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Home , Brian Gibson (director), Clancy Sigal, Cristina Kahlo, Frida, Frida (soundtrack), Laura San Giacomo

November 22, 2011 (XXIII:13) , (2002, 123 min.)

Directed by Julie Taymor are Based on Hayden Herrera’s book Frida: A Biography of Screenplay by , Diane Lake, & Produced by Lindsay Flickinger, Sarah Green, Nancy Hardin, , Roberto Sneider, Lizz Speed Original Music by Cinematography by Film Editing by Françoise Bonnot Production Design by Felipe Fernández del Paso Art Direction by Bernardo Trujillo Set Decoration by Hania Robledo Costume Design by Julie Weiss Makeup department: Judy Chin....key makeup artist, John E. Jackson....prosthetic makeup artist, Matthew W. Mungle....prosthetic designer, Regina Reyes....3D body painting 2011 We Bought a Zoo (post-production), 2011 Water for Elephants, 2010 , 2010 Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, Salma Hayek...Frida Kahlo 2009 State of Play, 2009 Broken Embraces, 2007 Lust, Caution, ... 2006 Babel, 2005 , 2004 Alexander, 2003- ... 2004 “America Undercover”, 2003 , 2002 25th Hour, ...Lupe Marín 2002 8 Mile, 2002 Frida, 2002 Ten Tiny Love Stories, 2001 Diego Luna...Alejandro 'Alex' Original Sin, 2000 , 1996 Oedipo alcalde, 1994 Mía Maestro... Perfume, efecto inmediato, 1993 Dama de noche, 1992 Anatomia ... de una violación, 1991 El jugador, 1991 Ratas nocturnas, 1990 Roger Rees... Luna de miel al cuarto menguante, 1989 Llueve otra vez, and ... 1988 Hoy estoy triste. ... Margarita Sanz...Natalia Trotskaya SALMA HAYEK (September 2, 1966, Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz, Omar Rodríguez...André Breton Mexico) has 55 screen and TV credits, some of which are 2012 Karine Plantadit-Bageot... Chanteuse (post-production), 2012 Savages (post- production), 2011 La chispa de la vida (post-production), 2011 Americano, 2009 Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant, Best Makeup – John E. Jackson, Beatrice De Alba 2009 “” (6 episodes), 2007 Across the Universe, 2006- Best Music, Original Score – Elliot Goldenthal 2007 “” (7 episodes), 2006 Lonely Hearts, 2006 Bandidas, 2003 Once Upon a Time in Mexico, 2002 Frida, 2001 JULIE TAYMOR (December 15, 1952, Newton, Massachusetts) “In the Time of the Butterflies”, 2001 Hotel, 2000 Traffic, 2000 has six film directing credits: 2010 , 2007 Across the Chain of Fools, 1999 , 1998 54, 1997 Breaking Universe, 2002 Frida, 1999 , 1993 “Oedipus Rex”, and , 1997 Fools Rush In, 1996 , 1995 1992 “Fool's Fire”. Desperado, 1993 Mi vida loca, 1992 “Nurses”, 1992 “Dream On”, abd 1988 “Un nuevo amanecer”. RODRIGO PRIETO (November 1965, , Distrito Federal, Mexico) has 42 cinematographer credits, some of which Tamor—FRIDA—2

ALFRED MOLINA (May 24, 1953, , England) has Harem suaré, 1998 Shooting the Moon, 1996 An Occasional appeared in 122 films and television films and series, among Hell, 1996 Escape from L.A., 1995 , 1995 Leaving them 2013 Justin and the Knights of Valour (post-production), Las Vegas, 1994 Immortal Beloved, 1992 Puerto Escondido, 2012 Carmel (completed), 2011 Abduction, 2010-2011 Law & 1991 Year of the Gun, 1991 Hot Shots!, 1991 The Indian Runner, Order: LA (16 episodes), 2010/II The Tempest, 2010 The 1990 The King's Whore, 1988 Rain Man, 1987 Last Summer in Sorcerer's Apprentice, 2009 The Pink Panther 2, 2007 “The Tangiers, and 1984 Blind Date. Company” (6 episodes), 2006 , 2006 The Da Vinci Code, 2005 “Law & Order: Trial by Jury”, 2005 “Law & Order: EDWARD NORTON (August 18, 1969, Baltimore, Maryland) has Special Victims Unit”, 2004 Spider-Man 2, 2003 Coffee and 28 acting credits, some of which are 2012 Moonrise Kingdom Cigarettes, 2003 Luther, 2002 Frida, 1999-2001 “Ladies Man” (post-production), 2009 Leaves of Grass, 2009 The Invention of (30 episodes), 2001 Texas Lying, 2008 Pride and Glory, 2008 Rangers, 2001 “Murder on the The Incredible Hulk, 2006 The Orient Express”, 2000 Chocolat, Illusionist, 2005 Kingdom of 1999 Magnolia, 1998 The Treat, Heaven, 2003 The Italian Job, 1997 Boogie Nights, 1997 Anna 2002 25th Hour, 2002 Red Karenina, 1996 “Tracey Takes Dragon, 2002 Frida, 2000 Keeping On...”, 1995 Hideaway, 1994 the Faith, 1999 Fight Club, 1998 Maverick, 1993 When Pigs Fly, American History X, 1998 1993 The Trial, 1993 “A Year Rounders, 1996 Everyone Says I in Provence”, 1991 American Love You, 1996 The People vs. Friends, 1990-1991 “El C.I.D.” Larry Flynt, and 1996 Primal (13 episodes), 1991 Not Without Fear. My Daughter, 1988 Manifesto, 1985 Letter to Brezhnev, 1985 ASHLEY JUDD (April 19, 1968, Eleni, 1985 Ladyhawke, 1983 Granada Hills, ), who has “Reilly: Ace of Spies”, 1981 a BA in French from University of Raiders of the Lost Ark, 1979 A Kentucky and an MPA from Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Harvard’s Kennedy School, has Square, 1979 Song of the Shirt, appeared in 35 films, TV films and and 1978 “The Losers”. series, some of which are 2011 Flypaper, 2010/I Tooth Fairy, ANTONIO BANDERAS (August 2009 Crossing Over, 2006 Bug, 10, 1960, Málaga, Málaga, 2006 Come Early Morning, 2004 Andalucía, Spain) has appeared in 84 films, videogames and TV De-Lovely, 2004/I Twisted, 2002 Frida, 2002 Divine Secrets of productions, among them 2013 Justin and the Knights of Valour the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, 2002 High Crimes, 2000 Where the Heart (post-production), 2012 He Loves Me (post-production), 2012 Is, 1999 Double Jeopardy, 1999 Eye of the Beholder, 1997 The Haywire (completed), 2011 , 2011 The Skin I Live Locusts, 1996 A Time to Kill, 1996 “Norma Jean & Marilyn”, In, 2011 The Big Bang, 2010 “Scared Shrekless”, 2010 You Will 1996 Normal Life, 1995 , 1995 Smoke, 1994 Natural Born Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, 2008 The Other Man, 2008 Killers, 1991-1994 “Sisters” (32 episodes), and 1991 “Star Trek: Homeland Security, 2007 “ the Halls”, 2007 Shrek the The Next Generation”. Third, 2006 Bordertown, 2005 The Legend of Zorro, 2004 Shrek 2, 2003 Once Upon a Time in Mexico, 2002 Frida, 2002 Femme GEOFFREY RUSH (July 6, 1951, Toowoomba, Queensland, Fatale, 2001 Original Sin, 2001 , 1999 The White