project 3
Moonwatcher: A Personal Odyssey
Moonwatcher is Dan Richter on his journey through life:Pantomime, artist, beatnik, hippie, junkie, dealer, yuppie, millionaire and man-ape.
The 80-minutes documentary Moonwatcher: A Personal Odyssey describes the transformative life story of Dan Richter. He worked with the most creative and influential minds of his time such as Stanley Kubrick, John Lennon, Yoko Ono and Allen Ginsberg. Kubrick gave him the job of choreographer for the opening scene of 2001: A Space Odyssey. As part of the avant-garde and intellectual elite of London, Dan was friends with and lived with John & Yoko. As the hippie movement began as a feast of love and peace, Dan moved deeper and deeper into the radical drug underground. The film describes his personal alienation from everything and his search for a meaning in life. Many of his companions are dead and a whole generation is shattered. But he overcame his addiction, cultivating new passions and opting for the road to recovery and conciliation.
My Odyssey
I had embarked on a similar adventurous odyssey to produce this documentary. At the beginning of this catastrophic year in 2001, in Hollywood I got over lunch together with Dan Richter for the first time. Intrigued by his charm and amused by his anecdotes, I had no idea what to expect: I set out on an arduous journey that would take two decade, through the unpredictable lulls and storms of creative creation, the desert of the empty purse and lead along the subterranean streams of human destiny. Driven by an insatiable thirst for reality, my protagonists transported me to a truth that would change Dan Richter, his family and, ultimately, me cathartically. It is my wish that the public should be equally touched by these sincere confessions and honest dealings with an epoch that upset the world.
Why did it take so long? My colleague and climbing friend John Dunnicliff introduced me to Dan Richter after making a sensational hit with the Oscar nomination of
The Man On Lincoln's Nose
about my teacher Bob Boyle had landed. Richter had been well known in the climbing community. He is still involved in the SCMA - Southern California Mountaineers Association. I would have said the truth, to say I did not know him, but who could forget this climax of film history when Moonwatcher throws the bone in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey? Dan Richter is probably the most famous unknown actor in the world. And we became very good friends. There my story began with all its confusion and fears and challenges and urgencies and beauties and difficulties and controversies as well as amazement in search of my meaning. This documentary is a tribute to the life of a human who has not only played evolution and made history, but to explore our world through his eyes. Did I know what I did? Did I set limits? Did I plan when I would finish it? Did I have a concept and a budget? No, I did not know what I was getting into. Let me briefly tell you how it went on. Moonwatcher's story evolves constantly and rapidly with each spin and research. I did the first interview and listened to some nice anecdotes and then it turned out that Richter had lung cancer. Hey, every documentary filmmaker would have thought, how cool to record Richter's last breath, how he lay on his deathbed and turned into a star child? Hollywood would have loved me for that. Instead, I plunged into the "story", the beginnings of the 60s, then the hippie movement.We had the Beatles, the assassination of JFK and his brother, Martin Luther King, the Vietnam War, the first man on the moon Rock'n'Roll, the hippie movement, the summer of love in Haight-Ashbury, a lot of drugs and the first computer.
Look forward to the upcoming release in High Definition Video on Demand.
