Mary J Blige: The Unheard Story of the Album 'My Life'

Factual America

22 Jun

Written By

Mary J Blige is a multi-platinum R&B and Hip Hop recording artist, a 9-time Grammy award-winner, and celebrated actress.

She is also the subject of a new Amazon Studios documentary that releases on June 25th, Mary J Blige’s My Life, that marked the 25th anniversary of the artist's acclaimed 1994 album, propelling her to international stardom.

Joining us to talk about Mary J Blige and the making of this documentary is the Academy Award-winning filmmaker Vanessa Roth, best known for her short documentary Freeheld (2007) and Netflix series Daughters of Destiny (2017).

She tells us about how Mary’s life inspired and influenced the My Life album and her music career, about the challenges of making music documentaries, as well as what it was like working with Amazon Studios.

“Once you’re given the opportunity, you need to do the work.” - Vanessa Roth

Time Stamps:

00:03 - The trailer for Mary J Blige’s My Life.
03:43 - The period of Mary’s life that inspired her My Life album and the film.
06:49 - The unique sound of Mary’s voice and the nature of her lyrics.
08:10 - What Mary's fans will find in the film that they haven't seen or heard before.
10:50 - How Vanessa structured the film.
13:28 - How the film got started and whose idea it was to make it.
17:50 - How familiar Vanessa was with Mary's music before making the film.
22:07 - The role Mary’s family played in her life.
24:43 - Mary’s spiritual side and her belief in providence.
26:19 - Why Vanessa used animation in the film.
32:46 - What it was like working with Amazon Studios.
35:40 - The unique challenges there are in making a music documentary.
38:31 - Mary’s thoughts on the final cut of the film.
40:01 - Vanessa's connection to Forrest Gump and why she didn’t pursue an acting career.
45:07 - The secret to Vanessa's success.
47:10 - The series Vanessa has made on Nat Geo about women impacting societies.

Resources:

Mary J Blige’s My Life (2021)
Mighty Oak
Impact with Gal Gadot (2021)
Innersound Studios
Alamo Pictures

Transcript for Factual America Episode 66 - Mary J Blige: The Unheard Story of the Album 'My Life'

Vanessa Roth 00:01 Hello, I'm Vanessa Roth, and I'm the director of Mary J. Blige's My Life documentary.

Mary J. Blige 00:11 The only thing, I think, that kept us guided was the music. It just saved you.

Speaker 1 00:31 Global superstar...

Speaker 2 00:31 Double Oscar nominee...

Speaker 3 00:32 Nine Grammy Awards...

Speaker 4 00:33 The Queen of hip-hop and R&B: Mary J. Blige!

Speaker 5 00:36 Nobody sounds like her.

Speaker 6 00:37 When Mary sang, I heard the pain of a generation.

Mary J. Blige 00:46 In the neighborhood we lived in it's like prison. There was a lot wrong and there was a lot - I needed to get out. That's why I had that pen. My Life is probably my darkest album at one of the darkest times I've had. Most of the times I was just depressed and didn't want to live. I had it all inside, and I was able to sing it and write it. I didn't know that so many people felt the same way.

Speaker 7 01:14 She made it okay for people to say it's alright to be me.

Speaker 8 01:21 We still don't get to see that a lot, you know? Still.

Mary J. Blige 01:30 If you're here tonight and you are Mary J. Blige fan, you have been tested, you have been tried. And you have been proven.

Speaker 9 01:40 A lot of young black women could relate to where she came from.

Speaker 10 01:46 She gave us a face. She gave us a name.

Speaker 11 01:49 She did something really powerful by inspiring each other to want to live to see another day.

Matthew 02:06 That is a trailer from the documentary Mary J. Blige's My Life debuting on Amazon Prime on June 25. And this is Factual America. We're brought to you by Alamo Pictures, an Austin and London based production company, making documentaries about America for international audiences. I'm your host, Matthew Sherwood. Today, we're talking about Mary J. Blige, the multi Platinum R&B, hip-hop recording artist. The Nine time Grammy Award winner, and now celebrated actress, is the subject of an Amazon Studios doc. that releases on June 25. Joining us to talk about Mary J. Blige in the documentary is a filmmaker celebrated in her own right, it is then my great pleasure to welcome Oscar winning director Vanessa Roth to Factual America. Vanessa, welcome to Factual America. How are you?

Vanessa Roth 02:51 I'm good. How are you? I'm so glad that we're doing this.

Matthew 02:54 Yeah, I'm glad we're doing it, too. I mean, it's a bit early your time so hopefully the coffee has kicked in or whatever beverage you use to get you going in the morning. I think, as we've seen in the trailer, and I've introduced, it's Mary J. Blige's My Life, which is debuting on Amazon Prime on the 25th. So, thanks again so much for coming onto the show. And thanks for making this film. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I've watched a screener. So, I mean, Mary J. Blige; I don't really feel like we need to introduce who she is but maybe you can start us off by telling us what is Mary J. Blige's My Life, the documentary, about?

