Interview: Alexander Payne by Jeff Otto / FILMFORCE.com / October 19, 2004 With his first three films, Citizen Ruth, Election and About Schmidt, Alexander Payne has achieved the rare feat of not only avoiding the sophomore slump, but also of avoiding the trappings of success in Hollywood. Even with his largest-scale film to date, About Schmidt, Payne kept his very original voice and unique perspective. Payne's latest film is entitled Sideways, adapted from the 1999 novel by Rex Pickett. For the first time, Payne has decided to venture out of his home state of Nebraska and move to the beautiful vineyard territory of Santa Barbara County. Paul Giamatti and Thomas Hayden Church star as Miles and Jack, respectively. Jack is about to get married and these two longtime friends have scheduled this final getaway together before the ceremony to have a little fun. The problem is, Miles and Jack have different visions of what the weekend will be. Miles, a wine enthusiast, is looking forward to drinking some fine wine, eating some good food and playing golf. Jack, much to the contrary, is in pursuit of one final sex fling before tying the knot. The challenge of going four for four is now upon Payne and it seems as if he's up for the task. In a time of remakes and movies based on TV shows, Payne is one of those select few filmmakers that is still making films with an original vision, perhaps one of the saviors of originality in Hollywood. At a press day at the gorgeous Bacara Resort in Santa Barbara, California, Alexander Payne joined press to talk about the new film. The locale was just a few miles from where Sideways was shot. Miles is a character who is a wine connoisseur. Things aren't going all that great in his life, but wine is a hobby that takes him away from real life, at least briefly. As we follow Miles and Jack's adventure through Santa Barbara, Miles attempts to teach his uncultured friend Jack the proper tenets of wine tasting, giving audiences an interesting lesson along the way. "It's not all about wine," says Payne. "It's a story of people. There's a romance, there's a buddy thing, it's a road trip, and what's wrong with learning a little something about wine?" Following About Schmidt, this is the second road movie Payne has directed in a row. "Yeah, I know, and I was going to be doing a third one, this thing called Nebraska, but I'm not gonna do that next, and I don't even like road movies all that much necessarily. It's really just, [with] Election, I wasn't interested in making a high school movie, I couldn't have been less interested, but it just, the characters, the situations, somehow it just happens. And I can't stand shooting in cars." Shooting on location was an added bonus for the cast and crew. "We had a really rich time making the film, and a lot of it was because of the locale. Just in the sunshine, it was harvest time, you're out in the fields and it was just so beautiful. It's so nice to be outside. I love shooting outside. I'm not so crazy about shooting inside and I hate shooting in sound stages. "We had a real creative community spirit of making this film, where everyone was included, was made to feel included, contributing creative ideas… I would want the film, by extension, also to be inclusive with the audience, inclusive with the emotions... I don't like to manipulate the audience any more than you have to… If they find something moving, then great… Let the audience contribute to, not the construction of the narrative, [but] I don't like just clobbering the audience with things. I want to bring the audience in, and I think wine itself is an inclusive-making element." Payne doesn't think that the wine talk will alienate those who aren't as knowledgeable, and he hopes the film can educate those who might be interested in learning more about wine. "Well, I like specificity. If elements are going to be in a film of mine, I like them to be true and specific, so both about Santa Barbara County, where we were shooting, and that it feel accurate in that way, and also about the whole wine [stuff], because I think all the wine people are going to see the movie and judge me. Did he get it right, did he not get it right? The audience is not general, I never think of it as general audience. The audience is made up of individuals who know a lot. Everyone has his or her own niche. "I've done a few interviews with wine press and they've talking about, 'Well, how do we overcome this snobbery that's associated with wine?' I'm like, 'I know, it's so weird. Why is wine considered an exclusive or snobby undertaking? Is it because of the high prices they charge in restaurants, the high markup?' That's a problem with restaurants because, you go to other countries, Canada for example, and they don't, there's not that hideous, stupid markup. Many restaurants in New York have begun to learn that. But I want inclusiveness." Payne says that he has explored the wine world in the past, although he had not really been a part of that world in a few years before going into production on Sideways. "Yes, but my wine knowledge had kind of plateaued out. I had read a lot about it in the early '90s, because I was cooking a lot and was learning more about wine and bought a bunch of wine…" Coming off his highly acclaimed performance in American Splendor, Paul Giamatti has quickly gone from character actor to a hot commodity. The character of Miles in Sideways is a pretty different character, although some may draw the connection of Giamatti as a generally unhappy character in both films. "He never brought it up. I just saw Miles Raymond as so different from Harvey Pekar. The physicality, okay maybe Paul Giamatti himself has a certain connection to the tragic side of life that comes through in some of his performance, but who is funnier? I just love that guy. I just think he's such a great actor. And also, I hadn't seen a bunch of his movies; I really hadn't seen any of his movies before I cast him. I saw American Splendor when I had met him but not yet announced my selections or called him up to say, 'Would you please be in [my movie]?' I liked it and I liked him in it, but all I could think of is how different I thought Miles was, but I thought he'd be a good enough actor." The on-set atmosphere was said to be a pretty relaxed one, and Payne says that the off-camera antics between Giamatti and Hayden Church were often a site to behold. Still, Payne says that they mostly stuck to the script: "It was all pretty much the screenplay. From time to time, Tom would say something during rehearsal or practicing a scene, he just ejaculates these things constantly that incorporate into the script. But pretty much, what you see in the script is as written." While the character of Jack is the fun-loving good buddy to Miles on the surface, beneath he is actually a pretty dark and even downright unlikable character. "To me, the most violent scene in the movie is where he calls his fiancé and says, 'We're just going out for the night. We'll probably get home late, I just thought I'd check in now, say good night. I love you.' And he's going off to f**k." Jack is about to get married, although his exploits on the trip soon beg the question of why? "Well, it's hinted that he needs the dough. His career is floundering and he's about to marry into some money. That's part of it. Obviously, from experience, we see that many people get married for less than self-aware reasons." One of Payne's signatures has always been his multi-faceted and colorful female characters. "I don't distinguish between the genders. I hope they're all real people, male or female… We don't really think about that too much, we just hope they're all real, outrageous in some way. But there aren't enough good parts for women these days. That's true. You see old Warner Brothers pictures and movies in the '40s… Where's my Bette Davis, where's my Joan Crawford?" Payne sees co-star Virginia Madsen as having the look of those stars of the past. "She's a '40s Warner Brothers actress. She's a little Barbara Stanwyky. She's very 1940s and I love that about her. She's just really one of those gals, she's just out of time. She's one of them." So far, Payne's three films have all been adapted from other material. We asked Payne about this and why he is more attached to novels for his source material than screenplays. "I have never read a script I've wanted to make. There's been one. At least a novel, there's often more going on in a novel than in a screenplay; it's just a richer form. And then Jim and I can find our own voice through our dialectic with the novel… It's getting rid of stuff and asking questions of the novel and finding threads which were maybe presented but not elaborated on in a way that would have pleased us more. That's how we're able to work and find our own voice within an adaptation. And an example for me is, a great example is, Kubrick, and he's like Mr. Fantastic, innovative director who 95 percent of the time did adaptations." When all is said and done, Payne says that he's really just grateful to be doing what he's doing. "I have more fun then I've ever had in the rest of my life making movies. The biggest problem, or the studio's gonna yell at me or if a set falls over, I don't care, because it's all within the context of making a movie, and I feel so lucky, then what else is there?" Sideways comes to theaters on Friday, October 22nd.