Author: Calvin R. Evans
Published: October 22, 2005
Tool: [ email ]
Manhunt: Mr. Lassiter, thank you for taking the time to interview with us.
Lassiter: You’re welcome.
Manhunt: Now, I know that you are a resident of Atlanta and have been for some time.
Lassiter: Yes. I have been in Atlanta for about 18 years now.
Manhunt: Have you and other filmmakers based in the Atlanta area formed a filmmaking community of support and camaraderie?
Lassiter: We have something called the Atlanta Filmmakers Association, but there are also some other organizations as well. Most of us are just friends.
Manhunt: Ok, cool. Tell us a little bit about the business side of making a film. Take us through the filmmaking process.
Lassiter: You mean, of making a feature movie?
Manhunt: Yes.
Lassiter: Well, first it all starts with the script or the screenplay, and that usually times quite a bit of time to put that together. And if you are doing it independently, you have to go and raise the money, and that is usually done with a proposal or business plan. Now that proposal is going to tell that investor how they are going to get their money back. It’s going to have a budget as to what it’s going to cost, and that’s for every different department, because there is usually about 125 different departments in making a movie. It’s like a big corporation. Then after you are finished all of that and you’ve actually raised the money, then comes the hard part of actually shooting the movie.
Manhunt: Ok.
Lassiter: And if you are the producer and director yourself, then you go on and make sure the movie is done. You have to satisfy your investors. After you make the movie, you have to go and secure a distributor because someone still has to get the movie out for you. And that’s it in a nutshell. But it takes about two years.
Manhunt: Wow. Well I was going to say it sounds like a complicated process.
Lassiter: Oh it is, and the thing is that it’s more about the business than it is about the art. The art is the least thing you need. It’s about the business and what I mean is you have to know a lot about math, because you have to deal with budgets. Budget is everything in terms of how long it’s going to take to shoot, how much film you’re going to buy, how much it’s going to cost to pay each actor. Then you have to deal with percentages, royalty fees and all kinds of numbers things. But then you have to be good in English because you have to grammatically spell everything right in your proposal. So English, math, it’s good to know history because you have to do a lot of research. So you have to pull a little bit from everything that you do to make a business plan presentable. And then you have to go and sell yourself, so you’ve got to be good and marketing and promotion.
Manhunt: That’s a lot. And I am so glad that you said that about the business, how much business goes into making a film. I think a lot of people who want to get into film, they go to a movie and they see the finished product and they think, “Wow, it would be cool to do that. And I am sure that it is. I am sure it is a very fun process while you are doing it, but I don’t think they get to see the work or the business side behind it.
Lassiter: Well that’s why I tell people, because of the DVD, when you finish watching a movie, don’t just turn it off. Go and watch the other features because a lot of times you’ll see the behind the scenes, the making of the movie. You see all the sweat and tears that it took to make that movie. Then read about it, because making a movie is not easy. Its about one of the most difficult things you can do.
Manhunt: Really?
Lassiter: Yes, because you have so many people involved. Like I said it’s a corporation. You’re talking about 100 to 200 people that you have to employ. Then you have to manage all of these different departments, the art department, the production designers, the make-up, the hair stylists, the wardrobe, the casting crew, the catering, the camera department, the film department, and the editors. I mean there are so many different categories. And then under each of those people are a lot of other people. And you as a producer have to manage all of these people along with egos, and managers, and agents, and studio folk. It’s a lot. And you have to know all of the laws because what you do in Illinois you can’t do in California. When you’re dealing with unions, The Screen Actors Guild, The Producers Guild, The Directors Guild, all of these guilds are different for each state. For instance, where I am in Georgia, it’s a right to work state. You don’t really have to deal with unions. But when you go to Chicago, Illinois, that union may say you can only work an actor four hours before feeding them. Or you must give an actor 10 hours from the time you say, “Cut”, until the time you start the next day. Some unions may say you must provide transportation for an actor if they are more than 60 miles away from home. There are all different kinds of rules, and you have to know those rules because you will be penalized.