Vanessa Roth 03:38 Yeah, that's right, we don't really need to find out who she is, but the film itself and what I spent time with her about is the My Life album that she made. It's her second album, her sophomore album, and the film follows that moment in her life, and she's looking back at that time. It was a time when she had just gotten off of the just incredible success and pioneering, just boundary breaking, record of What's The 411. She had come from a really challenging background in New York, and had just risen so quickly, with What's the 411, that it really left her in the state of confusion. At that time, she also was in a relationship that was difficult and abusive. And all of this came to really bring out all this depression and anxiety she was really having at the time and didn't really know how to cope and a lot of things from growing up that were weighing on her from just society and internally. And so the film focuses on that moment in her life when she wrote the My Life album, which was what she says to me at the moment where it was really choosing life or choosing not life, and she wrote the album, as a way to really save herself, and when she did that, as she had said to me, and this is what we explore in the film, is when she told her truth, and she wrote this album as a way to really heal herself and deal with all the things she was dealing with internally. All these fans came forward and said me, too, Mary; me, too, Mary, and she realized she wasn't alone. And that was the beginning of this relationship she's now had with her fans where they really sort of feed each other back and forth, where just this idea of telling the truth and being authentic and being yourself and taking chances, at times, maybe when you feel most afraid, and that's really what the film explores.

Matthew 05:40 Yeah, I mean, I'm only a couple years older, I think, than Mary J. Blige and this was sort of the - part of a soundtrack to my certainly formative musical years, I will say, in the 90s, but I think what you've captured - well, I didn't quite have an appreciation for - is this relationship with her fans, which was quite, quite poignant, actually. And, you know, as you say, it's about My Life. One of the top - many consider one of the top - albums of all times, makes a lot of people's Top 100 lists. I gather, she also did some musical performances related to the 25th anniversary. But this is more than just a look back, isn't it? I mean, it's not just about making the album. I mean, as you say, I mean, it's - what also strikes me, having seen this is how it resonates, even today, and I was listening to it on the way over here. It kind of blew me away. It'd been years since I listened to it, and it sounds like - she doesn't sound like someone in her early 20s, let's put it that way.

Vanessa Roth 06:46 No. No, she doesn't, and I think it's because it's coming from her core essence, you know, her true self that, I think, is a timeless, is a timeless spirit, and I think what she's talking about, it resonates today, because it's about heartache, it's about longing, it's about pain, it's about trauma. And it's also about this hope, and this desire inside to, I mean, she says it in the film, and, like, her last song on the album is Be Happy, so, it's this, just really, and she says it in the film, too, at the end of the day, she just really wants to be happy. And I think that that's what that album does. It's this evolution of this woman at that moment, but it's again, like you said, it's not just that moment, because the things she talks about in the album are just timeless human emotions.

Matthew 07:42 And the feelings are still so raw. I mean, that was the thing that also you've got the interviews with the people, the producers of the record, the album, and some reunions, moments there, and just the things they share. I mean, and I guess, I guess maybe related, I mean, what are things that her fans are going to find out from this doc that they didn't know, may not otherwise know, in terms of these scenes?

Vanessa Roth 08:09 I think, to me - I mean, the fans, obviously, know what they know much more than I know what they already know. If you're a fan of Mary J. Blige, you follow, as I've learned, you really know Mary, and you know whole story, you know all this. I think what fans will find, though, is some really beautiful moments of connection between her and her fans, her and her producers and co-writers of the album, this 25 years later reconnecting and re-experiencing and talking about those days, and how that feels today; some concert, you know, concert moments that are fabulous. And also, maybe, there's some things in there with her family and archival photos and films that we were really lucky to get and find. We worked with Mary's sister, LaTonya, very closely with getting family photos. And then the storytelling, you know, we get the storytelling not just from Mary, but we got this gift of this opportunity; we spoke with Andre Harrell about that moment in their time. Andre, you know, was the - really was the person that put - the company that put Mary out into the world and through Uptown, and he passed away this year. And so, the fact that we got that story that he told about Mary about that moment, about Puff, and about that era just was I thought really, you know, just obviously, tragically, but also special for the fact that we got that legacy.

Matthew 09:49 Since you mention him, because we've had another director on who worked - it's the Biggie Smalls doc, actually, who - how do you refer - is he Sean? Is he Puff Daddy? Is he P Diddy? Is he Puffy? Is he Diddy? How do you get to refer to him?

Vanessa Roth 10:04 I think that's something you got to ask him. I don't know; I mean, obviously, he in the film, in our film, you know, from him we have Sean Diddy Combs. I know I referred to him as Puff. I think that, obviously, he's in charge of that.

