'Roma' Producer Talks Working with Alfonso Cuaron, Netflix Distribution | Gabriela Rodriguez | Producer Roundtables - video Dailymotion

Hollywood Journal

"He always gets his way," Rodriguez said of Cuaron. The only request from the Oscar-winning director ('Gravity') that didn't happen was a bear playing a tambourine.

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00:00what is the craziest thing you've done for a film or for a director there's a

00:09lot with Alfonso there's always hidden challenges everywhere that now they feel

00:15normal to me I don't have any point of comparison I don't know how the other

00:19directors treat their producers to me like this is what I needed to do it's

00:24expected of me was there anything you had to tell him no we just can't do it

00:28I tried to tell him I can't do this a lot but he always gets his way and I think

00:36the only thing that didn't happen was like in in one of our we went to the because

00:41he wanted to film in the places where we the real things happen so he wanted to

00:46shoot the exteriors in the street where he actually grew up and and you know so we

00:50had to intervene everything to look from 1970s and we had a meeting with all the

00:54neighbors and so the neighbors were all excited the ones I used to live there

00:58when he was young and they were like and remember there was this like bear that

01:02used to play a tambourine that was just you know stand in the corner and Alfonso

01:07goes like I want a bear playing a tambourine I'm not gonna get you a bear

01:11playing a tambourine and Nico Sely is my co-producer who's Mexican and then Basie

01:16is like oh I love this challenge I'm gonna do it and after obviously calling every

01:20suit every like place around that could possibly you should have called me we had

01:27a trained bear that we flew to Cape Town to be I mean he was amazing

01:31and I was like at the end Nico's like well maybe I'll wear a bear suit and stand in a corner and I'm like this is getting out of hand

01:36someone telling me he's not getting a bear

01:43so with 22 July and Roma they're both being released by Netflix which is

01:51obviously more known for its streaming releases what kind of conversations did

01:55you have about having your movie seen on the big screen

01:59and same for us like we we actually came like Netflix so it was involved after we

02:05were already in the end stages of post-production and Alfonso felt the same

02:11way you know this is a movie in Spanish in black and white but Mexico City in

02:171970 it's not necessarily I wouldn't it's not like we had all the big studios

02:22knocking on our door saying like we want to distribute it all over the world and

02:25million theaters like gravity so in a way sort of Netflix was a great platform for

02:31having 130 million people having the option to see it and like Paul was saying

02:37Scott also and Ted sort of are committed to a theatrical release for the film and

02:42our film is coming out in December and it will have a theatrical release and it

02:46will have it'll be selected theaters all you know in different places around the

02:51world but it will have that combination of having the platform experience

02:55and and the experience of people seeing it online and the theaters for those

02:59who love the theater and want to see it in the big screen

03:08how would you describe what you do to a kid how would you guys describe it oh I

03:14don't know I try to my nieces and my nephews to sort of explain a little bit what I do

03:19and I kind of boil it down to coordinating and I try to go relevant to if you're at home and like

03:25this is what your mom does every day like she juggles of getting you to school and

03:29then making your food and then going to work and then sort of and that's what you do to

03:33make so that your day is perfect and that's kind of what I tell them and say this is what I do but to make

03:38that movie and it's like that every single day and some days your brother gets sick some

03:42days you're late for school and those things are just like overcoming and that's

03:46kind of what I try to give them someday you have to be extras in the movie

03:50my hat goes off to like directors or creatives who actually put themselves out there into into

03:56wanting to face that challenge because like for the rest of us we're just sort of helping you make it

04:02but it's you who actually represent and take the chance I mean Alfonso in this one obviously it's personal it's his own life

04:08and that he must have had very specific things he wanted to tell this story what was sort of the most demanding

04:14thing you had to figure out everything I mean it was it was really hot I mean

04:19this is my first time actually producing I mean I've been working with him for many

04:24years but sort of having all the responsibility on me and yes he's also the producer of the film

04:30but he was directing it and writing it and editing and and photographing it so I was like

04:35okay something's gotta give right so someone's gotta get on the phone so he wanted this freedom of this creative freedom and

04:43this process that there was no sort of studio involvement or intervention or anyone flying in to tell you

04:50you're spending too much or why are you you know 20 weeks here or how why are we not getting there

04:55so once we got into the rhythm of knowing you know like every every scout was a tech scout

05:01and we need to bring 30 people in because every department needed to be represented

05:04because we all needed to like oh what's he gonna want here or if he says like oh that kid's gonna be

05:09wearing a helmet obviously and like only you know that you were wearing a helmet

05:14you know like three years ago I don't know

'Roma' Producer Talks Working with Alfonso Cuaron, Netflix Distribution | Gabriela Rodriguez | Producer Roundtables

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