EP028 – Go To Church: Watch Movies w/ Megan Gilbride

10.30.2025 - Season: 1 Episode 28

Keith wanders LA’s Atwater Village with acclaimed producer Megan Gilbride—a co-conspirator on TOWER, A SONG FOR YOU, and DEAR MR. BRODY. We stroll the neighborhood, two old friends and frequent collaborators, outlining just how Megan’s the “producer kind of crazy” and not the “director kind of crazy.”

Megan’s got theories and she has opinions—and she’s got the experience to back them all up. This wide-ranging talk covers a whole lot, like… the ethics of authenticity, how the budget tells a story, community building in the doc-making space, and the difference between journalism and cinema.

Plus: creeping on a stranger’s house to smell juniper trees, the Princess Bride theory of medium-specific storytelling, and why Megan won’t shoot 70mm “if there’s no wide shots in the fucking movie.” The producer of WHERE SOLDIERS COME FROM, LOVERS OF HATE, and FATHOM makes a case for JAWS, THE LIFE AND TIMES OF HARVEY MILK, ALL THAT JAZZ and the NY EXPORT: OPUS JAZZ—or as she puts it: going to church… watching movies… making fucking cinema.

Timestamps: 00:00 Intro and Atwater Village Setup | 01:00 Origin Story: The 2012 Picnic Table Pitch | 03:00 What Does a Producer Actually Do? | 06:00 Excellence, Financing, and Distribution as Creative Acts | 09:00 Cinema vs Journalism: The Grammar of Documentary | 13:00 The Psychology of Storytelling and Gut Instinct | 16:00 Ethics, Authenticity, and Not Being Provocative | 18:00 The State of Documentary in 2025 | 20:00 PBS as the Invisible Backstop | 23:00 Mid-Career Reality Check and Volume Problems | 26:00 Cauleen Smith’s Life-Changing Question | 29:00 The Space Inside the Frame | 32:00 Do You Wanna Make Fucking Cinema? | 36:00 Princess Bride and Medium-Specific Storytelling | 39:00 Community as the Through-Line in All Her Work | 42:00 Battery Dies, We’re on Zoom Now | 43:00 Gateway Drug: Jaws, Harvey Milk, All That Jazz | 46:00 What Makes Her Say Yes to a Project | 48:00 Go to Church: Watch Movies | 52:00 Where to Find Megan’s Work

Take it on.

So now,

okay.

Do I hit the thing again and then again?

There we go.

Oh, there we go.

Alright, so here we go.

Okay.

And this is edited, so if there's anything you wanna take back or if there's ever a,

a moment we need to reset, no big deal.

Let's,

let's go this way.

Okay.

You're saying if I let slip a piece of juicy gossip.

Or just if you say something a little weird and you want to

like, just say the sentence again.

Oh, okay.

All right.

But

yeah, sure.

Okay.

Trying that again.

All right.

We're still rolling.

We're still marked.

I'm also trying to do a two shot.

This is a Doc Walks.

First,

we are in Atwater Village, Los Angeles, California, with former Virginian,

former Texan Current Californian.

Megan Gilbride.

True enough, Megan Gilbride on Doc Walks.

It only took 25 episodes.

I was available during the dock and no,

I I, I You were available.

We have wanted it, but it has taken this long to make it happen.

Um, but here it is.

It's happening.

So you just

wanted a reason to come to la

I love a reason to come to la Yeah.

This is a good one.

Yeah.

Um, and I love any chance I can spend time with you, we spend a

lot of time together on Zooms, or more specifically Google meets

True.

So true,

but not nearly enough time in person.

And so today Megan and I are back together again.

We've already had pastries and coffee, so our day is off to a good start.

Shout out Proof Bakery.

So Megan, how do you feel being on Doc Walks?

Good.

I mean,

we're walking.

It's a beautiful neighborhood.

It's a beautiful day, and we're walking the streets.

I usually walk with my dog, but without my dog.

Ooh, this tree has eyes.

I mean this.

There's so much good stuff in the neighborhood.

On your left,

you're listening to Doc Walks with Ben and Keith, and so Megan and I

have been working together since 2014.

It's funny because you know what?

I was recently looking back, I always, and my lore, it was 2013, the fall

of 2013, but it was actually the fall of 2012, the picnic meeting

where you told me the concept for tower and you said people didn't get

it and I was like, they're stupid.

I get it immediately.

I wanna work on this

picnic meeting.

That's what you call that meeting?

No, it was the picnic table outside.

What was the name of that complex with the Bread Factory?

Mrs. Baird's.

Oh wow.

That is not where I remember me.

I remember meeting at the Flight Path Cafe.

That makes sense.

You pitch me Tower.

We were sitting at the picnic table outside.

What's the name of that place?

Oh, it doesn't really have a name.

Tillery.

The Tillery.

Tillery.

Yes.

The

Tillery Building.

I feel like I, whether I invented it or not, I remember

exactly where I was sitting.

Okay.

And, and I always thought it was the fall of 2013, but it was the fall of 2012.

That makes sense.

Um, okay.

This is a great episode for me because I am walking and introducing

you guys to, if you don't already know her, many of you do.

Megan is the producer of Tower.

She is a producer on a song for you.

She is the producer of Dear Mr. Brody.

She's currently producing multiple projects at Go Valley right now.

And in addition to those things, she also is the producer.

Of Fathom.

It's a beautiful film.

It's, it's like science mixed with art and all the great things

directed by Drew Z Anthopoulos.

Megan is the producer of Lovers of Hate, the 20 2010 2010 Sundance.

Traumatic competition entry by Brian Poiser.

She's worked with Heather Courtney on where soldiers come from.

We need to get Heather on the podcast one of these days, and she's, she's

always got multiple projects going.

In addition to being a, like boots on the ground producer, a financial

minded producer, a distribution minded producer, she's also an

incredibly creative minded producer.

So she is a multifaceted, full package, and she's been working on

everyone's behalf behind the scenes.

With Documentary Producers Alliance?

Oh yeah.

Also true.

Shortly after they debuted Megan, take it away.

