SIFF interview: STREETWISE director Martin Bell talks about TINY, the new follow-up to his 1984 Oscar-nominated documentary

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One of the most anticipated movies to play at the Seattle International Film Festival is undoubtedly the world premiere of Tiny: The Life of Erin Blackwell. It’s the follow-up to the 1984 Academy Award nominated documentary Streetwise. That film was an unflinching, but compassionate, documentary that followed several kids and young teenagers living on the streets in Seattle. I can’t walk through downtown without thinking of Streetwise when I pass a homeless person.

Streetwise began as a photo essay for Life magazine by the late photographer Mary Ellen Mark and became a documentary with Mark and her husband Martin Bell. After watching Streetwise, especially several years after it was first released, it was natural for one to ask of how the teenagers and street-children would grow up into adults. As Roger Ebert cynically predicted in his 1985 review, “These are children living rough in an American city, and you would blame their parents if you didn’t see that the parents are just as alienated and hopeless, and that before long these kids will be damaged parents, too.”

In Tiny, we meet, again, one of the most memorable figures in Streetwise over 30 years later through the lenses of Mary Ellen Mark and Martin Bell. Erin Blackwell, or Tiny, is was the teenage prostitute whose mother thought living on the street and selling herself was a “phase.” Now she’s a mother of ten, struggling to hold her family together through drugs, homelessness, and the legal system. Tiny is a nearly equally remarkable film to Streetwise because of the passion and empathy that Mark and Bell show towards their subjects.

I spoke with Martin Bell via phone a few days before he was set to fly to Seattle for the premiere of Tiny. Below is our conversation, edited for length and clarity:

Can we talk about when you knew you were going to make this follow up to it or when you knew you were going to follow up with Erin, or Tiny?

Yes, so, well I don’t know how much you know about how this all came about. You know, initially, it all started with Life magazine, you know that story, right?

Yeah. With your wife doing the photo essay for Life magazine?

Yes, correct, right. So, met Tiny. So after we finished the Streetwise film, Mary Ellen and I continued going back and visiting Tiny over the years. And Mary Ellen just kept going and going and going and so … About, let’s see, 2014 I think, Aperture was going to publish all of this work that Mary Ellen had done. And we thought that maybe it would be a good idea to make a film just to support the book. You know, in other words, to have something that you could use … But anyway it got out of control. You know, it turned into its own thing. So, in a sense, so the real reason it was made was, the intention was to support Mary Ellen’s book and that work but then it became a film. And so, it still supports her book but it became a bigger thing.

I could see how a project like that could get out of control but I’m glad that it worked out this way.

It did get out of control, oh my god. Yeah.

I believe that you two, you and Mary Ellen, stayed in touch with Tiny ever since the movie came, ever since Streetwise came out.

Yes. Well, actually so, the story is, you’ve probably heard this all before but I’ll repeat it anyways. When we finished shooting Streetwise, Mary Ellen and I offered Tiny to come and live with us in New York. And I said, “You know, there’s one condition, the condition is you have to go to school.” And she said, “I ain’t going to school.” [laughs]

Because she was just fresh on the street, as it were, and it was exciting. And the thought of actually having to come to school on a regular basis wasn’t as appealing, so she turned us down. But, she says that she thinks about it often, she regrets not coming.

Can I ask if you stayed in touch with any of the other people that you featured in Streetwise?

Yes, absolutely. I don’t know how much you remember of the film, but, I mean, there were a couple called Patty and Munchkin.

I remember them.

Right, and so, Munchkin who survived, Patty’s dead. Munchkin we stayed in touch with, I’m sure he’ll be at the screening on Sunday. And let’s see, Mike, who was in the wheelchair in Streetwise, we stayed in touch with him. Shadow, he’ll be at the screening on Sunday. We’ve invited Mike, I don’t know whether he’s got the message actually so we’ll see. But also Rat, the kid that jumps off the bridge at the beginning of the film.

 

Yeah. Well, I was also wondering, when you shot Streetwise, how did that shape your perception of … Did it change how you thought about homelessness? Was it what you expected it to be, I guess?

The thing is it came as a surprise because you know I never really met a Streetwise in that way before, that kind of personal connection. Because to make a film, it’s a much more intimate thing. Generally you pass people in the street and you have no idea what their lives are like. In this particular case, we, Mary Ellen and I, were able to enter this world and find out what was some of the elements that were behind … The reasons for them being out on the street. No, I mean, it was a surprise, you know. It’s pretty brutal.

