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Actress/Director’s Unlikely Friends by Don Schwartz
Once a talented Hollywood actress, Leslie Neale may look the part but she hardly acts it. photo: courtesy L. Neale
LESLIE NEALE'S "UNLIKELY FRIENDS"
are perpetrators of violent crimes, their victims, and those who help them meet in a safe place in the name of a relatively new movement called "restorative justice." In the one deceivingly-short hour of her latest film, “Unlikely Friends”, we meet these people, and are confronted with human emotions and behaviors that challenge our deeply-held beliefs about victims, victimizers and justice.
Born and raised in Dallas, Neale "escaped" Texas at the age of 25 to become a successful Hollywood actor. Boredom, circumstances, and an ineffable impulse pulled and pushed her into the world of documentary filmmaking with a tight focus on crime and justice in the United States. Neale’s films have made strong impacts politically, socially, and internationally. She producers under her Chance Films banner.
“Road to Return”, her first major feature, tells the story of a black ex-bank robber and a white college professor who work together to create the nation’s leading after-prison care program—helping ex-cons return not to crime, but to society as productive citizens. The film is narrated by Tim Robbins.
“Juvies” examines the phenomenon of trying, convicting and imprisoning children as adults, and questions this mode of justice. Is this the best solution to juvenile crime? Mark Wahlberg narrated.
“Unlikely Friends” introduces "restorative justice," a world which allows meaningful contact between perpetrators and their victims. Narrated by Mike Farrell, “Unlikely Friends” focuses on the challenge and the power of forgiveness. This is the film that pushed and pulled me to interview Neale.
CineSource:Tell me about your transition from actor to filmmaker.
Leslie NealI had quit acting, wanted to get off the circuit. You know, it’s hard work.
I always used to say that when you got the job, that was the vacation—because most of your work is trying to get work. You’re auditioning several times a day, changing your clothes, your hair, your makeup several times a day.
And if you’re lucky enough you’re getting called into producers—you’re getting close to being hired a lot. And when you got the job, it was kind of a vacation, but there was a long distance between when you were auditioning and to when you got a job, although I was one of the fortunate ones in that I was able to work and make a living at it.
Leslie Neale on a shoot at a penal institution. photo: courtesy L. Neale
I was tired. I wanted off the circuit, and I ended up falling in love, and getting married, and having a child. I took some time off for awhile. When my son was about two or three I had gone back to work, doing a movie in North Carolina.
And again, it was a guest star role, wasn’t very exciting, it was kind of expository—you’re just there to serve the main characters to progress through their storyline. I thought, ‘What am I doing? My kid’s back home. I’m stuck out here. It’s boring.’ So, I decided to quit.
I didn’t know what I wanted to do. And yet, like most creative people, you have that energy that needs to find expression, an outlet. I didn’t really feel like I was good at anything other than acting. I was just sitting with that, going through a lot of inner work, introspection, trying to find out where I thought my purpose lay in life.
My husband at the time had written a book. He had been a rock ‘n’ roll musician, and wrote a book about his life, and he went on a book tour, and he said, ‘come with me,’ and I ended up visiting a prison in Louisiana with him.
A prison?
He had been very involved in the men’s movement—Robert Bly and people like that. And he had been at one of these men’s conferences where a man stood up and said he had a program that was doing great work with inmates at a Louisiana correctional facility, and he would love to bring drumming—because in the men’s work you do a lot of drumming. He said he’d love to be doing this with inmates. My ex-husband said, ‘Okay, I’ll buy you the drums for that.’
While my husband was on this book tour he said, ‘I have to go and pay my respects to this guy.’ I said, (laughing) ‘Yeah, I don’t really want to go. I’m not interested.’ I ended up going, and it really changed my life.
Where was this?
This was in Dixon Correctional Institute, right outside Baton Rouge. They were doing drumming with men in prison to help access their deeper feelings. And I experienced a level of honesty that these men were sharing that I had not necessarily experienced in the outside world. And I said, ‘Wow, something’s going on here. Something real is going on here.’ My ex-husband and I talked about it, and we thought, ‘Gosh, we need to let other people know about this.’ This was twenty years ago—before hardly anybody was doing anything on prisons.
We thought, ‘Somebody’s got to do a film, and we’ll bankroll the film.’ And we were trying to find people to do it, and nobody really had the passion, or got it, or understood it. My ex-husband said, ‘You do it.’ And I said, ‘Wow, I don’t know. I went to film school, but I don’t think I can make a film.’