Oh, where are we here?

This is a pocket park.

Okay.

It's a fantastic place.

So bring your kiddo

place to bring the kiddo.

So you remember that first conversation around tower?

Yep.

And we're, we're coming up.

Megan and I have, you know, been in discussion, um, with some folks about, uh,

our movie tower came out nine years ago.

Um, we're in the process of looking at the distribution deal renegotiation

after our initial window is over, kind of for moving forward.

So that's the thing that she and I are talking about right now.

Um, and we're also looking at kind of finding a way to celebrate and

mark the 10th anniversary of the film and, and utilize the film,

bring the film to more audiences, um,

which is also the 60th anniversary.

Of the tower shooting.

That's right.

So it's tied in.

Our film came out on the 50th.

It's now 10 years later.

You can do that math.

You don't have to.

Megan did it for you.

That's why I work with her.

Uh, but not only what is your, uh, like how do you think about

your role as a producer as it equates to our collaborations?

Like, how would you describe what you do to an outside person?

Oops.

This way.

Who maybe knows?

That we've made a few films together.

I mean, I just want to be involved in every piece of it.

As you said, I'm sort of obsessive about distribution and how that is a reflexive

conversation with the financing that, that those things are always in dialogue,

and I think if you really genuinely don't know what your audience is and

you don't know what your distribution plan is, how can you approach.

Financing if you don't know what you need and why you need it.

Mm-hmm.

And who's gonna be reached by the project.

So that's always a consideration taking something on and us working together.

Like typically there's a significant amount of fundraising to do when we work

together and being able to sort of like explain what the value proposition is

to the folks who might finance us is.

Vital to the work, like, I like excellence, so it sounds,

sounds, maybe say more trite.

I like excellence in the sense of like, it needs to be something new

that people haven't seen before, which either means a topic or it

means the method that it's told in.

It's like it has to be serving something that doesn't exist and you

just need to, when you're talking to financiers and talking to distributors,

you need to be in context of that.

So I feel like,

which I always love hearing, you know, I'm just gonna jump in here.

Yeah, do it.

'cause I always love hearing that, like when you're saying like, oh, I've got this

new idea and nobody's done this before.

I mean, I think there is no such thing as a new idea and

everybody's done everything before.

Of course, of course.

But oftentimes, like in the same way that writing the grant solidifies

the reality of the project, like mapping the comps and triangulating

like what this is and is as, as, as valuable as figuring out what it is of.

Yeah,

totally.

Although, I'll say this a thing that really drives me crazy in

like grant writing descriptions.

Like when I've read and evaluated or when I've given feedback on somebody's

application, when they say like, it's not this and it's not this, and I'm

like, you have to know what it is.

So you do have to know what it's not.

But I think the entry point for that is what it is.

And I think, you know, it's like.

What is the shooting style?

And by the way, like we're gonna use anamorphic lenses is not a shooting style.

My background in, you know, fiction filmmaking, it really feeds my

sense of documentary and like, I think it should be a movie.

I usually think it should be a movie in a theater.

I think that's one of the things you and I really agree on.

'cause you also are passionate about fiction filmmaking.

What is an analog or what is a scene or what is a shot or what is a moment of

sound that, that you're like, oh, like I'm getting goosebumps thinking about it now.

Like that gives you the goosebumps and you're like, I know we

can do that in this project.

And what that brings to it is emotion and in engagement and you know, like trying

to put the audience in the situation of the character who you're telling

the story about, of the participant you're telling the story about.

Uh, I think that's important emotionally, and I know that some

people who really have a more traditional or like journalistic sense

of documentary, all of which I also love that they maybe it feels too, you

know, too surreal or too subjective.

And for me, I feel like I'm the most inspired and the most lit up

by projects that place the viewer.

Solidly in the emotional and experiential space of your, the participant of the

event or the person you're talking about.

And I think that's a thing you and I really agree about.

Well, it's, it is, and it's something that is really fun to talk about that

doesn't come up in most kind of dry analysis of like the documentary process.

Um, right.

Yeah, totally.

It's almost always.

What's the subject and what's the impact on the audience?

Right?

And that is valuable and necessary and certainly at the heart of everything

we're doing, but remembering that this is a craft and that we're not,

at least I'm not, and I don't think you are either, at least I don't

think you present yourself this way.

Right.

We're not journalists.

And if we're journalists, we would create in a medium that focused on

who, what, when, where, um, and why.

Right?

But we are oftentimes really focused on how.

How are we going to approach this thing?

Totally.

Um, and not to say that that separates us from the standard documentarian.

I think we just put some emphasis on it that we take pride in and it's a place

of joint, um, collaborative conversation.

Well, and it's like, I am, I really want it to be organic, right?

Like, I don't want it to sort of be like, like I do talk about the grammar.

I write the word grammar in grant or you know, in whatever decks

or like grant applications all the time because I really think.

Yeah, it's funny 'cause as a person who is like a word person is an auditory

thinker and really not a visual thinker, like the grammar is so important to me

because it also tells a story, right?

Like the stage picture.

Also tells a story.

And you know, when I say excellence, like that's what I mean.

I think it should be the total package.

So I think it should be like able to be financed, something that people should

wanna put their pants on to go see out of their houses, um, or like set aside, you

know, a hundred minutes to sit and watch.

And I think what we have to do creatively is to drive that.

Experience, right, is to say you need to give it time and we're gonna try

and get, like, we're gonna try and show you a reason to be in that time.

And it's like, you know, tower for the event that it's documenting is so visceral

and the way that, you know, your kind of vision for what you wanted it to be

is so in the moment and so experiential.

And I think, you know, sort of, dare I say like, you know, loud

and immediate and immersive.

Right away.

Whereas like Fathom is such a quiet movie, it's like such a, the dynamic range

of, of silences and, and dynamic sound.

And so that's like requiring you to kind of like sit down and pay

attention in a totally different way.

And like same thing with Heather's, with where soldiers come from, which was really

the sort of second doc I ever worked on.

Like, she's such a verite filmmaker.

