Honeydripper, a film by John Sayles

This update is so overdue.

All summer I was all about Toronto. I’m so grateful to South by Southwest and Now Magazine for sponsoring the band, promoting HONEYDRIPPER and for working with Cameron to make a great party. Then Toronto happened and it was everything we wanted it to be.

We were thrilled with the response to the movie at that first screening. People win prizes, but there is also value in a detail: when I tell people that that audience clapped along with the end credits song and then gave our cast a standing ovation, they get it.

The NOW party was perfect. I wish we could replicate it everywhere we go. Intimate, but roomy, plenty of food and drink, all easy to get to. Danny joined the team that night, onstage with the young cast and the old musicians, and then at the NOW party where he was safe and comfortable. I was surprised when he showed up at the Planet Africa party, but I shouldn’t have been since it was such a good groove.

The next day was really fun for me, hanging out in the NOW Lounge in the daytime after enjoying the rooftop. It was exciting for me to hear that NOW is officially pro-HONEYDRIPPER, and I’m excited for Gary that he might be on the cover of NOW. He had a fabulous time. John says he thinks Gary might get a full night of sleep after he’s 25.

We were barely home before we did the IFP seminars in NY and the next day had our New York IFP screening. It was good to show it to young filmmakers, and lots of friends and my parents came to the screening and the party which was in a nice old former church/former disco on 57^th St.

Four days later we flew to San Francisco and then drove through that miserable Steinbeck valley into the coastal paradise of Monterey. What a pretty place! Gary was in love with it the first day, especially because his Austin allergies disappeared. He couldn’t get enough of the ocean view. He won’t be long for Austin after these travels. It was rainy, really rainy until just before the Honeydripper All-Stars started playing on the Garden Stage. A great audience of “music lovers” as the Los Lobos guys called them from the big stage. Eddie Shaw is famous and beloved in that world and there were John Sayles fans too. We were backstage chatting with a couple of staffers a little younger than we are, big fans of the movies. They asked how many of John’s movies I had produced and when I heard myself saying “13 of the 16”, I was impressed with the sound of it. Mable sang well and enjoyed having her SF family around. The band was happy to be together again and even Tim Bernett who gets all the headaches of herding these cats was a little wistful, not knowing when they’d be gathered again. We talked with him about a reduced unit Band, and he agreed: we’ll start trying smaller combinations and do the full Honeydripper All-Stars only when the budget allows.

The next day we hung around the Festival and ate more good food before the Conversation with Clint Eastwood and John Sayles about using music in their movies. It was well moderated by a Seattle music writer Paul DeBarros who had selected good clips illustrating the work. He stayed out of the way and Clint was relaxed and curious and respectful of John and John enjoyed himself. It was taped and we’ll have it up on Youtube and our site soon.

The next day after a visit to the fabulous Monterey Aquarium (Paula’s favorite) we drove with Gary back to SFO for the flight from there to London, en route to Bilbao. A long flight is made much better by entering Business Class. It’s so much fun to watch Gary discovering the Business Class Lounge and all the other perks of high class festival travel. The fact is that I’m still impressed with that stuff and it’s fun for me to have a companion in that. JS acts like he doesn’t care.

It was a long haul but San Sebastian in the best film festival for fun and we were warmly welcomed. I love the hotel where we stay, the Londres right on the little beach called La Concha.

We won Best Screenplay! Our premiere screening was a big hit and afterwards our fabulous PR organized a little gig for Gary and 2 local blues players in a super cool jazz club. People adored it and we logged a lot of press. The press and photographers loved Gary and Yaya and the kids had a ball. My friends Ita and Ines came which was fun. You have to go to the baths there. They are the best I’ve ever been to.

Then John and I went to Bilbao to see the Guggenheim, a building more lovable than you can imagine. The film series in the museum’s auditorium was American, in original language so we saw THE LUSTY MEN one night and SINGIN IN THE RAIN the second night. Can you believe we had never seen it on the big screen?

We enjoyed the Guggenheim at all times of day and night and had a nice time poking around the old town and eating MORE. We loved a little bar called Los Fueros where we had tasty gambas, which is shrimp. The Guggenheim café had unforgivably bad tortilla de patata.

It was fun to continue to see mention of the Festival and see John’s picture in the Spanish papers. I bought some excellent boots.

And then home. Without our luggage. The bags arrived 2 days (mine) and 3 days (John’s) after we did. According to the fedex delivery guy, BA is notorious for losing bags and he does a brisk business of delivering them around the Hudson River Valley.

Whoa, this is a long update. Full of love and thanks to all of our friends and supporters. Come join us on the HONEYDRIPPER trail over the next few months. We are going everywhere.

xxm