Framing the Vision: Theresa Vitale on Life as a Director of Photography

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
I'm Theresa Itepli. I'm a director of photography and a cinematographer.

Speaker 2 (00:09):
Hello, and welcome to Art, the podcast where we get
up close and personal with women from around the world
of visual arts. I'm Chris Stafford and this is Season three,
Episode ten. My guest this week is the American director
of photography and cinematographer Terresa Itali, whose resume spans all

(00:33):
genres of film and TV productions. Theresa is passionate about
elevating women, both in her love of sport and her
dedication to the industry, two paths that have merged as
she crossed the bridge from US under twenty three national
rugby team to film and TV production. As we will hear,

(00:53):
sport taught her so much that has helped her in
her career, not least of all the value of teamwork
and collaboration. Theresa was born in nineteen eighty two in Wallingford, Connecticut,
the eldest of two daughters. She has a sister, Roseanne.
Shortly after her parents, mariover Charlie and Karen Weeks, moved

(01:14):
to Lawrence, New Jersey, where her father could commute to
New York while her mother was the home care provider.
Sports and music dominated her childhood. She played trombone for
nine years and tried every sport she could, eventually and
accidentally discovering rugby. Her natural talent was soon recognized and

(01:36):
within six months she made the squad which was competing
for the national championships. Despite coming up short that year,
she did go on to win the national championship with
the US women's under twenty three national team in two
thousand and five. Alas, her career called and she chose
the University of Massachusetts for its BA in Communications degree

(01:58):
with a focus on TV and film, graduating in two
thousand and five. An internship with MTV in New York
convinced her that she wanted to be a camera operator,
and from that point on doors opened and led the
way to a highly successful career. Her work has been
featured on major broadcast, cable and streaming networks including ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, HBO, Max, Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, Showtime, Bravo,

(02:32):
to name just a few, and specializing in docuseries, competition, reality,
cooking shows, studio shows, live music documentaries, behind the scenes,
and of course, women's sports. Theresa also takes great pride
in helping women find and properly fit personal protective equipment.

(02:53):
As an ambassador for EASYRIG, she continues the legacy of
her mentor Cat Cummings by empowering women with the right
gear and ensuring it fits them correctly. Teresa lives in
Long Beach, California, with her wife Heidi and son Baron.
Welcome to the podcast. Thank you for joining me.

Speaker 3 (03:13):
Thank you so much Chris for having me. I feel
honored and I'm super excited to be here today.

Speaker 2 (03:18):
Have you got rid of those nerves that you talked about?

Speaker 3 (03:23):
I shouldn't have shown my cards?

Speaker 2 (03:27):
Did you dump those on the way in?

Speaker 3 (03:30):
You know?

Speaker 1 (03:30):
I think nerves are a sign that you care, that
you want to do a good job.

Speaker 3 (03:35):
That's what I'm telling myself today.

Speaker 1 (03:37):
I have.

Speaker 2 (03:39):
Isn't it anticipation?

Speaker 3 (03:41):
I think so. Yes. You're used to.

Speaker 2 (03:44):
Being behind the camera, you see now, how does it
feel to be in front of the camera metaphorically speaking?

Speaker 3 (03:50):
Very uncomfortable?

Speaker 2 (03:52):
Does it?

Speaker 1 (03:53):
Yes?

Speaker 3 (03:54):
Very much so.

Speaker 1 (03:56):
I'm used to being behind, not comfortable being in front of,
prefer to be byed.

Speaker 2 (04:03):
What does that tell me about Teresa fatally the athlete,
the girl growing up wanting to do this well? Will
you shy girl.

Speaker 3 (04:12):
No, I don't think I was a shy girl.

Speaker 1 (04:15):
I think I will say part of me is doing
the podcast and getting the courage to do it for
the fourteen year old me, the fourteen year old athlete,
to tell her that she's good and she did a
pretty good job.

Speaker 2 (04:32):
My background is sports before I got into media, and
so I'm very happy to be able to talk about
sports with you. Let's talk sports, Teresa.

Speaker 3 (04:40):
I love that.

Speaker 2 (04:41):
Tell me where your passion for sports and your sport
of choice began.

Speaker 3 (04:47):
It's a great question.

Speaker 1 (04:48):
I probably would say, for as long as I can remember,
I've always loved sports, and I know both my parents
can attest to this. My earliest memory was probably around
five or sixty years old. I really loved softball, basketball,
and soccer. One of my earliest memories is throwing the
ball around with my dad and I was pretty young,

(05:12):
and I remember we were going for distance and my
dad told me, why don't you go across the street
and I'm going to stay on this side and see
if you can hit it to me. And when I
threw it, I threw it over him and my dad
said to my mom, you better get out here.

Speaker 3 (05:24):
You better see this. And I did have a little
bit of a cannon.

Speaker 1 (05:28):
Not to brag, but things pretty much escalated very quickly
from there.

Speaker 3 (05:34):
I played in recreational soccer.

Speaker 1 (05:38):
I played recreational softball and soccer, softball and basketball.

Speaker 3 (05:43):
I loved all of them. I think my greatest passion
was for basketball. Man.

Speaker 1 (05:47):
I just wanted to be a basketball player, you know.
I wanted to just be the like the New York Knicks.
I love the Knicks. I still do go Nicks. We're
still in the playoffs.

Speaker 3 (06:00):
But I wasn't the best at basketball.

Speaker 1 (06:02):
You know, And I think that really helped me because
I had to work the hardest at basketball. So I
was the little girl up front with the hoop that
my parents got me in the driveway because I begged
for it, and I was just shoot and shoot and shoot,
and it'd be like dinner is ready?

Speaker 3 (06:18):
One more shot, five more shots? You know. I was
that little girl.

Speaker 1 (06:22):
And it was to the point where my parents even
got me that basketball retrieval where the ball just kicked
right back.

Speaker 3 (06:27):
Because I just needed that ball to come right back
to me. And I was just always so determined.

Speaker 1 (06:34):
I don't know, I've always just had that kind of
fire in me, and that took me took me through
middle school and high school. I played varsity basketball, varsity soccer,
varsity softball.

Speaker 3 (06:45):
I was the captain of soccer. I was the captain
of basketball.

Speaker 1 (06:48):
We didn't have captains for softball, but we had a
really good core of women that I got to play with.
We'd won some district championships for all stars, and I
really took a lot of pride and being a leader
on the field, being a leader off the field. And
I may have never been the fastest or the best player,

(07:10):
but I take a lot of pride saying I was
the hardest.

Speaker 3 (07:12):
Worker in the room.

Speaker 1 (07:14):
If coaches wanted to say after a couple of people
say after, I was always saying after, always practicing, getting better,
honing in my craft.

Speaker 3 (07:23):
And so.

