Documentary filmmaker Les Blank has spent much of his life in Louisiana,
whether attending university here at Tulane, working as second camera shooting Dennis Hopper’s Easy Rider, or capturing communities outside of the American mainstream that had music at their hearts. He shot a series of films on Cajun, Creole and zydeco including 1973’s Dry Wood on Bois-Sec Ardoin and Canray Fontenot, and Hot Pepper on Clifton Chenier, also from ‘73. He would return throughout his career to Cajun country, and in 1978 he shot Always for Pleasure, a film on New Orleans street music culture.
In his films, he has employed a poet’s sensibility—perhaps a byproduct of his MFA in creative writing, but he says he’s not sure. Blank lets visual details and the way people speak say what needs to be said, and by turning his camera lens on different American folk music communities, he rescues the music from museums and establishes it as the product of real people.
Blank will be in New Orleans March 20 when the Ogden Museum of Southern Art presents “A Well-Spent Life: An Evening with Les Blank.” He’ll show 1971’s A Well-Spent Life on Texas bluesman Mance Lipscomb, Dry Wood, 1979’s Del Mero Corazon on the love song in the Tex-Mex Ñorteno music tradition, and 1983’s Sprout Wings and Fly on Appalachian fiddler Tommy Jarrell. On March 21, the Ogden will show Always for Pleasure and a new version of Lisa Katzman’s Tootie’s Last Suit about Big Chief Tootie Montana.
I know you went to school at Tulane. How did you get there?
From ‘54 to ‘60, I attended Tulane. I had worked on tugboats in previous summers. The summer before my senior year of high school, I worked on one in New Orleans. I got off in New Orleans and was amazed to see that certain parts of the town, the bars never closed and some don’t even own a key to the front door. There’s no need to if they’re opened 24 hours a day. I’d been at an all-boys prep school [in Tampa] with pretty rigid rules; this was a real eye-opener to me. I liked to play football and their football team was part of the Southeastern Conference at that time. So those things all led me that way.
From my limited point of view, I enjoyed the French Quarter, the bars along Decatur Street, the oysters, the warmth of the whole area. Towards the end of my stay there, I learned about the clubs where people like Fats Domino were playing to all-black audiences. In those days there weren’t much mixing in the clubs if any at all. That, to me, was eye-opening—to be in there and be friendly with people who normally are conditioned to think that they don’t get next to or dance with you.
How did you get into filmmaking?
Ever since I was a kid, I was totally blown away by movies. I saw Pinocchio when I was four years old. I couldn’t understand that this was make believe up there on the screen; I thought it was all totally real. We had no TV at the time, so this was my first visual-audio experience. Then the Saturday afternoon matinees always had these cowboy serials that I liked a lot. When I was in prep school, the head of the art department had a connection with the Brattle Theatre in Cambridge, the only theatre in New England that imported art films from Europe. I think New York was the only place beside Cambridge where these movies could be seen. He brought these films to the campus every Monday or Friday night. We got to see these beautiful 35 mm prints with these great films. That led me to really like films that had some guts to it, some heart to it, like European films did.
When I got down to Tulane, I was toying between being a surgeon. I liked the idea of brain surgery and being a writer. I flunked chemistry, so that sort of cut off the scientific side of my direction. I thought I’d major in English/literature writing about what other people had done to prepare me to be a writer. By this time there were art films being imported into New Orleans. One of Bergman’s films was shown in a place that showed what they called “nudie films,” the first erotic films, European art films sold on the basis of the nudity of the film. People who flocked to them just to see naked Swedish women swimming around in the river didn’t care about the art, but I did. Well, I liked both actually!
By this time, I went to U.C. Berkley to get a graduate degree in English but it was too academic for me and I dropped out. I was sort of bumming around on the loose, then it really hit home that this was what I wanted to do. In the midst of my ruthlessness, restlessness and depression and anxiety, I dropped into a naval recruiting center for college graduates to have my brain tested because of all the many interviews I’d taken and failed. I thought my lifestyle was maybe affecting my brain cells. They brought me back for a physical, and I passed that, surprisingly enough. Then I passed the interview. When I told them about my police record in New Orleans, for having been arrested for drunkenness, fighting—at one point I jumped in the river to swim across it because I was bored with my friends on the ferry boat—they said they wanted their fighter pilots to be full of piss and vinegar, so they gave me orders to go to flight school in Pensacola. While driving there, I overnighted in New Orleans and called up a friend of mine who had been teaching in the theater department. I told him I wanted to make movies. He said they had a degree called a Master of Fine Arts in theater with an emphasis on playwriting. You could write a three-act play as your thesis, take some courses, working with actors and play scripts, and somehow get a footing in the world of movies. I thought, this sounds a lot better than killing people in an airplane.
