Barbara Kopple

Interviews

Gregory Brown

• Publisher: University Press of Mississippi
• Year: 2015
• eBook ISBN: 9781626745698
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Film & Video

With a career spanning more than forty years, Barbara Kopple (b. 1946) long ago established herself as one of the most prolific and award-winning American filmmakers of her generation. Her projects have ranged from labor union documentaries to fictional feature films to an educational series for kids on the Disney Channel. Through it all, Kopple has generously made herself available for a great many print and broadcast interviews. The most revealing and illuminating of these are brought together in this collection.Here, Kopple explains her near-constant struggles to raise money (usually while her films are already in production) and the hardships arising from throwing her own money into such projects. She makes clear the tensions between biases, objectivity, and fairness in her films. Her interviewers raise fundamental questions. What is the relationship between real people in documentaries and characters in fictional films? Why does she embrace a cinéma vérité style in some films but not others? Why does she seem to support gun ownership in Harlan County, U.S.A., only to take a decidedly more neutral view of the issue in her film Gun Fight?Kopple's concern for people facing crises is undeniable. So is the affection she has for her more famous subjects--Woody Allen playing a series of European jazz concerts, Gregory Peck on tour, and the Dixie Chicks losing a fan base but making a fresh start.

Filmography

As Director—Films

WINTER SOLDIER (1972)

Debuted at the 1972 Cannes Film Festival; released in Beta SP and Digi-Beta, on DVD April 2006 by Milliarium Zero

Director: Winterfilm Collective, i.e., Fred Aranow, Nancy Baker, Joe

Bangert, Rhetta Barron, Robert Fiore, David Gillis, David Grubin, Jeff

Holstein, Barbara Jarvis, Al Kaupas, Barbara Kopple, Mark Lenix, Michael Lesser, Lee Osborne, Lucy Massie Phenix, Roger Phenix, Benay Rubenstein, Nancy Miller Saunders, Michael Weil

Cast: John Kerry, Scott Camil, Rusty Sachs, Ken Campbell, Vietnam

Veterans Against the War

16 mm, b&w and color, 95 minutes

HARLAN COUNTY, U.S.A. (documentary) (1976)

Premiered New York Film Festival Oct. 15, 1976, Almi Cinema 5 Distributing; aired on PBS 1978; rereleased Criterion Collection DVD 2006

Producer: Barbara Kopple

Director: Barbara Kopple

Associate Director: Anne Lewis

Cinematography: Hart Perry (principal cinematographer), Kevin Keating

Sound Recordist: Barbara Kopple

Editing: Nancy Baker (director of editing), Mary Lampson, Josh

Waletsky (sound editor)

Music: Hazel Dickens (score), Merle Travis (score), Nimrod Workman, Sarah Gunnings, Florence Reese

16 mm, 103 minutes

NO NUKES: THE MUSE CONCERTS (1980)

Distributed by Warner Bros.; MGM/CBS Home Video 1981

Executive Producer: Sam Lovejoy

Producer: Julian Schlossberg, Danny Goldberg

Director: Danny Goldberg, Julian Schlossberg, Anthony Potenza

Documentary Footage Director: Barbara Kopple, Haskell Wexler

Cast: Jackson Browne, David Crosby, The Doobie Brothers, John Hall, Graham Nash, Bonnie Raitt, Gil Scott-Heron, Carly Simon, Bruce

Springsteen, Stephen Stills, James Taylor, Jesse Colin Young

103 minutes

OUT OF DARKNESS: THE MINE WORKERS’ STORY (documentary) (1990)

Released on VHS 1990; available on DVD

Executive Producer: John Duray, Greg Hawthorne

Producer: Gene Carroll

Associate Producer: Dena Mermelstein, Shelly Silver, James Green

Field Producer: Gene Carroll, Barbara Kopple, Gary Fritz, John Duray

Director: Barbara Kopple, Bill Davis

Associate Director: Darryl Orr

Writer: Gene Carroll, John Duray, James Green

Cinematography: Gary Fritz, Kevin Keating, Mathieu Roberts, Mark Hay, Phil Parmet, Richard Chisolm, Jim Morrisette

Sound Recording: Gary Fritz, Mark Hay, Brian Hoffert, Richard Pooler, William Porter, Thomas Szabolcs, Brian Tooke, Dennis Towns

Main Title Design: Joanne Flaherty, Cathe Ishino; Computer Graphics: Shaun Pritchard

Editing: Bill Davis, Shelly Silver, Stefan Bruck

Music: Tom Juravich (performer), Michael Aharon (score)

Best Breaker Boys: Nicolas Kopple-Perry, Russell B. Ginsberg-Davis, David Massimo-Duray

Color with b&w sequences, 100 minutes

AMERICAN DREAM (documentary) (1990)

Released March 18, 1992, distributed by Prestige: A Division of Miramax Films

Producer: Barbara Kopple, Arthur Cohn

Associate Producer: Ernest Hood, Jonathan House, Molly Ornati, Gail Rosenschein, William Susman

Director: Barbara Kopple

Cinematography: Peter Gilbert, Kevin Keating, Hart Perry, Mark T.