Speaker 1 (07:25):
After high school, I tried to walk on the soccer
team at the University of Massachusetts. And I walked on
to the soccer what I thought was the soccer field
that Chris.

Speaker 3 (07:35):
Said that you liked the story. I went down with
this like awesome Adidas track suit. I mean it matched.
It was baby blue and black. I still remember it.
My friends on the team still make fun of me
for this outfit, and I just thought I was hot shit.

Speaker 1 (07:48):
And I walked down to the soccer field to walk on,
and I was at the rugby field.

Speaker 3 (07:53):
I was on the road field, and.

Speaker 1 (07:56):
I went down to the rugby field, and you know
these girls, they don't mess around. They were giving me
crap right off the jump. And I met the coach.
His name was Frank and he said, hey, you'd like
to see what you got. Why do you need soccer?
Come down and play rugby.

Speaker 3 (08:09):
And I said all right. He said come back Tomorrow'll
be here at four thirty.

Speaker 1 (08:13):
I said, no problem, came back at four thirty the
next day, and the rest was kind of history. I mean,
I got really lucky. I walked on to the University
of Massachusetts at the time, they had two thousand and one.
They had three sides, which was almost unheard of. They
played Division one. We had an A side of B
side on a C side. I walked on in the fall.

(08:35):
I started playing rugby and I sall in love with it.
I fell in love with it because I loved the people,
I loved the challenge. It was something brand new. I
knew nothing about rugby, not a lick, and I became
obsessed with it, so like everything else, I just wanted
to get better. That was the spring two thousand and one,
and by I'm sorry, that was the fall two thousand
and one. And by the spring two thousand and two,

(08:57):
we were at the national Championships because University of Choosers
was ranked eighth in the country at the time, and
I was brought on as a substitute and my coach
put me in. I've been playing this sport for six
months and I was playing in, you know, part of
the national championships.

Speaker 3 (09:13):
It was just crazy.

Speaker 1 (09:14):
So I think in my life things have always kind
of escalated quickly in a good way because I've worked
so hard and I've been so determined. But that's a
huge part of my life, and so sports is an
enormous part of my life, and I'm I'm really grateful
for everything that sports has given me and has contributed
to my life and now to my profession.

Speaker 2 (09:36):
Were there any thoughts of making it you're a profession
and getting into coaching or being a you know, a
professional athlete.

Speaker 3 (09:44):
It's a great question.

Speaker 1 (09:46):
You know, I would probably be lying if I if
I said no, but absolutely yes. After that first year
of playing Rugby aumass I had a lot of really
good coaches who I really loved, and they pushed me,
and one in particular, Warren the Callum, and he said
to me, I want you to try out for the

(10:06):
New England team. There's an all star team that plays
in the summer. I think you'd be perfect for it.
I tried out for that. I made the New England
team and they told me, I want you to try
out for the Northeast team. I tried out for the
Northeast team. I made the Northeast team, and from the
Northeast team, I played in one of the championship games
and completely unbeknownst to me, the national team coaches were
there and we actually lost in those finals.

Speaker 3 (10:31):
And I was a loose head prop at.

Speaker 1 (10:33):
The time and I was going against the national team
tight head prop in that game, and man, it was
a battle, Chris. I mean, we were going at it,
you know, And I thought for sure I didn't play
the best I could have. I was really hard on
myself about the game. I had a very particular moment
where I remember I could have done a little bit better.

(10:54):
I have another moment where I remember I really got
to her and I stood her up in the scrum
and something about that must have been okay, because the
national team knocked on my door right after that and
they asked me if I wanted to play for the
US to bell metal side under twenty three national team.
And before you know it, I was on a plane

(11:14):
going to New Zealand and I loved it. I loved
every single second. Some of my greatest friends in the
Whowai world are my rugby friends. And from there, we
played a bunch of games in New Zealand, and for
lack of better terms, we got our butts kicked and we,

(11:35):
I mean, man did we learn a lot about qui
rugby and respectfully. And we came back from that trip
in New Zealand took everything that we learned and I
still tell his story to my son to this day.
That we got back, we played all of the women's
select sides from the country and we won the national championship.

(11:55):
We were the complete underdogs and we actually beat New
York to win the national championship. So I have the
huge luxury and the huge honor of saying that I
have a national championship with the US under twenty three
national team and it was because we learned so much
by losing in New Zealand.

Speaker 3 (12:15):
So you've got to fight.

Speaker 1 (12:17):
Through that loss and that that heart ache and that
heartbreak to turn around, come back, be determined and to
win that championship. That it's not just about the wins.
And I still tell my son in this story to
this day. But after that, yeah, man, I really wanted
to play a rugby That's what I wanted to do,
and so I continued on that path with playing rugby.

Speaker 3 (12:39):
There's tiny problem was that I.

Speaker 1 (12:43):
Was playing in tournaments and I was also at the
same time starting my career, so things for me, this
happened simultaneously.

Speaker 3 (12:51):
When I was training for the national team, I had my.

Speaker 1 (12:54):
Internship at MTV, so I was also starting the foundation
for my work. And when I continued to do both
of those parallel, I would get the bumps in the
bruises and the normal things that I would push through
and go to work. But I remember this one specific
tournament I played in San Diego. We won the tournament,
a friend of mine had asked me to step in.
I separated my shoulder during that tournament. That was on

(13:17):
a Sunday, and on Monday morning, I was back in
LA having to shoot a show with the camera on
my shoulder for thirteen hours.

Speaker 3 (13:24):
It just didn't work out right because it was the
injuries were just too great.

Speaker 1 (13:29):
So I remember having a conversation with my corror and
specifically my grandfather and my mother's father, and you know,
I said, I don't know what I'm going to do,
because I really want to pursue rugby. I really do
want to play for the national team. Back then, in
two thousand and one through two thousand and five, there
was no money. I was selling T shirts and balls

(13:50):
to get to New Zealand. You know, that's how we
got there. There was very much under representation, definitely was
not being televised.

Speaker 3 (13:58):
And he said to me, this is hard for me to.

Speaker 1 (14:00):
Say, but you gave it a good run, and you
did really wonderful and we're proud of you. But now
is the time for you to really start taking your
career seriously. And I think that's the path that you
should follow. And I still remember that conversation to this day,
and from then on I made that seguay into not
playing v and working professionally in my business to avoid

(14:25):
the injuries and to take it more seriously and give
it one hundred.

Speaker 3 (14:29):
And ten percent.

Speaker 2 (14:31):
What takes the most knocks is the shoulders, right, I mean,
you're going to get knocked around in rugby. I think
probably that's maybe the attraction for you when you decided
not to go on the soccer field, was like, oh yeah,
this is a lot more physical. Really get into this.
I can. I can knock my shoulder for a few
times on this. But then in doing what you're doing
now in the career that you did choose, your shoulders

(14:53):
obviously are essential. You got it, and I'm glad to
hear that you have rec enough and you've and you've
been kind to your shoulders. Teresa, Shall we say yeah?