Did your experience here spark your interest in Cajun music?
When I was there, there was no such thing as Cajun records or Cajun restaurants. You may find a hole in the wall across the river. On the football team, there was a Cajun guy who had a real different accent and a sense of humor. He told me about this club over in St. Martinville. There was a dancehall down this dirt road; when you walked in, everybody was doing this strong two-step beat where the floors was actually going up and down with the crowd stomping all at the same time as they danced in a circle around the dance floor with their partner. The waiters wore revolvers and people did not speak English at all. I had to use my college French to make myself understood. That convinced me that there was something going on that I liked and wanted to know more about. I didn’t have any more experiences like that until I left school.
I did an industrial film up in Chicago in some ugly factory making something like carbon paper. I noticed the Chicago Folk Festival was happening and I went over there. They had people like Dewey Balfa and John Cohen. Dewey invited me backstage after their show and he had a gallon of moonshine. We sat around, sipped moonshine and talked. He said, “You come to Louisiana, we’ll help you make a film.”
Dry Wood and Hot Pepper started off as one single film. As time went on, I noticed the people around Bois-Sec Ardoin was more of a rural, agrarian community. Everybody worked on farms where they were sharecropping. People around Clifton (Chenier) were barbers, factory workers—a little more urban, you could say.
How were you able to insinuate yourself into these cultures where you were the outsider?
I’m always careful not to antagonize people. Some cameramen will just look at, say a family having a picnic, and they just worry about their focus and exposure and screen movement. (They) don’t realize these are human beings who have feelings and personal space. You have to sort of float into a situation, not being too pushy. I think a lot of it has to do with how enthusiastic you are about your subject. If you really love what you’re doing and love the people you’re doing it with, then I think it communicates and loosens up a little bit. I think most every film I’ve made, I’ve managed to get it back to the community before the subject dies. It’s mostly all worked out real well. I remember tales of Cajuns getting really annoyed of outsiders coming in and making fun of their culture.
Were you ever concerned that your camera affected what was going on around you?
For better or for worse, sometimes people are self-conscious in front of the camera. I don’t use that footage, or I try not to start shooting until they’re not acting self-conscious. Sometimes it just works out where the audience knows the subject knows the cameras on, and I do leave some of that in if it somehow works with the rest of the material.
The fellow who pulled his tooth out on Spend It All, he made sure to let me know. He told me that when he got drunk enough, he was gonna pull out this tooth that had been bothering him. I said, “Good God, let me know when you do, and I’ll shoot it.” He said, “Okay,” and he came up later on in the party and said, “I’m ready,” and I said, “Okay.” I was able to focus and that was the case where he did it for the camera, but he would have done it whether the camera was there or not. Whether he would have done it at a party with a bunch of people watching, I don’t know.
Ideally, I’d be interested in anything I’m making a movie about. I’m curious about how people have their own little world inside and they function in a unique way with who they are, past experiences, hope for future experiences, how they interact with people around them. I enjoy watching how these things happen with a camera; hopefully in some type of artistic form it will live into the future. Maybe after we’re all gone these films will still be floating around. People can see how people were in this day in time, how one person and his crew picked out selections and rearranged them and had something to say.
You mentioned the Cajuns distrust of outsiders. Was that ever a problem?
One time I went to Louisiana to show [Benton Daigle, one of the film's subjects] Spend It All and as things turned out, I got in a little trouble with the law and ended up in the same jail he was in. I happened to have a 60-millimeter projector with me and the film Spend It All, and the cop says, “What are you doing down here anyway?” I told him I was trying to show this film I’d finished to everybody, and this one guy I couldn’t find, his name was Benton Daigle. He said, “Oh Benton, yeah, we have him.” He was in the same jail they were taking me to, and they brought him down to watch the movie. The police booked me into the jail. I said, “Why don’t you watch this movie and then book me if you still think I belong here”
One time I went to Louisiana with this one guy I couldn’t find to show him Spend It All and as things turned out, I got in a little trouble with the law and ended up in the same jail he was in. I happened to have a 60 millimeter projector with me and the film Spend It All, and the cop, he says, what are you doing down here anyway – they were not friendly to outsiders – and I told him, well, I was trying to show this film I’d finished to everybody. And this one guy I couldn’t find, his name was Benton Dagel (sp?), and they said, oh Benton, yeah, we have him. He was in the same jail they were taking me to, and they brought him down to watch the movie. The police booked me into the jail, and I said why don’t you watch this movie and then book me if you still think I belong here. And he said, no, he wanted to get his work out of the way, so he booked me, and then watched the film.