Manhunt: Sure.
There are all kinds of things you have to know other than cut, action, lights that are the last thing you need to know.
Manhunt: Right. Now that kind of leads me into the next question, you mentioned the skills that you need to have in terms of knowing how to market yourself and having the academic background. Now aside from the academic background, which obviously is very important, what other types of training do you recommend for someone who would like to be a film director?
Lassiter: Well you could do it one of two ways. You could go to a film school. The thing that I caution with that is, all you learn is film production. What I did is I went to college and got a communication degree. So I learned television, radio, newspaper, and public relations, all of it. So I could transfer all of that into film. If you go to a film school and you can’t a job in film, you’re not going to know anything about television, you not going to know anything about radio.
Manhunt: I understand.
Lassiter: You see what I’m saying? So I went and got a Bachelors Degree in Communications so I could be well rounded in all of it.
Manhunt: Ok.
Lassiter: And I didn’t study film. I learned more of my film stuff from being in television. But it will require some type of schooling.
Manhunt: Now, you mentioned that you learned what you learned about film in television, correct?
Lassiter: Most of it, then I wound up being an intern on, In The Heat Of The Night, the television series. They were filming here in Atlanta back in 1991. So once I started on that, and understanding that film is so much different from video, because television is done mostly in video, and music videos and movies are done in film. So it’s a whole different medium, totally different. I didn’t realize how different until I started making music videos.
Manhunt: Well I didn’t know that myself until you just mentioned that. So that is news to me.
Lassiter: Oh yeah, it’s like night and day. I mean, what you can do with a 90-minute videotape, you can’t do with 90 minutes of film. It’s totally different. You could take one person and put a camera on his shoulder, a light and have a microphone to capture audio and video. For film, you would need fifteen more people to do that same thing. You can’t just take that camera and put it on your shoulder. First, someone has to load the film, that’s a whole different person. When you’re getting a shot in focus in video, you just zoom it in to the subject and then manually use your eye to focus on the person to frame your shot up. In film, it’s a technician that uses a tape measure to measure from the camera lens to that subject and says, “Oh the F stop should be on this number.” That’s how it’s done in film. It’s a totally different game.
Manhunt: It sounds like it.
Lassiter: And you light it differently. You need lots more light in TV than you do in film.
Manhunt: Wow, ok. Now moving on to video, when you are preparing to do a video shoot with an artist, how do you come up with the video concept? How involved does the artist get in the process?
Lassiter: It depends on how big the artist is, how big the budget is, and how big the label is. Most of the videos I’ve done, I write the concept and I usually write the concept based on the song. The song tells me everything that I can do. I pick something that I think will work within the budget as well. Then I present it to the label or whoever is writing the check, and then they usually will say I don’t like it, fix it, change that and we go from there. If you were doing a big Mariah Carey type artist who can sell 6 or 7 millions copies, that artist might be very involved with the treatment of the story line and all that. But still, just like a movie, it still comes from the script. Someone still has to write that treatment out in a beginning, middle and end. It has to be a story.
Manhunt: Right, I got you. Now I know that you are currently in a legal battle with 20th Century Fox over copyright infringements for your movie, Pay The Price, which you say was stolen and turned into the movie, Drum line. Can you tell us the current status of that lawsuit?
Lassiter: Well, we are within a few months away from finding out from the judges of whether it will go into trial or not, we still do not know yet. But we’re very close. We’ve had a couple of small offers made to us from Fox and we turned it down. So we’ve been in litigation for two years, it will be two years this coming November, 2003 was when we filed the lawsuit. It’s been back and forth, we have a lot of experts and a super attorney team, and I have thirty-two attorneys working on this case.
