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A
Foreign. This is all of it on wnyc. I'm David Fuerst filling in for Alison Stewart. A new film gives us a glimpse into the life of actor Carol Kane and her 98 year old mother, Joy, inside their Upper west side apartment. It is titled simply Carol and Joy. Shot on 16 millimeter film, the 40 minute documentary feels more like an afternoon visit. It starts with Joy, an active music teacher, former dancer, lifelong Francophile, recounting childhood memories of her father, Carol's grandfather. And in the film, we hear stories about growing up as a woman. Friends stop by. Piano music and singing fills the room. And the film captures a mother and daughter deeply connected by creativity and shared curiosity about life. Carol and Joy is streaming now on the Criterion Channel. And joining us to discuss is the film's director, Nathan Silver, who was recently here on all of it with Carol to talk about working together on the film between the Temples. And also joining us are the film's stars, Carol and Joy Kane. Welcome, all of you, to all of It.
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B
Hello.
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C
Hello.
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A
How are you?
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C
Thank you for having us.
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A
It's great to have you. And I can say watching this film, it was delightful spending an afternoon with all of you. It really feels like stopping over for a visit. When I finished, I wanted it to just keep going. So it's great to have you here.
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C
I've heard that. I've heard that from a few people. Like, why didn't it keep going?
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A
Why didn't it keep going?
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C
Well, Carol, and also, listen, I have to correct you. I hate to correct you. On Thanksgiving, my mama turned 99, so 98 is no longer accurate.
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A
I am so happy that you corrected me. Thank you. And happy birthday.
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B
Thank you. And David, if you'd like to continue and go on, I will tell you that the next chapter happens in Paris because some months afterward, Nathan, who now lives there, and we found ourselves in Paris at the same time. And of course, trusty camera out and continued shooting. Only the language is in French.
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A
Oh, well, that's wonderful. We'll all meet in Paris next time. That sounds fantastic. As far as I'm concerned. Carol, when did this idea come up to shoot a documentary about you and your mother?
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C
Well, okay, I must confess, I had nothing at all to do with it. I believe, and Nathan will chime in here that. That there was a discussion about the fact that I lived with my mother in a very small apartment. And I believe that Nathan said something to the effect that if he lived with his mother, they would kill each other or something like that. And I believe Was it Chris, Nathan's co writer, that said we should. I think Nathan came over and saw, like, a improv session with my mother and her piano partner. And was it Chris that said, yeah, Jack?
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D
So what happened was I went over to their apartment when I. We were doing for Temples. I had to interview Carol for a website. And it was my first time meeting Joy. And I walked into their. Their place, and it's exactly the movie. It's just filled with, like, life art. And I just. I couldn't believe it felt like this, like Lost New York, that I didn't know it still existed. And I immediately afterwards texted my co conspirator, Chris Wells, and he said, we need to make a movie about this. On top of that, our hair and makeup artist from between the Temples, Emily Shubert, started taking vocal lessons with Joy.
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A
Oh, started taking voice lessons with Joy.
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D
Yeah, and she's in the movie, too.
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A
The music scenes in the movie are spectacular, by the way. The music lessons are outstanding.
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C
They're.
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B
Thank you.
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D
Yeah, they're.
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C
I agree.
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D
Joy's incredible. And so Emily would constantly tell me about Joy, and she said, you gotta go over there. There's something there. And then Chris was like, there's got to be a movie. And it kind of came about through that, through just going to the apartment and seeing that, you know, these. These two are very special people. Well, in their apartment is kind of funny. It's like Seinfeld. People are constantly coming in, constantly coming in.
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A
You definitely get the sense of that watching this documentary. People are constantly.
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C
The people come in and out of the apartment, like Seinfeld.
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A
He said, now that's nice, Nathan, that you had this idea of heading on over there and invading their space. But, Joy, how did you respond to this idea of having cameras inside your home documenting you in the place where you live?
