9 @ night
In 1988, the day after my film HEAT AND SUNLIGHT won the Grand Prize at the Sundance Film Festival, I drove through the San Francisco Tenderloin district on the way to my editing room. The Tenderloin, then as now, was a place where law enforcement paroled people out of prison, where drugs, prostitution, and gang violence flourished, where ordinary citizens walked the streets with practiced care.
My younger brother Greg, diagnosed paranoid-schizophrenic and a missing homeless man for the previous 10 years, was on my mind that day as I watched the shopping bag ladies, the brown baggers, the screamers, the hookers and the gang bangers mingle with citizens just minding their own business and trying to survive. As in all my trips through the Tenderloin, I thought I might see Greg on the Glide Memorial food line or at Hospitality House waiting for drug counseling. He didn’t appear, but something else happened that day.
In 1992, along with Rand Crook and Ethan Sing, I started the Tenderloin yGroup, a free acting workshop and cinema production ensemble working in the San Francisco Tenderloin and serving inner city residents, professional actors and all comers. A place for marginalized people to learn and practice the Direct Action Cinema method of making community movies, our “players” came from all walks of life and every kind of experience. Some overcame homelessness, substance abuse and mental disturbance and used workshop experiences as a form of empowerment. Others were interested in acting for personal reasons and came to experience the strong emotion and human orientation for which our workshops were known.
We had as many as 50 people attending our player’s workshop each week, representing all races, countries, denominations, sexual identities and self definitions… an inner city melting pot of people and ideas. Gradually we developed a working ensemble of 25-35 players who met regularly, rehearsed and acted in our collaborative films. In our system actors are called players, recalling the traveling players, minstrels and acting troupes of Medieval Europe but also emphasizing the human “play” of collaboration, improvisation and the expression of cathartic emotion. Although most members were amateurs, professional actors also participated because of our emphasis on honesty, strong emotion and self- realization.
Our first dramatic feature, CHALK, was voted one of the top films of 2000 by the Village Voice. Other films have played around the world to excellent reviews including retrospectives at the Hong Kong International Film Festival, the Mill Valley International Film Festival, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Pacific Film Archives, the .MOV Festival and the Manila International Film Festival in the Philippines, the Fargo International Film Festival, Resfest both in Korea and in South Africa, the Kansas City Filmmaker’s Jubilee and many others.
For the last nine years we have been at work on 9 @ night, a series of stand alone dramatic features which together create a portrait of 40-50 marginalized inner city characters at the turn of the 21th century. Kieslowski’s DECALOGUES, or his RED, WHITE, BLUE series were an inspiration in the direction we have pursued in this project. Now, we have completed 9 @ Night features, and we’re preparing for the premiere of the entire series.
As we begin work on our new venture, Citizen Cinema, based in the East Bay, where we will continue our cinematic work with everyday citizens and film professionals, we are ready to market and promote our 9 @ night series for release in 2008. We are planning to work with community institutes, film festivals and international art venues to make the 9 @ night film series known to the world.
September 17th, 2007 at 12:02 pm
Hi Rob -
- I want to touch in with you and send to you my support of what you are doing. Your work and direction resonate with me and what I am doing. I have several commonalities with you.
- In 1971, my first job in San Francisco, outside of working at ACT, where I had come for acting training, was at Hospitality House. I assisted Richard Rekow, who ran a theater project there. My specialization was in the Theater Games of Viola Spolin, who had been my teacher when I was a teenager in Chicago, my home town.
- Now, I teach independent filmmakers how to use improvisation in their rehearsal process, along with Stanislavski’s techniques from his later life, which incorporated improvisation.
- I create original scripts using a combination of improv & writing. What I am drawn to is creating theater, and now film or video about issues most people want to keep secret, but desperately need to get out in the open. One of these “theater pieces” that I co-wrote and acting in made it to off-Broadway.
- I also have taught at FAF, and now teach ACTING for student filmmakers and animators at Cogswell Polytechnical College’s Digital Motion Picture Dep’t. In 1979, I started a school and theater in San Francisco, The Next Stage, where I train actors, directors and total beginners in improvisationally-based acting (I’m not sure what to call this, but you know what I mean).
- I now have several students who have created successful feature length films, using the techniques I teach. I first heard about you thru one of them.
- I would love to know more about what you are doing. I am looking for opportunities for me as an actor and director that connect me with like-minded artists who are focused on getting out to the public the untold stories of forgotten members of our society. I use Theater, Film and Video as tools for healing and education.
- I would love to talk to you about your work and see what you are doing.
Thanks -
Marcia Kimmell
November 22nd, 2007 at 11:14 pm
I wanted to let anyone who knew him and loved him, that Richard Rekow passed away last night, the night before Thanksgiving…
November 27th, 2007 at 6:19 pm
please email me if you’d like to contribute to Richard Rekow’s obituary. thank you.
palms joined
_/|\_
November 27th, 2007 at 6:22 pm
[gary dot gach at gmail dot com]
thanks, r. nillson for the bandwidth; i owe you one. gary
December 6th, 2007 at 1:58 pm
I was very close to Rich during the late 70’s and well into the 80’s. We kept up intermittently in subsequent years. I would love to add what I could to an obituary.
March 5th, 2008 at 12:00 pm
Hi,
I wanted to find out whether there is going to be the possibility of obtaining your series on DVD - Region 2 for Europe - UK.
Please, the following is a bit cheeky - sorry; but would it be possible at all to arrange for the information to be posted through Diane Gaidry’s blog. There is a huge following of funs interested in Diane Gaidry’s work and we read frequently updates posted on that site.
Many, many thanks.
March 5th, 2008 at 7:02 pm
A blaze of poetic symbols derived from the human experience.
Love.. Hate.. Energy.. Angst..
All Raw and True. An achievement that would have made maestro Cassavetes proud..
Can’t wait to see it Mr. Rob!
– Raymund Cruz
August 14th, 2008 at 1:01 am
My condolence as to the loss of Richard Rekow go out to all.
I appreciate this opportunity to be able to remark on the workings of the above #1 responder named Marcia Kimmell along with Richard Rekow as well. I believe at this time in my life I would much rather attend her school, “The Next Stage” in San Francisco than even my life long dreams of attending ACT in San Francisco after reading about her accomplishments in her remark. I find myself impressed by her achievements.
Julie Marie Angel