Some of the inmates covered in Neale's 'Unlikely Friends'. photo: courtesy L. Neale
But anyway, that’s exactly what happened. I went to women filmmaker friends of mine, and asked them to mentor me through this. And every step of the way I had a couple of seasoned women filmmakers who would give me advice or steer me in the right direction. And I stumbled through that first film which is called ‘Road to Return’. I asked Tim Robbins to narrate it, and he very graciously did.
We took it to Congress, and were able to get a Senate bill passed to appropriate the first monies for what was then called ‘aftercare’ in the United States. It is now called ‘re-entry.’ And this is to help ex-cons reintegrate safely and securely back into society so they can become tax-paying citizens, and not recidivists.
This was my introduction to making films, and we were able to get attention on the film, and get people to say, ‘Oh, yes, we should care about this issue. Let’s appropriate money.’ I thought, ‘Wow, what a powerful tool to help affect change at the legislative level.’
That’s when I went, ‘Okay, this is kind of fun.’
I was invited by a nun who I had dinner with—and she’d seen my film—to go into juvenile hall here in Los Angeles. She said, ‘I just want you to see my program.’ It was a writing program with kids in juvenile hall. I watched an evening of kids read their work. They were really accessing deep emotions. It was so powerful and so real, I thought, ‘I want to do this with cameras.’ Meaning I want to teach these kids how to videotape and interview themselves—as a therapeutic tool.
I ended up staying around her program and juvenile hall for about three years—trying to be able to do my own program. Finally, I think they just got tired of me asking, so they gave me a room, and with little video cameras, I got my first class of kids. And this eventually became my second film—which is called ‘Juvies’—that Mark Wahlberg narrated.
How was it distributed?
‘Juvies’ went on to become very pivotal in the juvenile justice movement—actually, there really wasn’t a juvenile justice movement before ‘Juvies’. HBO picked it up, Cinemax picked it up. We created a grassroots groundswell by connecting to a lot of grassroots organizations first, and then HBO showed it, and then it became one of the top ten human rights-watched film in the world in 2005.
We were able to start the first-ever juvenile justice conference at the United Nations—the conference is still carried on today. We were the first ones to get out there and knock on the door and say, ‘Hey, you know, the United States didn’t sign the United Nations Convention Rights of the Child treaty. The United States and Somalia are the only ones not to—we need to look at this issue.’
The movement’s still growing. There’s a lot more attention on it now, thank God. A lot of change has come from the Supreme Court down, but there’s still a lot more work to do.
This sounds like it would be a very gratifying experience, these first two films have done what you wanted them to do. They were well-received and impactful.
Neale on another one of her 'tight' location interviews for 'Unlikely Friends'. photo: courtesy L. Neale
Yeah! I’m kind of cheating a little bit because there have been little films inbetween these films (laughs). I guess I talk more about my personal work, this is my personal passion, but I have been a hired-gun to go do other little films. I was hired to do a film on gospel music, and a film on nuns—and then I ended up doing ‘Juvies’.
And, yes, it is gratifying. It is really hard work, and I wish that there could be a moment where I could go, ‘Yeah, right. I feel really gratified.’ But, the success of a film, in my case, has been a long, slow process. There’s a lot of downs that come with the ups. I know it had a great impact, but the road was taken one step at a time, and you don’t necessarily get that huge fulfillment while you’re walking the road.
I think that comes with the territory.
I guess it does. I wish it didn’t. Even as an actress, I never liked to watch my work, but I was so much more interested in the rehearsal process. I loved that part. When I was on the stage, by the time the show was up, I was like ‘Ehh, this is boring.’ Doing for the audience and having to talk to the audience afterwards, and all that glad-handing, I didn’t enjoy. But I loved the process. And, maybe that’s what I like about filmmaking, as well.
That’s a virtue, that you’re getting gratification from the process of filmmaking.
Thanks. I wish that I could take that in more. Like, okay, well, I threw my rock in the pond and it did something. Maybe that helps drive me to want to make the next film (laughing).
When I was making ‘Juvies’, and even ‘Road to Return’, in any film that I’ve made, even this last one, ‘Unlikely Friends’, when I tell people what I’m doing at cocktail parties, they’ll go, ‘Oh, really, uh-huh, okay.’ And, especially with ‘Juvies’, when I tell people, ‘Oh yeah, I’m doing a film on kids being tried as adults and sent to adult prisons,’ people say, ‘Why do you care about kids committing crimes?’