Speaker 3 (15:04):
I think my parents are happy about that too.

Speaker 2 (15:08):
Probably, But that must have been really hard walking away
from sport, you know, having been there myself. It's really
hard to just turn your back, isn't it when you know.

Speaker 3 (15:16):
You're good at something? Yeah?

Speaker 1 (15:18):
Absolutely, I think it was really hard on me, and
I was young, and I think that's hard too to
do when you're young. Now that I'm looking back on it,
to make that decision was a really mature and hard
thing for me to do. But I like to say
that all live my life with any regrets. And I
love that I had to walk that path to help

(15:40):
me build the building blocks to where I am now.

Speaker 3 (15:41):
And it's made me who I am one hundred and
ten percent.

Speaker 1 (15:44):
And so I'm really grateful for all of the experiences,
all the coaches, all the mentors throughout the way, and
it's helped mold me to be the person that I am.

Speaker 2 (15:54):
Well, you know, I've interviewed hundreds and hundreds of athletes
from all different sports of my career trees, and the
one thing I will always ask, I mean, is what
sport has taught them? What did sports teach you?

Speaker 1 (16:08):
Sports has taught me so much. It's intangible what sports
have taught me. It's taught me how to be a.

Speaker 3 (16:16):
Teammate, how to be a really good leader.

Speaker 1 (16:23):
It's taught me about the grit and the hard work
and no matter how many times you fall down, you
got to get back up and you got to keep going.
It's taught me a team mentality. I played all teams
sports and it's taught me about a team mentality. And
so I'm able to, I think, take my team mentality

(16:44):
thought into my job every day and being the leader
when I'm the director of photography, it's teaching me to
advocate for my team, how to get certain things done
and accomplish, how to be everybody's hype girl. I mean,
I've been described as that, and I love that. I
love being positive. I love cheering everybody on. I'll even

(17:05):
sometimes do a nice little clap, you know, like let's
do a slow clap, let's go, let's you know, or
let's huddle up and let's cheer for somebody, you know.
I think I owe so much to what I've learned
from sports and creating me to be the person that
I am. It's taught me good discipline. I talk about
this a lot too with my son having good discipline

(17:28):
and even to this day, like I do a lot
of things behind the scenes to help myself and to
help my body to be in tip top sape shape
in order to do what I do every single day.
If I have a really hard show coming up, I
train for it. I train, I meal prep, I go
to my beloved orange theory. I've got some weights in
the garage and I just basically kick my own butt

(17:48):
to get myself in tiptop shape. So when I'm asked
to perform. I can do my job under stress. I
can help others and I can deliver a product that's
going to be underd and ten percent of my effort
all the time. And so it's taught me that that,
you know, some days you get up and you don't
really want to do something.

Speaker 3 (18:08):
Some days you're human and you've got to push through that.

Speaker 1 (18:11):
And I've learned all of that because of sports that's
given back to me.

Speaker 2 (18:17):
You know, absolutely do And I know you got your
dream job the other day when you're running Camo for
documentary involving it will someone we both know.

Speaker 1 (18:29):
Yees. So I actually I can't speak exactly on too much.
I did talk to the showrunner because it hasn't been
officially announced yet. However, there are pictures on the internet
there's me all over the place. I had the full
circle moment that I got to be in Kansas City
at the Waves Stadium, which is for the women's professional

(18:52):
soccer team, and I got to film and witness ten thousand,
five hundred yes I said ten thousand, five hundred guests
watching USA women's rugby. I mean it was a full
circle moment for me. I was so proud and so honored,
so happy. I mean, people were like, we can't even
hear you on the walkie, You're.

Speaker 3 (19:10):
Just talking so loud, but you're so excited.

Speaker 1 (19:14):
And it's through, and I'm like, I'm sorry, I am
just I'm just so happy for them.

Speaker 3 (19:19):
I'm so happy for the program.

Speaker 1 (19:20):
I'm so happy for the country to finally understand the
grit and the determination and how amazing these women are.
That I am just such a small part of that
equation that if I could document that, man, I'm the
luckiest person on the planet. I was just I'm still
on cloud nine from it. I'm so happy about it
and so grateful and so thankful.

Speaker 2 (19:42):
So you get to combine all your passions all at once, Teresa,
You you're a spoilt girl that day, and promoting women's
spots that time is like a pot boiling over right,
every opportunity you have wanted to promote women's spoils. Of course,
we can never have enough coverage of women's sports. It's

(20:03):
been my lifelong passion promoting women's sports. So I'm really
delighted to get this opportunity to meet you and know
that we are singing from the same hymn sheet. We
are on the same this is gripped for this, and yeah,
I can continue to do that work and do the
work that you love doing. But I want to now
rewind the clock. You know. That's what we do here

(20:24):
on the show Theresa. We go back to the beginning.
We're going to go back to nineteen eighty two when
you were born in Connecticut, Wallingford, Wallingford, Connecticut, but you
grew up in Lawrence Township in New Jersey. That's kind
of been about midway between New York and Philly, somewhere
like that.

Speaker 3 (20:41):
Yeah, I would say that.

Speaker 2 (20:42):
Actually, yeah, well how old were you when you moved?

Speaker 3 (20:47):
Well, I was pretty when I was pretty young.

Speaker 1 (20:50):
My sister and I were both born in Wallings were
sixteen months apart.

Speaker 3 (20:54):
My dad worked in insurance, and we moved around a lot.

Speaker 1 (20:57):
We lived in Connecticut, we lived in Chicago, we lived
in New York for a little while we moved. We
were lived in Terry Hill, southern New Jersey, and then
we ended up settling in Lawrence. My dad worked in
New York City, and both my parents wanted us to
have some sort of a normal life and live in

(21:17):
the suburbs. So we picked Marrence had good school system
my parents picked, and so my dad could commute back
and forth to the city and we could have some
sort of a quote unquote normal childhood.

Speaker 2 (21:31):
Well, your father, clearly, with the name of Utally, has
to come from Italy, so you've got Italian bloody. So
many Italians actually moved to New Jersey, didn't They Not
so much Connecticut, but they a lot of them moved
to New Jersey when they emigrated here. But tell us
about your dad. What was his story when he immigrated

(21:52):
from Italy.

Speaker 1 (21:54):
Well, my dad's grandparents immigrated from Italy, so my dad
is second generation. My grandpa parents were first. They're from Sicily.
It's a small city called Shaka in Sicily. And my grandparents,
my dad actually was born in Brooklyn and like all
good New Yorkers, moved to Long Island, so he was

(22:15):
brought up on Long Island. And you know, I think
with both of my families, my mom was born in
Queen's moved.

Speaker 3 (22:24):
To Long Island as well.