Matthew 10:25 Yeah. So, I mean, so the other thing that happens is, well, in this doc is that Mary J. Blige really opens up her inner self to us, doesn't she? I mean, she's on camera quite a bit talking about that. I guess, we do get to see some of the backstory in order to understand the album and the artist in the person; isn't that right?

Vanessa Roth 10:50 Yeah. So, when I was structuring the film, one of the most important things to Mary was that this film is about this album. And it's not, it's funny, it's called Mary J. Blige's My Life, and we're being very deliberate to say, though, it's not a biopic, it's not a film about her life; it's about the album, My Life. But in telling the story, and this is, again, like when I was sort of structuring the film, and figuring out what beats we need, is when I came on the idea - when we were going to do the album, I felt that in order to do the album, you had to understand where she came from, what built her up as a person up until the time she was 25, 24 - 25. And to do that we do tell the story of her life up until the point where she makes the album. And so, because we needed that in order to understand the weight of what she was carrying, by the time she made the album. So, yeah, so viewers will get an idea of what that growing up was. I didn't want to use any kind of, like, re-enactment things, or any devices like that in the doc. But we felt that because Mary really narrates the whole doc, it's really in her voice. And we have these interviews, but it's really her voice; her leading us through this journey. But to kind of dive a little bit more emotionally, we added this element of animation that helps tell that story of that little Mary because she talks about a lot; she had talked to me about, for her there's always like that little Mary that herself today is protecting. And so, we wanted to create that little Mary; what that little more vulnerable person who that was for her and keep that present through the course of the film, because that's really who evolves. And that's who she's trying to protect when she writes the My Life album.

Matthew 12:51 Okay. And then, and as you say, it's not a biopic, which I would stress that was certainly - that comes across very quickly, I think. If it is it's a biopic of the album, you know, but we do get a better understanding - the thing that struck me is that we get a better understanding of - well, we do get a better understanding of Mary J. Blige, but I feel like what we also find out is who is Mary, you know, who the girl from Schlobohm Projects, Yonkers, basically, you know.

Vanessa Roth 13:21 Yes.

Matthew 13:24 How did this film come about? Whose idea was this?

Vanessa Roth 13:28 So, the film started with Mary; Mary and her team: Ashaunna Ayars and Nicole Jackson from Blue Butterfly, which is Mary's group. And then they worked together with Creature Films, who's Mark Ford and Kevin Lopez, and Entertainment One with Tara Long. And they brought it to Amazon. And then, after some shooting that they had done, they ended up bringing me on. And it started by following her on her Royalty tour, she was on with Nas, and in the Royalty tour she had a section of the tour that she was doing this 25 year anniversary of My Life. But the reason for it really from Mary's perspective, and really was driven by Mary, and Puff came along as well, was really that she felt that she wanted to give something back to her fans. She's been on this journey she feels with her fans all this time, and that album was really people's favorite and most special and really meant something in their lives. And so, she wanted to make this film really for them.

Matthew 14:37 And I think that's very interesting, because I was wondering how, you know, how collaborative this was, and creatively, and it seems like she was quite hands on. But I think what's just as interesting is, how did you become involved? Because, I mean, I think you'd be the first to say, you're not an R&B, hip-hop music director by trade, or in your specialties more even heading up sort of social reform type issues and stances and things like that. So, why did they pick - I mean, I'm glad they picked you, but why did they pick you?

Vanessa Roth 15:14 You know, it's just a really first question: how did I get it? There's no mystery that it doesn't seem like I'd be the first pick to make this film. I think what it was, and what I hope that I delivered on, was that the films I make, yeah, most of the time, all the time, I make films about social impact, social justice; I do a lot about legacy and memory. And I do a lot about mental health, but, and really, it's usually about people who are often very invisible or marginalized, put to the side, and their narratives are not shared. I think that the reason they came to me was because what I'm always looking for in the work I do is just what connects us to each other as humans, really trying to make things that do tell a human and intimate story, but can do it also in an epic kind of way, that - it's, you know, that you're brought into it, because it's really intriguing and engaging, but then very quiet at the same time, and I think that's what Mary wanted. And, I think, you know, what she wanted, yes, it's a music doc, and I think it's a great music doc, and there's great music and concert in it. And it's about this album. Yes, that's all true. And I absolutely relied on Mary and Puff, and the producers, and my editor, and my shooters, and everybody who have done music docs before, and Amazon to make sure we were delivering, you know, an A-Plus amazing music doc. But, I think at its core, what I brought to it and what my style of just filmmaking is as well on the road is just like you said, I wasn't making a movie about the icon persona of Mary, but I was trying to tell a story that Mary wanted, which is about Mary, the internal Mary, which is what the My Life album is about. And tried to dig a little deeper, so it wasn't just performative.

