Hello, I'm John McGrath.

I'm a producer for Kansas City PBS.

And on this special edition of Art House, we are premiering Art House live a conversation with Kevin Willmott.

This was our film series first community event held at Kansas City PBS.

We sat down with the Academy Award winner to talk about his past growing up in Kansas.

His latest film, centering on a Kansas City legend and the sage advice he had for aspiring filmmakers in the audience.

Oh.

One of the reasons there's this backlash right now against black folks, against migrants, against gay folks, against trans folks.

Is that things have moved forward.

And the more things that moved forward, the more bigger, the bigger backlash you get.

I don't like talking about movies.

I like making movies.

But making my small movies really kind of enabled me to work with spike.

And some of.

You have to try to do the best work you can, and then you have to try to support people as much as you can as well.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the stage.

Our guest new this evening, Mr. Kevin Willmott.

Kevin, come on up.

Run around this way.

Too much random.

All right.

Mr. will not.

Please have a seat.

So glad you have a seat here for us.

Wow.

Well, welcome.

Thank you.

Okay, so welcome to our first art house.

Live in our new digs.

The living room.

What do you guys think of this place?

It's pretty awesome.

We're so happy to have you here.

And, So, Kevin, you actually had a great relationship.

Kevin, you had a great relationship with Kansas City PBS over the years.

we show Jayhawks one of your films.

How long ago was that?

When did we show Jayhawks?

20 years ago.

20 years ago.

Oh, great.

And just recently, no Place Like Home, the documentary.

We just showed that recently.

And Kevin has been on art house not once, but twice.

And that's a big deal for our house.

If you're on twice, you're a big deal.

So, so, so, Kevin, you know, and I'm totally nervous.

I got Kevin.

Woman.

Oh, the Oscar winner.

This is great, isn't it?

So, Let's start.

There's so much to start with, and we're going to talk a little bit about the past.

So, it just because some people know what some people don't.

Junction city, Kansas, that's where you grew up.

What was it like to grow up there?

Yeah.

There you go.

Little props for some joints.

You city.

What was it like there?

Well, you know, we, we, we affectionately call it Junk Town.

Junction City was, is a, you know, great little town.

you know, I grew up there in the, in the late 60s and, and 70s and, and, you know, it's adjacent to Fort Riley, which gave it a real funky, you know, hip thing, which kind of with nice streets about.

But, growing up there was really unique, you know, our family was not in the military.

So when you're in an army town and you're not in the military, very different experience.

and so, but as a whole, Junction City was great because there was three movie theaters and a small town and a drive in.

Wow.

and so we, I went to the movies, like, every weekend.

Pretty much, we didn't go see kids movie, so, you know, Disney movie, they beat you up my neighborhood So, you know, we went to cowboy movies and James Bond and and monster movies and Godzilla and, you know, that's that was our steady diet, really.

And the whole neighborhood we go and they had this thing called, the coked up movies, which, I don't know if they had this in Kansas City, but it was sponsored by Coca-Cola.

Wow.

And and back in this back when it was still in bottles.

This is ancient history here.

These bottles.

but.

Yeah, but you had you had you you would you could get into the, the theater by putting a Coke tubs in a box.

So, so we would just go in the street and find eight bottle tops, and you could go and they would let you bring your own popcorn into the movie.

So dudes would bring bring in greasy bags and popcorn.

And it was, it was in every kid in the city was in these theaters, in the theater and whooping, hollering and and having fun.

And so anyway, it was it was it was a great, great time to grow.

Well, you know, and so, that led to Marymount College in Salina.

Tell me about that.

So, you know, I, I, you know, I had a, you know, we'd have to get to college and, and didn't had never really planned to go to college.

but I was mentored by someone here.

Maloney is here.

Jody Maloney is was one of my mentors.

And father, Frank Cody.

And they kind of made me go to college.

You know, they said you you you're behind is going to college.

So so I went to a small Catholic school in Salina, Kansas, but it had a great drama department, led by a man by the name of Doctor Dennis Denning.

and so I studied theater.

There was no film in the area, really, so I studied theater.

I'm so glad I studied theater because, you know, when you don't have access to film.