I mean it really wasn’t in our consciousness yet—to care. And so, I do feel somewhat gratified that I did help create that consciousness—for people to care. And, also, for people to care about ex-offenders returning to society—the same on ‘Road to Return.’
And even with ‘Unlikely Friends’ which is about forgiveness, when I would tell people, ‘Okay, I’m making a film about victims of really violent crime who not only forgive the perpetrator, but actually become friends with them,’ people’s faces just turn to stone—like, ‘Really! That’s not possible. They must be crazy. That’s Stockholm Syndrome.’
I was afraid, actually, that the film would never be released. But the actual reception has been amazing, which shows me that there has been a shift in the collective consciousness.
Neale's many inmate interviews are both eyeopening and heartfelt, from her 'Unlikely Friends'. photo: courtesy L. Neale
Let’s talk about ‘Unlikely Friends’. How and when and where did the film get conceived and then developed?
With ‘Road to Return’ I realized, ‘Wow. Films make an impact.’ I got hooked—even if they’re big or small films. I saw that there was so much work to do with the criminal justice system. As I said, I’d become a mother at that point, and I realized that this was a system that’s affecting us all, that if we didn’t help people really heal themselves, that we were all going to be at risk—either from another crime, or our loved ones could get caught up in this system. So I made it my issue.
I realized there weren’t a lot of people doing work on it—unless you were a missionary, the Catholic Church, or one of the born-again Christians, the religious sectors. Those are the people who tended to do the work in criminal justice.
It was in ‘Road to Return’ that the central figure in that film was a bank robber; and he had gotten out of prison, we had become friends. He told me a story that he had gone back to the bank he robbed and apologized. And he told me that the bank teller who he had held a gun to just had tears streaming down her face, and said, ‘Thank you for coming back because I haven’t been able to get you out of my mind for twelve years.’
I knew immediately that by him making a connection with her, in a positive way, it freed her, released her, finally, from the pain she was suffering. And it had helped him. He had made proper amends to her. I thought, ‘Wow, that is so amazing.’
And I was sharing this with somebody, and they said, ‘You know, that’s restorative justice.’ They told me it was a term, a concept, a practice coming out of tribal culture—specifically, the Maori tribe and Aborigines in Australia, coming down through Canada, and that it was growing. This was nearly twenty years ago. And I thought, ‘Wow, some day I want to explore that.’
So, after I made ‘Juvies’ I came back to that idea. By that time the restorative justice movement had begun to grow here in the United States. It’s pretty small, but it’s growing. I began to watch a few films that had been done on restorative justice, and I thought, ‘Well, you know, it’s kind of been done. I don’t want to redo something that’s already been done.’
And then I began to hear about these stories of people who had gone one step further, and they’d actually become friends with the perpetrator—after meeting them, after connecting with them. I thought, ‘Well, that’s a hook. That’s a way to tell this story in a different way, in a fresh way.’ It evolved into something else which is really more focused on forgiveness than on restorative justice—the power of forgiveness. That’s how I got the idea for ‘Unlikely Friends’—how it came to be.
What did you do with the idea?
I just put the word out there in my circles, my connections, and I started looking for stories, and it took a long time (laughs). I found more stories that I can tell, and I began to assemble the structure of the film, and chose the stories that weren’t repetitive from one another. I started following five different stories of people who had been victims of violent crimes—either they had been the victim, or they had lost a loved one, usually a child. I asked, ‘What’s the benefit? Tell me, how do you do this thing called forgiveness. What did you do?’
What do you think comes first between perpetrator and victim, the intent to forgive or the intent to confront?
Technically, it’s the need to connect with the perpetrator, to ask them, ‘Why me? What was going through your mind? Why my loved one? Who are you? How did you come to make this horrible, horrible choice? What were my loved one’s last words?’ They want answers. Typically, that’s the route. Sometimes forgiveness will come through that meeting.
You can have these confrontations, if you will, or these meetings, and there may not be forgiveness—but there’s still a resolution. In other words, in order for restorative justice to work, you don’t have to have forgiveness. ‘Unlikely Friends’ is focusing on those particular victims who did find forgiveness, and looking at that aspect of it. Usually it comes from wanting to meet with the perpetrator.
There are a lot of people who are coming from a spiritual tradition or path such as Christianity or Judaism, whatever, who have a knowingness, a sense that forgiveness is their pathway to freedom. They want to do it, but it’s very difficult. Then there are some people who say, ‘Well, there’s a ‘should’ involved.’
