Conversations with Scorsese (49 page)

Yes, ultimately
The Departed
came out the way I wanted it to come out. But it cost a lot of money, and there were big-name stars in it, and therefore I had to work with the studio very closely. Screen it, argue, discuss it, you know. We stuck to our guns. We got pretty much what we wanted, though there were a couple of things here and there which we didn’t get. That doesn’t really matter. The thing is, I don’t know if it’s worth going through the process again. Because, ultimately, the marketplace for big-budget films means there will be less experimentation in them. It’s the old story. Now, even more so.

At my age, having gone through what I have, I don’t know whether it’s worth it anymore.

RS:
I understand. It’s a wearing process, even when everyone’s being pleasant.

MS:
When I was finishing
The Departed,
I said, “I’m out of here.” I barely saw the answer print. I was off shooting the
Rolling Stones film,
Shine a Light.

RICHARD SCHICKEL:
Shine a Light
is pretty much pure heedless performance—it’s not like
The Last Waltz
or the Dylan doc.

MARTIN SCORSESE:
Pure rock ’n’ roll. They didn’t touch up any of the music, except one note, I think.

RS:
There’s no social commentary in it. Aside from the incredible lines in
Mick Jagger’s face, he’s still moving the way he used to. That’s an inspiration rather than a commentary. I mean, my knees ache in the morning when I get up.

MS:
After Jagger saw the first cut of it, he said, “You know, I’m still tired from the film.” He said, “It’s one thing if I did two songs in one day. But I did all that in two hours.” I intended to keep him part of the group—to show how they play off each other onstage, the energy and the exchange of physical and psychic energy, the intimate nature of it all.
Keith Richards moving out onstage, bending, kneeling down.

RS:
In some weird way it was, as I said, kind of inspirational. Every once in a while you see the audience and they’re very young as a whole. There are very few
old gents like you and me in the audience. The Stones are now kind of old guys, too, so it was good that you put in the footage when they were busted for pot, or whatever the hell it was, in the old days. It reminds you of where they came from.

MS:
I had to balance that. Every time I put too much of that footage in, it took away from the music. It was a very delicate balance.

RS:
I could see that. But the picture needed something to ground it historically.

MS:
Yes. At the end you see Keith Richards, when he finally stops, hanging on to his guitar, trying to catch his breath.

RS:
He was flat out of breath.

MS:
Gone, and then he resurrected himself! It’s just stunning to watch.

RS:
I have to tell you, I have gotten belatedly to like rock ’n’ roll much better than I did back when I was supposed to love it.

MS:
Maybe because it’s not forced on you now, as it was when your peers expected you to love it.

RS:
Maybe. But I like the beat of it. And with better recording, I can hear the lyrics better. So I know what the songs are about. They don’t just sound like a lot of noise.

MS:
There’s something very interesting in what Jagger does, what they all do, onstage—Mick, Keith,
Charlie Watts, Ronnie.

RS:
I love watching a drummer like that.

MS:
You know, his back straight, his hands moving, and calm, cool. He’s the very core of the group.

RS:
There’s a moment in there where he just goes [
makes whoosh sound
].

MS:
We did movie lighting, and the stage was very hot. Jagger at one point is sort of fanning with his shirt on a reverse shot, laughing at Charlie. Basically he was saying he was hot. When they left, they just took off. We didn’t talk after the show. I left a message for Mick saying it was wonderful, that kind of thing. The next day he called me from San Francisco and said, “Have you recuperated yet?” I said, “No.” He said, “We’ve been working arena shows, and stadiums. So imagine if you had been shooting a spectacle film for a year, and then you were told to do a play by
Eugene O’Neill for two nights on Broadway.”

What drove me in this film is just the nature of the energy itself, which can’t be stopped. Primeval almost.

RS:
That comes through very strongly.

MS:
I sort of forgot about their age. I just saw this movement.

RS:
Let’s talk a little about coverage. How did you assign it among your fifteen cameras?

MS:
Just by luck and determination. I drew up all kinds of shots but basically I didn’t use any of them.

RS:
But you had cameras assigned, right—one on the group, one on the drummer, one with a side angle?

MS:
Yes, but because Keith moved a lot and, certainly, Mick did, there had to be several cameras assigned to each guy. And the cameramen asked, “Aren’t you going to be shooting yourselves, shooting each other?” I said, “It doesn’t matter.”

RS:
I think it was fine to see a few of those cameras. I’ve seen a lot more cameras in other docs.

MS:
I said, “Just go with it. Don’t worry about picking up other cameramen, don’t worry about it.” Sometimes we were able to carry out our design. There was a big camera in the center, on a crane. And at certain points in songs it would pull back, or it would come in. That was rehearsed, and we were able to get some shots I really wanted—especially the one where Mick got Keith to sing into the same mike with him.

RS:
Right.

MS:
There’s always been something special between Mick and Keith. The people who really know the Rolling Stones love to see Keith and Mick singing at the same mike again. Mick said, “I think I could do ‘Faraway Eyes’ if I get him on the stage, but I don’t know where he’s going to be.” He said this in a very sweet way: “You’d have better luck predicting the Grand National.” If you ever look at the film again, you’ll see he’s looking for Keith.

RS:
Yes, that’s quite clear. It makes you think about all the years they’ve shared.

