MIssing hours - Interview with director Ate de Jong

[Tom]

excerpt from a 2014 interview with Dutch director Ate de Jong about Miami Vice and the episode he directed (full interview at: http://www.peek-a-boo-magazine.be/en/interviews/ate-de-jong-director/)

 

Before we move on to your latest film, I am obliged as a fan of Miami Vice to ask you a few questions about it. Not many people know it, but you have directed an episode of this series. How did you get involved with them?

Miami Vice wanted at that time - second half of the eighties - young directors with a personal style. Under the influence of producer Michael Mann they also looked at European filmmakers who lived in Hollywood. My agent gave the producers of Miami Vice a tape of my film In The Shadow Of The Victory. That tape was not rewind by the previous viewer, and stood exactly on the only action scene in the film. The vice-producer who was responsible for finding directors (they had a separate producer for that) looked at it for three minutes and found it classy enough.

In the interview the producer asked what movies I wanted to make. I thought it was easier to say what I did not want to make. No musicals I told him, because we can not make those in Europe. And then I wanted to say, not science fiction either, but he interrupted me and shouted to his secretary "Mary, what is the new episode about?" She shouted back "About aliens". "Aliens, is that something for you?", asked the producer. "Great," I said. Yes, I was an opportunist.

Wasn't it difficult to handle all these stars?

We have no stars in the Netherlands and Belgium. Here, stars drive with a bus back to their hotel. That's something else in the USA. It was not easy to deal with stars. Don Johnson was a disaster and ran every moment away from the set when he didn't like it. But he did that not only with me, even with the American directors.

Afterwards I was asked to direct 2 episodes, but I have not done that. "I'm not masochistic enough", I told the producer. Stupid. It would have been much better for my career. Afterwards, it was very special because in my episode Missing Hours I had James Brown (the Godfather of Soul) and then the totally unknown Chris Rock as guest stars.

As a movie fan, I consider the style of Miami Vice as one of the most innovative styles from cinema. Agree with that?

Yes that's right. Incidentally, the unshaven look of Don Johnson appeared to come from a jar. Don was not hairy at all. The visual style was fixed and as a director you had to arrange that. So your quality as a director depended on that style and how you cope with the stars.