It's been three years since Wendy Jo Carlton directed Sharon Gless playing a lesbian (a dream of the lady queer community for decades) in Hannah Free, the movie adaptation of the award-winning play by Claudia Allen. Windy City Media Group Publisher Tracy Baim was an executive producer of the film.
However, after the critical success of Hannah Free, a lesbian romantic drama with an emphasis on the drama, Carlton decided to work on something much lighter in tone. To that end, she penned a romantic comedycomplete with songs (written in collaboration with Stephanie Vlcek). The result, which like Hannah Free, was shot here with Chicago actors and crewmembers, is the charming Jamie and Jessie are Not Together.
The movie tracks the period in which Jamie announces to roommate Jessie (who harbors a secret crush on her) that she's leaving Chicago and moving to New York to try her luck on the Broadway stage. Before she leaves should Jessie let Jamie know her true feelings? As friends and lovers weigh in with their observant, sometimes hilarious opinions (often in song), the possibility of a new love interest for Jessie also begins to cloud the picture as the moving deadline approaches.
Jamie and Jessie has been touring the festival circuit to responsive audiences and good reviews (AfterEllen dubbed it "A pop confection with surprising depth") since June and now the movie will have its hometown premiere at the Gene Siskel Film Center, 164 N. State, on Oct. 28. The openly queer Carlton enthusiastically chatted about her latest "baby" in an exclusive interview with Windy City Times.
Windy City Times: I'm going to guess that the movie is slightly autobiographical?
Wendy Jo Carlton: I think the genesis for the story comes from several different worlds. One would be my own experience falling in love with a good friend when I was youngerit being an ill-fated love affair; something that wasn't going to work out.
Also, I think being a lesbian woman in our culture was interesting to examine. You can see two women together in our heteronormative culture and you could assume what's actually a lesbian couple are just close friends as much as in the queer community, the subculture, you might think two women together are lovers but they're actually just friends. It goes both ways, depending on whose eyes are looking at you. I think that's inherent in the queer culture I traffic in and I wanted to tell a story about that moving, gray line of intimacy versus lust versus romance versus the kind of love that lasts for years and potentially forever if you're just close friends.
I think especially in the queer girl community, in my experience, there can be a lot of emotional and political problems because of that gray, moving line of intimacy and love versus lust. For example, many lesbians are friends with their ex-loversnot everybody and not all loversbut it's pretty common. And I think that's less so in mainstream, straight culture.
WCT: And in queer male culture. You know when I came to that early test screening and I was the honorary lesbian [laughs] in that screening room I went through that entire movie thinking that Jamie and Jessie were lovers who were breaking up because that's how I saw it from my "guy" perspective. You remember how all the women were like, "What planet are you from?" [Laughs] when I was shocked to find that they were just friends?
WJC: [Laughing hard] Yes, I remember.
WCT: It just is hard for guys to "get that," I thinkgay or straight. Guys jump the bones and move on. [Laughs] They don't stick around to be friends afterwards. Oh, I can't believe I said that. I'm going to get hell for that.
WJC: [Laughs] Yesand the fact is, you're not always jumping the bones. Often, it's that you used to jump the bones and now the relationship has moved into a deeper, more relaxed friendship and for whatever reason, the romance or sex affair didn't last. I'm interested in those stories; I'm interested in the complexity of love affairs and I'm interested in telling this story which is one of confusion.
WCT: In addition to playing out this delightful story you add this cool, unpredictable twist with songs which come out of the bluestarting with the song in the coffee shop in which Jessie starts singing to her coworker soliciting advice and ends up getting some from all her regulars. It's a Glee-like moment.
WJC: I think for me, incorporating musical numbers into this romantic comedy, this drama, this love story, was something I've always wanted to do in a feature film and I think they serve to entertain on a superficial level but on a deeper level, it gives both the characters and the audience a chance to "cleanse their palates" with these songs in a more creative, honest way. You can be more honest when you're singing often. That's why music is obviously such a universal thing in the world in general. So I just wanted to incorporate that tone into the movie. People really get a kick out of the gay Greek chorus that I put in.
WCT: Yesthey're fun. The Luden's Cough Drops brothers, with their long beards...