River Australia) won a best actor Oscar for Shine (1996). He has Kid, 1998 The Mask of Zorro, 1996 Evita, 1995 Assassins, 1995 appeared in 48 films and TV series, among them 2011 The Eye of Desperado, 1994 Interview with the Vampire: The Vampire the Storm, 2011 Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, Chronicles, 1993 Philadelphia, 1993 The House of the Spirits, 2010 The Warrior's Way, 2010 The King's Speech, 2007 1992 The Mambo Kings, 1990 Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!, 1988 Elizabeth: The Golden Age, 2007 Pirates of the Caribbean: At Baton Rouge, 1988 El placer de matar, 1988 Women on the World's End, 2006 Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, 1986 Puzzle, 1986 Matador, 2006 Candy, 2005 Munich, 2004 The Life and Death of Peter 1985 Réquiem por un campesino español, 1984 Los zancos, 1982 Sellers, 2003 Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Labyrinth of Passion, and 1982 Pestañas postizas. Pearl, 2003 Ned Kelly, 2003 Swimming Upstream, 2002 The Banger Sisters, 2002 Frida, 2001 The Tailor of Panama, 2000 VALERIA GOLINO (October 22, 1966, Naples, Campania, Italy) Quills, 1998 Shakespeare in Love, 1998 Elizabeth, 1998 Les has appeared in 75 films, some of which are 2011 La kryptonite Misérables, 1996 “Mercury” (13 episodes), 1996 Shine, 1987 nella borsa, 2011 A Butterfly Kiss, 2009 The French Kissers, Twelfth Night, 1982 Starstruck, and 1981 The Added Dimension. 2009 Giulia Doesn't Date at Night, 2008 La fabbrica dei tedeschi, 2007 The Girl by the Lake, 2007 Black Sun, 2007 KARINE PLANTADIT-BAGEOT (January 15, 1970) has 5 acting Actrices, 2007 Ma place au soleil, 2005 Texas, 2005 Mario's credits: 2007 Across the Universe, 2005 Stay, 2004 “Sex and the War, 2004 36th Precinct, 2004 Alive, 2004 San-Antonio, 2002 City”, 2002 Chicago, and 2002 Frida. “Caesar”, 2002 Frida, 2001 Hotel, 2000 Spanish Judges, 1999 Tamor—FRIDA—3

for the stage has come from the popular musical The Lion King (1997), an adaptation of the animated film. Taymor received two Tony Awards for her work on The Lion King, one for Direction and one for Costume Design, making her the first woman to receive a Tony Award for directing a musical. In 1991, Taymor won the prestigious MacArthur Fellowship (genius award) for her innovative work in theatre. Taymor has also worked in film in recent years, directing Titus (1999) and Frida (2002). Both movies received positive reviews for their stylish filming; Frida was the more acclaimed of the two, garnering Oscar nominations in six categories and winning in two (Best Makeup and Best Original Julie Taymor (From Wikipedia) Score). Taymor and her long-time partner Goldenthal were co- Julie Taymor (born December 15, 1952) is an American director nominees in the Best Original Song category. of theater, opera and film. Taymor's work has received many For the Metropolitan Opera 2005-06 season, Taymor accolades from critics, and she has earned two Tony Awards out directed a successful production of The Magic Flute. It was of four nominations, the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding revised for the 2006-07 season and, in addition to full-length Costume Design, an Emmy Award and an Academy Award performances, was adapted for a 100-minute version over the nomination for Original Song. She is widely known for directing Holiday season to appeal to children. That version of the opera the stage musical, The Lion King, for which she became the first was the first of a series of NCM Fathom Live on the Big Screen woman to win the Tony Award for directing a musical, in presentations of MET operas downloaded via satellite to movie addition to a Tony Award for Original Costume Design. She was theaters across North America and parts of Europe for the 2006- the director of the Broadway musical Spider-Man: Turn Off the 07 season. Dark but left in March 2011, following artistic differences with In June 2006, Taymor directed the opera Grendel for the the producers. Opera, starring Eric Owens, which was also Taymor was born in Newton, Massachusetts, the presented as part of the Summer 2006 Lincoln Center Festival in daughter of Elizabeth (née Bernstein), a political science teacher, New York City. Taymor's more recent work has been as director and Melvin Lester Taymor, a gynecologist, both of Jewish of the film Across the Universe, a 1960s love story set to the descent. Taymor's interest in theatre took root early in her life. At music of and starring Jim Sturgess and Evan Rachel the age of seven, she was already drawing her sister into stagings Wood. The film opened in September 2007 and received a of children's stories for her parents. By age nine, she was Golden Globe nomination for Best Comedy/Musical in 2008. entranced by the Boston Children's Theatre and became involved In November 2008, Taymor directed a film version of with them. In high school, she became interested in international Shakespeare's The Tempest, released in December 2010. travel, and made trips to both Sri Lanka and India with the In April 2007, it was announced that Marvel Studios Experiment in International Living. Being the youngest member was preparing to make a musical adaptation of Spider-Man for of theatre groups became common, as she joined Julie Portman's Broadway. Taymor was selected to direct the show and write the Theatre Workshop of Boston at the age of 15. Yearning for a book with Glen Berger. The production features music and lyrics more in-depth approach, Taymor went to Paris to study with by Bono and The Edge. The musical, Spider-Man, Turn Off the L'École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq. During her Dark, was scheduled to begin previews on November 28, 2010, studies there, she became exposed to mime which helped in the at the Foxwoods Theatre, with the repeatedly-delayed official development of her physical sensibilities. opening night finally held on June 14, 2011. On March 9, 2011, Although in 1970 Taymor was enrolled in Oberlin it was reported by that Taymor would be College in Ohio, she sought experience with Joseph Chaikin's leaving her role as director of