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B
I didn't have any pre occasion thoughts about it, but when Nathan came and his group, his team, they were so delightful, I just adored them. And it was very jolly. We sang. I mean, the cameramen, the soundmen with everybody. We just had a little festival while we were between official acts. And then. Nathan is such a lovely interlocutor. In other words, once we were seated face to face, I didn't have any worries or preconceptions. Nathan just spoke to me naturally. He asked me questions in a very friendly, warm way, and I answered. And so it rolled by itself. I must say that I was a little apprehensive before I met them all because I said, I can't do this program. And I haven't rehearsed. Blah, blah, blah. And of course, because of who Nathan is, it just rolled sweetly along on.
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A beautiful human scale. I want to put. I want to hear a little moment from the film here. This is Joy. You're speaking with a young visitor who has come over. One of these people coming and going. And you're talking about an important musical experience from your youth.
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They're going to play my husband, Mike. Harold.
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A
No, this the. I think it's the other clip here. Let's hear it.
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B
And then one day, my dad took me to a great big symphony hall. And I heard a French piece by a French composer that was called La Mer. It was about the sea. And I was sitting in the balcony, and when that music rolled out, I thought I was gonna fall over the balcony. It was so real and it was so full of movement.
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I love that. And we're happy you did. We're happy you stayed on the balcony, by the way.
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B
Yes, but I engaged in more and more movement in my life. That is dance classes and really movement and leading movement groups.
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A
What does it mean to you to still be teaching and sharing music?
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B
Oh, everything. I mean, I couldn't. What would I do if I didn't move, if I didn't make music? My life would be dry. It would be dry as a dried up old pear. I have to make music and it feeds me. It's juicy. It's full of movement.
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A
That's wonderful. How did music shape life in this home, Carol?
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C
Well, I'm just the lucky recipient because I was extremely foolish when I was young and my mother offered to teach me the piano. And of course, my reaction was, I'm not studying with my mother, so I didn't learn to play the piano. And it's such a loss because she sits down there and makes this beauty, you know, and. And I just get to sit and hear it in the day and the night. I just get to sit and hear this beauty come out of the keyboard, you know, And I have to interject.
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B
Here that meanwhile, we had discovered a children's theater program. And so when she was five years old, she joined it. And so she was busy all the time.
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A
I was going to say, we all get to enjoy your acting skills, Carol. So it's a different thing, but we thank you.
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C
It's a different thing. And you asked me about the music. Music is so nourishing. And there's that unique thing of being able to do it on your own, you know, you don't need an audience. And you don't need a writer. You don't need any. You just go. In my mother's case, she plays gorgeous pieces that other people have writt, but she also improvises an enormous amount of the time, so she just makes music from scratch.
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A
I want to talk about the. You know, you talked about filming in this apartment. Carol, you basically moved into your mother's apartment full time in 2020 during the pandemic. Right. Why did you move in?
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C
Well, my mother had a health issue where she had to have an operation called a tavr. And it's a heart situation where they open up the aortic valve. So she had this surgery, and they sent her home the next day at the age of 95. And then the next day we had to go back through emergency and she couldn't breathe. Her lungs had filled up with water. And we were in ICU for like, 13 days. It was a very scary time. And she's so strong, and she made it through. But that's when I moved in because, you know, we needed to take care of each other at that point.
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A
And what has it been like kind of reliving your mother daughter dynamic, living together again now?
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C
It's different than it was when I was young because when I was little, obviously I sort of had a father there sometimes, but he had to travel a lot for work. And I had a sister there, my sister Andina. Now we're just the two of us, and we're adults, and it's a whole different dynamic. It's not reliving, it's just building a whole different dynamic, wouldn't you say?
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B
Oh, absolutely.
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A
The film examines some of the joys and complications and frustrations, and you can explain better than me, but the injustices of growing up as a woman in the early half of the 20th century. It looks at some of the choices that were made for you, Joy. And, you know, it really doesn't shy away from some painful family and personal history. Yeah.