I wrote plays, and I still write plays, but I really started as playwright, and and it taught me certain skills, writing skills as a, as a, as a playwright that I applied to my screenplays now.

But the other thing it did was when, when I would write a play, I was going to do that play.

I was going to produce that play.

I didn't write it to show people to read it.

I, I wrote it as I was writing it.

I'm saying, and we're going to get my buddies together and we're going to make we're going to do this play.

And so, so, so that was that and that, that whole thing I started as a kid, really, I try to hold on to that because, you know, the whole notion of Hollywood makes a living developing movies.

They don't make a living making movies.

And so that's that's one of the things that you quickly find out when you work in the industry.

They make a it's really development.

They live.

Everyone lives on development.

They don't live on the money of making movies.

And so I try to hold on to that thing I learned as a kid.

It's like when I write the script, I plan on trying to do this doggone thing.

And so that's that's one of my little, you know, ethics that I try to hold on to.

Yeah.

It's so funny you brought that up, because that's a that's a big part of what we're going to talk about later.

So that's so cool.

You brought that up, which so you and then I think what a lot of people you know, Kevin's a filmmaker, writer, professor.

But when you went back from marymount, you saw some injustices even before Junction City when you left and you went back and they were the same.

Right?

So you became an activist going from from back from marymount to Junction City, correct?

Yeah.

Well, so they had this thing in the in the 70s called the Cedar program, and it was a government program that that hired poor kids to give them a summer job.

So I worked several different jobs in the Cedar Park.

And one of the jobs I had was at the fire department in Junction City.

And my boss was a firefighter.

And, and, and when he brought me upstairs to where the firefighters, live, you know, they all live in a dorm up there.

He said, you're the first black person we've let up here.

Wow.

And he said he said, you know, that this that this was this was 1976.

And they had never been a black firefighter in Junction City.

and so, so when I got to school is 19, I get out of school in 1982 and I go back home and there's still never been a black firefighter.

And Johnson City was the second largest black populated city percentage wise in the state.

So you're going like something's wrong with this picture here a little bit.

so so we got together with some guys I knew and we protested and we integrated the fire department.

You know, generally is an odd place because the 60s kind of flew over the city and never quite landed.

Exactly.

So, so we had we had some catching up to do a little bit.

Right, right.

Kind of low.

But yeah.

Yeah.

Which is so which brings us to, NYU, the MFA program.

When I was growing up, NYU was like, man, that was that was it.

That was the film school, you know, screw the West Coast.

That's right, that's right.

York, NY.

That's right.

How did you get in there?

And that was a master's of, of of of film program there.

Yeah.

And to just to back up just a little bit that when you were at marymount, you wrote a play called Ninth Street.

I wrote the play Ninth Street at Marymount.

and that play got me accepted into the department at NYU.

And, it was really kind of a miracle because, you know, the film school thing had just started to get big, you know, and, Scorsese he went to NYU.

Oliver Stone went to my you.

But they were at an older NYU.

This it hadn't been the film school thing yet.

You know, the whole idea of a film school was just getting started in the 80s, where they were really selling the film school.

Right.

So, so getting in there was, I was in the dramatic writing department, and, so I went there and I really went there more than anything, to learn how to write a screenplay.

And, so, you know, but I wrote plays when I was there, too, and, so it was a really great place.

Two year program.

and so, you know, it was really intense, you know, they always said, oh, you know, you, you know, you'd be a little Kansas boy.

You know, you get to hear the, you know, you're not in Kansas anymore.

Joke about me.

And times when you're going to do your great is.

Yeah.

but, but, you know, the thing was that was great.

Was that, you know, we we I was able to do my thing.

I was able to start getting an idea of how I was going to make my first film.

And so I really adapted the play Ninth Street into the screenplay when I was there.

And, so they guys would say at the when we graduated, guys would say, yeah, so, so you're going to L.A., you know, where are you going to go?

I said, I think I'm going back to Kansas.

And it's like, what is wrong with you, dude?

and I went back because, no one knew me in New York and no one knew my story in New York, and no one knew about Ninth Street.

And I knew that if I was going to make the film, I was going to need a lot of help.

and so, so that's why I really came back to make my first film.