Spider-Man after disputes with the Open Theatre and other companies and studied through show's producers, who wanted to drastically alter the existing correspondence. Hearing that director Herbert Blau would be storyline and general artistic direction. moving to Oberlin, she returned there and auditioned In a March 14, 2011 piece by Roger Friedman, it was successfully, becoming, once again, the youngest member of a reported that Taymor will receive her original Spider-Man troupe. In 1973, Taymor attended a summer program of the credits, with sources saying that Spider-Man producer Michael American Society for Eastern Arts in Seattle. The instructors Cohl and Bono did bring in a script doctor, music supervisor and were performers of Indonesian topeng masked dance-drama and other new members for the creative team. As of June 2, 2011, wayang kulit shadow puppetry. This would prove to have a great Laura Penn, the executive director of the Stage Directors and effect on Taymor in later years. Taymor graduated from Oberlin Choreographers Society, confirmed rumors of the ongoing College with a major in mythology and folklore and Phi Beta dispute between Taymor and the show's producers about Kappa honors in 1974. In 1980 she met composer Elliot director’s fees that Taymor has not received from the production. Goldenthal, and the two became partners in both life and in their In a Hollywood Reporter piece from November 9, 2011 detailing work. the lawsuit, as a co-bookwriter for the musical Taymor is looking After college, Taymor used a Thomas J. Watson to stop Spider-Man from using copyrighted elements of the Fellowship to study pre-Bunraku puppetry on Awaji Island, original production in the newly-adapted version and subsequent Japan, to learn more about experimental theatre, puppetry and licensing without approval as outlined in her Author deal memo. visually oriented theatre. Taymor's greatest acclaim as a director Tamor—FRIDA—4

emotions she felt, expressed them by teasing him, playing practical jokes, and by trying to excite the jealousy of the painter's wife, Lupe Marin. In 1925, Kahlo suffered the serious accident which was to set the pattern for much of the rest of her life. She was travelling in a bus which collided with a tramcar, and suffered serious injuries to her right leg and pelvis. The accident made it impossible for her to have children, though it was to be many years before she accepted this. It also meant that she faced a life- long battle against pain. In 1926, during her convalescence, she painted her first self-portrait, the beginning of a long series in which she charted the events of her life and her emotional reactions to them. She met Rivera again in 1928, through her friendship with the photographer and revolutionary Tina Modotti. Rivera's marriage had just disintegrated, and the two found that they had much in common, not least from a political point of view, since both were now communist militants. They married in August 1929. Kahlo was later to say: 'I suffered two grave accidents in my life. One in which a streetcar knocked me down... The other Frida Kahlo, from Edward Lucie-Smith, Lives of the accident is Diego.' Great 20th Century Artists: The political climate in Mexico was deteriorating for In 1953, when Frida Kahlo had her first solo exhibition those with left-wing sympathies, thanks to the reactionary Calles in Mexico (the only one held in her native country during her government, and the -painting programme initiated by the lifetime), a local critic wrote: 'It is impossible to separate the life great Minister of Education Jose Vasconcelos had ground to a and work of this extraordinary person. Her paintings are her halt. But Rivera's artistic reputation was expanding rapidly in the biography.' This observation serves to explain both why her work United States. In 1930, the couple left for San Francisco; then, is so different from that of her contemporaries, the Mexican after a brief return to Mexico, they went to New York in 1931 for Muralists, and why she has since become a feminist icon. the Rivera retrospective organized by the Museum of Modern Kahlo was born in Mexico City in 1907, the third Art. Kahlo, at this stage, was regarded chiefly as a charming daughter of Guillermo and Matilda Kahlo. Her father was a appendage to a famous husband, but the situation was soon to photographer of Hungarian Jewish descent, who had been born in change. In 1932 Rivera was commissioned to paint a major series Germany; her mother was Spanish and Native American. Her life of for the Detroit Museum, and here Kahlo suffered a was to be a long series of physical traumas, and the first of these miscarriage. While recovering, she painted Miscarriage in came early. At the age of six she was stricken with polio, which Detroit, the first of her truly penetrating self-portraits. The style left her with a limp. In childhood, she was nevertheless a fearless she evolved was entirely unlike that of her husband, being based tomboy, and this made Frida her father's favourite. He had on Mexican folk art and in particular on the small votive pictures advanced ideas about her education, and in 1922 she entered the known as retablos, which the pious dedicated in Mexican Preparatoria (National Preparatory School), the most prestigious churches. Rivera's reaction to his wife's work was, however, both educational institution in Mexico, which had only just begun to perceptive and generous: admit girls. She was one of only thirty-five girls out of two Frida began work on a series of masterpieces which had thousand students. no precedent in the history of art - paintings which exalted the It was there that she met her husband-to-be, Diego feminine quality of truth, reality, cruelty and suffering. Never Rivera, who had recently returned home from France, and who before had a woman put such agonized poetry on canvas as Frida had been commissioned to paint a mural there. Kahlo was did at this time in Detroit. attracted to him, and not knowing quite how to deal with the Tamor—FRIDA—5