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B
Not some of the choices, David. All the big choices were taken away from one. In my early adulthood, I lived in a very nice community, but the standards were rigid, that girls in my social class did go to college. But the subject was how to catch a doctor, a lawyer, a scion of a wealthy family, how to catch the right man and marry well. And it was expected that one would then have children, two, three or four. It was just expected. It was the dumb thing. And one didn't question that. One did. One was in trouble. And I was in trouble because I was always rebelling. Against that. But I was not strong enough in the beginning to resist the pressures upon me. And I was made to marry and almost automatically had children, because that's what we did.
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A
Well, this film captures some very serious history and some serious stories. Humor is also very present. Again, let me mention the film is called Carol and Joy. It is now streaming on the Criterion Channel. We're speaking with Carol Kane, Joy Kane, and director Nathan Silver. And, Nathan, how did you film this? Was this basically like you're there for a couple of days and you just let it roll, let the camera roll?
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D
Yeah, I mean, it's.
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C
You're.
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D
You're there basically to recreate the first experience of going there, or my first experience going there. And just. I wanted to capture what the apartment. What it felt like to walk into this apartment and just the. The people as they are. It's portraits of them and of really. And I feel like the whole idea. And, you know, my.
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My.
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My cinematographers, Sean Williams, Hunter Zimney, I've worked with them a bunch, and they're. We're. We're always on the same page. And they knew what we needed to gather, and it was just about really making it feel like an afternoon there. So we basically. We shot for a couple of days, but it was. The bulk of it was caught on the day. And then we went in to get other people who we'd missed, like Joy's piano partner and Emily Schubert to do voice lessons with her. So it was a really lovely time. And it was just like. Like Joy was saying, it just felt like we were almost over there for coffee and conversation. More than a.
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A
Well, the film begins right, with everybody's making coffee and kind of getting their orders in there. But I wanted to ask you, Nathan, about something that happens a lot during the course of this documentary. There are these times where the film runs out, right?
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D
Yep.
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And they are some of the really great moments. You know, the screen goes black, but we can still hear the conversation continuing. And every time it happens, I always sort of said out loud, oh, I want this to keep going. But it also gives. It just. It captures this perfect feeling of we can't capture everything. It's impossible. And there's so much to say and do. Exactly.
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D
And it's just, you know, we knew we needed to shoot on film because Joy, to capture Joy, she's an analog lady. We need to do her justice. And so we shot on 16. And that's one of the things about a roll of film. It's limited. You know, it's not like digital. And so those rollouts, we would start each. We would pick the stories back up during the shoot. But Our editor, John McGarry, he was like that the film is in. The rhythm of the film needs to be in those rollouts. And I love that because it shows that Joy can't be contained or can't be captured on film alone. And it feels like she's overflowing with life. And I think that that's the beautiful part about her. And that's what I wanted the film to feel like, you know?
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A
Absolutely. That is what. That is the feeling. And I think it's part of why, at the very end, I'm just feeling, oh, I want this afternoon to just keep on going. Carol and Joy, maybe starting with you, Carol, what do you hope audiences carry with them after spending time with you and your mother?
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C
Oh, just the spirit of artistry and beauty that my mom embodies. And also the incredible courage that she had in breaking away from a life that was not right for her. You know, she had courage. She eventually divorced my father, who I love, but that wasn't right for her. And then she moved to Paris when she was 55 and started a whole new life. And that is not an easy thing to do. And she did it. So therefore, she is my role model of courage.
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A
And that decision.
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C
And artistry.
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And artistry. And that decision. A major moment. Joy at the age of 55.
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B
Yes. I didn't think so at the time. At the time, it seemed to be the only thing to do because nothing was working for me here in New York or in the States until I ran. You asked me what do I hope that people might draw from the film. I hope especially that young women and women that are not so young will be encouraged to take risks and to not think that where they are is where they'll be forever, because that's not true. And just take courage and take their life in their hands as much. So that's what I hope.
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That is a wonderful message to finish with. We have been speaking with Joy Kane, Carol Kane and Nathan Silver about their new short documentary film, Carol and Joy, which is now streaming on the Criterion Channel. Thank you all of us, for joining us today on all of it.
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C
Thank you.
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B
Thank you. Bye, David.
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D
Thank you.
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A
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