Speaker 1 (22:26):
I get a lot all of my work ethic from
both my mom's side and my dad's side. My mom's
Irish Catholic, my dad was Italian Catholic, and all of
my grandparents worked tremendously hard. My mom's parents worked. My
grandfather worked two jobs. My grandmother would take care of

(22:47):
the kids and then she would work at the steak
pub as a waitress over night shifts, late night shifts,
and both of my grandparents on my dad's side, my
grandfather actually is on my dad's side, was the person
that I remember being in a union. He worked for
Entemens and he drove the trucks. So my family has
always been pretty pro union as far as that goes.

(23:10):
And my grandmother worked man. She worked pretty much almost
too right before she passed away a little flower. So
I come from a deep line of people who worked
their butts off. My dad, he tells me stories to
this day where he worked, started knowing the lawns in

(23:30):
the neighborhood and from there he worked at the deli
cutting the meats, and then he went to the College
of Insurance and then worked his way up.

Speaker 3 (23:39):
In insurance to provide for our family.

Speaker 1 (23:42):
My mom went to school, she went straight to the
home of insurance, which is where they where they met,
and she took care of everything at the house.

Speaker 3 (23:52):
She was our home care provider. Man.

Speaker 1 (23:54):
That woman did miss one game, you know, and she
worked tirelessly to make sure that she showed up for us,
you know. So there's no wonder that you know, both
of them don't sleep a lot. I don't sleep a lot.
We have that energy. We have a lot of energy,
and that comes from my grandparents. That comes from my roots.

Speaker 3 (24:13):
And I saw that and.

Speaker 1 (24:14):
I remember seeing it growing up, and I admired my
grandparents so much for that.

Speaker 3 (24:19):
There was so much love from both sides. You know.

Speaker 1 (24:22):
They worked their butts off and no matter how tired
they were, they would still put out you know, fun
spreads and music and laughing and we would get together.

Speaker 3 (24:30):
We were in that car going.

Speaker 1 (24:31):
A long island all the time, you know, Like that
was our weekends, was going to see my grandparents and
spending time with them. So I'm really lucky. I'm really fortunate.
All my grandparents deeply supported me and my sports. They
would come to my games, they'd come to UMass, they'd
make a weekend of it. And I'm really lucky and
really blessed that I came from awesome roots, you know,

(24:54):
and I feel extremely grateful for that too.

Speaker 2 (24:57):
Did you bummed with any one of you parents?

Speaker 3 (25:01):
You know? I hate to be like the PC one.

Speaker 1 (25:05):
But I really had a special bond with each of
my grandparents, you know, if that makes sense. With my
grandma Vitally, we just, I mean I look like her,
I've got it, like the round face, and we smiled,
eyes kind of squinched up, and we love chocolate, and man,
she was just funny and sweet.

Speaker 3 (25:26):
And my grandfather, he was just Grandma Vitally was just
the nicest guy, man.

Speaker 1 (25:31):
I mean, alright, he was just the sweetest I matter
how hard he worked. And me, you know what I
really amired about my grandfather Vitally is how much he
loved my grandmother. That was I think the first time
I really saw somebody really love their spouse like that.
You know, when I was little, how much my grandfather
by Tally loved my Grandma Iteally. And then man, my

(25:53):
mom's side, if we could do a whole podcast on that.

Speaker 3 (25:58):
My mom's mom a nanny, I mean, she was.

Speaker 1 (26:01):
A pip she. I mean she lived eighty seven. I
hope I'm not wrong on that. Mom, Please don't get
that eighty seven. She was the last one to live.
No shocker there.

Speaker 3 (26:12):
Her funeral was packed.

Speaker 1 (26:14):
I mean, Nanny was always singing, always had a ton
of energy, always giving.

Speaker 3 (26:19):
I mean she would give the last.

Speaker 1 (26:21):
Penny in her pocket to give you a gift for
your birthday, Chris, if she knew that you had done
a podcast for me, you know what I mean. Like
that was the person that she was. She'd show up
to games unannounced, drive three hours there, three hours back,
never complain. And so we had a very tight knit bond,
that's for sure. I admired the crap out of Nanny,

(26:41):
and luckily my son even got to meet Nanny, which
is pretty darn cool. So we still talk about Nanny
a lot. And then my Grandpa Weeks, my mom's last
name is Weeks. He was just he was the guy man.
I mean, he's where I get all my love and
my obsession with the New York Yankees, and we just

(27:04):
really had that bond and we shared so much bond
on that he called me, always called me his all
American girl.

Speaker 3 (27:09):
Because I don't know, I mean, I don't know why.
I think he just was.

Speaker 1 (27:13):
Just fascinated with my work ethic and how I just
didn't really care what people thought about me. I just
found my own way kind of and we he just
we had a special bond. We would eat lunch together,
we would go to the diet together, we'd go on
car rides together. We were really, really really close and
he was just a really good guy. So, like I said,
I was just really lucky I had a bond with

(27:36):
all four.

Speaker 3 (27:37):
Is that crazy?

Speaker 2 (27:39):
Well, that is blessed, isn't it. I mean, that's wonderful
that you had. Then you mentioned your mom, Karen Karen Wakes,
and also your grandmother. There was music in the family.
You had some singing and musical introduction, you know from
your family. There very musical and you played the trombone too,
so quite a serious musical background.

Speaker 1 (28:02):
Yeah, I mean, I think we could also do another
podcast on Karen my mom.

Speaker 3 (28:06):
She is one in a million as well. The apple
didn't fall far from the tree from Nanny, that's for sure.
You know Anita Baker.

Speaker 1 (28:13):
I mean she's just in the kitchen my mom singing
Nita Baker, Whitney Houston with the wooden spoon, you know,
like make a dinner.

Speaker 3 (28:20):
That's just how I remembered.

Speaker 1 (28:22):
You know, growing up and being in the kitchen my grandmother,
my nanny was she really was the voice. I mean,
she had a really good voice, and she would sing
stuff like Hello Dolly, right, and at the time we'd
be like, oh my god, please stop. But now to
this day we'll be like, well, hello Jallie. Like if
we reminisce about that, we miss that, we love that
about her. We would sing songs in the car. We

(28:45):
would go on and on and on and on. We
would sing songs for holidays. She would sing songs to
us to go to sleep, to like soothe us. And
to this day, like my mom will still sing to
my nieces and nephews, we sang to my son. He's
thirteen now, so we're gonna really as much to him
anymore because we embarrass him. But we did, and you know,
they all passed that down to me, the importance of

(29:09):
music and how that can soothe you or that can
bond you. And I really love that. I love the
show tunes my grandmother would sing and how passionate she
was about all of that, and I was just really
lucky she had a really good voice too, and hot
tip because I know there's gonna be somebody out there
who's gonna listen, and if they they'll get mad at

(29:29):
me if I don't say this allegedly. Sometimes I have
been known to tear the house down on some karaoke,
and the only person I could thank for that is Nanny,
That's for sure, because I don't think anybody else and
everybody I've mentioned in this podcast can hold a tune
besides Nanny.