Kahlo, Surrealist,' she said, 'but I wasn't. I never painted dreams. I however, pretended painted my own reality.' not to consider her Early in 1940, for motives which are still somewhat work important. As mysterious, Kahlo and Rivera divorced, though they continued to her biographer make public appearances together. In May, after the first attempt Hayden Herrera on Trotsky's life, led by the painter Siqueiros, Rivera thought it notes, 'she preferred prudent to leave for San Francisco. After the second, and to be seen as a successful attempt, Kahlo, who had been a friend of Trotsky's beguiling assassin, was questioned by the police. She decided to leave personality rather Mexico for a while, and in September she joined her ex-husband. than as a painter.' Less than two months later, while they were still in the United From Detroit they States, they remarried. One reason seems to have been Rivera's went once again to recognition that Kahlo's health would inexorably deteriorate, and New York, where that she needed someone to look after her. Rivera had been Her health, never at any time robust, grew visibly worse commissioned to from about 1944 onwards, and Kahlo underwent the first many paint a mural in the operations on her spine and her crippled foot. Authorities on her . life and work have questioned whether all these operations were The commission really necessary, or whether they were in fact a way of holding erupted into an Rivera's attention in the face of his numerous affairs with other enormous scandal, when the patron ordered the half-completed women. In Kahlo's case, her physical and psychological work destroyed because of the political imagery Rivera insisted sufferings were always linked. in early 1950, her physical state on including. But Rivera lingered in the United States, which he reached a crisis, and she had to go into hospital in Mexico City, loved and Kahlo now loathed. When they finally returned to where she remained for a year. Mexico in 1935, Rivera embarked on an affair with Kahlo's During the period after her remarriage, her artistic younger sister Cristina. Though they finally made up their quarrel, this incident marked a turning point in their relationship. Rivera had never been faithful to any woman; Kahlo now embarked on a series of affairs with both men and women which were to continue for the rest of her life. Rivera tolerated her lesbian relationships better than he did the heterosexual ones, which made him violently jealous. One of Kahlo's more serious early love affairs was with the Russian revolutionary leader Leon Trotsky, now being hounded by his triumphant rival Stalin, and who had been offered refuge in Mexico in 1937 on Rivera's initiative. Another visitor to Mexico at this time, one who would gladly have had a love affair with Kahlo but for the fact that she was not attracted to him, was the leading figure of the Surrealist Group, André Breton. Breton arrived in 1938 and was enchanted with Mexico, which he found to be a 'naturally surrealist' country, and with Kahlo's painting. Partly through his initiative, she was offered a show at the fashionable Julian Levy Gallery in New York later in 1938, and Breton himself wrote a rhetorical catalogue preface. The show was a triumph, and about half the paintings were sold. In 1939, Breton suggested a show in Paris, and offered to arrange it. Kahlo, who spoke no French, arrived in France to find that Breton had not even bothered to get her work out of customs. The enterprise was finally rescued by Marcel Duchamp, and the show opened about six weeks late. It was not a financial success, but the reviews were good, and the Louvre bought a picture for the Jeu de Paume. Kahlo also won praise from Kandinsky and Picasso. She had, however, conceived a violent dislike for what she called 'this bunch of coocoo lunatic sons of bitches of surrealists.' She did not renounce immediately. in January 1940, for example, she was a participant (with Rivera) in the International Exhibition of Surrealism held in Mexico City. Later, she was to be vehement in her denials that she had ever been a true Surrealist. 'They thought I was a Nickolas Murray's portrait of FK, c. 1940 Tamor—FRIDA—6 reputation continued to grow, though at first more rapidly in the Frida (from Wikipedia United States than in Mexico itself. she was included in Frida is a 2002 which depicts the prestigious group shows in the Museum of Modern Art, the professional and private life of the surrealist Mexican painter Boston Institute of Contemporary Arts and the Philadelphia Frida Kahlo. It stars Salma Hayek in her Academy Award Museum of Art. In 1946, however, she received a Mexican nominated portrayal as Kahlo and Alfred Molina as her husband, government fellowship, and in the same year an official prize on Diego Rivera. the occasion of the Annual National Exhibition. She also took up The movie was adapted by Clancy Sigal, Diane Lake, teaching at the new experimental art school 'La Esmeralda', and, Gregory Nava, Anna Thomas and Edward Norton (uncredited) despite her unconventional methods, from the book Frida: A Biography of Frida proved an inspiration to her students. Kahlo by Hayden Herrera. It was directed After her return home from hospital, by Julie Taymor. It won Oscars for Best Kahlo became an increasingly fervent Makeup and Best Original Music Score and impassioned Communist. Rivera (recipient: Elliot Goldenthal). had been expelled from the Party, Plot which was reluctant to receive him Frida begins with the traumatic back, both because of his links with accident Frida Kahlo (Salma Hayek) the Mexican government of the day, suffered at the age of 18 when a car trolley and because of his association with collided with a bus she was riding. She is Trotsky. Kahlo boasted: 'I was a impaled by a metal pole and the injuries member of the Party before I met she sustained plague her for the rest of her Diego and I think I am a better life. To help her through convalescence, Communist than he is or ever will her father brings her a canvas upon which be.' to start painting. Throughout the film, a While the 1940s had seen scene starts as a painting, then slowly her produce some of her finest