One degree of separation from Michael Jackson

Never done: Met Sarah, Andy, Jay, and Peter, and saw a rough cut of a film that no-one but the filmmakers have ever seen before

For the past six months or so, Josh has been editing a film about the god-like violinist Jascha Heifetz. For the past six months, the writer on the project, Sarah, has been asking to meet me. Finally, the day came when they had a rough cut together, and needed some outside eyes to give them feedback, and they invited me into the editing room, along with two extremely accomplished violinists, Andy and Jay, and the film's producer/director, Peter.

I love, love, love, love, love getting to tell other people what isn't (and is) working with their movie. Especially when I do not have to figure out how to fix it. I know that sounds a little sadistic, but I actually mean it in the most generous possible way. I love taking that time to help midwife a piece of art, and I love coming in cold, with beginner's mind, and paying attention to what does and doesn't interest me, what is confusing, and what story is -- and isn't -- being told.

The only thing that was off about this screening is that the two violinists were introduced as such -- this one is a famous, but now injured and retired virtuoso, and this other one is a famous violinist who plays in the house band on Prairie Home Companion, and has also played with Itzhak Perlman, Placido Domingo, Michael Jackson, and as written on his bio, the Native American occupying force on Alcatraz. I was introduced as Josh's companion. Nice.

But as it turned out, Andy and Jay were two of the most respectful and down-to-earth famous violinists I've ever critiqued a film with. (Yes, and the first.) I loved the way our three sensibilities wove together, and I loved listening to the ways that they watched the film. They said things like, "You should hold that shot until he hits the E chord in The Girl With the Flaxen Hair." And, "You had a theme from Porgy and Bess playing under a scene from the 1920's, but it wasn't composed until 1935." One of them, and I'll leave it to your imaginations which one, also said, "It's about a fucking violinist, let him play the fucking violin!"

Meanwhile, I was giving notes like, "I feel like the story really starts at minute 11, when we first learn that his father never approved of anything he did," and "The first-person narration is confusing, especially if you aren't going chronologically," and "If you're going to mention suicide, you can't toss it away so quickly. If we know why, we can better empathize with him."

And what happened, and what makes me think that Andy and Jay are such mentshes, is that we all listened to one another, and usually agreed with one another, and definitely respected one another's opinions. So even though as far as they were concerned I could have known as much about story structure as I knew about natural language programming (which my sister knows a lot about) they didn't act like it, and that is a quality I respect more than almost any other. In our Mussar practice, it's Humility: Seek wisdom from everyone.

This experience reminded me that we can learn as much when someone else models ethical behavior as when we ourselves model it. And what I learned, and hope I never forget it, is that if you're making a movie about a fucking violinist, let him play the fucking violin!