5 Questions with Jessie Barr and Lena Hudson
Jessie Barr (left), Lena Hudson (right)
“Too Long at the Fair,” directed by and starring Jessie Barr and Lena Hudson, follows two best friend on an adventurous day getting to know a recent divorcee. At once charming and penetrating, the film is a wonderful showcase for Barr and Hudson — we asked them how the project began, balancing tones, and what was the hardest scene to pull off…
1) Can you talk briefly about your backgrounds, and how you first got interested in filmmaking?
Jessie: As a little kid I was obsessed with dress up, make believe and play. I’d write, choreograph and direct shows for me and my cousins to perform at family gatherings. I studied ballet, sang in operas and was obsessed with Shakespeare. I was weird. I went to NYU Tisch, where Lena and I met, making theater together. I studied drama and English and American Lit there. My life long dream was to be a broadway actress in musicals and film never really seemed like a possibility to me. I think film and TV always felt like a world that was out of reach. What is “Hollywood?” Theater I could make with no money in a basement in Bushwick with my friends. Film felt more elusive to me. But meeting my husband, Tom O’Brien, who had made two independent films when we met, opened my eyes to the world of independent cinema. Discovering independent film changed my life. I learned about Cassavetes, I learned about Mumblecore and I started to question why I didn’t know about many women directors. I started researching and watching and reading and talking with friends and was introduced to Ida Lupino, Nicole Holofcener, Věra Chytilová, Lynn Shelton, Julie Dash, Agnès Varda, Andrea Arnold, Lynne Ramsay, Carla Simon, Alice Rohrwacher, Dee Rees, Sarah Polley, and many others. I learned about independent film! It was thrilling! People just making films as best they could with what they had. My first on-camera experience besides a Law & Order episode was this web series that my husband and I made together called OM CITY. The series was inspired by our lives as yoga teachers in NYC. Acting, writing, producing, scouting, kickstarting, casting (Lena is in two episodes and she’s amazing) and bringing that world to life felt like I had finally found what I wanted to do. I could channel all my skills and instincts and love into filmmaking.
Lena: I started out as an actor, doing lots of weird downtown theater. This was my first film! And actually the first time I had ever written anything for myself. I think I was really prompted by wanting to make something where I was in charge (or co-charge) of what was being said and what was being put out into the world.
2) What’s the origin story here - what was the first element you had in place, and then how did you go about building up from that?
Lena: We knew we wanted to use our real life friendship as a jumping off point and that the leads would be best friends. One of the first story elements we had in place was actually the princess party idea. We have both worked a lot of weird jobs to stay afloat and there was something about the way that gig blends the fantastical with the mundane felt very cinematic. Then we worked the set up of the transaction in there. It felt weirdly right for them to be dressed as princesses while being propositioned. Watching those two fantasies collide felt really interesting to us.
Jessie: I think the first element was Lena and I drawing from the truth of where we were emotionally at that time. I’d just moved to LA from NYC and we really missed creating together. We wanted to work together and play characters that we’d never played and that we’d enjoy digging into as actors. We wanted to take control of our creative destiny. We were also both grappling with this transition from girlhood to womanhood or adulthood and struggling with this feeling of groundlessness that comes from confronting the questions: when are you too old to be “the clown”, to play with abandon, to follow your bliss or seek out fantasy? What happens when reality and fantasy crash into each other? We’ve always been drawn to clowns and played them and identified more with their child-like optimism and openness than the perfect pretty princesses so the film started to expand from there.
3) I love the mix of tones - it’s funny and lighthearted, but then it starts going deep with the chats about divorce and sexual fantasies. Can you discuss the challenge in shifting tones, and what was the hardest scene to get right? In the editing process, was there a period when it wasn’t quite gelling. If so, what did you do to work it out?
