Andrew Goth and The War of Art

by Erich Leon Harris | Published November 10, 1999

Autumn has come to Beverly Hills, and the bar at the Four Seasons Hotel glows with warm afternoon light, autumnal colors and the heat of celebrity. There are several movie press junkets occurring at once, and at any given moment one can turn and see the likes of Harrison Ford, Brad Pitt, Greg Kinear or even Siegfried and Roy taking in liquid refreshment between pitch, PR, and BS sessions.

Sitting comfortably unaffected amongst all of the “glamour” is Andrew Goth, the dynamic young writer-director who makes his feature film debut with Everybody Loves Sunshine, an explosively violent and uncompromising but beautifully acted and photographed tale of gangland warfare and obsessive love set in Manchester, England. The film stars British music phenom Goldie as well as David Bowie and Goth himself playing a leading role.

Goth is as charismatic in person as he is on screen. He is completely passionate about moviemaking in general and this film in particular. No doubt this quality proved invaluable in securing such a talented cast and crew on his first feature. Our talk began with a discussion of gang culture in the UK.

ERICH LEON HARRIS (MM): You show a side of Manchester that many American audiences have never seen before. Could you tell us a little about the origins of this story.

ANDREW GOTH (AG): This film is based on urban legend. It’s a fictitious rendering of what I thought these gang wars were about as a child. I wanted to make the picture feel big. In England lately there have been a lot of films that feel tiny. Some of my heroes are people like Sergio Leone. So in the opening sequence, when the main characters are being released from prison, I wanted to get tight on their faces and make the audience see these guys like I did when I was a kid. I shot them in slow motion and from a low angle to make them look larger than life, very menacing, because all of their power is based on fear of their violent potential. I needed a big beginning, with no backstory to tell people exactly who these guys are.

MM: The only people who seemed to move freely through the war-torn neighborhoods were the children, who had no fear of these very violent guys.

AG: The whole aspect of adding the children was to show where I was at that age, because that was when I met them. I used to go looking around Manchester for the gangsters with my friends. We knew they were around and we idolized them.

MM: In addition to gang culture, the film shows a culture where blacks and whites are not bound by color lines. Everyone mixes freely. There is an interracial couple whose main conflict comes from the husband’s loyalty to the gang as opposed to any racial baggage. Is that your experience?

AG: Yes. That’s exactly how it is and exactly how I’ve lived my life. I find it quite saddening, the line that is drawn between the races here in America. It’s very different in England, I’m glad to say. It’s never been a factor in my life. I find it very strange and sad that I have to explain or defend that relationship to critics.

MM: How do you defend that criticism?

AG: It’s really more confusion than criticism. People keep asking me “What is going on here? Why did you do this? Does that happen?” I wanted the film to challenge people and stay with them. Of course, I’m not naive, we have our problems, but we have more of a friendly mix, racially.

MM: Your visual style is as sharp as your writing. The colors in your palette are very lush. One sequence where the warlords meet was reminiscent of Kurosawa. What other moviemakers have influenced you?

AG: Certainly Kurosawa, without a doubt. But whoever my influences were, it has left me with a desire to shoot all of my films in Cinemascope. I want t

o be as wide as possible. I want to create as big a feeling as possible. The guys who shot the film had just come off of Seven Years in Tibet and the whole creative discussion was to make sure the audience didn’t know what was coming next. To really shake up their sensibilities. To go from a tight, confined space to the vastness of the moors. That’s where we had the moors murders, the famous child murders in the ’60s.

MM: Those were the murders committed by Hindely that The Smiths sing of, right?

AG: Yeah. You could bury a body in the peat, and the body floats around under the surface for miles, and you never know were it may turn up. [That setting] was the ideal contrast to some of the claustrophobic rooms and clubs. I like that, and I like to get in real close on faces like Sergio Leone did. I like to use special lenses to make people seem larger than life. Manchester is very cold and gray and I wanted the title Everybody Loves Sunshine to be ironic, so every time a character is in the sunlight, they react to it. I would counter the grays with red, like in the Chinese restaurant, or the blues and greens in the clubs.

MM: This being your first film, how do you feel about the finished product?

AG: I’m very proud of it. The passion of all the people involved with it makes me proud. I walked around with the script under my arm for five years before it was made. I had cast the film the first year and I was able to use 90 percent of the actors five years later. Those things really make me feel good.

MM: What influenced your decision to cast yourself in the lead role of Ray?

AG: It was definitely not my first choice. I had planned to go out and find an actor to play Ray. We had very stringent budgetary restraints. So to play one of the lead roles was financially beneficial to the production, because I could waive my fee and such.

The final decision came based on the work I had done with Goldie. Goldie and I hung out and worked on the script for about a year and a half before we ever had the money to shoot. When we rehearsed, I would always play the part of Ray, because he was always going to play Terry. These cousins were very close, to the point of having homo-erotic overtones to their relationship. I wanted p

People to feel the ambiguity and that element was very difficult to get across properly. He and I were able to almost workshop that feeling. Then, when we were finally financed, the bond company said that there was no way that they were going to let me direct and play a leading role, because who was I? I had no track record. So we went out and looked for an actor, but Goldie never considered that I wouldn’t play the role of Ray, so he really pushed for it to happen, and in the end the bond company came around to the idea. So they rearranged the schedule so that we worked five-day weeks and not too many back-to-back days.