Wow, wow.

okay, so, okay, so CSA, the Confederate States of America, a mockumentary.

I had the date wrong.

We've kind of pre-show this.

So when did you.

So you made it?

When?

And it came out.

When what?

What was the deal with it?

Yeah.

So it's it's a really kind of interesting story because, you know, CSA is kind of a controversial film.

Oh yeah.

Thing I love it.

So for those of you who may not know, CSA is about what happens.

Yeah.

That poster there and this are these posters are just amazing by the way.

Yeah.

These were these are not the posters that came out with the films.

These were posters that you guys did and beautiful work.

but CSA is about what happens if the South had won the Civil War.

so it's, it's, based like, on the Ken Burns Civil War series, except the South had won.

And so you're in this.

You're not in the USA anymore.

You in the CSA and you watching Confederate television, and you're seeing the history of the of the United States, of the Confederate States of America, as a Ken Burns documentary.

But then you also get to see their their TV shows and their commercials and their products.

And of course, it's a whole racist universe.

and so we got into Sundance with that film, and it was a big deal because, you know, I think we were the first Kansas guys to get into a Sundance with, and so even at Sundance, with all the hip Hollywood so-and-so's, it scared the hell out of them.

And, and so we sold the film to Sundance, which was I took my students for Ku there and there.

So we were all staying in a, a dorm that in a, in a and sleeping on the floor.

Sleeping on the floor.

That's like the K you gave me, the money to buy a little condominium.

Right.

And, about 30 students there are hanging out everywhere.

Everywhere closets, all kinds.

And so we sold the film, which was really great because a lot of these students had worked on the film.

And then we took it to market and we sold it.

Wow.

And so it was really kind of the the real filmmaker experience in terms of making the film, taking that market and selling the film and, so it was really in that sense was really great.

And, and but then when we sold it, we sold to IFC films.

Right, right.

and then they got scared and didn't want to release, they got scared.

They got they got scared.

so, independent, Entertainment Weekly did a big article on the film and basically said, like, why isn't this movie been released?

And so they then released and, and it was great.

I went all around the country, you know, showing the film.

And it opened in Memphis.

Who?

Yes, indeed.

And so, so so I'm in Memphis and I go to the Fox News station in Memphis.

They will forget CSA, CSA, and the black anchor guys are saying, are you crazy?

You know, and they're scared to death.

They're scared.

They're scared and literally scared.

Yeah that's horrible.

And and so I do my interview and all of that.

And I'm walking out the door and the receptionist lady at the, at the, at the receptionist counter, and she feels a sigh will rise again.

And I said it never felt so.

So it was quite an experience.

Wow.

That's amazing.

What experience?

And then that led to spike Lee.

Yeah.

So so we had the same agent at the time.

And so, you know, he heard about the film and, and, my agent said he'd like to see the film.

He heard about it.

And so we've let them see the film.

He loved it.

And he said, I want to help.

I want to support you in the film.

So it's presented by spike Lee.

And then he asked me, do you have anything else?

And I had another script.

It was called Gotta Give It Up.

and it's was, a play.

I was in the play, Louis Estrada at Marymount.

Oh, wow.

And when I was in the play, I said, man, this would be a really great, film if you turn it modern.

And you because the the language, the the Aristophanes, this is, you know, 211 BC but but that that language that he was using was really hip and it rhymed.

It was in rhymes of sound.

It's not like hip hop in a lot of ways.

Yeah.

Spoken word.

Yeah.

So I took that and I wrote a whole script that was in verse based on the list.

Estrada play and I called it got to Give It up.

And because in the if those of you who may not know this Estrada is about women going on a sex strike to stop men from going to war.

And so in the, in the in the play, in the screenplay I wrote, it's, you know, women go on a sex strike to stop guys from from gangbanging.

And so we try to get it made and went all over Hollywood that everybody couldn't get it made.

Jennifer Lopez was going to play.

There you go.

Yeah.

So, so then 15 years later, I get a call from spike one day and he said, you still got that script?

I said, yeah, we still got.

I said, let's set in Chicago and call it a shot.

Right.

There you go.