Speaker 2 (29:47):
What's your karaoke go to?

Speaker 3 (29:49):
I got too? You're ready?

Speaker 1 (29:51):
So it depends on the crowd, Chris. I gotta have
a little bit of a good stage. I like to
get the crowd into it, keep it moving. And if
it's if it's loud and it's rowdy and people are
having fun and they're into it one hundred and ten percent,
it's proud Mary Tina Turner. And it's got to be
the version where it starts slow and then it builds
right because you get up there and you're like, they're like,

(30:11):
what is this chick doing right? What is this white
chit doing? And then it's just like the hair comes down, Chris,
and we just go and we.

Speaker 3 (30:17):
Just have fun.

Speaker 1 (30:19):
I did like to have fun, and I like to
have a good time. And then if I'm not doing that,
it's Whitney Houston. I want to dance with somebody.

Speaker 3 (30:26):
But the voice has to be right for it, because
that's a hard one.

Speaker 2 (30:31):
How about I will survive? Can you add that two
year old repertoire?

Speaker 3 (30:35):
I guess I probably could.

Speaker 1 (30:36):
It's not right now, but maybe I'll do one for
you one day.

Speaker 2 (30:40):
You know, I want to see this karaoke trees and
this is the side of you. When you started this podcast,
you said how shy you are not used to being
in front of the camera, but you are comfortable in
front of the microphone singing karaoke obviously after a cocktail.

Speaker 3 (30:56):
Maybe I loved it.

Speaker 2 (31:02):
So a very happy childhood is what I'm hearing.

Speaker 1 (31:06):
Yeah, very happy childhood. I feel I'm blessed. That's the
only word I can say. And never not busy, like
always busy. I think I drove my mom crazy, just always.
You know, oh we're in another band. You know, you're
doing the pet band, but are you in the jazz band?
And then you're doing the concert band and the recitals.

Speaker 3 (31:27):
It was a lot. I mean I did a lot.

Speaker 1 (31:30):
I had, like I said, a lot of energy, and
I wanted to put that towards good stuff and stuff
that I really enjoyed. And I will have to say
I really did enjoy playing music absolutely.

Speaker 2 (31:42):
So between sports and music. Then your childhood was pretty
full by the sounds, so things both in and out
of school. And I'm wondering what time you spent with
your youngest sister, Roseanne. You said the sixteen months between you.
Did you get along? Did you do any of these
activities together?

Speaker 3 (31:59):
Roseanne?

Speaker 1 (32:00):
You know we are the typical sisters. We absolutely love
each other. There is nobody else I would do some
of the things I do for for my sister. I
absolutely love her. I love her three beautiful children. I
was there for two out of three of the birds
physically there.

Speaker 3 (32:20):
The last one was born in covid so that was tough.
But we you know, we bickered. We for sure bickered.

Speaker 1 (32:26):
No, my sister is we did not do the things together.
My sister is the exact oppetitey. I always kind of
make the joke and maybe.

Speaker 3 (32:34):
It's funny or not.

Speaker 1 (32:35):
She is basically the feminine version of me. So we we.

Speaker 3 (32:39):
Sound alike, we have a lot of energy alike.

Speaker 1 (32:43):
But we're complete opposites. Same route, same foundations, but complete opposites.
As far as like some Denyers, she she played field
hockey and man did she crushed and field hockey.

Speaker 3 (32:54):
She quit that after a little while.

Speaker 1 (32:57):
You know, she actually was the that really got me
into more of the musical theater and Broadway.

Speaker 3 (33:04):
One of her favorite.

Speaker 1 (33:05):
Shows is Rent, and I really loved listening to her
listen to Rent, and so I ended up getting the
tape because Rosanne had the tape.

Speaker 3 (33:13):
So I attribute that to her.

Speaker 1 (33:15):
She's such a fantastic mom and I admire how how
good of a parent she is. And you know, I
could pick up the phone right after this and she'll
pick up and we'll talk. And so we're still really close.
But no, we did not We did not do any
activities together. We bickered like the best of them. But
you know, she's she's my best friend then and now

(33:35):
and I love her to pieces.

Speaker 2 (33:38):
Are you saying that you with the tomboy then in
the family?

Speaker 1 (33:41):
Oh yeah, I was the tomboy. But I'm gonna I'm
gonna give kudos to Rosannah. Can I tell us one
quick story? Cools so totally off brand for being the
tomboy my senior year. So I was a senior, my
sister was a junior, and I got nominated for homecoming
and my mom and my sister will love that tell
us sorry because they love they love this part. And

(34:03):
I didn't want to do it, Chris. I didn't want
to wear a dress. I definitely didn't want to go
in the middle of the football field and wave my
little hand and all that and write a bio because
you know, you already know how I felt about that,
and so.

Speaker 2 (34:15):
I'm not seeing you in homepomes.

Speaker 3 (34:19):
So I got nominated.

Speaker 1 (34:21):
I was part of I think it was ten of us,
you know, males and males and female couples that went
out there. And I went out there and I won.
I won Homecoming Queen. And I know for a fact, well,
first off, I wore pants, so I didn't wear a dress.
I felt pretty good about that. A couple of T
shirts because I was a little sweaty, you know, I
didn't want to have the pit stains coming through. But

(34:42):
I know for a fact my sister had a huge
hand in me and me winning homecoming because the whole
school voted, and my sister everybody loved Verzanne in high school,
and I know she got her friends and they got
their friends, and they got their friends and everybody to
vote for me. And man, I know that my mom
and my sister were always so happy with the a
lot of the things.

Speaker 3 (35:00):
That I did.

Speaker 1 (35:01):
But that day when I went Homecoming Queen, I mean
they were front Row at the fence, just going nuts,
you know, just going nuts. And so to this day,
my mom also has the picture of me with the
Homecoming Queen on her dresser, And you know, I got
to give a shout out to Row because I know
for a fact that she had a big hand in that.

Speaker 2 (35:19):
So what kind of activities were you doing with your parents?

Speaker 3 (35:22):
Then?

Speaker 2 (35:23):
What would you say you learned from them? The kind
you know, we do different things with moms and dads,
and I'm wondering what you did and what do you
learn from them?

Speaker 3 (35:32):
Then I learned from my parents.

Speaker 1 (35:36):
I think with my mom, I learned unconditional love. I
learned showing up, even if you don't understand the game,
even if you don't understand why people are kicking ball
at me, as she would say when I was the goalie,
you know, showing up and how important that is for

(35:57):
somebody as they're growing up. You know, I have a
kid now, as I've mentioned, and showing up is so important.

Speaker 3 (36:04):
You know.

