Anything that has such a signature and original look to it is very inspirational. Another film that came out around a similar time that had a strong impact on the way films started looking or the way art in general started to look was Alien. It had such a distinct look with all that H.R. Giger stuff. And with Star Wars it was tailored more towards a younger crowd.
Look at guys like Seth Green who are completely obsessed with Star Wars and are so happy to go there and geek out and pay tribute to it in an amazing clever way.
It's amazing to me that a film franchise has had this kind of impact on a worldwide level. There's really nothing else. What is that going to be for this next generation, for my kids who weren't there in 1977 when Star Wars debuted? Is it going to be Harry Potter? But this franchise is really something. The costumes and props tour galleries and museums like King Tut's tomb; it's incredible.
The next door neighbor kids -- who have been die-hard fans since they were two -- are always pretending to have lightsaber battles, and doing all the moves without lightsabers. And I do a pretty good Yoda impression, so I leave them messages on their parents' answering machine and they love it!
As a dad, do you find yourself rediscovering Star Wars through the eyes of your son?
In Revenge of the Sith, at the end when Anakin's crawling out of the lava and his face is burning up, that was pretty brutal. I watched that with my son and kept one eye on him to make sure he was okay. That was really graphic.
My son already informed me two years ago, "Daddy, I want to be a writer/director." Ever since he could hold a pencil he's been drawing. He has his own comic books. When he was like two years old we'd buy him reams of paper that he would just go through with his drawings. He has two big books full of all his movie posters that he makes of the films he wants to do. He makes his posters first and rates them PG-13 and so on depending on the violence. He says he wants to make horror-comedies. Of course, he hasn't really seen any horror films. [laughs] He asked me once what I thought the scariest movie was and I said The Shining, so now he wants to see it.
When we took a tour of Kerner Optical, as well as Skywalker Ranch, his eyes were bugging out. Afterwards he said, "Daddy, I want to be a writer/director more than anything now!"
I've directed a lot of music videos, but this was my first feature. I had written some screenplays over the years and we raised a bunch of money and had a bunch of different producers come and go; and nothing happened. So I rewrote the screenplay into a novel form. We ended up doing the film and get got picked up by National Lampoon and now talking to some people about some other projects.
Were you inspired by other mockumentary-type films like This is Spinal Tap and A Mighty Wind?
I talked about the idea of a film about a fictional jam band with Matt Stone from "South Park" and we laughed about it and thought it was great. I throw around ideas with my friends all the time and nothing comes of it. But this idea seemed doable, so we did it. Halfway through the production of it, I decided I should probably watch Spinal Tap just to make sure we didn't step on any toes. And I realized that our film is much less overt. It's more like a Ricky Gervais type piece like "The Office." It's very dry. A few of the little old ladies who saw it on the film festival circuit thought Electric Apricot was a real band. [laughs]
What were some of the different obstacles you faced as a first-time feature director?
For music videos we always had full crews of people, but this film was very indie and shoestring budget. The premise is that it's a student film by a UCLA grad student. And that was our excuse for why it looks the way it does, as well as our excuse for having no money. But I have to say I have a deep appreciation for what George Lucas must have gone through to make his films. For me, this was like a continuous kick to the testicles every single day. I've been involved in a lot of different productions, but with this film we had so many things happen. We had numerous trips to the hospital, a hit-and-run, and a DP that flipped out and disappeared with all our footage for a couple days and we couldn't find him.
There's your DVD bonus features right there!
It was insane! Every day something crazy would happen. I had to go to the hospital in the middle of the night with a kidney stone, and I had to do a long drive the next day because I was the only one insured to use the van. We had a power outage. The festival we were supposed to shoot at got cancelled a half an hour before we arrived. [sigh] Of course, I can laugh about it now, but at the time I was roaring like Chewbacca.
Everything's a challenge. To me, making music and recording albums is easy. Writing novels is hard. It's a very solitary thing. There's no camaraderie like you have in a band. Making that movie was like building a house with weekend carpenters and all the materials are on fire. [laughs]
Would I do it again? Yes! You live and you learn.
To learn more about Les Claypool and his film Electric Apricot: Quest for Festeroo, visit his official Web site here.
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