Yeah, it really was. That’s one of the things that really moved me was kind of how all the people … how they coped with life. I think some of them did really like the freedom but I also think that how they got by was sometimes kind of brutal.  I mean I remember one person’s calling at the pizza place and ordering a bogus order and waiting for it to be thrown out.

Right, that was Rat. [laughs] He’s a character, that guy. He put his life together, I have to say.  It’s an amazing story, which we will be telling, soon. I made a film with him so that will be coming out soon.

Oh that’s wonderful. I was going to ask if there were any people that you featured that were a little more successful than Tiny was.

Well, the thing is, I think Tiny is successful in a way. The thing is, she survived it and she held her family together and survived all the drama, you know.

Oh yeah, absolutely, I think it’s pretty incredible that with all the issues that her family’s had that she held them together.

Yes, and Munchkin put his life together, Shadow put his life together, Rat put his life together. It’s interesting. Mike is, you know, is still defiant. [laughs] Mike, the guy in the wheelchair.

Oh yeah, I remember him.

Yeah, no, so, you know, we have talked to some of these guys and we will make additional films that will be part of this ongoing story.

I’m so glad to hear that you’re still in touch with a lot of people from Streetwise and follow them through their life.

Yeah, but remember a lot of them just didn’t make it. I mean, they died. It’s incredible the number of kids that died.

Yeah, for sure.  I was wondering, too, is there anything unique about Seattle that caused Mary Ellen to get the first, to get the assignment for Life magazine?

Okay, so the reason… that’s a good question, because the reason Mary Ellen came to Seattle and Cheryl McCall who’s the writer of the Life magazine piece. Seattle had just been voted the most livable city in America. So that was the reason that city was chosen. So if this happened in the most livable city, you could imagine what it might be in other places. And that was the reason. And actually the reason the film came about was Mary Ellen and I had been looking for a story to do together and, you know, Mary Ellen met Tiny in the parking lot of the Monastery nightclub by accident. I mean, it’s just like the moment she saw her get out of the cab and she thought, “Oh my god, that’s amazing.” She was thirteen. And Mary Ellen called me, I was in London, and she called me and she said, “I just seen this kid and she’s amazing. And this is a film.” And so we made a film. [laughs].

And one of the things that I think really resonates, and I just watched Streetwise again recently to get ready for talking to you and for watching the new documentary. But it’s so relevant today too, I think we kind of have the same problems, I mean a lot of things that make a place like Seattle so attractive as a place to live for some people are also displacing a lot of people or squeezing them out, like replacing low income housing with luxury apartments. And I think, well you said Seattle was the most livable city, I mean it’s a nice city and I love living here, but we still have this …

You have a huge problem there, yes. That is just amazing, I mean, that is and extraordinary thing that’s happening there. All along the freeway, right?

Yeah and the city’s trying to, I think the city is trying to remove, to displace people from there. It’s just horrible what’s going on.

That will be relevant really, I mean, it seems to me, to this because it’s all part of that problem, really, isn’t it?

Yeah, absolutely. I know that there’s a group that every year goes out and counts everyone they see sleeping on the streets for one night and I know that the number this year was significantly higher than the year before.

You know, when we were making the film in ’83, there were places downtown that housed, overnight, people would come and sleep on the floor and there were like hundreds and hundreds of people sleeping out, but they were under cover in an old building downtown by Pioneer Square I think it was. Amazing, just unbelievable. I have film from that time, too.

What’s going to happen with this movie beyond it playing in Seattle at SIFF this weekend?

Well the next time it plays will be on the 25th of June in Brooklyn at (the Brooklyn Art Museum), so that is exciting for us because it’s in the city. So that’s the next thing. But, of course, we have a sales agent with the film, so we are seeing what kind of reaction we get and then we’ll see if we get any kind of other offers.

I think it will do really, really well.

I hope so. [laughs]

I don’t want to take up too much more of your time but I was wondering if you have any other things that you’re working on that you want to talk about.

Okay, well there is, okay, I can talk about one of them at least. One of the things is that Mary Ellen and I spend a lot of time in NYC. Mary Ellen was photographing on the street and … So for years, before 9/11, all that, and we were on the street and I would film, so, Mary Ellen has a lot of photographs of the street and I have film of that and I think one of the things I’m going to do, is make a film about the city of NY from the street, as it were, through Mary Ellen’s lens and through my lens, you know, the movie and the stills.

I’m really excited to see where that goes. I love the work that you have done. There’s so much empathy you bring to documenting this …

Well, keep your fingers crossed … But that is one of the things I’m going to start once we’ve got past this promotion part of this, I’m going to start work on that.