She, um, really makes herself a part of the lives of the

people that she's working with.

She's so in tune with their emotional and experiential lives and, you

know, it's okay, wait, hold on.

Let's go this way.

Let's go that way.

That it's just, you know, like ver tastes so different than.

You know, something with animation and archival heavy, something that

is, you know, sort of like big, kind of big screen meditation.

So those are all like different movies.

But I think again, we're trying to achieve excellence.

And so I think when we are discussing, especially, 'cause I always

say you're a maximalist, right?

It's like, what is the maximalism offering us?

Like what is the archival offering us?

What is the animation offering us?

I dunno.

I, I like to say I think we've been really successful at having it be

organic to the story, having it really have a relationship to what's going on

in the film and who we're documenting.

Having it, you know, be emotional and like all of that is important to me.

Like otherwise, you know, kind of what are we doing?

I love hearing you describe this.

It is also very much how you work.

Like it is not just like, this is how I. This is how I think

about a thing and I talk about a thing, but it doesn't necessarily

reflect the reality of the thing.

You're doing a very good job of capturing the reality.

Okay.

Let's of our experience, because you ask a lot of questions.

Obviously all producers have to ask directors questions to arrive at budget

numbers based on a production idea to, you know, collaborate on a plan to

figure out distribution and figure out.

You know, the out outlook of the project, but the questions that I am

challenged by when you ask, uh, that are exciting because they force answers

that I'm usually not quite ready for, but we need is, you know, like

the psychology of the, of the story.

Yeah.

I am a maximalist and I'm also a fairly gut level.

Yeah.

Like I'm driven by curiosity, but the curiosity is, is fed by my, or.

Lives in my gut.

Like I definitely can be like a, you know, big idea in the sense

of like whistleblowers, right?

But like, you're like, who is the person that is emotionally like we are hooking

us in and attaching us right away?

What is their experience that's doing that?

And I think that's, you know, you really distill an idea.

With that framework.

And I, to me, that's the gut part of it.

Yeah.

Well, it's the story I just realized, like I have to sit

around a campfire and tell a story.

Right?

And so we

both love the campfire.

Yeah.

That's really, but that is, that is literally what this is to me.

Right?

It's not a news report.

And that's the thing is, and that's why, and that's why I make that distinction

between journalism and the kind of filmmakers that we are, the kinda

filmmaking we do together because.

I do think if I'm critical of the documentary world, which it can be,

it's often that I think people fall too easily onto the journalism side

of like, lemme just tell you the who, what, when, where, and call that a film.

And to me, like I have such respect for the medium of visual storytelling that

is born out of an emotional reaction,

right?

And so I wanna make emotional reactions 'cause I wanna have emotional reactions,

I wanna share emotional reactions,

right?

And I wanna understand.

The who, what, where, and why through emotion.

Well, but also too, like I am equally offended by

inauthenticity and provocation.

Yeah.

Like when it's clear that something isn't.

An organic moment when it's clear that something is really set up, like it needs

to have a reason to be really set up.

I need to get something out of the artifice, like the ethics of how we're

presenting people, especially given their, like what they're offering to us, right?

Access to their inner lives.

And being respectful of that is also really important to me.

And I think that's a thing we also talk a lot about.

It still has to be ethical.

It still isn't just pro provocation only.

And I, that is a thing in filmmaking.

Like if there's anything in DOC that I really don't like, it's that, and

that's like, like I definitely have said no to projects where I'm just

like, this is just trying to be like a, to provoke people to a feeling.

And I don't, there's just so much of that in our world and

it doesn't create empathy.

And I, I, that's just not my thing.

Well, so much of the ethics, again, I, you know, Megan not only went to film school,

but she taught film school for many years.

I didn't go to to film school, but I've watched a lot of movies

and I've been working with movie people my entire adult life.

And I think the ethics of filmmaking are actually relatively straightforward.

Yeah.

And it's, I, it's kind of like the social contract that we have in almost all

aspects of our lives totally applies here.

Yeah.

So if you're gonna invite someone to your house, right, you make sure the bathroom's

clean and you have a snack on hand.

Totally.

And I, you know.

I know that we're on the same page when it comes to ethics, but at the same time,

we've also never tried to do a story that has like significant like gotcha elements.

A hundred percent, a hundred percent

either on camera with the subject matter, or really for the audience.

Like we're not trying to,

no.

To like pull the wool over anyone's eyes or like set up a false dichotomy

and then pull the rug on that.

Right.

I started out by asking you like, how would you describe what you do?

How do you describe the role of a nonfiction producer in 2025?

Well, we were just over pastry talking about like, why

does a movie need to exist?

Why does a story need to exist?

I think so many of us are overwhelmed by choice and while it's wonderful

to have access to, you know, decades worth of media to have a channel that's

like just the Golden Girls 24 7 or just Matlock 24 7, I think it makes

stories more disposable and I think that that, you know, breaks my brain.

A little bit in a way that I think I'm still kinda noodling on, but

also knowing that like there's just far less space for financing.

People don't wanna do theatrical for documentary.

And then you are thinking about like, how does the audience stay engaged?

I think we walked this way.

We did.

We came from that way.

We walked that way.

Came.

I think we'll try and go that way.

Check

it out.

So I think fi, you know, financing is hard.

There's a lot of consolidation.

There's not a lot of places that are financing because a lot of people have

been fired from the consolidation.

There's a lot of people trying not to be fired, which means, I don't know,

I think like a lot of meetings and not a lot of movies and, you know,

curation is the piece that's broken.

That's the part that's driving all the other backend stuff.

So that's why it's a music doc or a celebrity doc or a, you know, like

you have to, you know, you have to have like brilliant filmmaking

plus a branded topic plus like a reason to be with the branded topic.

Like, it's not even enough that it's a famous musician or a celebrity.

It has to be, you know, some other thing.

And while I really love, you know, the, the invite, the participation

of the folks who are giving their time to be in our films.

Um, in the way where like that, that is sort of the, one of the

hallmarks of respecting them.