Manhunt: Wow! I bring that whole issue up because, again back to the business side of the business, if you go and write a screenplay or put a product together which you are ready to package up and begin to send out to various studios to procure a deal, you’ve got to have your business part settled as well. So if you didn’t have your copyrights and things of that nature together for your screenplay, this whole issue of having a lawsuit probably wouldn’t exist.
Lassiter: Oh it wouldn’t exist. That’s the first thing when you go to find a lawyer; the first thing you have to do is prove ownership. The ownership means you had it copyrighted first. The second thing you have to prove is striking similarities. That it is very much similar to the movie you are bringing the claim against. Then the third thing you have to do is prove access. So you have to show that someone had reasonable access to your script. In my case I had all three of them. I copyrighted my movie in 1992, Drum line was copyrighted in 2001, nine years difference. In terms of striking similarities, we have over ninety things that are similar to mine. They used the same schools I used, the same bands I used, some of the same actors, some the same crew, most of the same locations, took some of the same dialogue, some of the same songs. It just goes on, and on, and on with the similarities. Then in terms of access, my script was sent over to 20th Century Fox, the Fox pictures in New York and Los Angeles, and several staff members have gone on record as to admitting that they received my information well before Drum line was done. And Dallas Austin, who is one of the producers who claims that the movie is based on his life, his staff has admitted that they have received it as well. So we have all three.
Manhunt: Uh huh. So you’re in pretty good standing right now.
Lassiter: Well we are, but you still have to go in court and pretty that…
Manhunt: Sure, sure…
Lassiter: And you have to play that political, politic, government game too.
Manhunt: Well I hope you get your just due.
Lassiter: I hope so too.
Manhunt: I mean, anytime you put your heart and soul into something and you don’t get the proper compensation for it, that’s terrible. I hope that everything works out for you and you get your just due brother.
Lassiter: Hey I appreciate it, that’s what we’re all fighting for. And there are hundreds, if not thousands of people like me that this has happened to, that did not have the means to get a big attorney, or did not have enough similarities or whatever. And you know I shot my movie first, it’s not just a copyright infringement from the script, they actually took my movie. Their movie looks like mine, so I finished it. You know, a lot of people don’t have that, they may just have a script, and it’s hard to say, “Well his script looks like his” because people can change things on paper. But you when you’ve shot a movie and someone else has shot a movie, and your doing a split screen and to the left is this scene and to the right is the scene from that movie, and they look alike…I mean two people just don’t think alike.
Manhunt: Sure. Wow, that’s pretty deep. It’s a shame to think that studios would prey on people like that, but it happens. And in a case like this, if it goes through the proper legal channels and it is found out that they have liability, then I look to hearing some good things from you brother.
Lassiter: Well I have a few. I have quite a few things ready to go.
Manhunt: That’s good, that’s very good. Now what do you have that is currently in the works, or anything that is finished and just waiting to be released?
Lassiter: Well I just finished the Chrysler commercial and video for Vickie Winans, and I’m also working on the Las Vegas Mass Choir, that’s going to be a live DVD. We’re shooting that at the end of October, and it’s going to have Tommy Ford from the TV show, Martin, and Channelle Brown, who played Kim on A Different World. They will be hosting that. And I have a stage play that I supposed to be directing in January. And then my other screenplays, I’m just waiting for financing. We are in development now on a movie called, Revenge. It’s a mystery thriller.
Manhunt: That’s all right. Now I know you have a long history in video, and I know you also have a long history in the music business, 20 years correct?
Lassiter: Exactly, 20 years.
Manhunt: Now you are also a publicist correct?
Lassiter: Yes I am. I’ve been doing that for ten years now.
Manhunt: Which do you feel is more challenging, being a publicist or film directing?