work, dissolves into a live-action scene with her paintings now became more actors. clumsy and chaotic, thanks to the Frida also details the artist's joint effects of pain, drugs and drink. dysfunctional relationship with the Despite this, in 1953 she was offered muralist Diego Rivera (Alfred Molina). her first solo show in Mexico itself - When Rivera proposes to Kahlo, she tells which was to be the only such show him she expects from him loyalty if not held in her own lifetime. It took place at the fashionable Galeria fidelity. Diego's appraisal of her painting ability is one of the de Arte Contemporaneo in the Zona Rosa of Mexico City. At reasons that she continues to paint. Throughout the marriage, first it seemed that Kahlo would be too ill to attend, but she sent Rivera cheats on her with a wide array of women, while the her richly decorated fourposter bed ahead of her, arrived by bisexual Kahlo takes on male and female lovers. ambulance, and was carried into the gallery on a stretcher. The The two travel to New York City so that he may paint private view was a triumphal occasion. the mural at the Rockefeller Center. While In the same year, Kahlo, threatened by gangrene, had in the United States, Kahlo suffers a miscarriage, and her mother her right leg amputated below the knee. It was a tremendous dies in Mexico. Rivera refuses to compromise his communist blow to someone who had invested so much in the elaboration of vision of the work to the needs of the patron, Nelson Rockefeller her own self image. She (Edward Norton); as a result, the learned to walk again with an mural is destroyed. The pair return artificial limb, and even to Mexico, with Rivera the more (briefly and with the help of reluctant of the two. pain-killing drugs) danced at Kahlo's sister Cristina celebrations with friends. moves in with the two at their San But the end was close. In Ángel studio home to work as July 1954, she made her last Rivera's assistant. Soon afterward, public appearance, when she Kahlo discovers that Rivera is participated in a Communist having an affair with her sister. She demonstration against the leaves him, and subsequently sinks overthrow of the left-wing into alcoholism. The couple reunite Guatemalan president Jacobo when he asks her to welcome and Arbenz. Soon afterwards, she house Leon Trotsky (Geoffrey died in her sleep, apparently Rush), who has been granted as the result of an embolism, political asylum in Mexico. She though there was a suspicion and Trotsky begin an affair, which among those close to her that she had found a way to commit forces the married Trotsky to leave the safety of his Coyoacán suicide. Her last diary entry read: 'I hope the end is joyful - and I home. hope never to come back - Frida.' Tamor—FRIDA—7

Kahlo leaves for Paris after Diego realizes she was Valdez was contacted early on by the - then unknown in unfaithful to him with Trotsky. When she returns to Mexico, he the US - Salma Hayek, who sent "her [promo] reel to the director asks for a divorce. Soon afterwards, Trotsky is murdered in and phoned his office", but was ultimately told she was then too Mexico City. Rivera is temporarily a suspect, and Kahlo is young for the role. By 1993 Valdez had retitled the film The Two incarcerated in Fridas with San his place when Giacomo and he is not found. Ofelia Medina Rivera helps get both playing the her released. portraitist. Raúl Kahlo Juliá was cast as has her toes Diego Rivera, but removed when his death further they become delayed the gangrenous. movie. At the Rivera asks her same time, to remarry him, Hardin and she agrees. approached HBO, Her health and with "rising worsens, young including the development amputation of a executive and leg, and she producer" Lizz ultimately dies Speed (a former after finally assistant to having a solo Sherry Lansing) exhibition of her intended to make paintings in a TVM, hopeful Mexico…. Tina Modotti photo of Diego and Frida at May Day Rally, Mexico City, 1929 that Development (director of The film version of Frida Kahlo's life was initially "What's Love Got to Do With It, the story of " and championed by Nancy Hardin, a former book editor and The Story) would direct. Casting difficulties Hollywood-based literary agent, turned early "female studio proved insurmountable, but Speed joined Hardin in advocating executive", who, in the mid-1980s wished to "make the transition the project, and after four years in development, the two took the to independent producing." Learning of Hayden Herrara's project from HBO to Trimark and producer Jay Polstein (with biography of Kahlo, Hardin saw Kahlo's life as very assistant Darlene Caamaño). At Trimark, Salma Hayek became contemporary, her "story... an emblematic tale for women torn interested in the role, having "been fascinated by Kahlo's work between marriage and career." Optioning the book in 1988, from the time she was 13 or 14" - although not immediately a Hardin "tried to sell it as an epic love story in the tradition of Out fan: of Africa, attracting tentative interest from actresses such as "At that age I did not like her work... I found it ugly and and , but rejection from the film grotesque. But something intrigued me, and the more I learned, studios. As Kahlo's art gained prominence, however ("[i]n May the more I started to appreciate her work. There was a lot of 1990 one of Kahlo's self-portraits sold at Sotheby's for $1.5 passion and depth. Some people see only pain, but I also see million, the highest price ever paid at auction for a Latin irony and humor. I think what draws me to her is what Diego saw American painting"), "announced her plans to star in a in her. She was a fighter. Many things could have diminished her film based on Frida's life", and 's Tribeca spirit, like the accident or Diego's infidelities. But she wasn't Productions reportedly "envisioned a joint biography of Rivera crushed by anything." ” and Kahlo." Hayek was so set on acting the role that she sought out In the spring of 1991, director began Patino, longtime-lover of Diego Rivera, and production on a New Line feature about Frida Kahlo starring (after his death) administrator to the rights of Frida and Rivera's in the lead. San Giacomo's casting was art, which Rivera had "willed... to the Mexican people", objected due to her non-Hispanic ethnicity, and New Line bowed bequeath[ing] the trust to Olmedo. Salma Hayek personally to the protests, and left the then-titled Frida and Diego in August secured access to Kahlo's paintings from her, and began to 1992 citing finances. Hardin's project found itself swamped by assemble a supporting cast, approaching Alfred Molina for the similar ones: role of Rivera in 1998. According to Molina, "She turned up "When I first tried to sell the project... there was no backstage [of the Broadway play 'Art'] rather sheepishly and interest because nobody had heard of Frida. A few years later, I asked if I would like to play Diego". Molina went on to gain 35 heard the exact opposite--that there were too many Frida projects pounds to play Rivera. in development, and nobody wanted mine." When producer Polstein left Trimark, however, the production faltered again, and Hayek approached and , and the company purchased the film Tamor—FRIDA—8 from Trimark; Julie Taymor came onto the project as Director. That scene, this movie, FRIDA, was directed by Julie Meanwhile, in August 2000 it was announced that Jennifer Taymor. She won two Tony awards for the LION KING on Lopez would star in Valdez's take on the story, , Broadway. It was her film version of Shakespeare's TITUS by then being produced by . Nonetheless, it ANDRONICUS, all about blood feuds and vengeance, that was Hayek and Miramax who began production in Spring, 2001 prompted me to interview her last year after the massacre on on what was to become simply titled Frida. September 11. Filming Julie Taymor is back Filming took place this evening. And I welcome from April 7 through June 2001 you to NOW. and was shot entirely in TAYMOR: Thank you. Mexico. I'm happy to be here. Among the on location MOYERS: What was places shot were three there about the life of this UNESCO world heritage sites: woman that made you want to Teotihuacan, Xochimilco, and tell her story? 's historic centre. Other TAYMOR: Well, her on location sites include Rivera life seemed to transcend her and Kahlo's Juan O'Gorman- pain, both her this was a woman designed San Ángel studio who shouldn't have lived after house and the San Idelfonso this horrific accident that National Preparatory School. skewered her. Replicas of the Casa Azul And yet she was in bed (Kahlo's Coyoacán house) and the RCA Building's lobby were for two years, her father put a mirror under the canopy of the built at Churubusco Studios in Mexico City and shot in Stage 4 bed, and she started to paint herself. And through her life she there. seemed to be able to make... To create art out of the worst For scenes depicting Diego completing a mural, crew circumstances. And that's an incredibly inspiring story. members stretched a canvas across a scaffold placed in front of On top of that, it's an amazing romance, the rockiest the painter's actual artwork. This "makeshift 'mural'" included romance I've ever come across, ever, between her and Diego sketched outlines and painted portions. The optical "illusion" of a Rivera. work in progress was achieved through the canvas "flattened" by MOYERS: And the most unlikely. a camera shooting from a TAYMOR: Oh, it's distance and therefore unbelievable. He was 250, 300 "blending" the edges into the pounds; she was 5'2". He was big. fixed mural. Their differences were huge. He Salma Hayek wore was a very famous painter at the over fifty costumes as Frida. time, hugely famous, and Some pieces were purchased phenomenally famous for from street vendors in Mexico womanizing. And she knew it City. when she married him. Bill Moyers’ So you had infidelities interview with Julie Taymor, all over the place, and yet this 10/25/02: woman loved Diego. And it was a MOYERS: Every tremendous relationship, divorce, now and then a movie comes come together, fall apart. along that truly changes how MOYERS: She was a we see the world or shows us revolutionary in so many ways: something about the world we had never quite seen before. artistically, politically, sexually. What did you identify with her Such a movie opens this weekend in New York and Los as a woman? Angeles, and next Friday across the country. The name of this TAYMOR: Well, this woman painted not to make movie is FRIDA for the artist Frida Kahlo. She was hardly money. Not that I haven't made money. known outside her native Mexico when she died in 1954. But But she painted what she painted because she had to, today her paintings bring record bids at auction. because she was passionate about it. She didn't care at all if More than 100 books have been written about her in people bought her paintings. As she said, she painted her reality. Spanish and English, and she's the first Latin woman to be I find that I make as an artist the kind of choices that I honored on a United States postage stamp. have to be impassioned about. I'm not going to spend two years Quite a remarkable celebrity for someone who lived in on a film or four years on an opera if I don't feel like I can put constant pain after an accident that almost killed her when she my own self into it. That doesn't mean it has to be about myself. was a girl in school. Here's one of the many vivid scenes in That's a difference. FRIDA, starring Salma Hayek. Frida painted her own reality, her life. I'm a director and I paint many other people... Other people's realities. But I do Tamor—FRIDA—9 have to invest in it. And the other thing powerful scenes in the movie. that I found compelling is that Elliot SCENE FROM FILM: Get out! Goldenthal, who did the score... Get out! Get out! MOYERS: The music. MOYERS: I'm chilled every time TAYMOR: ...We have a long I see that. 20- year collaboration. And I love that TAYMOR: Why? Diego and Frida were these incredible MOYERS: I do not know. I was artists who supported each other in their going to ask you why. Why is the work, in their art. haircutting so significant? MOYERS: He is your TAYMOR: Well, that