I think a lot of the stuff where, you know, the family or the, you know,

participant, the subject has a much more of an editorial voice can often kind

of result in a lack of authenticity.

And that's a thing I think we have to kind of be mindful of

in the work that we're doing.

So.

It's, you know, it's, it's hard out there.

It's hard.

And I think all of us have to be thinking deeply about why we're

making what we're making and thinking deeply about who our partners are.

And I think participating in some level of advocacy to protect what we do,

like the stuff on PBS independent lens and POV, to lose that, to lose CPB.

Um.

I don't even think people understand how much that's been a backstop for

American filmmaking for such a long time.

I don't think people know how much that has supported all of us in our development

as filmmakers and the work that we make.

I don't think people understand it yet.

It's sort of like the best and the truest documentary filmmaking.

That we make as a country.

The reality is it is tough out there and financing's the hardest

and we've lost our backstop.

Right.

I totally agree with you that people don't realize, you know, like we both

started with ITVS, with PBS, we will have long relationships with them

if they continue to be there, right?

In one way or another.

But at the same time, we also got it started working at at budget

ranges that were above, right?

What ITVS and PBS.

So it really served an incredible purpose in that sense.

From our selfish point, from my selfish point of view, right.

Like helped get the ball rolling.

Inspired and then supported.

And then distributed.

Yes.

And then we stepped into a different realm, right.

And, and allowed space for other people to kind of keep into that system.

Right?

Totally.

Um, and I'd like to be back in the system.

I have nothing against it.

I'm not, believe me, I'm not too good for cpbs money or PBS's airwaves.

Um, well, and this is, you know, speaking of everything I do say to.

Filmmakers who were looking for distribution advice or people I talked to

in classes, you know, people want that.

You know, the Capital S streaming deal, the global streaming deal because that's

awards campaign and prestige and money.

But nobody's gonna see your movie more than when it's on PBS.

Like we got the carriage reports on tower and it was 2 million people

across multiple demographics.

And when we were so lucky, 'cause we were in this moment

where we could do theatrical.

And streaming and broadcast, and we had those rights divided, so we had great

champions in each of those spaces.

Like that really was like a kind of bonkers lucky moment where we were able to

negotiate that, you know, no one's gonna see your movie more than when it's on PBS.

Even now, you know, sometimes the most lucrative deal isn't the deal

that gets the movie into the world.

And we've really done a lot to manage that, that those kind of

sometimes conflicting forces.

Yeah.

Um, I think the other thing when I talk to people like I've been a

grim reaper on film festival panels for, you know, a dec over a decade.

Yes, true.

Like I've been telling people, I don't think I say the thing that

like actors say of like, if you can do anything else, get out.

But I think the piece of advice that was the piece of advice 10 years

ago has kind of come back around of like, are you doing commercials?

Are you doing branded documentaries?

Are you teaching?

Are you.

Like, what are the other things you're doing?

Because the road has gotten longer and the road, like there was this great moment,

whatever the quote unquote golden age, where you could, you could basically,

you know, be a mid-career person and make kind of a mid-career salary making docs.

Um, and they get out into the world and get seen.

And that moment, you know, that bubble burst real fast.

And in a way it's almost, I'm not gonna say worse than it was.

Before that kind of moment.

But I am gonna say that maybe there's more people who kind of

got through the gate than the gatekeeping that was at that time.

But it's not, it's not that much bigger.

The gate is not that much bigger.

And also too, it's like it's just a volume of projects.

They're all getting done out of the same place, which is kind of not unlike a thing

that PBS got dinged for a few years ago.

You know what I mean?

Like too homogenous, right?

Too homogenous, too much.

The same filmmakers.

Um.

But, but in the kind of non PBS space, you don't kind of get to call

out the companies for doing that 'cause they're private institutions.

Right.

Also too, I think because people watch docs, more people are less willing to

kind of give you themselves, or if they give you themselves, it isn't, you know,

like there's special people who are willing to give you access to themselves

and can really be genuine and kind of.

Comfortable in a way.

And part of that is what we do and part of that is sort

of their outlook on the world.

So, okay.

This is my favorite.

Oh, right here?

Yeah.

Oh, they're getting a delivery.

Do you live here?

Do you live

here?

Oh no, you're getting, yeah.

Okay.

Coming down.

Oh, homeowners coming down.

I've never met anyone who lives here.

Do you wanna say hi?

There's like a little like prayer.

Space right here.

Here.

Turn around on you.

Let me see you again.

No, you on the press the little button.

Yeah.

Here we go.

I love this.

It's the smell of these trees is part of it.

Can you see?

It's terrible.

Make your move.

Make your move somebody's house.

But I love this,

but it's just like it has these juniper trees.

And it just smell, it smells amazing.

I think you kind of can't get the smell quite right now, but

just like

the water feature, it's usually really quiet right here.

All right.

We're creeping on this house.

I know.

We really are creeping on this house.

I love going on a scout with you.

Um, okay, so you produced all these projects out of your home

in Austin in the years after finishing up at UT Grad School.

Mm-hmm.

You were a member for a,

oh wait, I wanna say a thing about that Please.

Because.

In the conversation you guys did with Paul?

Yes.

Ben was talking about a terrible review.

Megan is referencing, I believe, episode 19.

Don't hold me to that with Dr. Paul Steckler.

Dr. Paul Steckler.

So Ben was talking about his like end of year review and talking about

wanting to make Winnebago Man as a film and he, I forget which one

of you guys was like, name check.

The professor who thought it was a bad idea.

Uhoh,

and it was Colleen.

Colleen Smith.

And I have to say, not in the review, but at close to the end of my career

at ut, um, Colleen taught a class where she talked a lot about grammar.

Um, and it was a really amazing class.

And she's an amazing filmmaker, but so she just, oh, hello.

Lots of dogs with feelings in the neighborhood.

I know.

You're beautiful.

Okay, back to Colleen.

So I was sitting with Colleen.

I think, you know, we were probably giving notes on my thesis

film, which was a fiction film.

All the films I made in grad school were fiction projects.

And were you there at the

same time as Ben?

