An Evening with Gus Van Sant and James Ivory

The Oregon Sesquicentennial Film Festival, put on by Marylhurst University, began on May 1st with a nice talk between Gus Van Sant and James Ivory at McMenamins Mission Theater in NW Downtown Portland.

The choice of venue was perfect, allowing a small, intimate setting with perhaps only a couple of hundred people inside. The event was a sellout, with many non-ticket holders outside trying to get in. We got lucky, I heard about the event early on a sponsor radio station, KINK FM. My wife is an amateur actor and I knew she would love it, not to mention me.

A local writer who is probably best know for his scripting of the Gus Van Sant directed Finding Forrester, Mark Rich, made the introduction. I enjoyed listening to him talk about his success as a writer coming later in life and his perspectives on the writing process as a whole. Overall, his time was probably the best from the place of another writer looking to get more exposure.

Mark Rich talked about growing up in the small town of Enterprise, Oregon (pop around 2000) and making the trip all the way to Portland in his youth to see One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest as a young man. That led into discussions with James Ivory centered around growing up in the only slightly bigger town of Klamath Falls.

When Gus Van Sant and James Ivory began talking, the conversation ranged from local architecture to some of the intricacies of film making. The conversation was tilted more than I would have liked to the work of James Ivory, as I am very much a fan of Gus Van Sant's work and would have loved to hear more from him, especially about his latest success, Milk.

Screenings included bits of some of James Ivory's early work like The Householder and led up to his latest and yet unreleased film The City of Your Final Destination with Anthony Hopkins and Laura Linney. The conversation between the two directors went on for nearly two hours, including a question and answer period at the end.

Once the event was over the principals remained in the room talking to attendees, both known to them and not. My wife the aspiring actress took the opportunity to speak first to Gus Van Sant and then to James Ivory. As she didn't bring a resume, she actually asked Gus if he would take down her name and number. Being the consummate gentleman that his reputation says he is, he actually did it and was quite friendly. While that was going on I also got the chance to talk to Mark Rich about the process of a first screenplay.

All in all, a very interesting evening with some very compelling personalities.