But for most people it’s an inner soul recognition. Forgiveness is the choice that will free them of the pain that they suffer from having been gravely harmed or having lost a loved one. Most victims I talked to lost a child, and the pain they described to me is so excruciating they felt that forgiveness was their only choice out of that pain.
One woman who I did not use her story in the film, but I interviewed her on numerous occasions, she lost her daughter to a very brutal crime, and I said, ‘Oh, I don’t think I could forgive that.’ And she said, ‘Yes, you could.’ I said, ‘I really, really think I could not do that.’ And she said, ‘Yes, you could because you have to.’ And, I knew what she was telling me was that it’s your only way out of that pain.
I tend to focus more on those kind of stories. It wasn’t what comes first—meet my perpetrator or the forgiveness—it was for them the only light out of the tunnel.
Most people do not instantaneously arrive at forgiveness, but I have met people that get to it very quickly. Most of us don’t. Most of us will go through three to five years of struggling, pain, torment, anger, rage, revenge until we arrive at that choice to make.
It’s been explained to me that forgiveness is a choice, and that it’s a practice, very much a spiritual practice. It’s not a one-time event. I tell the story of a cop who has his eye shot out by a bank robber. He was a highway state trooper, and he was pursuing a bank robber, ended up with five bullets in his body. He was in his early twenties. He’s now in early fifties, and he’s in excruciating pain due to those injuries. He’s says, ‘You know, sometimes, when I get up in the morning still, and I have to practice forgiveness.’ Yet he considers himself best friends with the man who shot him.
That was an eye-opener for me. I had thought, believed, for some reason, you forgive and forget one time. And, if you still struggle with it—resentment feelings arise, agitation or anger, then you’re ‘bad’ because you haven’t really forgiven. These courageous leaders in my film—or ‘teachers’ as I like to refer to them—demonstrated that it’s a practice.
Anything else you want to say about the making of the film—trials, triumphs, epiphanies?
The biggest challenge is always financial. I try to get grants, people to pre-buy it. That’s the real frustrating part (laughing) of filmmaking—to have a good idea, to know you can execute it, and you don’t necessarily get the support for it. And yet, you keep going on. That’s the hardest thing for me. It’s like, ‘Well, am I really on the right track? I’m not getting the green-light signs.’
The Roy Dean grant was very instrumental in keeping me going when I won that. I thought, ‘Yes, I’m on the right track.’ Then I won another grant for music. That’s probably the biggest personal challenge that I have—believing in yourself, believing in what you’re doing, and keep going. I’m very, very grateful that it sold to Discovery right off the bat, as soon as it was finished.
I’m grateful, too. I’ve noticed you have quite an elaborate website for ‘Unlikely Friends’. Who is responsible, and how is the site being received?
I really appreciate that. I think Olivia Klaus who is an associate producer for me did a terrific job. She and her husband, Adam Morrow, helped design the site. She’s a great filmmaker in her own right. I’d like to have more traffic at the site, and for people to really use it, and to post their own stories of forgiveness, their own personal challenges.
The most gratifying thing that’s come from the website is that I’ve had people reach out to me with their own stories of forgiving what we call the ‘unforgiveable.’ A lot of people have done this—they’ve forgiven what we in society judge unforgiveable. ‘How could you forgive that?!’ We all know that phrase, right? Once the film was made, this website’s out there, people are using it, I’ve had people write to me and say, ‘Thank you so much because you know what? I haven’t shared that this happened to me.’
There’s a lot of shame, for whatever reason, around forgiveness. It’s so interesting because every major religion has a huge forgiveness component. It’s a universal law. You let go, and you move on. It is a power. And yet, if we pick up that tool, at least in our society, we can be severely judged for it. I find that contradiction very interesting, it just fascinates me. I would have liked to have gone more into that in the film, but I didn’t for time’s sake.
But with the website, people are coming out of the woodwork saying, ‘Thank you so much for doing this because I didn’t want to tell anybody. I don’t talk about this.’
I consider your website integral to the film.
Tell me about that.
Your film is an hour long. You stuffed that hour with so much drama and so much information, I felt like I’d watched a two hour film. Then I went to the website and I was overwhelmed some more. If I were to teach a college class, I’d show your film, and use the website as a syllabus. There are so many resources, and each of them demand their own careful attention. The film is so powerful, us viewers need help in responding to what we just learned. You provide that help immediately.
Thank you. I also put together a discussion guide that people can get with the film. A lot of prisons are using the film now which is a whole other component that I’m very gratified about because I knew the film would be something for victims, but I didn’t know how it was really going to play with the inmate population. To my surprise they feel very heard by it. I’m getting feedback that it’s giving them permission to ask for forgiveness, forgive themselves, and forgive others.