Exclusive interviews with:
DAN RICHTER
in Los Angeles/New York City/Provincetown/London
JED CURTIS,
Musician/Actor, Las Vegas
JEFFREY PERKINS, Filmmaker/Artist, New York City
YOKO ONO, San Francisco MOMA, June 2002
JILL RICHTER, Writer, Provincetown/London
SIR ARTHUR C. CLARKE, Science-Fiction Author, Author of 2001, Sri Lanka
STEWART FREEBORN, Costume and Make-Up Designer for 2001, England
DAVID CHARKHAM, Dawn-of-Man-Sequence Performer, England
TONY JACKSON, Dawn-of-Man-Sequence Performer, England
RICHARD WOODS, Dawn-of-Man-Sequence Performer, England
DOUG IBOLD, Film Editor, Burbank California
STANLEY BARD, Manager of the Chelsea Hotel, New York City
MISCHA RICHTER, Dan Richter’s Son, Photographer, London/Los Angeles
SACHA RICHTER, Dan Richter’s Son, Painter, Provincetown
ELIZABETH CONVERSE, Dan Richter’s Ex-Wife, Writer/Teacher, Los Angeles
WILLIAM RICHTER, Dan’s Son, Musician/Photographer, Los Angeles
JOANCLAIR RICHTER, Dan’s Daughter, Actress/Business Owner, Los Angeles
Why did it take so long? My colleague and climbing friend John Dunnicliff introduced me to Dan Richter after a comrade and I landed a sensational hit with the Oscar nomination of The Man On Lincoln's Nose about my teacher Bob Boyle. Richter had been well known in the climbing community. He is still involved in the SCMA - Southern California Mountaineers Association. I would have said the truth, to say I did not know him, but who could forget this climactic moment in film history, when Moonwatcher throws the bone in the air in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey? Dan Richter is often quoted to be "the most famous unknown actor in the world". And we became very good friends. The story began with all its confusion and fears and challenges and urgencies and beauties and difficulties and controversies as well as amazement in search of a deeper meaning. This documentary is a tribute to the life of a human being, who has not only played evolution as an actor but made history be rebelling and invites us to explore the world through his eyes. Did I know what to do? Did I set limits? Did I plan when to finish? Did I have a concept, schedule and a budget? No, I did not know what I was up against. Let me briefly tell you how it went: Moonwatcher's story evolved constantly and rapidly each day with a new spin, twist or research finding. I did the first interview listening to some nice anecdotes and on that day Dan Richter revealed to me that he had lung cancer. Hey, every documentary filmmaker would have thought, how cool, I could hang around and record Richter's last breath laying on his deathbed and turning into a star child. Hollywood would have loved me for that. Instead, I plunged into the "story", the beginnings of the 60s, then the hippie movement, the technology revolution and so forth. We had the Beatles, the assassination of JFK and his brother, Martin Luther King's murder, the Vietnam War mayhem, the first man on the moon, Rock'n'Roll, the hippie movement, the summer of love in Haight-Ashbury, a lot of drugs and the first computer.
Just look forward to the upcoming video-on-demand-release in beautiful High Definition.
The team:
Hans Pfleiderer - script, producer, director, camera
Hans Pfleiderer is a filmmaker and engineer. He studied architecture at the Technical University Berlin MFA. He worked as a stage and lighting designer with Eric Veensta from Art Lab Studios Berlin. He completed an MFA in Production Design at the American Film Institute and assisted legendary production designer Robert Boyle. As a visual consultant he worked for the documentary THE MAN ON LINCOLNS NOSE, which was nominated for an Oscar in 2001. He designed the Broadcast Studio for James Cameron's EARTHSHIP.TV, the feature films LA TWISTER, A House on a Hill, and many more. He was Visual Effects Designer and partly Supervisor on MINORITY REPORT, THE CELL, MOTHMAN PROPHECIES, PANICROOM, BATMAN RIDE and many commercials and music videos. In 2005, he shot a classical music documentary for his APOLLO PICTURES commissioned by the New York based Foundation for Universal Sacred Music and designed and supervised the production for their first music festival in Manhattan. He developed content for ARTE and regularly works as a post-supervisor for acquainted directors and producers. He currently works as Project Manager and in various other functions for ARRI - Arnold & Richter Cine Technik in the System Group department. In 2018 he founded his German production company Hans Pfleiderer Engineering and the internationally operating environmental organisation AHIMSA PROJECT, which also participates in the UNCTAD.
Doug Ibold - Editor ACE
Doug Ibold has been working as a director, cameraman and editor for over 50 years in the television and film industry. He has edited 7 series with over 100 episodes, including Magnum PI, Miami Vice, Law & Order, and worked with John Lennon and Yoko Ono, the Rolling Stones, Alice Cooper and NASA. He has received two EMMY and three ACE Eddie nominations and spent 16 years on the Board of Directors of Editors Union in Hollywood. He is currently teaching at the USC School of Cinematic Arts.
