The Film Panel Notetaker

Q & A with Family Affair Director Chico Colvard

Silverdocs

June 24, 2010

By Erin Essenmacher

Family Affair starts with the memory of a shooting. Director Chico Colvard, who narrates the film, explains how in 1978, as a ten year-old boy emulating scenes from his favorite show the “The Rifleman,” he shot his sister with one of the many guns his father kept in the house. Blessedly, she didn’t die. But she thought she was going to, which led her to confess a shocking and horrible secret: her father had sexually molested and physically abused her and her two sisters on a regular basis, for years.  The fallout from that revelation tore the family apart.  The father did jail time.  The children’s mother, who supported her daughters when the allegations came to light, couldn’t deal with the aftermath and abandoned the children soon after.  Flash forward twenty years: The girls are all grown up, some with children of their own, all with emotional scars that continue to manifest in their adult lives.  Their mother is still more or less absent save for a recriminating letter she sent the family.  And the father whose actions caused the destruction?  He was freed after less than a year in jail and now comes over for Thanksgiving dinner and sees his daughters on a regular basis.

Colvard begins filming these family gatherings and interviewing his father and sisters, hoping to both unravel the story to get at the truth behind family’s dysfunction, and to better understand how – and why – his sisters could choose to have a relationship with the man who has caused them so much pain.  The result it a loving, balanced and honest look at the lingering and devastating effects of abuse, and the incredible healing power of both honesty and forgiveness.

The film premiered at Sundance and has gone on to win multiple awards. Liz Garbus of Moxie Firecracker served as executive producer and LEF, Impact Parnters, Fork Films and the Firelight Foundation provided funding. Oprah Winfrey’s new network OWN recently acquired Family Affair for domestic broadcast.  Colvard, with the support of the Ford Foundation, has also created a robust educational and outreach plan around the film.

Here’s a synopsis of the post-screening Q and A with the director:

Q:  What made you decide to make this film?

CC: I never intended to make a film.  My intention was to make this for my sisters, because I would go to these family gatherings and after some initial laughing and banter, everyone took on their roles, and started blaming each other. I always thought that rage should be directed at my dad and I couldn’t understand why it wasn’t. I thought if they could see themselves, things would change. It really wasn’t something I wanted to talk about. I didn’t want this to be as public as it has been. Over the course of the 8 years I was filming, it occurred to me that something bigger was starting to happen.  My sisters were always supportive and consistently gave me their blessing. They’re just these remarkable, remarkable women and each time their little brother would show up with a camera, it gave them permission to talk.

Q:  How has the process of making the film changed you?

CC: Over the course of doing this, there was a shift for me. I moved from being a frightened kid cowering behind the camera and thinking we were unique, to now showing the film to thousands of people around the world and hearing not so much that they were abused, but that they also felt somehow betrayed by their parents.  That’s what I really wanted to come through, not for this to be the ‘incest’ film, but something more. I wanted to be able to deal with it and not make my sisters one-dimensional characters who are defined by this awful thing that happened to them.

Q:  Was the filmmaking process cathartic for you?

CC: I tried not to make it therapy. Some things that are private, you shouldn’t subject an audience to because it’s not fair.  During the process I went from frightened, to wanting my pound of flesh, to feeling slightly judgmental, to ultimately being grateful. My sisters are so incredibly brave.  Their choices have allowed us to have a family because they demand [our father] shows up, to give their own kids a  grandfather, some sense of normalcy, and what they didn’t have – a sense of family.

Q:  Did your father see the film?

CC: No, not that I know of, and in the course of interviewing him he never asked a question about me. Not once in eight years.  His daughter [from a second marriage] called me right before the film premiered at Sundance. She had seen the trailer and was angry.  She said the past is past and I should let it go, that her dad loved her and he had never done anything to her. I said, “I’m really glad you didn’t know the same man we grew up with. If you want to make your own film about how great he is, by all means, go do it.”

Q:  Are your sisters resentful that you didn’t have to go through what they did?

CC: No. Not at all. They’re real “sheroes.” When I think of what they did to protect me, it’s the one thing that makes me lose it [chokes up].  Those times I doubted the process, doubted the value of the film, they encouraged me.

Q:  What comment from a viewer stands out to you most?

CC: That’s hard for me to answer because I feel really protective of those people who have shared their stories with me. There was one comment during a Q&A at Sundance, this woman stood up in front of 500 or 600 people, sobbing and talking about the sexual abuse her mother had suffered, and how hard it was for her to talk about it and thanked me.

Q:  Why did you pull yourself out of the film as much as you did?

CC: I used to be in it even less! When I first started editing, all of the “out” points I selected in the edit were the points I saw or heard myself. I rationalized it by telling myself ‘this is for my sisters.’  Then I applied for a LEF grant and they thought my application was so good, they were using it as the model for other applicants. I thought “this is great! I’m a shoe in!”  and then I didn’t get it. I asked them about it and they told me the film was my story too and the story suffered for not having my voice in it. I realized I was asking something of my sisters – to put themselves out there – that I wasn’t willing to do, and that I needed to find a balance between making the film for my sisters and also willing to be vulnerable myself.