Matthew 17:37 And so, when you're brought on board, what were your first impressions of when you met her? I mean, were you a fan of hers? I mean probably were a fan, but I mean, you know, how familiar were you with her music beforehand? I mean, what is she like to work with?

Vanessa Roth 17:50 Yeah, I was familiar, but I was absolutely not aware of the deep, profound impact in so many ways that she's had on so many people's lives. I was always an admirer of just how talented she is in so many things, and how accomplished she is. And just I had noticed that but I really didn't know on this deeper level, like when I did spend time with fans, and when I did talk to - when I interviewed her colleagues and other musicians, just how deeply she's impacted and impacts people, and that was really special to see. And, yeah, when I first met her, we met, I met with her, her sister, LaTonya, Nicole and Ashaunna as a team. And to me when I had listened - I listened to the album, before I had gotten this interview with them - and was listening to every single word and I had read about what the album had been and done for people, and I knew how huge she was, but then listening to the words, I really did feel like I was hearing that longing, this begging, during this heartache, this person crying out for some kind of help and wanting to heal. So, I brought that up in the meeting, and I was nervous that I was saying that because I didn't know if, like, it's okay to say I heard all this because I'm sitting next to this icon and, like, is it okay that I say that I hear this. And I think that's what - and I said, I feel like this movie needs to be a love letter to that younger Mary, which is what she had wanted it to be, too. So, I think we connected on that. And then just on a really, really personal side, my daughter's a musician, and she's in her early 20s, a songwriter and I see, I listen to what she writes, and hear what she's doing, and see that it's such a healing process for her- the act of songwriting, and I also see so much in her that I don't know if she sees in herself yet because she's in her early 20s. And that was the other piece that Mary and I spent a lot of time talking about; and that's in the movie too, is this idea, she says, it's just still, like, really hits me that she says, when she looks at that younger self, she says, I didn't know I was me. And I just love that idea that we all in whatever, you know, to whatever degree, like, other people maybe see something in us, that takes us a long time to see in ourselves. And I love that idea of self-love and the evolution of that as a woman and as an artist.

Matthew 20:42 Yeah, I know, someone recently stepping down from a prominent position, but anyway, he was saying he wouldn't have gotten anywhere where he was without - you always have to have someone believe in you, which I guess it's probably the same idea. Someone has to see something that you don't know is there, don't they, and along the way,

Vanessa Roth 21:04 Right. But obviously, you must somewhere deep down know it's there, or else you wouldn't keep going. Maybe. I mean... she says that, too; like, obviously I was; she says, I was me because I was able to cross through the fear and do the things I've done. But yeah, like you said, and I think actually, you brought up a good point of movie does - it really is a series of people believing in her along the way from, you know, her sister and her family, and some people in her neighborhood, to then, Jeff Redd, who hears her music, to then Andre Harrell, to then Puff, to then - you know, and then the fans, and it just keeps going and people keep saying, yes, Mary, keep going, it's good, it's good.

Matthew 21:48 I mean, I think, I was gonna ask you what else really struck you about her? You've already mentioned connection to her fans, a lot of these issues. But, and there's this resilience, obviously. But then also, I think you briefly mentioned it earlier, is this the sense of family, I think that comes through this. It seems her family plays a big, big role in her life.

Vanessa Roth 22:07 Yeah, I think that they do. Yeah, the film, obviously, it talks a lot about her care for her mother, or concern for her mom. There's a moment in the film where she talks about abuse and recognizing that she's in a position that she saw her mother in that was very painful to her. She's very protective of her mom and of her sister. She has younger siblings as well. And I think family is a very important part of her life, for sure.

Matthew 22:43 Okay. I think we're gonna give our listeners a quick, early break, but then we'll be right back with Vanessa Roth, the director of Mary J. Blige's My Life from Amazon Studios.

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Matthew 23:56 Welcome back to Factual America. I'm here with Oscar award winning director Vanessa Roth. The film is Mary J. Blige's My Life; debuts on Amazon Prime on June 25. We've been obviously talking about Mary J. Blige. What comes out to me as well as having seen this film is this incredible sense of belief that she has, that obviously was not always there, as the film documents, but this belief in self or self-love, I think, as is also described, but seems also a hint of also this belief in providence. That was kind of coming through in some of her interviews and scenes in the film. Is that something you discovered while filming?

Vanessa Roth 24:43 Yeah, I think that Mary's very spiritual; however that manifests itself to her. We explore some of it but mostly it's her own, you know, it's her own set of beliefs; again, she's very spiritual, and has a very strong relationship with her idea of what God is to her. She talks about - in the film, we have this animated section that's one of my favorite animations - she says God is love; God is you; God is yourself looking in the mirror and saying, 'who do I want to be? What do I want to do?' So, obviously, she would have to speak to this herself; what I got from her is that it's a very personal relationship that she has to her sense of her ability to move through the hardest challenges that she has and to check in with herself.