MS:
The “making of the film” material we managed to get on there I thought was good.

RS:
I loved that stuff. I wanted more of it.

MS:
Me, too. I tried, I tried. But we had to stay onstage.

RS:
There’s a little contentiousness going on there.

MS:
Yes, actually.

RS:
Between you and Mick.

MS:
Yeah.

RS:
I mean, first of all, he obviously wanted the film to be made.

MS:
Yes.

RS:
But what did he think you were going to do, sit in the corner with a little handheld camera and shoot?

MS:
They’re flying around the world. I’m busy. I’ve got cameramen coming in. I don’t quite know what songs they’re going to play. In other words, I can’t control what they’re doing onstage. But I have to control. So does Mick. He controls what he does onstage, I’m controlling what I’m doing. Somehow the cameras and the performers had to meet. And it was a wonderful kind of chaos. I just started shooting everything. You know? It’s not designed. There was literally a rhythm we developed. And the rhythm of the world today, certainly in America, is that images can’t stay on for more than a few seconds.

RS:
Right, I know.

MS:
Still, you’ve got to stay on somebody for a while, let it play, to feel the effectiveness of it.

RS:
That is what I felt watching the film.

MS:
Me, too.

RS:
There is in the preliminary stuff where you’re getting hassled—

MS:
You know, the funny thing was when Mick finally saw it, the telephone sequence with his voice coming through like the voice of God, he said, “Well, Marty, you know that conversation was over an hour.” I said, “Yes, I know. But I cut it down.” It may have been over an hour, but there was still frustration because the two of us could not get face-to-face in a room for any period of time.

RS:
It mystified me that you keep asking, “Could I see the playlist?”

MS:
They wouldn’t let me see it. You know why?

RS:
Why?

MS:
Because, ultimately, they have to gauge the audience, gauge how they were all feeling. We never, ever went backstage or dealt with them later than twenty minutes before they went on. I just let them do it. Most performers do it. They tend to make it up at the last minute. I’m feeling this tonight, I’m feeling that.

The second day was generally the same as the first night. I knew Mick was going to make changes. And if he was going to make changes, I needed to know what those changes were. On the other hand, because I’d already shot the earlier concert, I could wing it. You know, what the hell? Okay, oh, it’s a different song, all right. I had a little bit of a problem getting a camera to cover somebody, but basically I was okay. It wasn’t that bad.

RS:
Okay. But here’s my point, applying to both nights: You’ve got your fifteen cameras. Obviously, at least ten of them have a specific thing they’re covering, right?

MS:
I think so, yes.

RS:
Someone is on Mick from the front of the stage. Someone is on Keith from wherever—

MS:
Keith. Somehow, yes.

RS:
But I was struck by the fact that at very, very crucial moments, you chose a close-up of the strings of a guitar—not necessarily Mick’s or Keith’s—but some other musician’s in the back somewhere.

MS:
Ronnie Wood.

RS:
That was kind of amazing, because you had so little chance to prepare for that.

MS:
There was not one song I feel that we lost. I never had that problem. It’s like dance. Sometimes I’m on the movement in the frame, even if it’s just a hand on a guitar or the string being touched, or the string being plucked. It reflects something at that point in the song that was more important to me than watching one of the people.

RS:
How did you know to be there at a particular moment?

MS:
Great cameramen do that. And great focus pullers.
John Toll,
Andrew Lesnie, who did
Lord of the Rings,
and
Robert Richardson did all the lighting, designed it, and was on a camera.
Ellen Kuras. And
Bob Elswit, who did
There Will Be Blood.
We had some of the greatest cameramen. They just had a great time. And also I was
in the back with fifteen or eighteen screens, whatever it was, in front of me. I was saying, So-and-so, see if you can get in tighter. Don’t forget, cover Keith here.

RS:
You were acting almost like a sports director.

MS:
Yes. But sometimes I just sat there and was mesmerized by some of the action, and didn’t say anything. Sometimes I was pointing and saying, “Get me a reverse, get me a reverse, and get it wide.” But the stage was small. And they have a lot of equipment back there. I didn’t realize that. That was our biggest issue. When the Stones go on tour, they have like a medieval village that they take with them from place to place. They set it up overnight, you know. And they have their way of doing things. And you have to fit in with their way. But they had to fit in with what we were doing, too. It’s kind of absurd. Like Mick almost being set on fire because the lights were too hot.

RS:
And you were going, “He’s going to burn up.”

MS:
Yeah! [
Laughs.
] I said, “Obviously, we can’t have that happen.” Another example: Somebody said, “Well, you need to shoot Mick from behind when he opens the door,” and I said, “But we can’t, he’s wearing a feather coat.” I mean, what are we talking about? On Halloween Mick is going to leave the stage, go out in the alley, and change costumes. I said, “On Halloween night, in New York City? [
Laughs.
] He’ll never get back to the door.” Anything could have happened. But there were a lot of police, all kinds of security. They had it locked down. You see Mick in the film and he says, “Hmmm, all these cameras.” That was the way it was. There was one point at which he was talking on the telephone, with all those cameras buzzing around. I thought, What happens if the camera moves the wrong way and he slams right into it? What if it hits one of the people?

RS:
He also mentions that all you were doing was going to bother the audience.