Amy Goldstein is a director, producer, and screenwriter of television series, feature films, and music videos. Her latest documentary, “Kate Nash: Underestimate the Girl,” was made for Storyville BBC and was released theatrically by Alamo Drafthouse in the United States, Level Film in Canada, and qualified for an Academy Award in 2021. It screened at IDFA, DOC NYC, and Sheffield Doc Fest, among other fests. Her other credits include “Self-Made Men,” “Because the Dawn,” “The Silencer,” and “East of A.”
“The Unmaking of a College” opens in N.Y. February 11 and L.A. February 18.
W&H: Describe the film for us in your own words.
AG: “The Unmaking of a College” is a docu-thriller where nothing is what it seems. On its face, it’s the story of an attempted takedown of one of the America’s most iconoclastic colleges, and how a group of determined students succeeded in saving it — and by the same token, save their rights to an education that taught them to think critically and to expect a seat at the table.
Diving deeper, it is an homage to the power of documentation. Through a mix of students’ footage and social media threads, interviews with students, faculty, staff, reporters, alumni, and whistleblowers during and after the longest sit-in in U.S. college history, the film unveils the real motivations of the school administration: to close down the school. The film exposes for the first time how the domineering university up the road provided a script by which they would appear to be the hero coming to save the school, a tactic that had already closed another school nearby.
The documentary reflects more broadly on a crisis in higher ed as many small schools are vulnerable and asks: what is the purpose of a college education? The students answer this masterfully as they apply critical thinking to decipher the truth from the fictitious, a vital skill at a time when misinformation is rampant in the wider world.
All in all, it’s a suspenseful and raucous ode to democracy in action.
The title of the film is derived from the book “The Making of a College: A New Departure in Higher Education,” the seminal book on which Hampshire College was created to radically reimagine liberal arts education.
W&H: What drew you to this story?
AG: First and foremost, the dedication and commitment of the students at Hampshire College. They occupied the president’s office for 75 days, which is unprecedented in American college history. They shared governance — which they were asking from their school administration — with evolving, well-articulated demands. It was a real-world education in leading change. The students wholly dedicated themselves to saving the educational model that taught them to question and to assess what is happening to the world — and they succeeded.
[I saw the film as a] chance to do something different, something a little bit against the grain of cynicism that’s sort of pervasive out there in our times. Many of us feel hopeless about the state of our democracy. The students show us that there is a way to change the status quo through organizing peacefully.
W&H: What do you want people to think about after watching the film?
AG: I hope the audience will realize that they too can have a profound impact and can make change happen whether locally in their communities or on a wider scale, through actions as simple as sit-ins, using your body and time to make demands for change, and documenting. You can figure things out as you go; the very act of fighting to preserve the important things that matter to you is empowering. Building community is empowering. Whistleblowers and the mainstream press are attracted to peaceful dedication. You are not alone.
W&H: What was the biggest challenge in making the film?
AG: As often the case in making documentaries, it was figuring out how to tell the story. This was compounded by the fact that there was a lack of transparency from Hampshire College president Miriam Nelson at the time. We had to first determine what the objective story was by interviewing a variety of stakeholders, such as board members, journalists, whistleblowers, professors, staff. And we then had to determine how to tell the story in a compelling manner: could we jump into the organizing of the students’ sit-in without exposition? How could we show that the administration was reacting to the larger looming crisis in higher ed without being too didactic?
As the president continued to send messages that led many to think the college was going to go belly up — including announcements of layoffs of faculty and staff, a bizarre letter telling incoming students that there will be no dorms, no food, and very little in the way of classes should they decide to come to Hampshire — how could we capture the sense of absolute confusion while maintaining an easy thread for the audience to follow?
Our goal was to make a suspenseful, entertaining film that would appeal to a larger audience while respecting our subjects, and subject — a tall order, but I feel that’s always the case with documentaries.
W&H: How did you get your film funded? Share some insights into how you got the film made.