No, I was there before Ben was there.

Okay.

So Colleen just looked at me and she said, why aren't you a producer?

And because it's primarily a directing program, I, I think I was lucky to

be in the, my career in grad school to be able to hear, to receive that

comment or that question, but she was the person who knew to ask it, and

like, I've been meaning to reach out to her to be like, you know, that you.

It kind of changed my life with like asking that question, so, well, I wanna

dig into that moment.

So you're in grad school?

Yeah.

You are in a program that is teaching, you know, master of Fine Arts in filmmaking.

But like you said, it's a Director's pro program, right?

Right.

And your focus is fiction.

Mm-hmm.

And why do you think one day this professor Colleen, who I don't know,

did she, she say, you're a producer, or why aren't you a producer?

Why, why aren't you a producer?

Why did she say that?

Okay.

Well, many reasons.

I think number one, very immediately I started working on my fellow

students' work, like first as an ad, um, like I second Aded PJ Val's pre-the

film that had like 60 extras that I helped cast and I was like queuing

all of them in this one master shot.

And it was sort of.

You know, like I didn't go to the bathroom or drink a drink for eight or nine

consecutive hours and I knew every single person's name and I had the best time.

And it was so, it was so fun.

And then I went into like first ADing and then I don't know that I ever here, it's

gonna get loud, but let's go up pure.

Okay.

Just for fuzzies.

Sure.

And then I, I don't know that I ever.

Properly produced someone else's work.

I think I was a good producer of my own work.

Uh, definitely a better producer than a director of my own work, but I learned

a lot directing, like, I think it's really valuable to understand what

kinds of questions you need to know.

And actually, uh, Alex Smith, who was another professor at ut, he used to, I'm

gonna do the, the thing he used to do the, your job is what's in this space.

Right.

Like that's what your job is.

And I think as a producer, my job is sort of like what's in that space.

And then everything around behind that space.

For our listeners, I'm just gonna jump in here.

Megan was classically extending her forefinger from her thumb.

And by doing that with both hands and reversing one, she was creating

a 16 by nine picture frame.

Yes.

And looking through that frame, glowingly imagining a future.

It is how I assume everybody in Los Angeles walks around all the time

with those four fingers extended.

No, I think now they just walk around with their iPhones and not even with

those apps that like give you the 25 millimeter or the 35 millimeter.

You know, like, I mean like the first project I edited at ut, I edited

on a steam back and I f-ing love.

Editing on steam backs like this, the magic, it's like when you are, when

you're loading up a steam back and sometimes when you're in the avid you

just cut a slap a piece of music in there and you play it and it's like a

transcendent thing happens, or like right.

Two clips are next to each other and like a transcendent thing happens.

And like you have to be willing to receive that.

Like I always say, like, let the footage talk to you, like you hack to let.

The footage talked to you.

That's part of the authenticity.

Like you can't, you can't know everything that's, that

will be a fiction film, right.

So, and in a fiction film, it's so hard to know everything in some people's

processes to discover it and let accidents happen and some people's processes to

be, you know, Hitchcock level prepared.

That's what I think that maybe like, that's what I got out of.

For producing out of directing my own stuff.

Yes.

Right.

Was like that moment of being visited, like in that space, in PJ's Prothesis

film with the 45th extra when I was like, oh, I see the connective piece that's

happening with our main actors and I'm gonna send the kid in the foreground,

or I'm gonna send That's right.

The lady in the background.

I'm gonna like, the luggage has to cross frame right in this moment.

Anyway, I think I had all these experiences where I'm a creative

person, I'm a supportive person, I'm a nurturing person, but I like excellence.

And in addition to that, I love all of the FI financing and distribution.

Like I'm a geek for the the financing structure.

And I'm a geek for how you're gonna get the thing out in the world and

who the audience is and where they are, and how do you connect with

them and how do you meet them.

And that's, you know, speaking of a thing that's troubling to.

Everybody we know, like, you know, who doesn't know how

to connect to the audience.

Warner Brothers and Paramount, you know, they have billions of dollars

in marketing funds and they don't know how to reach the audience.

It's funny 'cause I, I have said, you know, there's a director kind of

crazy and a producer kind of crazy and I'm the producer, kind of crazy.

And that's all the things like the financing and the budget.

By the way, another thing I say is the budget tells a story.

Like my budgets tell a story and people, it's very hard for people to like.

Push in and be like, what about this and what about this?

And have me not have an answer.

And that's when I say like, the director has to understand what the vision is.

We have to agree on what it is because that's the only way to make a budget,

is to know clearly what the vision is.

So you can sort of make, sorry, like a, you're doing

Greek,

you can make like a series of numbers.

Anyone can do that.

Um, but, but when the budget tells a story, that's when people can really

be really confident to put, let's go.

We did also do the stretch.

That's okay.

Let's just go down this way.

We'll sort of say on the shady side, if we can

say in the shade,

um, the budget tells the story and that's when the financier

understands that they can get.

You're gonna take good care of their money.

Like that's important.

That, that's important to me.

Like everything is a risk.

Nothing is a, is a done deal.

So I, you know, walk into the meeting and say, do you wanna make fucking cinema?

Or do you not wanna make fucking cinema?

Right?

Like, we wanna make fucking cinema.

Do you wanna make fucking cinema with us?

Like, you might as well set the money on fire because again, all

these big companies don't have enough money to kind of like figure out

how to connect with the audience.

But like.

If you wanna make cinema and be proud of something that you made

and have it live on in some way in the world, like, let's do that.

Do you wanna make fucking cinema is the question I wanna ask?

Um, pretty sure that's gonna

be the name of the episode.

We, we could go this way.

We'll go across one more and then go up.

I wanna make cinema

right

and I want to figure out how to do things the old way, right?

Mm-hmm.

To make theatrical documentaries.

Yep.

Long tail lives that that impact people and that people who love fiction films

and don't see a lot of documentaries cross the aisle to kind of come see.

Yeah.

But I also wanna have a long career that is sustainable into the 21st

century and not just trying to maintain a 20th century point of view.

Correct.

