Interviews

Julie Sands (Award-winning Filmmaker)

Gail Morris: How did you become involved with Gotham Cafe?

Julie Sands: I read Stephen King's story in Six Stories and immediately thought of it as a film. Over the years I even encouraged filmmaker friends of mine to option it because I just had to see Steve, Diane and especially Guy on the big screen. No one ever did so I decided to pursue it. I put together a production company Turtle Bay Entertainment, read my friend Bryan Michael Stoller's book Filmmaking For Dummies (thanks Bryan) and got started. I remember having a conversation with Bev Vincent and saying to him I won't make this film unless he writes it and to my delight he did! He co-wrote it along with Peter Schink and myself.

Gail Morris: Are you a fan of Stephen King?

Julie Sands: I am not the best 'fan' in a technical sense because I could not even tell you off the top of my head how many books Mr. King has written or the names of all his characters but he is my favorite author and I am a great admirer of his work. I have read all of his published works and am very pleased to see he is finally getting the critical acclaim he deserves most notably in receiving The National Book Award.

To adapt his work, "Lunch At The Gotham Cafe" and bring it to the screen was a wonderful opportunity as well as a dream come true and I saw a responsibility to do it right.I wanted to do a dollar baby with a level of quality that was indistinguishable from a feature film. I think I succeeded but you will have to be the judge of that.

Gail Morris: What does a Producer do on a production?

Julie Sands: A producer sees a project through from the beginning all the way to the end. In a project like this where we did not have a staff and everyone was helping out I had to fill numerous roles out of sheer necessity. I co-wrote the adaptation, cast the film, found the locations, brought on the entire cast and crew etc., etc., etc.. The 1st A.D. and I even shot listed the film! Oh yes, and I also played Diane of course. My average day was 18 hours BEFORE production. When we filmed I had to be there very early before the crew and was the last to leave, often cleaning up after wrapping out of a location, 23 hour days were the norm. I had to have a cooler in the back stocked with Red Bull and Mountain Dew to stay awake. When Lauri Hope and I finished the shoot we were so tired we couldn't speak or move, we just stood there staring at one another after being up for over two days and looked at the mess in the empty cafe and said we don't care what it costs we are paying someone to clean this up! It was all worth it though to get what I wanted on the screen.

I should also say there were a lot of unsung heroes on this production. Those whose names you won't see up on the screen in the interest of not having ten minutes of credits but should. People that helped me early on and were busy working on other projects and could not help out on set. Without these people I could not have made the film. People like my friend Chuck House an Emmy award winning makeup artist who worked on Amazing Stories and helped put my makeup department in place as well as got Lauri Hope interested in the project. Makeup artist and good friend Gabrial Geismar was there with me every step of the way but was shooting America's Top Model and couldn't be on set. Bruce Simon who advised me early on and was a great help. Barry Caldwell who got busy on CSI brought me a great script supervisor in Kelly Leffler. The list goes on and on and I will invariably leave someone out but I couldn't have done it without my friends. You know who you are. Thank you.

Gail Morris: How did you get started in this business?

I was a writer for several publications in the music industry and produced and directed a local cable show.

Gail Morris: What were some of the memorable things for you about working on Gotham Cafe?

There are so many! The funniest was Cullen Douglas (Guy) doing Riverdance as Guy. That was a sight I won't soon forget, I just wish we had it on film.

The most memorable was seeing King's characters, Steve, Humboldt, Guy, the bum from The Talisman and Father Callahan as well as the Gotham Cafe come to life.

Editing the film, along with the talented Peter Samet, has also been very rewarding. When you get to put together that scene that you had carried in your mind for so long, it's very fulfilling to see that.
 

  "Lunch at the Gotham Café" © Stephen King
Used by permission. All rights reserved