AG: This documentary is a passion project. Both of our editors, Troy Takaki and Caitlin Dixon, are the children of educators. Producer Anouchka van Riel as well.
We were all excited to have something hopeful, raw, and surprising to dive into during the pandemic. Our democracy was, and still is, under threat, and the peaceful organizing at Hampshire was a great example of peaceful democracy building.
This documentary was fast-tracked by the sheer enthusiasm of the attached talent. We did get equity funding and were backed by private foundation money. But many people were also generous with their talent and time.
With Zeitgeist Films, we found a passionate distributor with a daring approach to getting the film out.
W&H: What inspired you to become a filmmaker?
AG: At a very young age, I put together circus shows with the help of my neighborhood friends and pets. We would perform in front of the neighbors. I was the ringleader. I later started making short films. I always wanted to tell stories that were never told, with people often hidden from history.
And then I took Tom Joslin’s filmmaking class at Hampshire College. Tom pioneered the video diary, with which I am obsessed. In my final classes with Tom, he was working on “Silverlake Life: A View From Here,” where he documents the power of love in the face of AIDS. And ultimately his death. The personal and the political were tightly drawn in his films, and I was determined to find my way there. And I have been working at it ever since.
W&H: What’s the best and worst advice you’ve received?
AG: My father gave me the best and worst advice when I got into NYU grad film school. He advised me not to go because few women directed films.
W&H: What advice do you have for other nonbinary directors?
AG: I am a nonbinary director, but I think the advice might be the same for everyone: Pick up a camera. Try stuff. Tell the stories you are most passionate about. Get other people excited to join you. Surround yourself with people who know more than you do.
W&H: Name your favorite woman-directed film and why.
AG: I don’t have a favorite film, but “Capernaum,” a drama directed by Nadine Labaki, has left a deep mark. She tells the story of a 12-year-old child in Lebanon who sues his parents for child neglect and to stop them from having more children they refuse to care for. He is played by a Syrian refugee. Many actors were not professionals. The film is shot in the streets of Lebanon and Labaki collected hundreds of hours of footage not unlike documentary filmmaking. It’s an incredible and unique film in the story it tells and how it tells it. A.O. Scott says it best: “It’s a fairy tale and an opera, a potboiler, and a news bulletin, a howl of protest and an anthem of resistance.”
W&H: How are you adjusting to life during the COVID-19 pandemic? Are you keeping creative, and if so, how?
AG: We have been living with COVID for more than two years now. As an artist, I am cool with solitude.
I have done things I might not have taken the time to do outside of a pandemic. I took a road trip with my wife across the country to hang out with my mother.
I worked on the score of “The Unmaking of a College” on the road with uber-talented composer Nathan Larson, who is based in Sweden. I used to think I needed to be in the same room as the composer in order to score a film; in an ideal world, it is helpful, but I learned that I can also be open to composers who live all over the world.
My wife is pregnant. The pandemic has been productive.
W&H: The film industry has a long history of underrepresenting people of color onscreen and behind the scenes and reinforcing — and creating — negative stereotypes. What actions do you think need to be taken to make it more inclusive?
AG: Let’s take the remaking of “West Side Story” as an example. To really change things, I think we need the help of those with the most significant access to financing to use their access to back other people to helm films. If Steven Spielberg had put his weight behind an underrepresented person to direct the next “West Side Story,” it could have been a radical reinvention: a lesbian love story starring Lil Nas X in a musical Western? Who knows? It would be great to find out.
Most things have been tried except for passing the baton. Why not use your clout for inclusion by handing over the reins? You can EP or produce and help. As observed by the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative and the Geena Davis Institute, financing is one of the most challenging hurdles for underrepresented people. Who better to make the changes than the ones with access to funding? Then comes, of course, the prickly question of how to make the people in power and with access to money pass the baton. Some countries have passed laws on gender parity, Germany, for instance, but I feel that in order to accelerate change to get to true parity in the movie business, some great generosity could move the needle and be very fulfilling for the ones deciding to put their clout behind underrepresented voices.