particular significant other. scene happens after Diego has done the TAYMOR: Oh, yes. Yes. ultimate act of betrayal: he's made love MOYERS: For 20 years? with Frida's sister. And she leaves him. TAYMOR: Twenty happily Frida leaves him. unmarried years. And she... So much of Frida was MOYERS: So there was more about her physically, her hair, her braids, to her than being an artist. I mean, there her clothes. So she cuts her hair off at that was a... You could identify with her. moment. She plays with that other side of TAYMOR: No, I like that, but her which is the masculine side of her. she got... She also really wanted to have But that particular shot which is a family and children and she had no Salma Hayek in front of the mirror, luck at that either with miscarriages and because of her accident. completely painted. We painted her face. We painted her The body was not capable. clothing. We forced perspective. When you talk about the MOYERS: She could easily have been a victim. Yet as I theater, that is a forced perspective set. There's nothing computer said in the opening in the 1980s there was this explosion of generated in this at all. This is almost totally theatrical. interest in her. Why do so many women see in her the hero's You use motion control, which means your camera journey? moves once with the real Salma here, then you do the same TAYMOR: Well, I think there's a difference between action again with there, and you can then put them together. how she was perceived in the '80s and how we are trying to deal But it's so shocking to people because it looks like a two with her now. Because she was used as a... Whatever the word dimensional painting for a moment, and then you feel that it's a feminist means to you, she was used as an icon of pain and human being coming alive. suffering, really a woman who had tremendous abuse from her MOYERS: I'm chilled I think because of that and husband and survived, as I said, these accidents. chilled because suddenly as you talk I think of... I'm seeing the But I don't think that really is the heart of what Frida is. melancholy. I think now what we can see as women is a woman who was I mean, feeling the melancholy, the cut hair, the outrageous, unique, talented, single minded, tenacious, and very something lost, something gone, something that she loved, she feminine. Very caught up with her shears. And then suddenly this figure man. Very vulnerable. Very comes alive for a brief moment and then obsessive about her love for her lapses into the most utmost posture of guy. despair and melancholy. So there was this... There TAYMOR: And it's a little, little is, this incredible balance that's gesture. I was talking about this earlier attractive to women and to men I today. That's a little teeny gesture, just the think who see this story, of collapse. It's so subtle just to go, "Oh, my someone who can do both, where god, she's alive." You know. you didn't have to say, "I'm a MOYERS: Let's look at that woman, so I'm going to be scene when for the first time Diego is independent, and I don't need you as about to seduce her or she's about to a male, and I can stand on my own." seduce him. There's that. I mean, that's fine. TAYMOR: Exactly. But I also think that Frida, FRIDA: What is this? she knew how to lay a table, she DIEGO: Well, the benefits of knew how to put flowers in her hair. being party leader, you can arrange for What's mysterious about her is her the drinking to be done close to home. gender bending, her bisexuality, her FRIDA: If you think I'm going to ability to be both macabre, sleep with you just because you've taken grotesque and exquisitely beautiful, me under your wing, you're wrong. sublimely beautiful. DIEGO: Me? I was painting MOYERS: Let me show murals and womanizing in peace when the audience one of the many you came along. I have a proposal. We Tamor—FRIDA—10 will not sleep together. We will solemnly swear right here, right MOYERS: All I know, she said. She said, it's all I now that we will be friends only. know. FRIDA: Fine. Did you arrange for that? TAYMOR: Yes. DIEGO: Cost me a fortune. "That's all I know, that I paint my reality." She didn't MOYERS: I wasn't prepared for the light to come on. I even think she was a Surrealist, that we call it, Breton called her loved that, it was quite a touch. Surrealist. TAYMOR: Yes. Yes. I think that's part of the myth of But for her that was reality, when you see her inside of stories. her heart pumping blood or you see her exposing... Oh, even the MOYERS: Later they do marry. She takes him on miscarriage, some very dark and difficult paintings, and you see knowing that he is a compulsive the fetus... These items that are womanizer. Why did she do shocking for most people, that's that? You studied her life. Why the truth of her life. did she do that? MOYERS: Something TAYMOR: She just else that struck Judith, my wife thought he was worth it. She and me as we watched that just thought it was more bigger scene with Trotsky and his wife than that. and their friends around the Also we have a scene dinner table we heard echoes of and I think it's the crux of the our own gatherings in the 1960s, movie, really, which is, what is so much passion for politics. So the fine line between fidelity much commitment to a cause. and loyalty? When she... When I mean, did that have to he proposes to her she... He says do with Frida's time and place he can't be faithful. And she and those particular people? thinks about it. He says, he's TAYMOR: Those physiologically incapable of people were actually so fidelity. powerfully effective as artists And she thinks about it politically. They did make a and she says, "can you be difference. Their work was loyal?" And he says, "to you, political, it was fashioning the always." Well, what is the thinking of the time. difference? MOYERS: But what's MOYERS: My happened to the passion for favorite line in the movie is politics in this country? Many after they've been divorced and people don't want to talk about they've been separated, they've politics, and if they do they don't been apart. They've been in bring the passion.