So that script became Iraq, and that was the first really, I think maybe the first movie that Amazon Studios made.

Wow.

And that's how from an early one that you did.

Wow.

Kevin, the impetus of that was your idea.

Wow.

That's awesome.

I take all the blame.

Of course.

And then of course, black Klansman and the the five Bloods.

So, and, you know, we're super proud about you winning the Oscar and, you know, but I want to get to, I want to get something else.

and it's your newest film, and I'm super, super pumped about, and it's, it's called the Heroic True Life Adventures of Alvin Brooks.

Okay.

And I cannot wait for you guys to see this.

And guess what?

We have a first look trailer that you're all going to be able to see.

Okay.

So thank you so much, Kevin.

Okay.

So roll that trailer.

My dad was, bootlegger, and my dad's moonshine still was in the back.

This person, this man drove up in his truck.

I'm going to kill you.

You you.

But I can.

And my dad said, get off my property.

That one time.

And she heard him say, that man then shot me through and through.

That's how we got to Kansas City.

I. we decided to become the vanguard, if you will, of the black community that we saw when this happened.

But you got to watch yourself both inside and outside the car.

Watch your back.

There were ten women killed during chemistry between March and June, as I recall, 1977.

It was Lucille Bluford at the Kansas City call books.

What are you going to do on to those two that march in front of the drug?

How?

He said, yeah, we do that.

I said, y'all crazy.

Whether or not he was, talking to, president or on 39th in prospect, talking to somebody who was slanging last night.

Now, since life without the possibility of parole.

I was 21 years old.

I reached out to anybody who will listen, including Mr. Alvin Brooks.

I've had people say negative things about my father, but then they had to come back because he still helped them do whatever it is they needed to do.

And that's really what he taught us as individuals, to see the person.

And he loves Kansas City.

God, that is so amazing.

You made that movie and we need I mean, it's going to be a great movie.

I know it because it's a Kevin Willmott film, but, well, first of all, I got a lot to talk about with this.

But why do you make it?

Well, you know, I, I made a docu about the black hospitals in Kansas City.

And at that time, I interviewed Mr. Brooks.

and, you know, he was a policeman in the 1950s, one of the first black policemen in Kansas City.

And, you know, when I met him and I'm interviewing him, it was just like total living history.

Wow.

Just total living history.

And he's got so many great stories.

He's just a wealth of stories.

And so I said to myself at that time, I said, man, you know, this guy is just, you know, but then he wrote this book called Binding Us Together and and then that book, there's all the stories in the book.

So I said, oh, man, we gotta we gotta try to make a documentary.

And he's 92, sharp as a tack, sharp as a tack.

I mean, he he will tell you stories from the 1940s, late 30s.

And he knows the exact address where it happened in Kansas City.

Wow.

Cross street.

Yeah.

I mean, I can remember last week, you know, so, I mean, he is just an amazing guy.

And, you know, for me, was like, he is, he's kind of like a blues legend.

He's, you know, he's had kind of a blues life, you know, these legendary, like, you know, these legendary kind of blues lives that, that you just can't quite believe his real.

That's that's Alvin Brooks.

And that's where the title comes from, the heroic real life adventures.

Because, you know, he just did all these heroic, heroic things and, on so many different levels and so many different.

And I think he's probably touched everyone in Kansas City.

I think he's probably helped everyone in Kansas City in some way or another.

I mean, everybody you talk to goes, oh, yeah, you know, I remember he did this for my mom.

He did this for my cousin.

He did this for my brother.

He did this for.

And he's 92.

And they still he still gets calls in the middle of the night.

Come and help me.

And he still helps us still today.

So it was just, it was a real honor to, to to tell his story.

you know, it's, you feel it's a real responsibility because he's beloved in Kansas City.

And so I want to make sure I'm hoping that, you know, everybody loves it, because I sure love him.

Yeah, yeah, I shot news in the 90s and just got to know him so well.

And I'm like a lowly, you know, news photographer.

And he treated me like I was a king.

Man.

Yes, he's the nicest guy.

He's beautiful man.

Yeah, yeah, he was great.

So, because like you said, we need to capture people like him now.

Yes.

Well, that's that's right.

