Hi8 is a new series of short interviews that serve as a quick hello to film figures we’re following. Inspired by the Walker’s 8-Ball Q&As, the series launches with a look at writers, producers, directors, and actors nominated for a Film Independent Spirit Award. In a self-navigated format, each artist picks questions from a list, answering those eight that best expose their current musings and fascinations. No two interviews are the same.
Director Anja Marquardt’s debut film, She’s Lost Control, starkly explores the life of a sexual surrogate in New York who becomes a bit too close with one of her patients. The film was nominated for Best First Feature at the Independent Spirit Awards. The “worst blizzard of the century” provided an opportunity for the film’s producer, Kiara C. Jones, to take a moment away from her busy life to talk to me about the subway, Malcom X, and breaking up with technology. Jones started her creative career as a poet and hip hop artist before moving to New York City to pursue a career in filmmaking. She’s Lost Control screened at the Walker earlier in January 2015.
1. What do you wish to have done with your mortal remains?
I’d like for the people I love to skip the funeral and see the world. Cremate me and scatter my ashes in warm, beautiful, clear blue, water around the globe.
2. What artist turned your world upside-down as a teenager?
When I was 17 my friend Dent gave me a shoe box filled with cassette tapes. It was recordings of Malcolm X speeches from the 1960s. Some would categorize him as an activist, but he was definitely an artist. He was a brilliant orator, clever and concise in his choice of content and presentation of thoughts. I used to listen to the tapes on my Walkman and would rewind the poignant and often inflammatory thoughts. I moved through the tapes in order. Then, one day, his voice, his pace, his message had changed. I was shook. In reality the distance between those speeches was years, but in my world I had gone to bed with pre-Mecca Malcolm and woke up with post-Mecca Malcolm. If you don’t know what that means, it’s worth a little research. For 17-year-old me, it was life-changing. I would go back and forth between the tapes, looking for similarities, differences, wondering what he would say if he were alive today. It taught me that people truly can change, like butterfly change. Yesterday crawling, today flying. It freed me to understand that being true to myself didn’t mean staying the same. I have the right to explore, discover, interpret, reinterpret and change. Thank you, Malcolm and Dent.
3. Describe a recent dream in 15 words or less.
Glitter dances, bubbles of snow, humble spotlight, applause and laughter, wordless speech, baby sister, proud.
4. What is your hometown like?
Like most of America, beautiful on paper with a torrid past and a volatile future.
5. What is your advice for young people today?
Get offline.
6. What have you been reading lately?
Scripts… lots and lots of scripts. The more I read, the more I discover about filmmaking. There are lots of bad scripts out there. Not bad because they’re bad, but bad because the writer didn’t find the most interesting “good” to put on the page. There will often be one character or a line of dialogue and I’ll think—there, that’s what this script should be about. They say directing is about knowing where to put the camera, writing is about knowing where to put your thoughts.
7. Fill in the blank. What the world needs now is_____________.
A 30-day power outage.
8. What’s your favorite place to people-watch?
New York City trains. I love to imagine where people are coming from. Where they’re going. What’s on their minds. What’s making them joyful or sad. You can see the entire world on the subway, every class, race, creed, color, orientation. It is a microcosm of the human experience. That’s the best thing about living in New York, if you need inspiration, just walk out your door.
The Film Independent Spirit Award nominees screen annually at the Walker Art Center as part of a collaboration with IFP. Screenings are free for all IFP and Walker members. Click here for the complete schedule.
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