California. He comes back and Kahlo and Rivera, Mexico 1934. Photo by Martin Munkacsi. We don't bring the she says to him why? And he passion to it that we used to. says because I miss us. What has happened? TAYMOR: Us. TAYMOR: Well, the commercialization of art is MOYERS: And Joseph Campbell once said, you know, phenomenal, and that's for the movies as well. "That the commitment is to the relationship in a marriage." I mean, it's very, very hard for people to feel like their TAYMOR: That's true. voice could be heard unless it makes... Unless it gets, it's wide, MOYERS: And he missed whatever they became it's on TV and if you get to that point, then it has to be together. commercial. Or people don't want to put it out there. So... TAYMOR: Diego and Frida. Frida and Diego. Diego MOYERS: And you think this affects politics? and Frida. TAYMOR: I think politics itself, I think that people are There's a whole feeling that this... These two became an just in a terrified state right now to be critical of anything. But I item, even in the public eye, even in a social or celebrity circle, do think art still affects us socially in this country, tremendously. they were a unique couple. What's on television, what's on HBO. The kind of movies. It And I don't think that that's probably what he meant, but does. obviously she gave him something that he needed to be with. A movie like this, as you said, people will go out and MOYERS: His art is overtly political; hers is very, very they'll discuss marriage, they'll discuss loyalty. That is an personal. effective political, social act, if you get people to think. If you TAYMOR: From the beginning of her painting she was can provoke them. I'm an entertainer, but I also firmly believe in her own subject. She just stayed on that. That's what she could provoking. paint. She painted, as she said, her inner reality. She painted from MOYERS: In almost everything I've seen of yours inside. He painted the outside. there's a defining moment, usually a violent moment. You don't see the violence. Tamor—FRIDA—11

With the falling gold dust and the falling glass and the know, it felt like an eternity but probably a half hour dance. With falling oranges, there's also that pipe there that we know later is these voices coming out of them. And they danced to nobody. going to enter her back and vagina and means she'll never have Right after that, they and I went oh, my God. The first man came children. You don't see that act. out and they were performing for God. Now God can mean TAYMOR: No. whatever you want it to mean. But for me, I understood it so MOYERS: You grope with the consequences of totally. The detail on the costumes. They didn't care if someone violence not with the act itself. was paying tickets, writing reviews. They didn't care if an TAYMOR: Well, I learned from Shakespeare about audience was watching. They did it from the inside to the that. I learned. outside. And from the outside to the in. And that profoundly MOYERS: Good mentor. moved me then. TAYMOR: Yes, I did. And I think that people's MOYERS: How did you see the world differently after imaginations are richer sometimes than the reality. And also the you were in Indonesia? reality, if you show the act, you have the danger of putting the TAYMOR: Well I understood really the power of art to audience off so they can't enter into it. transform. I think transformation become the main word in my We always write stories of tragedies because that's how life. we reach our human depth. How we get to the other side of it. Transformation because you don't want to just put a We look at the cruelty, the darkness and horrific events that mirror in front of people and say, here, look at yourself. What do happened in our life whether it be a miscarriage or a husband you see? You want to have a skewed mirror. You want a mirror who is not faithful. Then you find this ability to transcend. And that says you didn't know you could see the back of your head. that is called the passion, like the passion of Christ. You could You didn't know that you could amount cubistic see almost all call this the passion of Frida Kahlo, in a way. the same aspects at the same time. It allows human beings to step When I talk about passion, and I'm not a religious out of their lives and to revisit it and maybe find something person, but I absolutely am drawn and attracted to the power of different about it. religious art because it gets at that most extreme emotion of the I think that's why travel was so important to me. I did it human experience. at a really young age, MOYERS: Excuse because you go outside me, I have to tell you that I and then you look at think you are one of the your own country, your most religious people I see own culture, working in the... completely differently. TAYMOR: Well, I remember yes, but not an organized back then I used to say religion. that arts were talked MOYERS: No, no, about in the arts and not...doctrinaire. But the leisure page. Now, why experience. would it be arts and TAYMOR: No, I leisure? Why do we agree with you. I believe in think that arts are it profoundly. leisure? Why isn't it MOYERS: What I sense in you as a seeker, a pilgrim, arts and science or arts and the most important thing in your life? soldier, whatever. You're a seeker. I think that art has become a big scarlet letter in our culture. TAYMOR: I am often interested in the story of the It's a big "A." And it says, you are an elitist, you're outsider. You know I lived in Indonesia for many years. effete, or whatever those things...do you know what I mean? It MOYERS: What happened to you in Indonesia. means you don't connect. And I don't believe that. I think we've TAYMOR: This is probably it for me. This is the story patronized our audiences long enough. that moves me the most. I was there for two years and I was You can do things that would bring people to another planning to stay longer and start a theater company. I went to place and still get someone on a very daily mundane moving Bali to a remote village by a volcanic mountain on the lake. They level but you don't have to separate art from the masses. were having a ceremony that only happens only every 10 years MOYERS: Thank you very much, Julie Taymor, for for the young men. I wanted to be alone. being with us tonight. I was listening to this music and all of a sudden out of TAYMOR: Thank you so much. the darkness I could see glints of mirrors and 30 or 40 old men in full warrior costume-- there was nobody in this village square. I was alone. They couldn't see me in the shadows. They came out with these spears and they started to dance. They did, I don't

JUST TWO MORE IN THE FALL 2011 BUFFALO FILM SEMINARS XXIII: November 29 Revanche, Götz Spielmann (2008) December 6 My Fair Lady, (1964)

SPRING 2012 BUFFALO FILM SEMINARS XXIV (TENTATIVE)

Jan 17 Victor Sjörstöm,The Phantom Carriage 1921 Jan 24 William A. Wellman, The Public Enemy 1931 Jan 31 Merian C. Cooper, King Kong 1933 Feb 7 Ernst Lubitsch, To Be or Not to Be, 1942 Feb 14 Luchino Visconti, Senso 1954 Feb 21 , Paths of Glory 1957 Feb 29 Sidney Lumet, 12 Angry Men 1957 Mar6 Satiyajit Ray, The Music Room 1958 Mar 13 spring break Mar 20 Clint Eastwood, The Outlaw Josey Wales 1975 Mar 27 John Woo, The Killer 1989 Apr 3 Krzysztof Kieslowki, Kieslowski, Red 1994 Apr 10 Terrence Malick, Thin Red Line 1998 Apr 17 Wong Kar Wei 2046, 2004 Apr 24 Christopher Nolan, The Dark Knight 2008

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The Buffalo Film Seminars are presented by the Market Arcade Film & Arts Center and State University of New York at Buffalo With support from the Robert and Patricia Colby Foundation and the Buffalo News