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HBO: 'When I Knew' the film is inspired by Robert
Trachtenburg's book of the same name. What
was it like working from that source material?
Randy Barbato: It wasn't a huge leap in terms of being excited
and inspired by the material. For us the
biggest challenge was how do we take it to the
next step? We ended up going all around the
country, and interviewed about a hundred
and fifty people. The first day we filmed in
Philadelphia we knew we were tapping into
something really special. We took out some
local ads and talked to a couple gay and
lesbian centers there. We rented space in a
hotel, and about a hundred people showed
up--you'd think it was an American Idol
audition.
We spoke with HBO that night and said,
"What are we gonna do? There's so many
people and every story is so compelling. We
have something bigger here." That's when we
started talking about this idea of creating
wheniknew.com, that maybe this was more
than just a film. And in essence that's what
we've done. In some ways 'When I Knew' the
film is a trailer for wheniknew.com where we
plan to feature all of the interviews we did,
and also allow people to upload their own
interviews. We're also using a video booth that
we've taken around the country to different
film festivals where people can share their
own stories. So, it's pretty exciting.
HBO: How did you pick the stories that ended up in
the film?
Randy Barbato: The stories were all so good, but ultimately we
picked stories that moved us emotionally the
most; stories that made us laugh, or brought
a tear to our eye. It was more of an emotional
mosaic that emerged, and it also just so
happened that we had this group of people
that really do represent young, old, black,
white, hot, not so hot.
HBO: It's interesting to see how far we've evolved,
culturally, where this kind of subject matter
can be spoken about so openly. What do you
think it says about our society that you were
able to capture so many intimate, revealing
moments?
Randy Barbato: It's invigorating and inspiring to even be able
to make a film like this where people can
reveal themselves and talk about this subject
the way they do in the film. It reminds us how
far we've come. When you think about the
traditional rite of passage for most gays and
lesbians, it's that moment when they come
out and share a huge part of their identity
with other people, when they say, "I am gay,"
or "I am lesbian." And for many years that's
really been the talking point and the story
that we share. This film is really not about
that moment, but this other moment when
you first make that discovery, or you first
start to realize that you're gay.
And the sad thing is, from the moment of
"when I knew" to the moment of "when I came
out," there's all that time in between which for
so many people is a very difficult and
challenging time. That's what the inspiration
of making this film was about: reducing the time from when people knew to
when people came out. It's about making
something that might contribute to the way
not just gays or lesbians might openly talk
about that and remember that, but also for
heterosexuals to get a better understanding of
what it might be like for a young person to
discover that they are different, that there
might be something about themselves that
they can't even share with their own family.
It's important for people to understand that
the very core of your identity is something
that for many young gays and lesbians they
often fear sharing with their own family.
Because of this, it's really important for
parents to see this movie. Because parents
have no control over whether their child is
straight or gay, but what you do have control
over is supporting and loving and protecting
them.
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