Jessie: We always knew it was a risk to set up the audience’s expectations and then to subvert them but having the first half of the film feel tonally like we are in one space and then to take a deep dive in that living room scene. But that is what we really felt the film needed and what we were most interested by. We tried to be very truthful and play everything truthfully, the comedy, the absurdity and the vulnerability. The most challenging process in the edit was when we realized we didn’t have time to include a lot of set up and we had more footage initially that made the film feel a bit unclear or unspecific. Because you have so little time in a short, it really is just about a set up and a pay off, otherwise it’s confusing for an audience or ends up feeling general or like you’re trying to fit a feature film’s worth of themes and story into a few minutes. You don’t have time to develop every nuance and thread so you really have to pick your most compelling moments and cut so that everything builds to and nourishes that.
Lena: The big scene between Chris and Jessie and I was definitely the toughest. We played around with the pacing and tone a lot in the both writing and the edit. I think we discovered that it really needed to be a slow burn, you don't want to be too eeked out too quickly. It hopefully feels like we pull the rug out from under you bit-by-bit, and we're not quite sure how we got there (both for the characters and the audience). Also, we received several notes during the edit where people were pushing us to shoot the scene in the bedroom that you don't see, and we ultimately felt very strongly that we didn't want to. It's not about the act, it's about what it does to them after. I also personally think that what the audience can imagine is gonna be way weirder than what we could ever show.
4) Also, you’re both such great actors. What was the prep process for you on the acting front? And how was the general process filming, in terms of how many takes you did / how much if any improv, ad-libbing?
Lena: Ah thank you! One thing I discovered during this process was how much writing is like acting. You need to be thinking about action and intention and character all the time. So once we got to the point where we were on our feet, I felt like so much of it was already there from doing the work as writers.
Jessie: Thank you for that! Because Lena and I had worked together for such a long time making theater we felt very connected and trusted each other as actors. We had spent so much time working through the script, rehearsing and talking about the characters and their relationship so once we were on set the preparation and work was underneath, it was there and we could just listen and respond and be present with each other and what was happening. Honestly I have no recollection of how many takes we did! Not many! We had to move so quickly and barely could watch play back but we trusted each other and knew what we wanted. Chris Messina who plays “Lee” in the film is incredible and had just come off of shooting “Sharp Objects” with Amy Adams so he was so in the flow that it made it a pleasure to work together. He’s such a generous actor. We did a lot of improving to get us into scenes or improving out of scenes. Some of the lines we ended up saying in slightly different ways that felt more natural when it came out but all in all we did keep closely to the script.
5) What’s a film you’ve seen recently, new or old, that you really loved and why?
Jessie: I just watched Alma Har’el’s “Love True” the other day and it really blew me away. Her style and that blurring of the line between documentary and narrative I’m so obsessed with. I watch so many docs and this particular integration was stunning to me. I was so inspired. It felt like a tone poem, a fever dream, a doc and drama therapy all at once. It’s exciting to be reminded how freeing the medium of film can be and how much you can explore the medium.
Lena: This might be cheating, but I re-watched Kelly Reichardt's River of Grass recently and, it's just one of my favorites. It so weird and sad and funny, and the way she plays with genre is just so damn smart. She's also someone who I think about a lot when I'm feeling low creatively because it took her like, 8 (?) years to get another movie made after that, which I find so fucking insane and if she can make it through that, then I can make it through whatever the hell I have going on.
Bonus Question) What’s next for you?
Lena: Currently producing the feature, Plagiarist, starring Jay Duplass and the First Lady of NoBudge, Kate Lyn Sheil. Also, forever developing my solo show, a clown cabaret called, Showwomanship.
Jessie: Lena and I are working on turning “Too Long at the Fair” into a series and right now I’m in post for my first feature film, a coming of age drama called, “Sophie Jones.” Making “Too Long at the Fair” got me so lit up about directing and I realized that this is absolutely what I have to do for the rest of my life. I’m completely in my joy directing and making films and I’m excited for what’s to come.
Contact Info:
Official Site / www.tlatfmovie.com
Instagram / www.instagram.com/tlatfmovie/
Twitter / www.twitter.com/tlatfmovie
Facebook / www.facebook.com/tlatfmovie
imdb / https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5669378/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Jessie Barr
IG: @barrjessie
Facebook / https://www.facebook.com/jessie.barr.739
Twitter / https://twitter.com/BarrJessie
Lena Hudson
IG: @lenahudson
facebook / https://www.facebook.com/lena.hudson.792