And he said, no, he wanted to get his work out of the way, so he booked me, and then watched the film.
One time I went to Louisiana with this one guy I couldn’t find to show him Spend It All and as things turned out, I got in a little trouble with the law and ended up in the same jail he was in. I happened to have a 60 millimeter projector with me and the film Spend It All, and the cop, he says, what are you doing down here anyway – they were not friendly to outsiders – and I told him, well, I was trying to show this film I’d finished to everybody. And this one guy I couldn’t find, his name was Benton Dagel (sp?), and they said, oh Benton, yeah, we have him. He was in the same jail they were taking me to, and they brought him down to watch the movie. The police booked me into the jail, and I said “Why don’t you watch this movie and then book me if you still think I belong here?” And he said, no, he wanted to get his work out of the way, so he booked me, and then watched the film.
Fortunately, Benton Dagel got a kick out of the film, he was laughing all the way through it. The cops started laughing, and when it was all over they said, “Great film, great film, too bad you have to go to jail.”
They brought in a bail bondsman, and he sized me up. My girlfriend wanted to know what her jewelry was worth. He said he would represent me, and then he got his brother, who happened to be lawyer, to be my lawyer, and off we went. They got me out on bail, and the brother of the lawyer said, When the judge asks if you’re guilty, say you are. That way we’ll get you off on a light sentence.” When the judge says, “How do you plead Mr. Blank?” I said, “Guilty, your honor.” And he looked over at me and said, “The state of Louisiana sentences you to one year of hard labor at Angola State Penitentiary,” and my heart fell to the floor. I wanted to scream out, “I’ve been framed!” like they do in the movies. And then a slight smile appeared on his lips and he said, “of which we will” – I forget the legal word for it – “reduce the sentence to two weeks,” and I still wasn’t very happy about that.
He said, “I heard you made a very fine film on our people,” and I said, “Yes, your honor,” and he says, “Maybe you can come down here and film me duck hunting.” I said that would be fun. And he said, “Mr. Blank, I want you to meet Mr. Boudreaux, the jailer,” and he led me off to do my time.
I did a film on the black French Louisiana, and I felt I should live in the community. The police got wind of that, gave me a hard time. I called up Marion, I believe his name was, the bailbondsman. I said, “I’ve got some trouble over here, can you help me out?” He said, You write a letter about yourself and what you’re doing and we’ll get Edwin to put it on the state letterhead.” His brother was the governor of Louisiana. I wrote this letter about what a great savior of Cajun culture I was, and what good works I was doing. Then he sure enough had it put on a letterhead, sent me a copy. Next time a state trooper pulled me over, he said, “What are you doing?” I said, “I’ve got this letter here.” He read it, saluted me with the big trooper hat he had on, and said, “Anything we can do to make your trip here useful, just let us know.” Then he went, and that was the end of my troubles.
What can you tell me about your experiences on Easy Rider?
The crew was selected of friends of Dennis Hopper or friends of friends. It was not your typical Hollywood crew. I guess that’s what Hopper wanted; he wanted as he said to be among friends and for everyone to do their own thing. They rented a big Winnebago in New Orleans, and we all piled in, drove around doing scenes he had in his mind to do to prove to Hollywood that he could take a small group of friends on a low budget and do this movie about the new America. We got to shoot for a week. We’d be down in the French Quarter outside of Pat O’Brien’s. Beer cans would be piling up about maybe a foot deep in the street and drunks would be rolling down the street and he’d say, “Quiet everybody! We’re shooting a major motion picture that’s going to change the world and I demand that you all be quiet so we can hear the actors when they speak.” And of course all the drunks would say, “What the fuck is this?” Throwing beer cans at him. He got really riled up started screaming at them till his face got all red. When the film got edited and shown to the big shots in Hollywood, they said, “Yeah, you’ve got something good, but we can’t give you the money with that rag-tag crew of yours. You’ve got to get a union crew and a good production manager to keep Dennis Hopper more regular, not so rambunctious or explosive.” For an extended version of this interview, go to OffBeat.com. For more on Les Blank’s films, go to LesBlank.com.