MM: How did it feel to be pulling double duty on set?

AG: I wasn’t afraid at all. I had total confidence in the performances. The camera guys had worked with Kenneth Branagh, so they were very helpful in showing me how they had worked on his set, and I could see on the video assist that what we were getting was good. To critique my performance was an ever-changing thing.

One day I think I was okay, the next day I’d hate it. So I’d have to bite my lip. As an actor and a director, I don’t think that it’s a scary proposition if you’re as immersed in the process as I was.

MM: Working with a talent like David Bowie, with you being a first time director, were you in any way hesitant to tell him if you thought his performance needed something extra?

AG: I was definitely nervous, without a doubt. But I took time out to fly to New York at my own expense to meet with David before the shoot started. I didn’t want him to fly in and start shooting, because I only had him for two weeks. I needed to meet him and relax about it beforehand. That meeting was the best thing that I could have possibly done. He invited me into his workspace and we had drinks and hung out. Ten minutes into meeting with him, you forget that it’s THE David Bowie. He told me how he had prepared his character, even the suits that he had chosen to wear. You see, he’d been in England when the Krays were around and he had all kinds of fantastic anecdotes about the time. Even how guys would sew razor blades into their jacket lapels in case someone grabbed them there, they’d be cut. There’s a subtle moment in the film where you see David sewing and you see him trim the thread with the hidden razor. Plus he was exactly the right age that Bernie should be. He’s really looked after himself, so he looks great. Since the character of Bernie was a homosexual in the film, David knew how those guys would have taken pride in their appearance.

MM: The homosexual aspect of Bernie’s character is nearly invisible. You really don’t know anything until he’s being accused of being a faggot by Goldie’s character. Is that by design?

AG: Yes. It has to be. You see, it really is a subtle thing until it’s used against him. He could have never had the power he has within the gang if it were any other way. Around the table

with the guys, he has to put on a front. But you get a sense that the really pretty guy is his lover, a fact that’s overlooked, if not totally accepted by the others.

MM: At the outset David Bowie wasn’t even considered for the role of Bernie. How did he become involved?

AG: I hadn’t really thought about the actors for the supporting characters until the film was financed. Once we were in production, I knew I wanted Bernie to have a standard English accent. He would have to be in his forties and be the sort of guy whose performance would center the audience. I thought British actors like Bob Hoskins or John Thaw would be right for the role of Bernie and had set out to read them. Then I happened to see The Hunger.

MM: That was one of Bowie’s early films—he played a vampire, right?

AG: Exactly. The thing about his performance there that changed my thinking was that he aged from a young man to a very old man during the course of the film, which really impressed me. I asked Goldie what he thought of the idea, as he had worked with Bowie on a music project. We were concerned that casting a superstar in that role might throw the whole film off-kilter. But over the next few days we decided to just send David the script to see if he was even interested in doing the project. He called three days later.

MM: What’s that like—answering the phone and it’s David Bowie on the other end.

AG: I remember the exact moment because I had just had an angry conversation with my Director of Photography. He wasn’t going to do the picture because the money wasn’t right. So when the phone rang again, I thought that it was him, but when I heard this smooth, almost melodic voice, I knew instantly who it was. I began pacing with nervous energy, trying to calm myself. I was in the production offices and I kept flagging down the staff and pointing to the phone, mouthing the words “It’s David Bowie!” I could tell right away he was serious about the project. He was asking things like who the editor was, and who the DP was. David likes to know about as many of the production elements as possible because he’s been around for so long. He knows the right crew is essential.

MM: How was he on the set with the other actors?

AG: Most of my cast were young and inexperienced, just out of school. They were nervous, but when David arrived he started talking to them, asking about their background, telling them stories. He set them at ease within five minutes. He was wonderful.

MM: With it getting to be nearly impossible to get financing without a star in the lead, what advice would you give a rookie director on approaching a legendary talent?

AG: On this project everything was in place before we approached David, but I’m learning on my new feature just how essential those “A-list” actors are to a film getting made. Personally, I find dealing with all of the agents and managers and studio executives frustrating. I was naive before, and I guess very lucky, now that I see what having an international superstar has done for the marketing of the film. But David made this film because he wanted to. He doesn’t have to do anything that he doesn’t want to do. I would tell any director not to be afraid to approach any talent who might be right for a role, no matter who it is. The worst they can say is no.

MM: We understand the film was going to be released straight to video, but you fought for a theatrical release. How important was that to you?

AG: Now that the film is made, it really is the most important thing. Like a painter or any artist, you want your work to be seen by as many people as possible. I want it to be on 22,000 screens, but we’re only going to be in LA, New York and Chicago at first. When I found out the decision had been made to go straight to video I was very disappointed because we are very proud of this film and we want it to be seen on the big screen.

I made it to be seen in the cinema. So we went out and raised the distribution monies ourselves. We can only afford to do three cities so far, but hopefully the film will catch on. MM