Petersson, Mathieu Roberts,

Sound Recordist: Barbara Kopple

Title Design: Cathe Ishino

Editing and Co-Director: Cathy Caplan, Lawrence Silk, Tom Haneke

Music: Michael Small (score), Sylvia Reed (coordinator)

Best Boy: Nicolas Kopple-Perry

Cast: Lewie Anderson, Ray Rogers, Jesse Jackson (among others)

16 mm, 98 minutes

BEYOND JFK: THE QUESTION OF CONSPIRACY (documentary) (1992)

Distributed by Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Group

Executive Producer: Danny Schechter, Rory O’Connor

Senior Producer: Stuart Sender; Supervising Producer: Gwynne Thomas

Director: Danny Schechter with Barbara Kopple

Writer: Danny Schechter

Cinematography: Kevin McCafferty, John Hanlon, Henry Zinman, Dasal Banks, Gary Griffin, Leigh Wilson, Bill Starling, J. Rolan Barry Audio: Gary McCafferty, Gene Huelsman, David Jamal Banks, Edna Snow, John Collins, Karl Suchman, Tom Richards, J. Rolan Barry

Design: Cathe Ishino

Editing: Bruce Follmer (supervising editor)

Music: Christopher Burke (original music)

Cast/Interviewees: Kevin Costner, Jim Garrison, Oliver Stone, Gary Oldman

Narrator: Ike Pappas

90 minutes

PRISONERS OF HOPE: ROBBEN ISLAND REUNION (documentary) (1995)

Released by Videovision Entertainment

Producer: Anant Singh

Director: Danny Schechter

Co-Director: Barbara Kopple (for Robben Island), Ken Kaplan (for Johannesburg)

Cinematography: Craig Matthews, Peter Baker, Shafiek Cassim

Sound: Simon Rice, Pierre Rommelaere, Chevan Rayson

Art Direction: Wynand Posthumus (titles), Rosalind Lurie (title design)

Editing: Henion Han

Cast: Gcina Mhlophe (narrator)

60 minutes

PRESIDENTS’ SUMMIT FOR AMERICA’S FUTURE: PRESIDENT’S SERVICE AWARD (documentary) (1997)

Segment Producer and Director: Barbara Kopple

WILD MAN BLUES (documentary) (1997)

Released April 17, 1998, distributed by Fine Line Features

Producer: Barbara Kopple, Jean Doumanian

Associate Producer: Kathleen Bambrick Meier

Executive Producer: J. E. Beaucaire

Director: Barbara Kopple

Cinematography: Tom Hurwitz

Sound: Barbara Kopple, Peter Miller

Editing: Lawrence Silk

Music: Eddy Davis, Woody Allen, Dan Barrett, Simon Wettenhall, John Gill, Cynthia Sayer, Greg Cohen; also music by Nino Rota performed by the Czech Symphony Orchestra

Cast: Woody Allen (Himself), Soon-Yi Previn, Letty Aronson (Herself—Woody Allen’s Sister), other family, t...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Introduction
• Chronology
• Filmography
• Barbara Kopple Interview: Making Harlan County, U.S.A.
• The Making of Harlan County, U.S.A.: An Interview with Barbara Kopple
• Filming in Harlan: Interview with Barbara Kopple and Hart Perry
• Interview with Barbara Kopple (on Harlan County, U.S.A.)
• American Dream: An Interview with Barbara Kopple
• Barbara Kopple
• Filmmaker’s Knockout Punch
• Stand Up and Do Something: Barbara Kopple Speaks with Lisa Lincoln
• Woody Captured on the Spot, without a Script
• Woody Allen’s “Wild” Concerts: Filmmaker Blows Own Horn on His European Jazz Tour
• Scene One: Something about Barbara
• Living for the City: Barbara Kopple
• Free Love, Commercialism, and Violence: Oscar-Winning Documentarian Barbara Kopple Explores Three Generations of Woodstock
• Documentary Filmmaker Barbara Kopple Discusses Summer in the Hamptons, as Shown in Her New Miniseries for ABC
• Kopple on Audience Appreciation
• Barbara Kopple
• Tales from the Front: A Conversation with Documentarian Barbara Kopple
• Women Who Witness War: Female Correspondents in Iraq Are Subject of Documentary
• Indiewire Interview: Barbara Kopple, Co-Director of Shut Up & Sing
• Spirit in the Dark: Barbara Kopple on Filming the Group That Wouldn’t Shut Up & Sing
• Crossing Lines: Barbara Kopple
• Barbara Kopple’s Shortlist
• Woodstock Never Dies
• 2010 IDA Career Achievement Award—The Magic of Being There: Barbara Kopple and the Subject-Filmmaker Relationship
• Exclusive: Barbara Kopple Talks HBO Gun Control Doc, Gun Fight: “Reason Is Lost”
• Barbara Kopple on Gun Rights, Freedom of Speech, and Virginia Tech
• Full Frame Day 2: Barbara Kopple and Guns
• Shut Up & Sing: On Accidental Political Activists
• Filmmaker Barbara Kopple on Running from Crazy and the Burden of Legacy
• Additional Resources
• Index