Speaker 1 (36:04):
She did a lot of the behind the scenes thing
that nobody gets to see the meals and the transportation
and talking me off the ledge and being the.

Speaker 3 (36:15):
The original hype girl. You know.

Speaker 1 (36:16):
She coached one of my softball teams when I was
really young, and I just remembered how much we laughed
and how much fun we had, right because it can
be so intense sometimes, especially nowadays, coaches are pretty crazy
and intense.

Speaker 3 (36:27):
My mom was so fun and so funny being on time.

Speaker 1 (36:32):
We were always on time. I love that about her
being thoughtful, you know. I remember being together and buying
gifts from my grandparents' birthdays and buying gifts for people's birthdays,
and volunteering. I volunteered with my mom. I did those
types of things, always giving back. One of my first
cousins and first friends is handicap and he lived not

(36:54):
too far from us, and we spent a lot of
time going to his housing facility to support him and
them and visit them and drop off supplies. That's all
my mom, you know, the carrying and the empathy part
of my heart and my soul. And I just feel
really lucky to have that and an unconditional love from
my mom and my dad. I mean, without a doubt,

(37:17):
the work ethic. You know, he worked tirrelessly for our family.
He never complained and he is still working to this day.
He's going to get mad at me for name dropping
how old he is. He's sixty nine, he's going to
be seventy this year, and he is still working full time,
traveling the world and crushing it. You know, I think

(37:38):
being able to see that, understand that, and the good discipline,
I got a lot of that from him. I mean
now I made I made fun of him when I
was younger. I'd think, you're like this, Chris. On Sunday nights,
he'd be like, I gotta do bills and I got
to got a couple of hours to get ready for
my week.

Speaker 3 (37:52):
And you know we can't. I can't throw any more
of the ball. I can't do this, I can't do that.

Speaker 1 (37:55):
We just I need some time. And he'd be sitting
at the desk doing it. Cut to now me, forty
two years old. Sunday night, I was like, I gotta
get ready for my week.

Speaker 3 (38:06):
I have a big week, like literally.

Speaker 1 (38:09):
Being a mini me as far as my dad and
the work ethic and prepping for a week to be successful, right,
you prep to be successful for your week.

Speaker 3 (38:18):
So I mean, my toolbox is full.

Speaker 1 (38:22):
And I think they both taught me so many important
life lessons on both ends of the spectrum that I'm
just blessed that I was able to balance that out
between the two of them, you know, and learn so
many things from my dad, so many things for my mom.
And then I hope, I hope that I am just
a blend of that, because if I am, I'm.

Speaker 3 (38:42):
So I'm stoked.

Speaker 2 (38:45):
Well that's wonderful. And you mentioned, you know how close
you were to Rosanne, your younger sister, but you're also
close to your half brother Michael.

Speaker 3 (38:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (38:54):
I love my half brother Michael. I just call my brother.
We actually all call each other bro, which is like
so weird. Yeah, I love my brother Michael. He's fantastic.
He's my dad's son from his first marriage, and we
didn't grow up together, but I think we are totally
making up for lost time.

Speaker 3 (39:15):
He is a confidant of mine.

Speaker 1 (39:17):
He's super intelligent, he's a lawyer, lives in Florida, has
two wonderful kids, and he's a really good dad. I've
got a lot of things going on in my life,
especially as an adulthood and I can go to him
and talk to him, and I really appreciate that. I
think it's pretty cool that we didn't grow up together,
but we can have this two point zero kind of relationship,
you know, and bond on that. And man, there are

(39:39):
some cora similarities between us, which is wild to feel
and to see when you've met somebody at fourteen years old.

Speaker 3 (39:49):
Like, we didn't get raised together, but man, we are alike.
It's pretty interesting.

Speaker 1 (39:54):
And I love him and I love his family, and
I'm super super excited that I get to be a
part of his life.

Speaker 2 (40:06):
So when did the camera come into your life?

Speaker 3 (40:09):
Then?

Speaker 2 (40:10):
Who introduced you to a camera? And you start playing
around with it as a child.

Speaker 3 (40:15):
Oh yeah, that's what we're supposed to talk about.

Speaker 1 (40:17):
Right.

Speaker 3 (40:18):
As well? Great question.

Speaker 1 (40:22):
You know, I've listened to a couple of other podcasts
as well, you know, very similar to a lot of
the women I've had the pleasure of listening to.

Speaker 3 (40:31):
I started at an early age.

Speaker 1 (40:32):
You know.

Speaker 3 (40:33):
My parents had.

Speaker 1 (40:34):
A VHS old school recorder and I was just interested
in it from the jump. You know. My dad loved
to take videos of us, me taking tennis lessons or
you know, us at a birthday party or a family gathering.
He loved that va Chas tape We're camp Quorder, and
I remember being like, well, can I play with that?

(40:55):
Can I play with that?

Speaker 3 (40:56):
And he would let me.

Speaker 1 (40:57):
So I remember being the videograph for the family when
I could, and I remember specifically we went on a
trip to Dollywood with my grandmother and grandfather by Tally,
no parents. It was just us, Me and my sister,
my grandma, my Tally Cripa, my Tally, and so I
got to be the videographer because Dad wasn't there. It
was just me, and I remember I was so excited

(41:20):
and we went to Dollywood and we were eating in
one of the cute little restaurants there, and while I
was filming, Dolly came out from the balcony and I
just remember this as a core memory because I tilted
up and.

Speaker 3 (41:32):
I'm like, there's Dolly freaking part in.

Speaker 1 (41:34):
You know. As a kid, I'm like that was cool,
But now I'm like, that's really really cool. And so
I guess I've always really had the fascination for it,
the interest in it, the drive for it.

Speaker 3 (41:47):
I guess maybe I just didn't know.

Speaker 1 (41:50):
And when I was at UMass before my last year,
I had to do an internship and I in turn
to do a bunch of different internships. And I talked
to my parents and they were like, we think that
you should try to do something in the city and
you should take this, you know, internship or do this
interview for MTV.

Speaker 3 (42:10):
And I was kind of like, what do I got
to lose? MTV? That's cool, you know, people are people
are into MTV. Everybody likes it. That's cool.

Speaker 1 (42:18):
So I went to the I went to the interview
and I and I guess I did well. I got
the internship. And I remember in two thousand and four,
this summer we did everything. I called it the Gopher right,
go for this, go for that, and we did everything
from logging to running errands. Of course I was a
personal assistant. And then I remember one day we got

(42:40):
to go in the closet where the cameras were, and
I was like, ooh, it was like Willy Wonk on
the chocolate factory, you know. And I went in the
closet right and I'm like, this is cool. They're like,
we need someone to prep all these cameras about Everyone's like, well,
I'm not doing it.

Speaker 3 (42:53):
I don't do it.