I mean, that's the that's the thing about I try to make these kind of small documentaries that that I don't I make them kind of on the cheap.

we just kind of raise some money and we just make them and, real small crew.

But it's like documenting areas of American life that really need to be documentary and really need to be captured and and sustained and, and, and, and archived.

Because, you know, when folks are gone, they're gone.

And those stories, they have disappeared quite often.

And, and those stories are the things that we can learn from today that I think really makes our lives so much better today.

And so that certainly, you know, Alvin Brooks.

Yeah.

And Allen Brooks and the other one, you did a documentary a couple of years back with about Gordon Parks.

And that guy is like my hero.

I mean, I've had I have so many of his photographs just ripped out of magazines.

And I know he's a very tell people about what Gordon Parks mean to you.

Well, yeah.

I mean, you know, as a kid, you know, these have these let people know who he is.

Yeah.

I think, you know, the great photographer, life magazine director, shaft, director of the Learning Tree and from and from Fort Scott, Kansas, right down the road.

A piece here.

and so for me, growing up in Junction City, you know, there was these movies of the week, and I'd watch it with my mom and, and at the end of the movie of the week, sometimes they'd have this kind of, making of featurette, and they had the making of The Learning Tree.

Right.

And he was shooting it in Fort Scott and Gordon Parks is the first African-American to shoot a studio feature film.

First one wrote the legend broke the barrier.

He broke the barrier, you know, and everyone that's come after him comes from him breaking that barrier.

So I'm watching this as a kid.

I'm watching him in that featurette, and he's directing the movie in Fort Scott, Fort Scott, Kansas, and he's on a horse and he's got a cowboy hat, and he looks cool, and he's cool as hell.

Oh, man.

And he's pointing and he's director, and he's telling folks what to do.

And and my mother said he's from Kansas.

And he was like, you can be a filmmaker in Kansas.

I thought you could only be a filmmaker in Hollywood.

Said, no, he may be in Hollywood, but he came back to tell that story here.

And so and then he made shaft, which was, yeah, I'm like, oh, Lord Jesus, right?

Yeah, yeah.

for my generation, shaft was the biggest thing that ever.

Because, you know, you gotta remember we watched we grew up watching James Bond.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And and James Bond.

We love we love Sean Connery.

Oh yeah.

But but but you know we knew we weren't we weren't Sean Connery.

And so there had never been a superhero that dressed the way the fellas in the neighborhood dressed didn't wear the leather coat and Italian shoes and the and the and the, you know, the double, the slacks and and and he didn't have they didn't have a soundtrack the way, you know, James Bond had a soundtrack and and Isaac Hayes was the soundtrack to shaft, which was just huge for us.

Right.

And so, I mean, that that whole period in the early 70s.

Yeah.

When everything was really breaking through was such a great time to grow up because it gave you it gave you hope, it gave you kind of an inspiration that you could you could be a filmmaker, too.

And then the connection where you got, Isaac Hayes to work with you on ninth Street.

So, yeah, it was that was a dream come true.

I mean, it's just been the shaft.

He's black Moses, you know, he's all that stuff.

And so just getting to hang out with him and talk about.

Yeah.

And, you know, we talked about him winning the Oscar, you know, and never thinking that I would win an Oscar one day.

And he was never even a concept.

I mean, it just cares about that.

But but when he won the Oscar, he did.

He did, you know, on the Oscars ceremony, he had his outfit with chains on.

Any of y'all remember that?

But he had a shirt off, his shirt was off in chains, and he's playing shaft.

And people are Dancing is the funkiest.

It's the funkiest.

Academy Award ceremony in history.

Yeah.

Wow.

Oh, man.

It's just.

Oh my God.

Yeah, that was what happened in the whole thing.

Yeah, man.

And, and it was just was so great.

And then to get to make a movie with him was just really a dream come true.

And.

And then I'm working on a script for spike about Gordon Parks right now.

Oh my God, Kevin.

So, so, you know, I don't know what'll happen with it, but it it might be on Netflix.

We'll see.

Man.

He's your hero, man.

He's my hero, dude.

And spike said, hey, he's your hero.

It's like, yeah, he's my hero.

What are you.

Where do you give spike my number?