Matthew 25:42 You've just mentioned it again, and I wanted to talk about this, is the use of animation in the film; I mean, as you're aware, it's in some ways, it's becoming quite common or de rigueur in a lot of docs these days, and I think it's a way of - for some it's a way of doing recreation, but that's not what you do here. Seems to me, it's used to set a tone or a mood, or to get that across, in my humble opinion; was that what you were trying to achieve with that? And how did that evolve as you were doing the project?

Vanessa Roth 26:19 Yeah, I feel like - so, I've been making docs a long time, like, 25 years now. And I...

Matthew 26:25 That's hard to believe; I can't believe you've got a daughter in your early 20s. But that's all I'll say.

Vanessa Roth 26:31 I do. I do. And I've been doing docs for a very long time and doing docs, my first one I did was in 1994. In New York. I was doing it about kids living in foster care at the time. Now those kids are like 40 or something. But - oh, animation. So, at the time I started doing docs, I feel like documentaries were very much of, you know, this, the content, however, we could get the story, we'd get the story, and things have evolved so much with sort of how docs are presented. And, in a way, there's this freedom, a creative freedom that I've appreciated. Some of it, it's a different conversation, I think we could have another time about the evolution of where docs have come. But, for me as a storyteller, there are parts of this that I do appreciate: the more of the openness and flexibility to tell stories using all kinds of mediums, and so animation in this, like I said, I didn't want to do re-enactments. We did have - there some really great archival pieces in there, but I also don't like using archival to represent an idea of an area and we had a really hard time finding good things that were about Schlobohm where she grew up that weren't, to be honest, like super racist, and discriminatory in the way that they were filmed, the news pieces. And the story was coming from her point of view, I didn't want archival old news pieces that were coming from some journalist's camera. And so, what we did do, we do have beautiful photography from real legendary photographers of the time, of the area, of the community, and of the neighborhood. And, to me that felt authentic and textured in the right way, that it wasn't someone else's voice coming in. But so, anyway, back to the animation. Like I said, she speaks so much about herself as a little girl and more of that inner life. So, that's what the animation is to me. They're sort of these dreamlike things, it's their memory. It's not really memory of, like, a true factual thing. It's memory of the spirit of her, again, like this essence, this little girl who had these hopes and these dreams, and this escape - music was an escape for her - she talks the very beginning of the movie, which is what links us to My Life right away, is that listening to Roy Ayers, and Everybody Loves The Sunshine, she would see herself kind of that's - like, she talked to me about, she'd be like, sort of spinning outside, like, you know, thinking about that song, and it'd be this dizzying thing to her. And that's actually her description of that is what made me think of doing animation because I thought, oh, I want to see that little girl spinning in the sun. And that that's this escape for her, and that's where she aspires to be, which is where she gets to be.

Matthew 29:42 I mean, I think it's a good point. I mean, I don't know if this is true for everyone. It's true in my case; if I think about childhood memories, I don't remember specifically what someone said or specific actions, it's more a - the earliest ones are all about how the sun felt or how a feeling or a, you know, something like that; it isn't, you know, and I think that's very interesting because as you do, you capture that - that certainly comes through in the animation with this young Mary J. Blige.

Vanessa Roth 30:18 We also wanted to - something that I didn't feel I could at least capture unless we did something like this was that fluid connection between that little Mary and her, today. And so, the animation does grow up with her. You know, and then there's some dark times that she talks about that I felt animation does a good job, kind of being able to be abstract.

Matthew 30:42 Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I've seen others try something, but it was much more - how best to describe it and not be unfair to them - but it was more like, I know the example would be someone animated, but someone sitting on the edge of a bed with their head in their hands and just looking very distraught, whereas you're right, you're very abstractual; it kind of - you've got her describing how she was feeling at those times, and how you represent that. I thought it was very, I mean, who did the animation because I think we should probably give them a shout out.

Vanessa Roth 31:18 Yeah, they were great. Yeah, it's a woman owned and run company called Mighty Oak. They're based in Brooklyn. I tried to also hire and work with as many women and make sure that we had a very diverse and mixed group of people working on the film. So that again, we had a - that we could just tell the true, the real, story. And not make assumptions about things. But the other thing about the animation that I thought was really fun: I had wanted, because we had this archival, with some archival things like from Soul Train... I also felt like I've seen so many docs that we just sort of flatly see all that archival and so the other thing that we do with animation, which I just had such a good time doing was imagining how - Might Oak and I built, you know, the animation sequences, a lot of them around archival stuff. So, the archival video exists inside the animation. And that was really fun. So, again, like a lot of this stuff was just to add some fun, because - Mary's music is so fun, and great, and exciting that I thought it would just add that little - again, added texture that I haven't been able to explore enough in my work, which I love doing.