Speaker 1 (42:54):
I was, we'll figure it out, right. So I remember
prepping the cameras. I remember getting them ready, and I
remember bringing them to shoot and TRL and all that
stuff was really big, so it was packed in the
city and I remember we did that for one day,
and I remember that day was my favorite day, you know.
I was like, that's what I want to do. I
want to be involved with the cameras. I don't know

(43:16):
how I'm going to do it, but that's what I
want to do. So after my internship was over, I
went back, you know, I went back to UMS to graduate. Actually, sorry, backtrack.
I went to Northridge for a semester, which was my
two thousand and four fall television and Film studies, and
I came out to California. I loved it. I loved it.

(43:39):
I loved everything about it. I loved California. I love
the weather. I loved learning about it. I loved having
professors who were directors in television and film.

Speaker 3 (43:49):
I loved learning about it, all of it. So I
went back.

Speaker 1 (43:51):
Finished graduated my spring semester two thousand and five, and
within two weeks of graduating, I told her I'm moving
out to LA She said, what I said, I'm moving
out to LA That's.

Speaker 3 (44:05):
What I want to do. I love it. I want
to try to get a job and I want to
work in production.

Speaker 1 (44:10):
And she was devastated and super upset, but she supported
me and she took me to the airport. She dropped
me off and she cried and I got on that
plane and I moved myself out to California and I.

Speaker 3 (44:21):
Had zero contacts. I knew nobody Chris literally And for
the viewers, I'm going to tell you this, there was
no Facebook right two thousand and five.

Speaker 2 (44:33):
The year was right, eighteen hundred and one.

Speaker 3 (44:35):
Exactly the BC.

Speaker 1 (44:37):
It was like there was no Instagram, there was no Facebook,
there was no staff me up. Yeah, I mean it
was you get out and you figure it out. There
was Craigslist, and as soon as I moved out, I
found an independent film that was filming in Burbick.

Speaker 3 (44:55):
I lived in the valley at the time, and the.

Speaker 1 (44:57):
Job description was working overnights and no pay, but you
get fed, no joke.

Speaker 3 (45:07):
So I took the job and I got the.

Speaker 2 (45:08):
Job food security even if not if had job security exactly.

Speaker 3 (45:15):
Right. And that's what I've was. I told my parents,
I say, You're never gonna believe this. They're gonna pay
me in food and they were like, well, you got
a good appetite. But they weren't they.

Speaker 1 (45:25):
I mean, I think they supported me, but baby thought
I was a little bit crazy. And on that very
first independent film I would get was a PA. I
got all of my trashy duties, my cooler duties, everything done,
and I would always go and hang out with the
camerau teine. I love the cameroutine and so I would
just pick their brains and just talk to them, ask

(45:47):
them questions.

Speaker 3 (45:49):
And on that film, I just worked my butt off.

Speaker 1 (45:52):
Whatever they needed I did, And by the end of
that project, I was making one hundred dollars. They bumped
me up. They made a hundred dollars a week, and
I thought I made it.

Speaker 3 (46:01):
Chris. I was like, Mom and Dad, I'm making one
hundred bucks a week. You're never going to believe this.
And they're like, okay, well.

Speaker 1 (46:08):
Are you gonna be able to make the rent? And
are you gonna be able to survive? But you know,
we're proud of you. Just keep going. And on that
film I met an ad named al Reeves. Still keeping
contact with al Reeves shout out, and he was like,
I love you, Ta, I love your energy. I love
I love working with you. I want to take you
with me. I want you to be my second second ad.

(46:30):
And I'm like, all right, man, I don't even know
what a second second ad does, but I'm yours.

Speaker 3 (46:37):
I got nothing lined up, so we took.

Speaker 1 (46:39):
The next gig was in Tahoe, and man that I
learned about Tahoe. We froze our butts off and I
ran around the good Chicken with my head cut off.

Speaker 3 (46:47):
But we worked our butts off.

Speaker 1 (46:49):
You know.

Speaker 3 (46:49):
We worked really hard.

Speaker 1 (46:50):
And I learned so much about the time management and
the call sheet aspect and people moving and how to
get people to and from set, I mean everything, getting
people two meals on time, getting people wrapped on time.
I learned so much on that project. And Al was
so great, like so gracious.

Speaker 3 (47:06):
So was nice to me.

Speaker 1 (47:07):
As soon as we got back, he said, taking you
with me to my next gig, and we're going to
the Biggest Loser.

Speaker 3 (47:12):
I said, okay, I don't even know what that is,
but sign me up again. I'm in it. Let's go now.

Speaker 1 (47:18):
I'm making one hundred dollars a day. Chris and I thought,
I again had made it a hundred bucks a day.
You know, I'm like, we just keep going up, let's
do it so and I knew nobody, so I just
followed him and we went over the Biggest Loser. I
was a PA and this is basically what changed the
old trajectory of my career. When I came on to

(47:38):
the Biggest Loser set, I met a woman named Kat Cummings.
And Kat is no longer with us, but man, if
you mentioned that name to anybody and unscripted, everybody knew Kat.

Speaker 3 (47:51):
She changed my life.

Speaker 1 (47:52):
She saw me see went right up to the bosses
and said, he's going to be my camera assistant.

Speaker 3 (47:59):
That girl right there and.

Speaker 1 (48:00):
Me, I'm going to take her under my wing. I'm
going to teach her everything. She knows we need more
women in the department, and she's mine. And that's how
it started. I worked with Kat for years and we
were a team, and she taught me everything. She was
tough as nails, Chris. She didn't put up with any crack.

(48:23):
She was and still is, in my mind, one of
the hardest workers I met in production. She's rumored to
have been the first, one of the first Women unscripted
on the West.

Speaker 3 (48:33):
Coast, which I think is pretty awesome.

Speaker 1 (48:36):
And everybody respected Cat everywhere she went and everything that
she did. And I got really lucky because she took
me under her wing and she really taught me everything
I needed to know on the job.

Speaker 2 (48:46):
One thing we didn't cover, and I want to just
rewind because it's wonderful. You know that you find these mentors,
you find these people along the way. But there was
something that was the catalyst you even choosing to go
when you decide I did to go to University of
Massachusetts and I'm hoist to go into communications with a
focus on TV and film. That decision came from somewhere, Okay,

(49:10):
in high school. I get the physical connection when you
actually got into the gear room and handled it. But
what was the catalyst for that decision to go into
TV and film from high school?

Speaker 3 (49:24):
You know, it's a good question.

Speaker 1 (49:25):
I think growing up pretty close to the city and
going to the city a lot to see Broadway shows,
to be a part of the heartbeat of New York,
having the music background, having the family background, I think
I just really took I just drew towards entertainment. If

(49:47):
that makes sense, and I drew towards telling people's stories,
and I really loved I mean, I loved growing.

Speaker 3 (49:57):
Up the comeback stories.