I will, I will, I will.

Oh, right.

So, you.

Filmography 1990 90 to 90 Street.

Like we talked about, 2004 CStr.

But he came out, and I'm sorry I got 2000 6006 Bunker Hill.

Only good Indian.

And in 2013, destination Planet Negro.

And to research for this, interview, I found an interview that Kevin did in Amsterdam.

they also loved how he was tall.

You know, everybody was in Amsterdam, was tall.

I didn't know that.

And, they asked coverage of all the films you made.

I do an answer.

Damn accident.

But then it would be horrible and it wouldn't be funny.

So, they ask you, Kevin, of all the films that you made, what's the one that you are most proud of?

You want people to see?

And you said destination plan is zero Negro.

Why is it.

Well, it's it's a funky, hip little movie.

we made it for about, $7,000.

all my friends got together, and, we shot it a coup, mainly.

and, I had total control over it.

It was a it is the kind of idea of a film that I didn't want to hear what Hollywood had to say about it.

Right.

But I knew they wouldn't get it.

No.

So, you know, you just didn't want to waste your time trying to convince them of something they would never get.

So you, you know, got all my friends together.

We all worked for free.

West studio, who was the first Native American to win an Academy Award?

He's in the film, right.

Because he had been in he'd been in my film The Only Get Indian.

Wow.

He came in and did a little bit for me.

and trade buyers who was in, on the TV show Empire, who's from Kansas City, former student, Towson, Mo.

More humble person.

Yes, yes, a friend of mine.

Yeah, yeah.

And so we all got together, made this film, and it's about, you know, it's 1936, black folks are dealing with segregation, you know, tough stuff.

And it's going well, you know, how are we going to solve this problem?

And George Washington Carver creates a rocket fuel with a peanut and sweet potato.

And they build a rocket ship and they go to Mars.

But something goes weird, and they go through a time barrier, and they end up here today with Obama as president.

There you go.

And we had the Tea Party in that film.

And if I tell people when you land, you don't know it's Earth, they don't know it.

They have like space heeled on your walk around going, hey, they don't know it's Earth.

They think they're on Mars.

they think they're on a whole other planet.

And, and they kind of are.

They are they kind of are on this kind of part of the show.

They kind of are on another planet.

And so, so it's kind of about how far we've come and how far we still need to go.

I just thought that was so good.

Inspiration.

Could you do bigger budget movies, bigger name movies?

And and I think it's inspirational for a lot of aspiring filmmakers out there that kind of all the your filmography.

No offense, one of the cheapest and the one you had the most fun is is your favorite.

And isn't that advice that you would give to everybody to just, you know, no doubt about it, be it for me, but what I learned from making ninth Street and CSA and the movies that I've made locally here, which, you know, we have a film incentive now, which is right stuff.

but Steph.

Yes.

Yeah.

but, you know, the movies, when you get to make them with your friends and you get to tell the story the way you want to tell it, and you don't have to worry about what somebody else thinks or what.

And it's not about money, you know?

I mean, filmmakers don't look at how much money your movie makes.

They only care about what people think about your film, right?

They only care about the response to the movie.

Exactly.

And Hollywood is all about, you know, how much the movie makes.

And if it doesn't make a lot of money, it's not a good movie, right?

And, you know, most of the movies that we now consider great legendary classic films were all movies that folks didn't quite get when they came out.

Right?

Like, you know, It's a Wonderful Life.

They hated that movie when it came out.

Right now, you can't get away from the doggone thing every Christmas.

You can't get away from it, you know, because it's Casablanca, the same castle black, same thing.

Yeah.

So, so, so like, a lot of Hitchcock to a lot of Hitchcock.

Yeah.

So anyway, you know, when you get to make movies kind of the way you want to make them, right?

And, with your friends, it's just a it's really a beautiful thing.

Yeah.

Because, Kevin, I put it in your hype video, but it's freaking true.

You just don't talk.

You make films, man, and and, and so you're doing other things to kind of how to.

But the point is now to have it to where you can do the work, that you can get the funds necessary to get together to do your the work you want to do.

Correct?

Yeah.

I mean, you know, you of course, you want a big budget.