Matthew 32:39 I think you achieved that. I mean, so this was an Amazon project from the very, almost the very beginning, is that right?

Vanessa Roth 32:48 From the beginning. Yeah.

Matthew 32:50 And so, was that your first time working with them? How did you enjoy that?

Vanessa Roth 32:54 It was great. I loved it. They were so filmmaker, not just friendly, but just so, just supportive and pushed the bounds . We had a rough cut that I wasn't - it was a rough cut we had to finish really quickly. And it was good. Like, it was about the music. It was amazing. It's still amazing; again, like anything we make about Mary's gonna, like, I'm lucky in that way, like, as Mary said, too; like, we're just, you know, everyone loves this album, loves Mary. So, it was starting in a good spot, but the rough cut was in a place that wasn't really getting to what I had wanted at that depth. And I remember Mary saying to me, it's good, like, you know, like, it's good, fine, you know? And I agreed with her, and I was nervous because I thought Amazon was gonna, like, be like it's fine; it's great but no, they completely agreed, like, it needs, it's missing this, like, this depth, this core thing, that we really need more Mary in this deeper way; like, go deeper, go, you know, and that's actually when we brought in the animation element to it, so - and that was really - and also the chap - we have chapters through the film that are named after lines in the My Life song that also can show her journey and evolution through that time. And so, anyway, yeah, just sort of - the Amazon people, the execs, were the ones really that kept saying, you know, Vanessa, go; be creative, do something that feels good. We want this to be a moment that is just as important as Mary is, and so don't feel that you need to just, you know, make this and move on, but like really wanted, really supported us all in going deep.

Matthew 33:29 Well, that's - how liberating that must be. I mean...

Vanessa Roth 34:49 Yes, really wonderful.

Matthew 34:50 I probably shouldn't say this, but we have a lot of docs from a lot of different other studios, and it's interesting, they'll always have someone listening in on the conversation to make sure I don't make any stupid mistakes, but we don't have anyone for Amazon here right now, so this is a - I think it's full, free run whatever we want to do - so, thank you. I'll give him a shout out, too. And then, I mean, what was the main challenge for you personally, because you've to go from the documentaries you've been doing to being, I mean, we've already talked about this isn't just purely a music doc, whatever. But you have made a music doc. I mean, how did you... You can put that, you know, there's your bucket list, you know, one off on the bucket list. But what were the challenges? Was that a challenge for you to make that transition, if you will?

Vanessa Roth 35:40 I think it was more of a fear going in that, yeah, like, what am I doing on this stage, I don't know how to do this, like, when we're in concert, like just more of a - little more of a fear. And then I sort of settled into, no, but I know how to tell a story. And I know what the story is, and I know that I'm good at from the beginning of doing docs my sort of mantra has always been, like, you know, it's important to know what you're good at, and who you are, in order to then collaborate with and rely on other people who are great at things that you're not, like, know what you're the expert in and know what someone else is. And I think that, as soon as I remembered that, and didn't have to put on anything of oh, yeah, I'm a music doc guy, cos I'm not.

Matthew 36:30 So, you need the boom shot over the crowd or whatever, you know.

Vanessa Roth 36:33 No, but I could collaborate with people who do, you know, this guy, Rick, who - I'm sorry that I'm losing his last name - but we had a live concert consultant. So, he worked, you know, we worked together on, like, where all the cameras would be, and really how to cover the huge concert. So, that it could still be, like, really feel live and immersive that way. And I also had Kalilah Robinson, who was my DP, she was really on the ground the whole time, filming, you know, everything and really had a good relationship with Mary as well. So, I think Mary trusted, you know, wherever Kalilah was. And so, yeah, again, the music doc part of it was more of a fear at the beginning. But I think also, the thing that's special about Mary is that Mary trusts her gut and her instincts. And as soon as she said to me, like, yes, I want you to do this. And I want you to do it in the way, you know how, I felt like, well, she must, I mean, she has choices, and she could have made a very different choice and gone with, you know, other people who have different kind of experience than I do. So, I just had to really trust that the gift that I could bring was to make a film that was as authentic and truthful as her album was, and as she wanted to be, and then the things about, I had to, you know, and which I love about docs, too, I had to learn very quickly about all the people in her life at the time, I had lots of music at the time, and the music now, the place that this - and I love that. I love the learning of that. So, I'm really grateful that I have a little education now.

Matthew 38:20 Yeah. And you said, after the rough cut, she says, yeah, it's good. What's your impression of the final? What's her feelings about the final version of this film?

