Mavis Staples; a new 'Birth of a Nation' at Sundance; Broad Street films

I turned out to love him because he is so cool. He lives in Portland and I happened to have a concert out in Portland and he came out with his wife and his two year-old son, Abraham. I didn't know him and I had mentioned him to one of my friends and she said, "Oh, Mavis. You will love M. Ward. He is very good." She said, "The only thing is that he's shy." And I said, "Well, you know me, I'll make anybody talk." But M. Ward, he stayed shy. But I really like the way he worked and he just let me go. I'm in a little glass room and he would say, "Okay, Mavis. You got it." I said, "Alright. Let it go. Turn the music on." 

Oh, yes. A lot of them were my friends. I hadn't met Nick Cave or Bon Iver. I talked with everyone on the phone like tUnE-yArDs. They wanted to know what I wanted and I let them know that I wanted some songs that were happy and uplifting. All of my songs I've been singing — my freedom songs and my gospel songs — I've just been shining my light and hopefully bringing everyone up. A lot of people would cry when I sang these songs. I knew it wasn't a sadness all the time, but I just wanted people to smile now and feel good. 

Well, if we were gonna hang now, we'd have to hold each other up [laughs] ... But that was something special. I had called his manager and I said, "I want Bob to come and talk for me and say something about the family on this documentary." He said, "Oh, Mavis. He doesn't do that. He doesn't do those kinds of things." And I said, "Well, can I have your address? I want to write him a note." 



He gave me the address. I wrote Bobby a letter. The next thing [his manager] was calling me saying: "Mavis, what did you do? What did you say in that letter?" I just reminded him of a few things [laughs] from back in the day. He decided to come and when he came that day, he brought me a single rose. One rose, yeah. 

[Laughs] Well, you know, both of us probably always have some feelings for each other, but we may as well let them just travel on out the door. Ain't nothing happening. But he's a dear friend. We see each other and have a nice little chat. 



You know, we made a record together out here in L.A. at a studio. When he walked in, he had his cowboy hat on and his cowboy boots. I was standing way in the back. I said, "Hey, player!" [He said], "Mavis, I'm not a player." I said, "Oh yes you are. You're a player." But those were wonderful days to remember. 

Right. Back in 1998, and in the beginning of 1999. 

You know, my sisters and I had moved to his house because he wasn't well. His bedroom was upstairs, and I went up to see how he was doing. He said, "Mavis, bring the music in here. I wanna hear it." I set it up and started playing it in his bedroom. I said, "How do you like it, Pops?" He said, "Mavis, don't lose this. Don't lose this." 

It wasn't finished because Pops, we would go to the studio and he would lie down. He just wouldn't feel like it. Then I would take him back home and he would tell me after a few days, "Mavis, book that studio! I feel like singing." The majority of it was finished, but there were certain times where he would sing and he wouldn't play his guitar or he would play his guitar and wouldn't sing. I kept it to myself all those years. 

Well I didn't want nobody to hear it but me. Then, when I got started back, I said, Now it's time to get Pops' record out. I couldn't do it after he first passed because none of us were on the radar — The Staple Singers or me. So I knew that I had to make a record. 

Then I got Pops' stuff out of the closet and I said, "I'm gonna take it to Tweedy." When he finished, he said, "Mavis, you wanna come over to the loft and hear Pops' product?" My sister and I hurried over there. He put "Friendship" on and, man, I heard daddy's voice ... I just had to let go. 

You know, the best thing to do is to get rest. My father taught me that. I'm still trying to talk a little softer. I talk loud because there were a lot of us children in the house and I wanted to be heard. But I get my rest and the best thing for me is my tea and honey. I don't have any problems with my voice. I'm not a smoker. Every now and then I have... 

Patrón, yeah.  

I will! Sometimes the show is over and I'm just fired up. I'm still ready to go. 

Nah! I'm always gonna have something to say. But I'll have to change that: as long as I have my voice. So you know what that means? I'm not going anywhere.  

I've been at Sundance for more years than I care to remember and I've never quite been in a screening this electric outside of maybe "Little Miss Sunshine." ["The Birth of a Nation"] was the seven-year passion project of an actor named Nate Parker, who wrote the film, directed the film, stars in the film and produced the film. It's the story of Nat Turner, who was a slave in Virginia and in 1831 led a slave rebellion in which 60 white people were killed. Nat Turner was eventually hung himself. Pretty much everybody who was attending Sundance as a buyer wanted it. 