Angelo Corrao - Editor ACE
Chop Suey (Director: Bruce Weber); ACE Eddie nomination for Best Documentary Editor; 2002 Teddy in the Berlinale; 2001 The Beatle Fan (Director: Peter McArdle); 2002 Nine Good Teeth, Documentary (Director: Alex Halpern); 2002 Touch with Lions (Director: Carl Schultz), GENIE nomination in 5 categories; 2001 Through the Wire (Director: Nena Rosenblum); Signs of Life (Director: John David Coles), Critics Award at the Deauville Film Festival; 1989 Let's Get Lost (Director: Bruce Weber) Oscar-nominated documentary, IDA Award; 1989 The Pick-up Artist (Director: James Toback); Reds (Director: Warren Beatty); Associate Film Editor, Primary Colors (Director: Mike Nichols); A Dangerous Woman (Director: Stephen Gyllenhaal); True Colors (Director: Herbert Ross); Firstborn (dir. Michael Apted); The Wiz (Dir. Sidney Lumet); Saturday Night Fever (Dir. John Badham); Dog Day Afternoon (Director: Sidney Lumet); Serpico (Director: Sidney Lumet); Klute (Director: Alan Pakula)
Max Wang - Additional Camera
in San Francisco
Christian Jost - composer
Christian Jost (born 1963) is a musical citizen of the world. The fact that he studied in the stronghold of new music in Cologne, but then had to break out in the USA at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, is already an indication of the understanding of his works. Christian Jost has been commissioned by leading orchestras, festivals and opera houses around the world, including the Berlin Philharmonic, the Jerusalem Chamber Music Festival, the Zurich Opera. He has conducted orchestras such as the Hamburg Philharmonic Orchestra, the Essen Philharmonic, the National Symphony Orchestra Taiwan and the orchestra of the Komische Oper Berlin. His operas have been included in the repertoire of European opera houses, and his orchestral compositions have been regularly performed worldwide. In 2003, he received the Ernst von Siemens Foundation Encouragement Prize. In 2009, his opera Hamlet was praised as the “World Premiere of the Year”. He recently staged his opera Egmont
in Vienna.
His works are published exclusively at SCHOTT MUSIC.
Epilogue:
A few words from Dan Richter:
I was born in Darian, Connecticut in 1939. I went to school in Kent. In 1959, I moved to New York to study at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts and American Mime School. I was assistant director and actor from 1963 to 1964 as a member of the American Mime Theater. I traveled extensively around the world to study mimetic expressions at theaters, including Bertolt Brecht's Berliner Ensemble, the Jacques Lecoq Theatre in Paris, the Kabuki Za and Kanze Kai Kan Noh theatre in Japan. In 1965 I settled in London where I taught and performed. I am best known for my work with Stanley Kubrick as his choreographer and star in the opening scene of 2001: A Space Odyssey. Sir Arthur C. Clarke, my friend and author of 2001 said: "Dan is the most famous unknown actor in the world." Sir Arthur referred to the fact that I was world famous in the role of Moonwatcher, who threw the bone in the air in the Opening scene of Stanley Kubrick's science fiction masterpiece. Considered one of the greatest moments in film history, it is often used as part of the montage, which, for example, opens the annual Oscar celebrations. But because my face was covered by a mask, few people know my name. I had a long career as a pantomime, choreographer, actor, director, producer and for two and a half decades as a businessman in Hollywood. Recently, my appearances in Documentary US vs. John Lennon by David Leaf and numerous television programs brought me public interest as a close friend of John Lennon and Yoko Ono. I lived and worked with them during the tumultuous years from 1969 to 1973. My new book Jester Juggle Junkie tells the story of those years and is the second part of my memoir following Moonwatcher's memoir, which describes the time of my work on 2001: A Space Odyssey. Jester Juggle Junkie is my own story, but by telling it, I give the reader an intimate insight into the life of John and Yoko. I was an insider, who witnessed the separation of the Beatles, John and Yoko in love, and John's transformation from a great rock star to the status of an almost saint.
"I was Dan, a friend who went along on the trip, an accomplice, an artist, a chamberlain, confidant, assistant, and drugmate; Yoko's American friend."