Vanessa Roth 38:31 Well, again, I can never speak for Mary, and never would. But from what she said, I think I mean, I think she loves it, I think, I know that - I know, again, like, to her what I've seen move her is when she does, like, see the fans and interaction with the fans, and I think that it is this love letter to that moment. So, I think just having that exist in the world makes her happy. And then, too, obviously, like I mentioned Andre Harrell was a really important person to her. So, I think the fact that we have him, it's a really beautiful thing to hold on to.

Matthew 39:17 Yeah, and there's that beautiful - so hold on to the end when you go see this, everyone, there's that lovely dedication at the end of the film, as well. We do a little segment where we often talk to filmmakers about their career. And some of the questions are kind of targeted for new filmmakers. But I have to take advantage of the fact, I mean, anyone can do Google searches and get on IMDB, but you have an interesting background - are these acting credits so you'll be the first person we've had who's been on Forrest Gump, Melrose Place, and Beverly Hills 90210. Is that true?

Vanessa Roth 39:57 True. Yes, when I was, yeah, that was, like, right before I started making docs. That is true. I grew up really, I did a lot of theatre growing up and thought for a minute that acting would be fun, and it was awful. I loved the craft, but what I loved was the craft of, like - again, what I loved, like, was theatre, I love the craft of working on things together. Collab. And I think that I love artistic process so much. And when I was - at the same time I was in those was also, I always have had these like two sides of me where I was that where as an actor, you get to get inside of this other character and become that and have access to the emotions of that, right. So, at the same time, I also got a master's degree in social work. And so, I had also always want to do social impact things. And as a social worker, you also get access to people's lives that, you know, things that are going on that you wouldn't in another profession. And so for docs, it's actually like this kind of beautiful marriage of that artistic collaborative thing with them, that other kind of work. And then just a little thing, it's not little, it's huge is that I'm in Forrest Gump because my dad wrote Forrest Gump; he's a screen writer. And so that was more just like, I was on - I was there and they did me a nice favor, but I love that it's there. And I love that that's, like, that little moment. It's my dad's movie, and that's fun.

Matthew 41:33 Yeah, how did you get into docs, then? I mean, obviously, you said there's this marriage between social work and the artistic side. But, I mean, you grew up in this family, your father's a famous screenwriter, but was that what kind of - how did you get actually decide this is going to be docs?

Vanessa Roth 41:53 Yeah. Okay. So first, I always promise I'm never doing another doc ever again after I finish every one because it's too hard.

Matthew 42:02 See, I had that question in here from our last interview, and I took it out because I was like, oh, she's always making docs.

Vanessa Roth 42:10 Really hard, it's really hard! I'm thankful that right now there's financing for docs. I'm in a place that I'm getting offered to direct something and I don't have to raise all the money. I don't have to do - I don't have to be every role in the film to make it. But I started - Yeah, did not mean for this to be a whole career. I didn't know what a career would be. But I didn't really come to it at all because of my dad. I, or, I guess, yeah. For myself, so my dad is a screenwriter. I grew up with him, you know, just working from home on his typewriter, always knowing he'd read me dialogue and things. And that was just the fabric of my life. And then my mom was an archaeologist. And she would come home with artefacts and stories of history and really humanizing history for me all the time. And then I had my grandparents who are my dad's parents, who were very social impact, social justice activists in all that they did, and they were teachers and they - and worked a lot just, again, with just equal rights in all forms and ways. And so, I feel like that was kind of this blending that I was raised with. And so, when I - I went to social work school knowing I wasn't going probably be a social worker, but wanted to figure out some way of bridging, like, the sort of storytelling with social justice. And so, as my thesis really for grad school is what I made into my first documentary was about foster care. And, I don't know; again, like I promise every time never to do it again. But I guess I keep - come back to it because actually, it's probably, exactly the right field for me.

Matthew 44:02 Yeah, I know the feeling. In my own walk of life. I'm gonna tell my children not to watch this episode because they - no way I was cool a family as you had growing up. So, that's must've been really cool. Mom's an archaeologist, dad's a screenwriter, you know, but then what's the secret to - So, as you say, it is a hard - you know, everyone tells me this. It's a lot of hard work. Even for people who've achieved what you've achieved. Yeah, the money is out there, but it's not always easy. As I'm finding out more and more.

Vanessa Roth 44:40 The answer's also correct. Money's always out there. That doesn't mean you're making that money!

Matthew 44:45 Yeah, well, that no, it's - Yeah, who's - Well, you go back to business side of me. They always say who's capturing the value? You know, and I think, you know, and so, yeah, filmmakers aren't capturing the - at least the monetary value for the most part. But what is the secret to success or your success, you think?

