyman party: Who's the person you'd rather have a beer with? The Republican Party, even though it's a party of incredible wealth and corporate interests, has hidden behind this everyman quality.
How often do we make films just celebrating people that do a good job, work altruistically, and are in it just for the sake of the love and not the business?
So much of what we get on our news debate shows is really people spinning one way or the other, giving their talking points one way or the other.
You tend to put your rock stars on pedestals - they seem like they've been there for time immemorial. But you realize that the rock stars have their own rock stars. They were fans and kids once, too.