Josh Mond’s James White screened at TIFF in its “Discovery” series, and that proved an apt category for a guy better known as a producer of films like Martha Marcy May Marlene. His own feature film – loosely based on his own life – made a splash at the festival and sold to various countries. Mond was battling a cold and flu combo during the festival, so instead of shaking hands we bumped elbows at the offices of FilmsWeLike before talking about the process of making the film.
The film’s opening is pretty remarkable. Did you have that scene planned from the start?
We wanted to start almost like an overture. My director of photography and I were talking about the idea that you could literally copy and paste this scene and put it throughout the film. I wanted to show [James] at his highest point, and then show him chasing that for the rest of the movie. And wanted to go from subject to objective point of views.
This New York isn’t the pretty, touristy New York.
I wanted you to see his New York. The coolest compliments I’ve received are from New Yorkers who love how I’ve shot it.
Tell me about the casting. That’s a huge role for a relative unknown.
I’d done an experimental short film, which was sort of a precursor to this, with Chris Abbott. When we were shooting it, I was really happy. When I went to edit it, I couldn’t believe how much he was doing – things I didn’t see on set. So while I was writing the script [for James White] I asked if he could do it. He was doing a play at the time, he read multiple drafts, and he said he’d do it. It couldn’t have been anybody but Chris. Cynthia had read the script and we met for breakfast, shared a lot about our lives, and we connected, and that was it. With Cudi [Scott Mescudi] – I wrote to his music. I had a lot of his music in the script. I knew the actor and filmmaker Mark Webber, who’d worked with Cudi. My producer reached out to Mark, Mark reached out to Cudi. And I met Cudi the day after he’d read the script, I showed him the short, and asked if he wanted to make a movie. Ron Livingstone was a friend. We’d done a lot of movies with his wife, Rosemarie DeWitt.
Cynthia was telling me there’s an autobiographical element to the piece. How tough was it dealing with this material?
Some of it is autobiographical. I did lose my mother four and a half years ago. I did grow up in New York. I definitely had a hard time processing life and the impending loss of my mother. It was extremely difficult to walk through a lot of the spaces in the film. I remember one take of a scene where Cynthia was sick, and she was getting these noises in her throat, and I thought, “How the fuck did she know?” That’s what my mom sounded like. And she said her mother had had the same sound.
I liked that there wasn’t a lot of exposition, no recalling past scenes between mother and son.
I tried in the script to avoid exposition as much as I could. I couldn’t get rid of some of the exposition. I hate it when I see exposition just handed to you. I like to drop you into a situation to figure it out yourself.
The bathroom scene feels like the centerpiece of the film. How tough was that to get right? How many takes did you do?
I don’t think it was many takes, probably three or four. We did it on adrenalin. In the moment, you feel stuff, and it worked. Watching that scene affects me more now. Every time I catch the end of the movie at festivals and screenings, I have a different relationship to it. It’s the most honest and the deepest the film goes. I think it’s what the film’s about: in [James] believing in himself, and the mother seeing it.
At the screening I attended, one jaded viewer said, “Oh, another film about a privileged white guy.”
Who said that? What’s their name? Where can I find them? The movies I’ve made as a producer have been polarizing. I’m still coming to terms with the fact that not everyone will like a movie, and that’s okay. You have to remember those who do connect with it. We’re all people, whether we’re privileged or not. And besides, I don’t look at James as being privileged. He sleeps on his mother’s couch. Besides, who the fuck cares if they’re privileged? This person’s mother is dying of cancer. It doesn’t matter if you have money or not. If [that person] feels that way I’m sorry. But if someone else can get something else out of it, that’s great.
See our review for James White here. Plus, don’t miss our interview with James White actors Christopher Abbott and Cynthia Nixon here.
movies@nowtoronto.com | @glennsumi