You want to buy movie.

The 24th was probably the biggest, but I've had four films and and it was great because you get a big budget and a big budget for me, not in terms of Hollywood, but for me it was a big budget.

And, and you get to tell the movie the way you needs to be told.

And that's a, that's a movie that would be very difficult to make on a low budget.

so, that reality is something that you're always kind of up against.

And that's the thing that most filmmakers are the most frustrated about.

And, you know, I was talking to, you know, some filmmakers early here and you, you're constantly trying to find a way to tell your story within that budget.

And I tell my students, it's like you, you've got to write for the money you have.

And and, you know, don't, you know, don't write, you know, and then they go to Egypt.

That's not good.

You know, that's not that's not good.

but, so, you know, you, you write the, the movie for the budget you have for the actors, the good actors that you have access to.

and when you write movies that, and you and, you know, you're writing them and you're going to make the film, you're not going to send it off to someplace to get their approval and their permission.

You're going to write this film, and you're going to get whatever you can get together, and you're going to make this film.

And the thing that I, I when I look back at everything I've done so far, the thing I say to myself almost every day is my wife Kathy, will tell you that, you know, it's important to define success on your own terms.

It's just don't allow people to define success for you.

It's really important to define success on your own terms because when you allow other people to define success for you, it ends up making you kind of a prisoner to their ideas.

And you end up saying, I can't do that because, you know, it may not be.

It may not be what they like.

It may not be what they consider good.

And you make a movie for $7,000 and and you do it the way you want to do it.

And you don't give a doggone what anybody thinks.

You know, filmmakers make movies for themselves and the audience.

But first you have to make it for yourself.

If you don't satisfy yourself, you kind of lost.

So you have to please yourself first.

It's kind of like on the airplane when the stewardess says, put your oxygen mask on first and then put it on your kid, right?

Right.

Because if you put it on your kid first and then you pass not, you can't help your kid, right?

So you have to put it on yourself first.

So it may seem like selfishness, but it's really just logic, right.

And and so, you know, you, you, you have to kind of be a little selfish in that sense.

But in the end it's really helps everybody.

Right?

And I think, I, I've had this trouble in my career is that you do talk a lot and you talk and talk and you just kind of kind of do.

Right?

And, it's not easy.

Yeah, and it's not easy.

And also, it's just a little bit more difficult nowadays to tell the stories that you want to tell because you get kind of confined, like you said, right?

Yeah.

And, you know, independent film is and this is what's so great about your show and what you're doing here, because independent filmmakers need to be supported.

You know, when I first started out with ninth Street Independent Film, you could make an independent film and and Hollywood would see it and it could be like Spike's movie, you know, she's got to have it.

That movie was a very small film.

Oh, yeah.

No.

No stars.

It's like 300 grand.

300 grand.

It's a great film.

And that film launched his career.

So that's.

That was the way that you broke into the industry, was that you made a small film.

They saw it and they went, oh, you're a director.

And you broke through that way.

Clerks.

The the list is very long, right?

Those movies.

Right.

That's that's that still happens.

But it's a lot trickier than it used to be.

Yeah.

And so, so you have to kind of, you know, find your way of telling your story the best way you can.

that's that hasn't changed.

It's but the mechanisms of them kind of bringing you in the fold and saying, hey, we see your little movie, let's let you give you a big budget.

Now, let's bring you in the industry that's become a little different now.

And so it's and but it still happens.

It still happens, but it's not quite the direct path that it used to be.

I introduce you to them filmmakers and his Jacob and Ben Burkhart.

Raise your hand.

They're brothers.

Yeah, I we were talking earlier and they're actually on the first episode of Art House, and we talked about the same thing.

It's like just do it, you know?

And these guys are doers and you talk to them about them.

It's like, they made the film, you know, they made and give you a copy of the film.

They give you.

My wife has.

Yeah.

So that's how you do it.

You got it.

You got to have the movie in the in your trunk of your car, and you and you hand.

It's like folks that are trying to sell their book.

It's the same deal.

And, and, and they're going to get there because they aren't letting things stand in their way.

Right.

So, you know, that's the first obstacle you got to get over, right?