The movie played incredibly well... Nate Parker got on stage after the premiere screening. He considers himself as much an activist as a filmmaker and he said: "I made this movie for one reason only — creating change agents. There are still a lot of injustices in our world." So even though this story unfolds two centuries ago, I think there's an argument that can be made that's it's relevant today, that it's timely and topical... [It's a] very well-made film. And the immediate comparison — the obvious comparison — is to "12 Years a Slave." That was a movie that Fox Searchlight also released [in 2013]. That movie won the best picture Oscar and it grossed almost $60 million at the domestic box office. So there is a precedent for a movie like this doing well critically and commercially. The amazing thing, apparently, is that Fox Searchlight was not the highest bidder at $17.5 million dollars. Netflix, apparently, was bidding $20 million for the film. I mean, that's just double the previous Sundance record [for "Little Miss Sunshine]." So this movie clearly struck a nerve with the buyers. 

Well I think there are four words that Fox Searchlight can give them: "12 Years a Slave." And there are four words they can use against Netflix:  "Beasts of No Nation." Netflix released "Beasts of no Nation," the film was really well-received but didn't make that much of an impact. I think Searchlight can say to Nate Parker: "Listen, we've done this movie before with '12 Years a Slave,' we won a best picture Oscar, we know how to market it, we know how to generate a conversation around a film." And Netflix can't really do that and they don't have the theatrical clout that Fox Searchlight does. 

I think that's a legitimate question and I think the streaming services like Amazon and Netflix may be in moviegoers' minds ... they assume that they can just wait until [the films] are on their devices or on their TVs. But I think that if you're a filmmaker like Nate Parker ... you want your film in movie theaters. And even though Netflix and Amazon do limited theatrical runs for their movies, Fox Searchlight is a theatrical distributor, that's the bread-and-butter of their business. So I think filmmakers want to go to where their films are going to be in theaters.  

Thomas: [laughs] Our offices are either of our apartments, depending on where we are.

Reiner: We're a small company. This is our first film, remember, so we actually came up with the idea because we loved that it was not just a double entendre, but a triple entendre — Broad Street as in Wall Street, because our first movie is a female-driven Wall Street movie. Also, we're two broads, right? And we're trying to make the world more broad, more vast, for women.

Thomas: The intention is really to create more roles for women, in front of and behind the camera, while at the same time telling really entertaining stories for a broad audience. [laughs]

Reiner: Sure. If you read anything in reference to statistics right now — and we've worked with the Geena Davis Institute, which has done amazing, statistically significant research about women in the industry — it's sadly appalling.



Not only when you look at how many female directors or female producers there are, but also in front of the camera it is 77% male. So all the media that you're watching, be it a cartoon or a Wall Street thriller you really have to go see — it's 77% men in front of the camera. So women and girls are unconsciously seeing themselves as a minority.

Thomas: My husband works on Wall Street, actually, so I'm a Wall Street wife. I was always fascinated with that world — I love Wall Street films, I watch all of them. But I've been fascinated by how they don't show the people that I see on Wall Street, and also how there are so few women in these movies.



So when we were thinking about a project to do, this female-driven Wall Street movie came up as an idea that hasn't been done. You asked about the statistics, how male-dominated Wall Street is, and what's interesting is that, out of graduate school or college, it's almost 50/50. They hire 50% women, but it's really an issue of retaining them and getting those women to the top.

Reiner: Wow, what a great question. Just as Sarah's a Wall Street wife, I'm married to an actor. And the amount of opportunity presented to my husband — David Alan Basche, who I love dearly — was outrageously different than the amount of opportunity presented to me. I met him when I was still in college, and that was a big piece of it for me.

Reiner: Well, yeah. For me, I would by lying if I said it got worse — I've been very fortunate past 28, while most women are afraid to turn 30 or 40 or 50 in our industry. And part of it is amazing show-runners like Jenji Kohan and Shonda Rhimes, who hire amazing women regardless of age. I'm deeply grateful for that.



"Equity" opened on July 29 and is currently in theaters.