Slamdance actually is indie and rebellious. Sundance obviously felt threatened.

I began filmmaking in high school, at the Chicago Academy for the Arts. My first documentary was about a dysfunctional obese middle-aged carpet cleaner named Bill, who lived with his Mom, and his love affair with Anna, a drug-addicted prostitute. I made that when I was 16.

Slamdance actually is indie and rebellious. Sundance obviously felt threatened.

All of William S. Burroughs friends pushed it forward and introduced me to one another. I was able to enter into that beat family for a while and document it.

I like documenting people who can break away from the conformist boring world we are stuck in and either live their life in a much more far out way or create art that critiques it well.

Sundance claimed to be "rebellious" on all of their programs, but they are not. Most of the movies at Sundance were multi-million dollar pictures that were already guaranteed a theatrical release.

I picked up On The Road, Howl, and Naked Lunch (in that order) in high school. I was blown away. The writing was amazing and the places it took me was even more far out. It opened up new avenues of thinking for me and so I went down the beaten road.