It feels like everyone I talk to is either all in on one or all in the other.

On the other.

Yeah.

And you can't be,

and I don't wanna be even all in on one and like shrug into

the other because I have to.

Right.

I wanna figure out a way to have one foot in both and realize that like, oh,

this is actually a path and it's not.

It'll be shadier if we go across the street.

Okay.

So that's my question to you.

Yeah.

Is how,

how do you be solidly in both?

Well, how do I get this thing?

Okay, there we go.

Uh, that's my question to you is how, geez,

you're

really doing like a lot of workout.

know, I know.

Everyone always worries you.

Worries you about like working with dogs and kids and actually it's wide angle,

the lenses angle, what to look out for.

Exactly.

Okay.

So I wanna figure out how to have one foot.

In the old way.

Mm-hmm.

And you know, we're still always driving to, like cinema, making cinema.

We wanna present our work in Vista Vision, whatever that is.

Yeah.

But

although

not for no reason, I don't wanna shoot a wide format if there's no

wide shots in the fucking movie.

And I, there's a particular film that I feel I hate producing inefficiency,

and that's one where it's like a director who has a lot of power, like.

There is a decline of producing.

And to me it isn't about like, I don't like oppression on either side.

I like constructive conflict.

And if I were a producer and somebody, we made a plan to shoot on 70 millimeter

and somebody brought me the boards and there wasn't a wide shot, I'd

be like, but there's no fucking wide shot, so why are we doing 70 there?

35 will do these great mediums just fine.

And so I don't, I don't like that.

Sorry.

Uh, it's good to have an opinion, um, but I do wonder, right?

We're walking around with these little rinky d cameras, but my goal isn't

to make cinema out of podcasting.

Um, and it's not even really my goal to make cameras out of podcasting.

That's something Ben talked me into.

know.

Yeah.

You could see I'm having problems with her right now.

But how do you and I as collaborators

mm-hmm.

Look at the marketplace, look at the stories that we're excited to tell.

Yeah.

And find an audience in a 21st Century way.

Okay?

So find an audience.

As I said, still a multi-billion dollar project that no one has solved.

That's a big question, but dovetail to that.

So one of the reasons why I love the Princess Bride, right, it's, it was a book

written by William Goldman and that it became a movie written by William Goldman.

And the thing is, William Goldman is speaking of a person you and I align over.

He's a great novelist and he is a great screenwriter.

And the thing is, the book does things in.

Fiction storytelling that only a book can do.

And the movie does things in movie storytelling that only a movie can do,

and that is what's important about,

should we hit this alley?

Uh, well, we can, I think I wanna say there's one more street here.

Let's go on this alley.

And that is what's important.

I always interrupt at the pivot moments.

No,

no, it's okay.

And that is what's important.

A book can do what a book can do.

A movie can do what a movie can do, and that is what's important

and that's what's important about when we talk about collaborating in the

potential new media that we have access to is like, we talk a lot about this.

Is this a fiction film?

Is this a documentary?

Is this a podcast?

Is this.

A, is this an article?

Is this a short, is it a feature?

One of my classes at ut, it was all short filmmaking and I was like, stop watching

features for this year of your life.

Watch shorts.

And I made all my students present on a short that they love because it is an

entirely different filmmaking grammar.

You have to establish character and setting in the first 15 seconds of

a short if you want it to be good.

Like you are so good of like.

You know, not making work that is episodic, but understanding that you

have to kind of always be building and pivoting for the audience to

stay engaged in a feature story.

And the story itself has to have those layers.

It has to require that.

And more than one time I've been, you know, impossibly cruel.

Where I've walked out of a film festival screening and said, they only made

one mistake with this movie and it was that they should have made a short,

and that's not a nice thing to say, but stories that let the footage speak

to you, let the story speak to you.

Like a project I finished this year was a film called The Plea.

It is a short doc.

It's 24 minutes, but it's data visualizations and it's about the

eradication of smallpox and it's such an important story and it

became so much more political over the time that we were telling it.

Like in a way that I couldn't have anticipated.

And the filmmaker, the director who narrates the videos and he's

like a data visualization and graphics kind of expert, he.

Has 350,000 YouTube subscribers, and it's a movie I get choked up watching.

And it's really different than the work that you and I do together.

But it's speaking truth and beauty and positivity.

'cause it was a great human story that people came together across the

globe to spend the money and do the challenging effort to eradicate smallpox.

That is a disease that people don't die from.

And what that means is people don't understand why, how they

die from it, which by the way is sort of what fathoms about.

If you were to drop a humpback whale into the ocean.

Today and there were no other humpback whales, it would die because they like us.

They need the community.

You know, that's, that's how we live.

That's how we've evolved.

You just tied together your smallpox short, which I need to see and

fathom, which I love thematically.

Mm-hmm.

In that there's a story that you have found yourself telling one way

you hear this film and another way in this film, and I have a belief

that every, uh, filmmaker is telling.

The same story over and over again in one way or another.

Well, and I think Tower's about that.

I think, well,

yeah.

Okay.

Keep going.

Well, no, I think Tower is about the, it's about people who.

Reach out to each other.

Right?

We, we have such a zero sum society now.

I, I hate to say it, I'm like, we're not watching sitcoms where the

siblings fight and at the end they learn a lesson and they come together.

We are watching reality stars say, I'm not here for anybody but me.

And we have that kind of society now.

We have that president now, and the thing is, like the people

in tower again, I just get.

You know, goosebumps thinking about them.

There was community there, there was community on that day.

We've never done a screening.

I've never been to a screening where somebody didn't come up to

me afterwards and say my uncle was there, or my cousin was there.

I was there.

Or I was at another place where this happened.

I was at a grocery store that got locked down.

Yes.

My son went to Virginia Tech.

Yes.

You

know, or my daughter, uh, is a teacher at Columbine High School today, and,

and this is a part of their culture.

Whether they want it or not.

That's the thing is the film is about people caring for each other and doing

profoundly heroic work to save each other.

And I do think that that's us and I think it could be us.

And I think if we chase that in us, then.