Lassiter: Making a movie, there’s nothing harder than that that I can think of, unless it’s being an astronaut or surgeon. I can’t think of anything that is more difficult than that. If you tell me you’re an electrical engineer or whatever. You may only have to deal with 10-15 people a day. When you’re making a movie, you are dealing with hundreds, if not thousands of people. If you’re shooting a scene, like for instance, when I shot Pay The Price, and we’re shooting a marching band, first of all there are three hundred people in a marching band. And you’re shooting a scene in a stadium with 10 to 15,000 people, when you say, “cut”, you have to be able to talk to 10 to 15,000 people at once. And there are not too many jobs on Earth that you have to stand in front of 10 to 15,000 people and give directions to.
Manhunt: You’re right.
Lassiter: So you have all of these people you’re responsible for and if any of them fall down and break their leg, they can sue you. You have to have all different kinds of insurances; you’re responsible for all these people. If one of you’re young ladies get raped on your set, you’re responsible. If somebody gets into a fight, you’re responsible. If someone is using illegal drugs, you’re responsible. So you’re responsible for all these things that it takes to make this movie. Then you get all the credit if it is successful and all the blame if it fails.
Manhunt: I have a whole new level of respect for the film game. I mean, you really have opened my eyes to a lot of things that I wasn’t aware of and I appreciate that. I really do.
Lassiter: No doubt.
Manhunt: I guess the last thing that I want to ask you is, if you were to give advice to an aspiring actor, filmmaker, video director, or an aspiring musician, what kind of advice would you give them as far as the preparation. I know that we already talked about the training and the skills you need to be a film director, but in terms of how you map out the course of your career, what kind of advice would you give them?
Lassiter: Do as much reading as you can do. You have to go to the library and check out books, or go to the bookstore and buy every kind of book you can find, but you have to understand the business of it. You have to understand it is a business more than anything else. A lot of people get caught up in “I’m on TV singing, and thousands of people will buy my record.” A lot of people don’t understand how records are made, how they are sold, how you make money, what all has to be paid for. So when you don’t understand the business side of it, that’s when you end up broke, or hurt, or suffering some kind of way. So before you jump off and say, “Oh I can out sing Whitney Houston”, or “I can out act Denzel Washington”, go and read the background. Go and understand what they did to get there. As great as Denzel Washington is, as great as Whitney Houston is, they both had a beginning. They had to struggle. Denzel didn’t just jump up and become an Academy Award winning actor. He had to read, learn how to read a script, learn how to memorize a script, learn how to take directions, learn how to become a part of a team. There’s a whole lot he had to learn before he became that. Then he had to learn how to deal with agents, and managers, and how this person gets this percentage of that, and how just because we sent you to go do a promotional tour to sign autographs, how the money for that is taken out of your money. You know, residuals, performance rights, mechanical rights, synchronization rights, all these kinds of things are what you have to understand. So really, you have to know the legal side, the business side, the contract side and all that. Although you may not be a lawyer you still need to understand those things or if not, you’re going to be taken away. So that’s my advice is to read, read, read. Long before you say you want to do it, read and understand it because after you read it and understand it, you may not want to do it. You may not want to get up at four in the morning and go do a six o’clock radio interview. You may not want to be in a different city every day. You may not want to be on call 24 hours a day. You may not want to have to smile when you’re sick. You may not want to go do a show when you’re aunt just died. You see what I’m saying; you may not want to do all that.
Manhunt: And I think that that is the part that a lot of people tend to overlook, and I am so glad that you brought light to that. I appreciate that.
Lassiter: You may not want to be up 23 hours rehearsing, you may not want to have someone telling you what to do. Because again, when you’re an actor, all an actor does on a movie set is what the director tells them to do. So when the director says stop, move, turn to the right, look this way, put your hand that way, walk in the door this way, stop here, that’s what the actor has to do no matter what the script says. You have to take directions. So if you’re not used to somebody telling you what to do, don’t get into acting, because you are going to be directed.
Manhunt: UMM! All right (Laughs). I appreciate you very, very much brother, I really do. Thank you for taking the time to speak with us.
Lassiter: You’re welcome.
