Interview Matt Horlock and Paul Thomas

The iconic Bill Hicks is the posthumous subject of a new documentary/animation hybrid. Kieron Casey chats to the film's directors to find out more

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What was it about Bill Hicks that inspired you to make a film about him?

Matt: In this country, Bill has always been someone considered to be of note, an important performer with something to say and was very funny with it. To think that when you looked around at the documentaries which were out there, we looked at the landscape and realised there was maybe a chance to tell Bill’s story in a fuller way with more insight into who he was as a person as well as who he was as a performer. This was a guy who was significant, who had a place on the cultural timeline.

Paul: That was reflected when we started pitching it. It began initially as a TV documentary and straight away there was a strong interest from channels. This film had been left unmade for 12 years at that stage. We found a way to do it and get the family to do it.

 

You said that the film was unmade for 12 years. It’s now been 16 years since Bill Hicks passed away. So the film took three years to make?

Paul: Yep. It’s told in an animated way and that took most of the three years. The first edit came together after a couple of months. The rest of the time was spent making the film shot by shot, scene by scene.

 

How did you first make contact with the Hicks family?

Matt: I basically had been doing short films for Film 4 and Channel 4 and developing a feature script when it was the 10th anniversary of Bill Hicks’ death and I realised I wanted to go to a tribute night but there wasn’t one on. So I decided to do that and through that I got in touch with Bill’s family. We put together a little documentary of the night and sent that to Bill’s family and they saw that we were coming from the right place and had experience making programmes.

 

You also interview his friends. How did you go about choosing your interview subjects and did everybody comply with you or did anyone turn you down?

Paul: It was hard work getting everyone to agree. We had a wish list but it took a lot of persuading. It was very personal and he was a very special friend to people. It was hard and emotional for people so there was a lot of hesitation to agree. Basically, Bill’s mum contacted everyone and told them that she was going to do the interview and that this film was “the one”.

Matt: But the other thing which qualifies these people to be the interviewees was Bill was a person who had lifelong friendships. He met Dwight, one of his best friends throughout his life, when he was eight years old. The people he had relationships with were the people that could constantly give the parts of the story that mattered throughout Bill’s life.

 

Most of the people who are familiar with Bill Hicks probably know him only through his stand-up. Does this film aim at contextualizing his stand-up with his personal life?

Paul: The film connects his onstage material with his life offstage. Every scene is told first hand by people within his life who were there. The film features a lot of clips (of his stand-up) but there is a seamless transition between the scenes into the clips so you can see exactly where Bill was, what he was thinking, how he was feeling about his life.

 

A lot of the footage is animated. What inspired this choice?

Paul: Just the potential of this technique; we’d seen it used in other places. There’s a scene when Bill is a teenager and wasn’t allowed to go down to a local comedy club so decided to sneak out (with friends). With a “talking heads” documentary what you’d see is people in their late forties/early fifties describing this scene when they were kids. Instead, what you can do is photograph the original family film and photos from Bill at school and superimposed him into the scenes along with his friends so that you can take an audience back there. It’s a totally, totally different experience. You’re inside a narrative story just like a dramatic film so it doesn’t feel like being in a documentary.

 

The film’s called American: The Bill Hicks Story. Why do you think Bill Hicks is more legendary in the UK than in America? What do you think it is about him that resonated with UK audiences?

Matt: The standard answer is the one that Bill’s brother Steve gives. Channel 4 played full length sets of his stand-up unedited and gave the viewing public the chance to engage with him as a performer in a way that he wanted to present himself, whereas in the States he was playing five minute sets on chat shows where he couldn’t swear or discuss matters that were off limits. Bill always felt there was an audience connection thing that was missing in the States for him. In the UK, he had a bigger opportunity to reach a television audience. He always thought that if he’d been given the chance in the US he would have connected in the same way. All the TV channels in the States have guidelines and are very mindful of their audiences. That’s the kind of thing that Bill enjoyed about being in the UK; he was able to have free reign.

 

One of things about Hicks is that he tried to communicate ideas in his comedy. He compared himself to Noam Chomsky at one point…

Matt: And the important caveat to that is “with dick jokes”. You have to remember that Noam Chomsky wasn’t known for his dick jokes. Well, I don’t know him personally. He might have a fantastic collection. I think the reason he described himself that way is that he was very keen on being seen as someone who was not just telling jokes and he was aware of the reputation of certain comedians in the US, such as Carrot Top, who seemed to not be interested in ideas at all. He was somebody who had a probing mind and wanted to use the stand-up comedy format as a way of pushing that. It’s a direct way - the most direct way - of interacting with an audience. In that regards, stand-up comedy is the last refuge of free speech.

Paul: And that’s why he stood the test of time. If he was just a funny guy he may not have been as prominent as he still is.

 

Do you think his short life helped cement his ‘legendary’ status?

Matt: He was very famously anti-marketing and advertising and the phrase used is “Bill Hicks never got the chance to sell out”. I suppose I find it difficult to believe he would have chosen a path that would have led him to embrace everything he opposed in his lifetime. The amount he achieved in such a short space and the tragic ending to his life story I guess does raise his life arc to mythic levels. His story is something people look at and aspire to - people look at him and think of how much he achieved in 32 years.

Paul: He was so prolific in his output there’s no way that would have stopped. He is forever young; he never turned into a fat middle aged guy.

Matt: I think one interesting thing to reflect on is that the interviewees said that every time something new came along they said “I wish Bill could have seen that!” He was really into Reservoir Dogs and they were really upset he never got to see Pulp Fiction. The main thing they were upset he never got to see was the internet.

 

American: The Bill Hicks Story is out 14 May. Click here for the Leeds Guide review

Posted on Tuesday 27th April 2010
Kieron Casey

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