Vanessa Roth 45:05 I don't even know if there's any, like, secret. It's just a lot of hard work. And being true to - I mean, to me, I guess I've been - It's been lovely that, I mean, not lovely, it's not the right word, but it's always rewarding and humbling when people come to me wanting me to do something. But that's also something that I think once you're given an opportunity, then you need to do the work. And I think, like, it doesn't get easier, it never is getting easier; sometimes I even feel like it gets harder, because I know how hard it's going to be. So, I'm coming with all this stuff, I can look ahead and say, oh, yeah, this is going to be an issue, this is going to be an issue, where when you're younger, I feel like you just get to go in and have all kinds of optimism on how great things are gonna turn out. So, it's hard work, I think, to me, I just really do try to stay just calm in terms of, like, really staying to the core of, like, what is the story I'm telling here? And who are the people and I have really strong relationships with the people in my films from, you know, back at the beginning of making them to now. And I think that's it. And I think it's also being flexible and kind of moving with where things are, rather than where you expect them to be. You know, there's that kindergarten saying of you get what you get, and you don't get upset. I feel like in docs, that's kind of what you got to do. And then you got to make something of that. So, I think, yeah, but I mean, the main thing is, I just think, it's not a secret. It's just hard work. And yeah, that's it.

Matthew 47:01 And having sworn off docs what's next for you? I know you've had this Nat. Geo. Presents series, is that already come out?

Vanessa Roth 47:11 Yeah. It's at the same moment. It wasn't meant to be the same moment. But yeah, I directed and am an executive producer. It's a six part series on Nat. Geo. Six short films about women around the world doing amazing, incredible things impacting their communities, which I just, I loved making that, and the Mary movie to me is that way, too. It's another remarkable story about a remarkable woman. So, the Nat. Geo. thing, that came out digitally, and then now it's going to be on the Nat. Geo. channel, actually, literally the same day. I mean, I think comes out June 24. So...

Matthew 47:48 Yeah, right. Okay.

Vanessa Roth 47:50 It's all at the same time. So...

Matthew 47:51 Hence your question before we started recording, 'what are we talking about today?' Because you must be pulled in several different directions doing...

Vanessa Roth 47:59 Yeah, and it's great. No, I feel good. And I'm really proud of all this work right now, where I am. I mean, I'm not kidding when I say I'm always too tired. But I have to, to be honest, though, to like, this moment feels really good. I feel like I'm able to tell the stories I really have always wanted to tell with the kind of support that I want. And I, you now, and I just think there's a lot of work out there that I'd love to be part of just narratives that the world is now more open to hearing. And as a woman filmmaker, too, I think, you know, just my time to be able to express the way that I want to in films, or whatever I do next, where it doesn't have to be doc, it can be doc, but I think there's again, like we talked about earlier, there's a moment to where, I think, there's more of an opening to just be a storyteller in whatever way that manifests.

Matthew 48:56 Well, whatever you decide to do, I hope you keep - if there are any other projects you want to tell us about that are in the works or - and if not, I hope you keep telling those stories.

Vanessa Roth 49:07 Thank you. No, I'm these have taken, you know, I did - during COVID, I did seven films, so I'm okay for the moment just talking about this.

Matthew 49:19 Well, I think we've come to the - unfortunately, we've come to the end of our time together, Vanessa, but thank you so much for coming on to the podcast. It's really been great to have you on to discuss Mary J. Blige and the Mary J. Blige doc, and if we haven't scared you off, we'd love to have you on again some time when you are with your next project, which you are not committing to yet.

Vanessa Roth 49:44 Thank you. That sounds great.

Matthew 49:49 All right. Thank you so much. So yes, I just want to thank Vanessa Roth again. The director of the Amazon Studios documentary, Mary J. Blige's My Life, debuting on Amazon Prime on June 25.

Advertisement 50:03 If you have any questions regarding how you can become a documentary director and producer or other roles in the industry, I recommend you check out careersinfilm.com to learn more about careers in the film industry.

Matthew 50:15 I want to give a big thanks and shout out to Sam and Joe at Innersound Audio just outside of York, England. Big thanks as always to Nevena Paunovic our podcast manager at Alamo Pictures, who ensures we continue getting such great guests like Vanessa onto the show. And finally, a big thanks to our listeners. As always, we'd love to hear from you. So, please keep sending us feedback and episode ideas. Whether it is on YouTube, social media, or directly by email. And please remember to like us and share us with your friends and family wherever you happen to listen or watch podcasts. This is Factual America, signing off.

Factual America Outro 50:51 You've been listening to Factual America. This podcast is produced by Alamo Pictures, specializing in documentaries, television, and shorts about the USA for international audiences. Head on down to the show notes for more information about today's episode, our guests, and the team behind the podcast. Subscribe to our mailing list, or follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter @alamopictures. Be the first to hear about new productions, festivals showing our films, and to connect with our team. Our homepage is alamopictures.co.uk

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Mary J Blige: The Unheard Story of the Album 'My Life'

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