Is I always tell my students the job of Hollywood is to say no, your job is to make them say yes, but they don't really want you there.

You've got to you've got to find your way in.

And everyone's ways in is different.

And but for me, what I try to believe is that you've got to find your way.

Being yourself.

And when you can find your way, being yourself, then when you get there, it's pretty satisfying.

Gig, right?

And think how empathetic it makes you that you're a professor to your teaching young people.

And you know, that doesn't just help them out, obviously, but it helps you out, too, right?

I mean, I mean, CSA is a great example of that.

I mean, my students helped in all kind of levels of the film.

I to my cinematographer I always work with is Professor Matt Jacobson.

We were colleagues together, and we've made a lot of movies together, and we just shot the Brooks film together.

And so, you know, you created a little team of folks, and, and, you know, they become your family in a sense, and you kind of go out and take on the world.

Wow.

This Kevin woman.

Everybody.

Not bad, I so nervous I'd have to I have to do some talking.

And you're amazing.

So.

Okay, this is kind of your standard.

and so the actor studio is just one of the questions.

So, look, I ask you all these tons of questions.

Anything I didn't ask you, you want to talk about?

Well, John, you're pretty good, dude.

I'll stop pretty good.

You know, you know, I think we talked a little bit earlier about, about ninth Street and about how it was kind of, well, I end up kind of calling it like, community filmmaking because, you know, tend to pay, worked on it.

You know, there was I mean, there's several people here that, you know, worked on it.

Robert Hubbard, I've met him.

Then there's all these folks that at my, my good buddy Mitch, you know, we that were all part of the Canon City film community and we were all starting out trying to make a movie, trying to make our movie, and we all helped where I said we were like the Amish, you know, we can all kind of who we all kind of raised a barn together, right?

Yes.

And, and so when you get to do that, then that's kind of where activism kind of comes in, because activism kind of taught me that you have to be willing to kind of, give ownership of what you're doing to others.

And when you give ownership to others, then they are willing to help you with what you're doing.

And and that's the thing that kind of, you know, everyone worked on these movies pretty much for free.

and, and so why are they working for free?

Because they are gaining something from it that they know is helping them as well.

and then there's also just the feeling you get when you're working on something together that's important.

And so that's the other thing I try to tell my students is try to make a film of some, some importance, because people will tend to want to help you with that.

And then your latest with Alvin Brooks is doing just that, right?

Yeah.

I mean, again, with Mr. Brooks, I mean, you know, when he tells you these stories, I mean, he there's, you know, he told us a story about actually is one of his daughters told me the story.

So he was in, they were in a store, I think of an ice cream store.

And, you know, Mr. Brooks is, you know, he did ad hoc, and he's been a policeman.

He's a very brave man.

So they're in this ice cream store, and he's he's in line with his daughter to get some ice cream.

And there's this guy kind of at the counter, and there's some weird kind of going on, and.

And then he kind of figured out the guy was robbing the store, so he go, so the guy saw him and he said, oh, hey, Mr. Brooks.

And and and he said, what are you doing?

And he said, well, you know, and he saw he was robbing the store.

And so come in, come in.

So he comes in, they go out to the car and I'll be right out to the car.

And so the guy stops robbing the store, goes out to the car and back up, and he goes out and, you know, and so he, you know, basically talks him out of robbing the store because he's Alvin Brooks, of course.

And, and, you know, one of the amazing things you hear in the documentary is that when they would go to crack houses and dope houses and say to them, we're shutting this down.

And, you know, people have guns in those houses and there's money that's obviously this is about money more than anything.

It's about money.

And because he was Alvin Brooks, they said, okay, we'll shut it down.

Wow.

And they never got hurt.

No one ever attacked them because of the respect they had for Mr. Brooks.

Wow.

Well, we can't wait to see that documentary.

It's premiering at the Juneteenth festival at Greenland Armor.

and guess what?

I just got confirmation from, Mike Murphy that we will air at the July 11th here on Kansas City PBS.

You can watch it here.

Here.

Okay, so, Kevin, it's time to wrap this thing up.

Thank you so much for for being our inaugural art house live a conversation with Academy Award winner Kevin Wilmore.

So thank you so much.