Contacting the talent

J

JCNailen

I have been researching a particular person that I am very interested in making a documentary of. Trouble is, right now, he is boiling in legal soup. I want to do this before he heads off to jail. And this brings me to two questions:

1) Should I rush into this and try to get it done before he heads off to jail, or wait and try to interview from prison? Has anyone here dealt with a prison interview? Red-tape?

2) If I press on and do it now, should I try to contact him directly, or go through his attorneys? Which leads to.... How much participation could I expect, since he has ongoing legal issues?

(pulling at hair) What to do!?!?
 
Relax.

Contact him now. See how is schedule is. Maybe you can shoot it before he goes off to jail. If not. Then ask him if you can do it in prison.
 
What would be best for your documentary? Interviewing your subject
after he is in jail? Interviewing your subject during the "boiling in legal
soup" part of his life?

I have done several jail interviews. There is a LOT of red-tape.

You second question is a little confusing. Are you saying that you want
to do a doc on this person but haven't even contacted him about
participating? My advice is to contact him BEFORE you decide to make a
documentary about him.
 
You don't have to go through his attorneys...he probably should though. Based on your questions, I'm not sure that he's finished with his court time yet, so your interviews could become evidence, but that's his decision to make. But if his lawyers are involved, you can be sure that they'll want to be a part of the interviews, and they don't work for free usually. They may demand payment to the interviewee also.

Rik is right, you need to either figure out two ways of doing the doc...one with him, one without him, or you need to get him on board right away.
 
Thanks for your input everyone. Actually, the doc would take on a whole new light if he was interviewed from prison.

Directorik - No, I haven't contacted him yet. I am still gathering news articles and researching the story to see what angle I want to approach this from, and to formulate my story. Once I figure that out, then I will ask him. If he says no, then I have simply wasted a month of research. I didn't want to ask him first, then find from my research that there's not much to the story, then try to explain that to him. I wanted my story down before I started asking people to be interviewed.

Did I go about this backwards? I just figured that when I asked the people to be interviewed and they said yes, then I could set a time/date and have my questions ready.
 
Doing research before you commit to the project is a wise move to make. I wanted to do a documentary on a guy who was in jail too, and my research showed me that someone was already doing it. When I'm ready, I might check with the guy and see "how it's going", but until and unless I find out that the other project is down, I'm not going to waste any time on it. You're correct to do that research, but when you get enough to know that the project is a go, I believe that you need to start finding out who will "play" with you. That way you can make other decisions like: Can you do the project without the primaries help? What if you don't get the guy talking to you...can you just interview the "victims" or his friends and neighbors and still make the film? What if the guys interview is only of how innocent he is?

I can't speak for Rik, but your initial post made me feel as if you were a lot further along in the project than just doing the initial research.

Good luck with the project.

Chris
 
I'm really excited about doing this. The subject is the Mayor of Jackson MS. He campaigned on a platform of getting rid of crime, then after elected, he was arrested for doing it. It's a really bitter topic for people state wide. Should make for an interesting piece.
 
Sounds like a really good story to tell. Just be ready for Political answers and legal answers. You may have to prove the guys interview is garbage with the other interviews.

Good luck though, it sounds as if you have a winner there!

Chris
 
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