There’s a prison that’s using it quite a bit in Oregon. I’ve had a couple of inmates write to me and say, ‘You know, we’d love to do a discussion guide for inmates with this film.’ I said, ‘Great. Go for it. Let’s work together.’ I’m really proud that I’m collaborating with a couple of lifers who are committed to change, and helping influence the discussion guide and grow it.
What form is the discussion guide in, and how can people get it?
They can buy it through the website. It’s in a PDF form which I email off to people so they can make copies or however they want to use it. People are using it in classrooms, church groups, non-profit organizations. There’s a community called the Dispute Resolution Center in Washington State that’s going to have a screening of the film coming up. They’re using the Guide, and doing a whole piece on forgiveness. Certainly, I encourage that.
Have you been invited to present at any legislative bodies for ‘Unlikely Friends’?
No, I haven’t. This is my first film that I don’t have a legislative component around. There is some legislation being written in some states. Pete Lee out of Colorado has written some restorative justice legislation. Steve Watts, a legislator in Wyoming, is featured in the film. He’s writing some legislation. In California, I don’t know of any.
But as I said earlier, the restorative justice movement is kind of growing, there’s a lot of... not controversy, but I will say reluctance to conflate forgiveness with restorative justice. The restorative people who could take political action are a little skittish of using what I call ‘the other F-word’—forgiveness. For that reason I haven’t dovetailed into legislation with this film. But if somebody wants to use it, I am more than open to that.
And you have with your previous films.
With ‘Road to Return’ I did—the U.S. Congress. With ‘Juvies’ I went to the legislature here in California. I was able to work with the California Youth Law Center, write a bill that Senator Sheila Kuehl carried for us. It would have allowed juveniles who were sentenced to ‘life’ have their cases reviewed at age 25, perhaps even re-adjudicated, or their sentences reduced. For that particular bill I made a shortened version of ‘Juvies’, and we got the bill passed by both the House and Senate, and then Gov. Schwarzenegger vetoed it.
We were proud of that, but it went dormant for a long time until it came about in another much-changed bill that the Human Rights Campaign helped carry, and it did pass under Gov. Brown—long time coming.
With ‘Unlikely Friends’, a lot of people are using it—from corrections, non-profit organizations, churches, universities. New York University in Abu Dhabi is considering bringing me out to show my work and run a workshop. But I don’t know if anybody’s using it for education in a legislative piece.
Maybe it’s just as well. This is from the ground up.
Yes. One of the points I raise in the film is if we make this more accessible for victims and offenders to be able to meet together, how that might help change the criminal justice system in a positive way. Right now it’s very, very difficult for offenders and victims to connect—in a safe way. First, it’s illegal for offenders to reach out to their victims at any time. Even though an offender has come out after serving their time they cannot make contact with that victim.
And you can understand. For a lot of people that could be a very unsafe situation. But there’s also a lot of people that it could be a very positive situation. So how can we as a society make that safe—for victims to reach out to their perpetrators, or for the perpetrator to say, ‘You know, I want to make amends to you. I want to tell you what happened, to apologize to you.’ That, in itself, is what restorative justice is.
Whether or not forgiveness is a component is neither here nor there. But that particular container for victims to come together with perpetrators in a safe way to talk can be very revolutionary, and very powerful for change—not only for the system, but for our communities.
And that is where we could get legislation—to make it easier for those who want to do it. Not everybody wants to do it. It’s not right for everybody to do.
Is there anything else about the film or its impact that you want to say.
It was an honor, an honor (with emphasis), and a privilege to make this film. I certainly struggle with my own demons in making any film; but I learned so much in making this film that I can apply to my own life. Everybody I talk to, whether their story made it into the film or didn’t make it into the film, everybody taught me so much.
They taught me that there should be no shame around any choice anybody makes—if it’s a choice for healing. We’re all wounded at some level. These people are so courageous with what they’re doing. That’s why I consider it an honor. I hope other people can learn something by watching the film.
I had one friend, after we did the premier in Los Angeles, I ran into her on the street getting coffee a couple days later. She said, ‘Oh, my god, I came home from your screening and I forgave 12 people.’ (we both laugh) So, at the very least I hope we all walk away going, ‘All right, who do I have left to forgive in my life?’
Don Schwartz is an actor, writer and blogger on all things documentary, and can be seen here or reached . Posted on Oct 02, 2014 - 08:07 PM