Ira Sachs, Rebecca Hall and Ben Whishaw on 'Peter Hujar's Day' | THR Studio at Park City

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'Peter Hujar's Day' director Ira Sachs and stars Ben Whishaw and Rebecca Hall stop by THR's studio in Park City to talk all about their new film.

Transcript

00:00I think my father was working with Maurice Sendak in some capacity and many, many, many years later

00:07I stumbled across a copy, my copy clearly, of Higgledy Piggledy Pop from when I was a child

00:14and I opened it up thinking I should read this to my daughter and there was a drawing of a sheepdog inside it

00:19and it said, Rebecca, I hope you enjoy this Maurice Sendak.

00:25And then I felt very starstruck in that moment knowing that I would have met Maurice Sendak at two years old

00:31and he had drew like a little wild thing's crown on it.

00:34Oh my God. Is it on your wall?

00:36Yeah, no, it's not. I mean, the book is in a case.

00:40In 1974 there was a conversation between a woman named Linda Rosencrantz and her friend, the photographer Peter Hujar.

00:51She had an idea to write a book about artists' daily life and she invited a number of artists over

00:57to speak to her about what they did yesterday and she recorded those conversations

01:02and then she very proceeded to lose the audiotapes of all the conversations.

01:08But this particular one she had transcribed and typed and she, and then it disappeared.

01:14Fifty years later it was found in the Peter Hujar archive at the Morgan Library by a young archivist and historian

01:21and it was published as a book called Peter Hujar's Day.

01:25And I read the book while I was working with Ben in Paris on passages and thought, you know,

01:33really like on the last page I was like we should make this as a movie.

01:36It was as one, like that Ben and I should make a movie of this material.

01:41And we share, I would say, a love and interest in Peter's work

01:47and also in queer life and queer creation in New York in the 70s and 80s,

01:52which for me has been very inspiring as I try to continue,

01:57like to see what those artists did and what they did during that time

02:01and how they did it with a certain kind of freedom and risk-taking

02:06has been very inspiring to me.

02:08Peter had no money, that we definitely know.

02:12When he died he was really penniless.

02:14Everyone was kind of horrified that he had really nothing at all.

02:18So that's obviously not good.

02:19But I think there's a freedom that comes with the situation that they were working in

02:27and a kind of radical, a radicality that was possible.

02:32And it's mixed, I would say.

02:35Yeah.

02:36It's one thing I'm thinking as you talk is the nice thing about being together

02:41is you actually learn from, like as you're describing Peter,

02:44I think I need to keep this in mind for myself,

02:47that not having money for creative things is positive,

02:51that it gives you actually attention.

02:54And yeah, that's a beautiful way to describe it.

02:56I sort of always thought that it would be a good idea

02:59to actually, you know, write to a filmmaker when you enjoy a film

03:04and say, I really love that film.

03:06But I often sort of chicken out of it

03:08because I'm like, oh, that seems, I don't know, too much.

03:11Why would they want it?

03:11I don't know.

03:12But in this instance, I did it.

03:14And I was like, more than write to Iris X,

03:16I'm going to set up a breakfast in New York City.

03:21And did and was able to just express what a fan I was of him.

03:27Like he said, he did offer me a job and I was actually very disappointed

03:30I couldn't take that job because of scheduling reasons at the time.

03:33And I just wanted to sort of know him and be in his orbit

03:37and have an opportunity to work with him.

03:39So when this came up, when he suggested this,

03:41it was really exciting to me for all the reasons that you said.

03:45You know, I live in New York.

03:46I have done actually for many, many years now.

03:48And I also have a fascination with that era.

03:53I think a lot of people do.

03:54But there's something, there is, it's easy, yes, to romanticize it.

03:59But I think there is a good way to romanticize it

04:01in the sense that there was a sort of, there was a community

04:05and there was a sense of striving to create and stick it to the man,

04:12I guess, that I think is very different to the place

04:16that artists find themselves in now.

04:18Where, you know, that there isn't really any counterculture in a way.

04:23There is only culture, which is good and bad.

04:25But the sort of sense that there's no, that these,

04:30that these were people who were just creating art for art's sake

04:33and not thinking about the commerce angle or the,

04:36yes, they needed money desperately, but that wasn't their sort of,

04:39they weren't thinking about how to do something that could be,

04:42have integrity to them and make money or be a brand or whatever.

04:46And I think for me, what was interesting about the text

04:51and what I imagined and what has sort of developed with these two

04:55is also a story of a friendship.

04:58And I think that is really the unexpected part of the film

05:01and the part that makes it actually seem in the present.

05:04Like you try to make a film, it is maybe a period film,

05:07but you want that period nature to disappear.

05:10And I think that's what happens because of kind of the emotional life

05:14between these two people, Ben and Rebecca,

05:17and also through these two characters, Peter and Linda.

Ira Sachs, Rebecca Hall and Ben Whishaw on 'Peter Hujar's Day' | THR Studio at Park City

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