Like, that's our purpose.

So, yeah, I don't know.

I think, uh, lovers of hate isn't quite about that.

Um, but it is about people who are not chasing that and, and, and how,

and how that fractures them, you know, to a degree in a, in a kind of

interesting and dark and funny way.

So, yeah, that's, I mean, I'm not one of those out for me people.

No.

For better or worse, I'm not.

This is a business of tangibles and intangibles, and if you're not

happy being paid in intangibles, you're in the wrong business.

Unfortunately.

Certainly

in docs.

Yeah, certainly in that work.

So I love that, that you've recognized that story in you.

When did you recognize that?

Like That's the thing is I'm not prolific.

I'm very hands-on in all the work that I do.

I struggle with that as an idea that I don't make a high volume of work, but

there's very little that's come out in the world where I have that like intense

jealousy of, I wish I'd made that.

Like I should have made that.

Like I'm super happy for those filmmakers who have made it.

And I love everything I've made and I try and chase that.

And so it's interesting because I don't know until just now that I

really articulated that as a theme, although it was certainly a theme

of the Dock Intens of this year.

We really talked about how we could build community, especially between career

filmmakers and emerging filmmakers.

Um, but, and I know that's a buzzword kind of everywhere.

Also, it's like the thing that keeps us alive, right?

It's like the surgeons general being like, you don't have

community, you're gonna die.

Alright, we are back.

This has been a Doc Walks.

First, Megan and I have been walking all around Atwater Village, but due to my

negligence of not charging the batteries on the camera, we ran outta battery.

Welcome back to Doc Walks.

We are not walking, we are zooming.

This is dock Zooms between Keith and Megan because when we were walking in thAtwater

Village, I forgot to charge the batteries on the camera and the batteries ran out.

So first,

safety fired.

Fired off the job.

Yeah, that's right.

Um, you'd think with the budget we have, we'd have.

Backups and contingencies.

But, uh, so we ended abruptly our, our walk and talk and it was lovely

and I was enjoying it immensely.

Um, same.

But now we're back together here on Zoom.

I'm just gonna hit you with some lightning round of questions that we'd like to

wrap up our episode with Lightning Round.

What is the Gateway drug film for you?

Megan, what was the film that you remember from your childhood?

Early days that said, I want to do that, or I want to go there, or I want

to be a person who makes a thing that does a thing that this thing did to me.

I mean, I've always been in love with the movies.

Uh, you know, as do many folks who know me that I have a lifelong obsession with

jaws, and I think Jaws is fantastic and.

In ninth grade, I wrote a paper that was after our reading of an

Enemy of the People by Henrik Ibsen.

And I did, the paper I did was a direct comparison of the Chappy fairy scene

that where the, the whatever mortician or the medical examiner says this

could have been a boating accident.

And 'cause the mayor says it should have been a boating accident, uh,

with a scene from Henrik Ibsen and.

Later, I was like, oh, this is like Peter Bentley's book.

And then it was Carl Gottlieb wrote the script.

And so I couldn't be right about this, but like literally 40 years later, Carl

Gottlieb was cleared as saying it was like a mix between Enemy of the People.

And then he quoted some Monster movie and I was like, all right, I like that.

You know, 14-year-old Meghan was hip too.

Gibson references and jaws, but all, I mean all kinds of movies.

It's hard to know when I tipped over into wanting to make movies.

I think two seminal ones that I consumed around the same period.

One was a doc and one was fiction.

Film was another movie.

You know, I'm obsessed with all that jazz.

Again, Roy Scheer, so keep the connection to Roy Scheer, brilliant in Jaws, also

brilliant as Bob Fosse in all that jazz.

If you've never seen it, you should see it.

It's some of the best editing.

So that's one of my all time favorites.

But then I also saw the life and times of Harvey Milk.

And I remember like via the IFC channel, which we all

kind of got to have access to.

I remember just like sitting on the floor of my living room sobbing watching

that movie 'cause it was so good.

And luckily I got to meet the filmmakers years later at Sundance.

But I think those were gateway drugs.

Although I will also out, I think it's Legends of the Fall.

That's one where Brad Pitt dies at the end 'cause he fights the bear.

Oiler alert.

Is it a river runs through it or Legend of the Fall.

Okay.

Maybe

it's a river run.

It's one of those two river runs through it.

Or Legends of the fall.

And I'll say it only because I remember being like, this is how

this scene should have been directed.

This was not actually well directed at the end.

And I was like, redirecting it.

And so I think that's it.

Sticked in my mind as kind

a river runs through it because Redford isn't around to take

your critique at this point.

I mean, you know, I, I love him.

All the President's men also a movie I'm obsessed with.

So his mil, uh, the sting.

Like his milieu, his, his OOM is one I'm very into, but whichever movie

it was that at the end where he, the bear attacks him in the woods, I

was like, this didn't totally land.

They could have done this better.

And I was redirecting it in my brain.

When you look at a project, what grabs you most about knowing as a

producer, I wanna sign on if a, if a director, if one of our listeners says.

That's the lady that's gonna help me get my idea across the finish line.

That's the lady whose voice I need in my ear.

What's gonna make you say yes to a project?

I mean, it, it isn't only one consideration.

It, it is.

The people making the movie life is too short.

Making movies is very intimate work.

I don't desire to spend time with terrible people who think treating

others in a bad way or manipulating other people is a way to work.

I don't feel that that's ethically right and that's not how I operate.

It has to be creatively excellent and inspiring.

'cause you have to wanna spend a lot of time with it, and that is hard to nail.

'cause I get distracted easily and it's a, it's a long road carving that marble.

So I love it to be creatively excellent where we're really like pushing

ourselves to do interesting things.

And all of it comes organically from the story.

It's not just us like throwing shit at it.

And I have to feel like I can fund it and we can sell it and people wanna watch it.

And that's the thing that's become so hard lately.

And so, on the one hand I don't want barriers to that to dictate.

The work that I wanna make, that I get inspired by and

people I wanna collaborate with.

But it has to be a consideration for me as the producer.