WJC: Yes! [Laughs] They're the onlookers who comment on the actionour gay bear Greek chorus. In my mind those two characters know the higher, transcendent love that everyone's looking for. They're like angels that can't get too involved.
WCT: Was there a film that inspired you to do this kind of hybrid? I don't know that I've seen a lesbian romantic comedy with musical numbers before.
WJC: I honestly haven't seen one eitherin all the 20 years I've been making films and shorts and I do feel, arguably, that this is the first lesbian musical. But I put a caveat to that because I see it as a love story comedy with musical numbers. I didn't set out to make a feature length musical per se. It's a hybrid for sure.
WCT: What's been the reaction to your combining these disparate movie genres from screening audiences?
WJC: When people haven't seen it there might be some resistance if an audience doesn't quote unquote care for musicals and they're seeing that word used. But it's not a typical musical by any means.
WCT: The approach reminded me a bit of Once, where it's more of a dramedy with musical numbers. The songs seemed to function more as musical interior monologues in a sense. Does that resonate with you at all?
WJC: That's a great comparisonespecially because I love that movie and think it's very original with great characters so, thanks, I don't mind that reference at all [Laughs].
WCT: This movie was shot with a Chicago cast and in and around Chicago. So, for nascent local filmmakers, can you talk about the nuts and bolts of putting something like this together? Is it creatively and financially viable? Can you make a living doing this?
WJC: Boy that's a lot. [Laughs] I've been making films for 20-some years so I'm not new at this. This being my second feature-length film as a director, having learned a lot from the Hannah Free experience and then, I've made 20 short films in different genres so I'm used to playing with different approaches; different lengths; so I'm used to following the muse and I trust my gut and my creative attractions and interests.
A film is a collaborative experience and you need to get the right people around you who share in your vision and hopefully, you like each other as people so you can have a rapport. With this film I was anxious to make a film with lesbians and women characters as protagonists that was not about death, not about coming out, not about the melodrama of someone cheating on someone. I wanted to go further into my own experience and things I'm interested in. Unrequited love for example. This is something that will resonate far beyond the lesbian audience.
WCT: Yesthe movie certainly touches on universal themes. I'm glad you mention that because there's a movie playing around town called Circumstance that is very clearly a budding lesbian romance and that element has been downplayed in both the trailer and synopses for the filmit's been very "coded" and I'm guessing that's in an effort to get mainstream audiences to give the movie a try.
This is, I would imagine from a bottom line point, a tough conundrum when it comes to marketing a movie. Did you hesitate about tagging your film with the "lesbian" label? Was that thought about; discussed?
WJC: Yes, I've thought about the branding, so to speak, of the movie and the impression it makes when someone watches the trailer or reads the synopsis on the website or whatnot or in a film festival catalogue. I don't have control over the latterhow they tend to segregate. Some go as far as using little icons that designate the movies "for women" and "for men" and I feel like that's pretty condescending and so limiting and also, ironic. We can all read the synopsis; I don't need an icon to tell me that segregation within my own queer community.
WCT: It's that opening scene from Yentl"Sacred books for men, storybooks for women."
WJC: [Laughs] Yes, that's it, exactly. I mean, we're already queer; not part of the mainstream. I don't need the queer film festival to make suggestions for me.
WCT: But the flip side of that is that audiences often want to be told; theywedo seem to crave that in culture these days.
WJC: Also truebut that's a bigger subject, isn't it? [Laughs]
WCT: Which we'll save for another day. May I just finish by saying that there are characters and themes in Jamie and Jessie are Not Together that will appeal to audiences of all sexes?
WJC: Absolutely. I would just like to add that I have a lot of thoughts, insights and opinions and, to be honest, uncertainties around labeling and the marketing of queer films and in particular my film, now that it's done and going to be seen. The primary audience is obviously a niche audiencequeer women and men, but I want it to also be entertaining and universal enough to, as you said, appeal to audiences of all genders. I certainly want to encourage everyone to come out and support our Chicago premiere (at the Gene Siskel Film Center Friday, Oct. 28). I'll be there along with a lot of my cast and crew.
See www.jamieandjessie.com .