Yeah.

What we all know.

It's a tough time out there right now.

Tougher than it's ever been, maybe, or maybe just as tough as it's always been.

I'm not sure.

Um, but what is like a positive piece of encouragement you

can give somebody that, uh.

Is trying to decide whether or not they should make a documentary, um,

whether or not they should commit to taking their idea and, and, and

making it somebody else's problem.

I don't think it's harder than ever.

I think it's harder than it's been recently when a number of us, you know,

who fell in love with movies and came into this career thinking it's a career.

Um, I think it's challenging in that moment, but.

People know how to watch docs in a way that they never did before.

And people perceive docs to be right on par with their favorite fiction

films if it really turns them on.

And I think that's such an opportunity space.

So it's tricky because people were getting flooded with things that they

might wanna watch constantly, all day long on platforms that we could

never have imagined of 25 years ago.

But.

People know how to watch these stories now, and I think that is such an

exciting opportunity that you can come out of the gate with something

that you're passionate about, that you create in an, in an excellent

way, and people will be there for it.

People will, there's no barrier entry of like, oh, it's a

doc and I don't watch docs.

I, I think that has totally collapsed and it, that's such an opportunity.

Yeah.

Okay.

So lightning around here.

What's a doc that came out in the last 10 years that you wish you were a part of?

You know, this is actually a thing that I, I don't frequently

have the instinct, honestly.

I'm very picky about the work that I make and I usually, my instinct is I love that.

I'm so glad it came out.

And very rarely is it like.

Why, why that one slipped through my fingers or why didn't I make that

one a movie that really profoundly inspired me that I love the way that

they made it and I would've loved to be on it, is the reason I jumped.

Oh, which is a movie that very few people have seen because

it came out at Sundance 2020.

It is filmmaking excellence at Peak.

It is fantastic access.

It's great storytelling.

It is innovative in the sound design.

It's innovative in the way that they shot it.

And I tell people constantly to watch that movie because it's, it's

not, I don't think it's underrated.

I think people just dunno.

It exists and it's, it's,

give us the one-liner and what that one's about.

Um, the reason I jump is about children with profound autism who

mostly have nonverbal autism, and it is based on a book that was written

by a, a Japanese child with autism who basically dictated a book.

And so it's been translated, I think, into 40 languages and it's

just really gorgeous and really evocative, and it's great filmmaking.

I'm gonna have to see that.

When you first said the title, I was thinking you were talking about that movie

I, which I now realize is the bridge.

Which is,

oh, Uhhuh,

about the reasons people jump off of the Golden Gate Bridge.

And then there's also a Japanese book, a Japanese doc, about people who go

into like the suicide forests of Japan.

Yeah.

Uh, I haven't seen that one.

I want to see that one to whatever that one is.

Um, if you're listening and you know what that one is, let us know.

But if not, I feel

like that came out right after that movie that we saw the Silences movie, Uhhuh.

At the Dallas Film Festival.

I know.

I love, you know, I love a movie.

Which then

brings us to Sam Green's 32 Sounds and documentary that I still wanna make.

It's not even on our board, but it should be, which is all about vibration.

I wanna do a documentary that's all about vibration.

Will you do that with me?

Yeah.

Let's go Stand outside during a parade and feel those like snare

drums, shake you as a child.

That's a great opening scene.

Megan Gilbert, I can talk to you for hours.

I actually have talked to you for hours already today and we'll probably

talk to you for more hours tomorrow.

But for our listeners, is there anything that you want to leave us

with or is any ideas that we didn't get into or anything you wish we had

talked about or anything we should plan to talk about on the next episode or

just do you have any parting words?

I don't know that I have parting words.

I think like go to church, you know what I mean?

Watch movies, like that'll really.

And when I say I go to church, I mean watch movies, like watch movies in a

silo, in a place where you can sit down and have an experience if you can do

that with other people in the room.

Oh, okay.

Sorry.

Another one I wanna mention is, um, the New York Export Opus Jazz.

I had a great in 2010, I had some really phenomenal festival experiences and

South by programmed a couple of movies I really loved that like you could kind

of only see in the festival circuit.

And that was one where I kind of went to church, New York, export

Opus Jazz is again one of the best shot movies you'll ever see.

Totally gorgeous.

So like, you know, listen to this and then hang up and find a movie

that somebody told you was great.

And just sit down and give it all your attention.

If you haven't seen Megan's work.

Go check out dear Mr. Brody.

Check out Tower.

Definitely check out Fathom.

It's up on Apple.

And tell us about the smallpox film and where, where the feature that that has.

Oh,

yeah.

Um, the plea, it's, uh, it's on YouTube so anyone can watch it.

Right now it's 24 minutes and the, the director's name is Neil Hallin.

So you can look for Neil and the plea on.

Great.

And we're gonna actually put the link to that in our show notes of this episode.

So, um, you can go watch the plea and you can look forward to another time when

Megan and I will walk together again.

Maybe Ben will join us on that one.

Um, and uh, I think we did it.

We did it

well, thank you so much.

Thank you so much.

I will talk to you soon.

Take care.

All right, thanks.

Talk walks.

Next time on talk Walks.

We are going for a walk, Ben.

No way, Keith.

Yeah, let's do it.

Uh, let's do it with, uh.

The one, the only, the hardworking.

Chelsea Hernandez.

Next time on Doc Walks is Chelsea Hernandez.

She's a, she's an Austin filmmaker.

She's a director, she's an editor.

She's a member of the Brown Girls Doc Mafia.

She got her start in PBS.

We have

collaborated together before, so, uh, she's got a lot to, to tell us, and, uh,

she's got a lot of irons in the fire.

Tune in next time in dog Walks for Chelsea Hernandez.

Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.

And Doc Walks is

produced, directed, and edited by me, Keith Maitland, and this guy Ben Steiner.

Hello.

And we also have Dayton Thompson, our co-producer, and then we

have an army of interns helping us at Go Valley, and we have our

friends at the Bear helping us out.

We hope we have you guys listening.

Are you there?

Is this thing on?

Not anymore.