Speaker 1 (49:59):
Right, so it's probably super cliche as the athlete and
the lesbian, but like Rocky, I was obsessed with the Rockies.

Speaker 3 (50:08):
You know what I mean. I mean, and not just one.

Speaker 1 (50:10):
I mean, of course, the one with the Russian is
absolutely amazing when he's training in the woods in the
snow and the Russians getting injections, but the Rockies, the
Karate Kids, those movies about the comeback kids, you know,
rooting for the underdog. That was so amazing to me.
I love that. I love a good underdog story. I

(50:34):
love a good comeback story. So I think that helped.
I think it's a combination of all of it. I
think it was like an equation for me, a formula
of a mixture of things, of growing up not far
from the city, wanting to tell people's stories, loving the
comeback stories, the music. All of that part just kind

(50:54):
of came together and it almost just happened organically for me,
if that makes sense, And that for me, I think
the kind of person I am is the only way
I would have had it happen if it was something
I had to do or I was forced to do.

Speaker 3 (51:08):
I've hardly been like I'm stubborn, no way, right.

Speaker 1 (51:12):
I think that's what really drove me in that direction
to want to do communications because it was just fun.

Speaker 3 (51:20):
It was exciting.

Speaker 1 (51:21):
I got to be in the center of Times Square
as an intern, like, I got to be where the
energy was, and like a mock to the flame.

Speaker 3 (51:31):
I just went to it and I couldn't get enough
of it.

Speaker 2 (51:35):
Did you ever consider acting?

Speaker 1 (51:37):
No?

Speaker 3 (51:38):
I did not consider acting. Is that okay?

Speaker 2 (51:41):
You know, judgment? I'm just wondering with that energy and
the enthusiasm, you knowed, the bright lights drawing you in,
if it ever drew you to the stage yourself.

Speaker 1 (51:51):
No, I think it drew me to tell the stories
of those on stage.

Speaker 3 (51:56):
I mean, to this day, I know if.

Speaker 1 (51:58):
I see somebody on stage doing something that I loved,
a laugh, a smile, I get goosebumps.

Speaker 3 (52:05):
It is day.

Speaker 2 (52:07):
When did you start but first noticing cinematographers, directors, and
you know, putting names to the work, and start to
admire particular styles in the industry.

Speaker 1 (52:21):
I probably would say, believe it or not, it was
probably younger when I really loved things a little bit
off the cuff but popular, but not like Pee Wee's
Playhouse or Peewee's Big Adventure, Tim Burton, that kind of stuff.
Stuff that was a little bit different but funny but quirky,
you know, stuff that maybe didn't always appeal to everybody,

(52:44):
but I liked.

Speaker 3 (52:45):
I love that movie.

Speaker 1 (52:46):
I think I wore that movie straight through the VHS.

Speaker 3 (52:51):
With the Rockies and the Karate Kids.

Speaker 1 (52:53):
That's probably when I started to really visually realize, oh, wow,
you can do.

Speaker 3 (52:58):
Things that are off the cuff. I mean, you could
do things that are different and take risks and take
chances and be successful with that.

Speaker 2 (53:07):
And you've pretty much run the gamut really in terms
of the genres that you've worked in, and clearly you
love the storytelling the documentary. When did you decide that,
you know, if you could choose, you know, there was
a time that you probably couldn't choose. Right. You were
getting your arms around everything that you could possibly do.
But at what point would you say there was the

(53:27):
crosswords like, Okay, I want to turn left here, this
is where I want to go. This is the direction
for me in the business.

Speaker 3 (53:35):
As a camera operator, as director photography or both both?

Speaker 2 (53:40):
Yeah, both, you know.

Speaker 1 (53:43):
I probably want to say that I had a really
big turning moment from my very first director of photography
gig that I was offered.

Speaker 2 (53:52):
What year was that?

Speaker 3 (53:53):
Oh, it's a great question. I knew you're going to
ask me that quest.

Speaker 1 (53:55):
I was thinking about the year like your nuts, Okay,
So I want to say that that was twenty fourteen.
It was twenty fourteen, for sure, and I was pretty
I was doing pretty well as a camera operator. I
had moved back to New York for a short period
and came back to LA So I was really I

(54:17):
was really busting my butt as a camera operator. And
one of my other mentors and best friends, Jen Morton,
offered me my very first director of photography gig, and
that was a huge turning point for me. She gave
me the opportunity to DP a very popular Bravo show
at the time, and it was the first time I

(54:39):
really felt like somebody believed in me, you know, and
somebody really believed in all of my talents. And I'm
not just saying I can hold a camera and compose
pretty shots. I think Jen is able to see the
parts in me that I have that I really, I

(55:00):
really think helped contribute for me to get that DP position.
And what I'm trying to say is, I guess being personable,
having the energy, being positive, having a team effort on set,
and also having that likability by the cast, right because
especially with women. It was a female documentary series, so

(55:21):
following a pretty successful lead woman, and I think it
was important for that lead woman to like the director
of photography, you know, and so there needed to be
some sort of a likability there. And she sees that
in me. She saw that in me, and she gave
my first opportunity. At that point when that happened, I
didn't think I could do it, Chris. I didn't know

(55:42):
if I was cut out to be a director of photography.
And because she believed in me and she gave me
the opportunity, and I got the show.

Speaker 3 (55:49):
And we did it and we're still doing it. We
just worked together yesterday.

Speaker 1 (55:52):
You know. That gave me the momentum to say I
can do this. I can be a director of photography.
I can keep people like Jen who's my best friend
and mentor, in my back pocket, and I can continue
to project forward and take this career to the next
level and where I want to be and what I
want to do.

Speaker 2 (56:12):
Given your energy, your enthusiasm, you're seeming out with confidence
in all things. Where was the hesitation about being able
to DP for the first time?

Speaker 3 (56:23):
Another good question, Chris. You know, I feel like.

Speaker 1 (56:29):
Unfortunately, innately or maybe by society, we as women, we
doubt ourselves right and we're told that we're not ready,
or we need to have more credentials, or we didn't
go to in a you know, it seemed college to
specifically get a master's in something. I think that we

(56:53):
doubt ourselves and I look back on it and I
probably shouldn't have, but I did.

Speaker 3 (56:57):
And that's me being truthful and me being honest.

Speaker 1 (57:00):
You know, I think I also really want to do
a good job, and I always said this. My transition
from camera assisting camera operating was significant too, because I
never wanted to take that jump and not be ready.

Speaker 3 (57:15):
I feel pretty strongly that in.

Speaker 1 (57:18):
This business your name is your resume, and so I
was afraid of tarnishing my name by taking me jump
too soon and people saying, oh.

Speaker 3 (57:27):
No, no, no, you can't hire trees if I tell her
she doesn't know what she's doing. She's not ready for
it yet, you know, And so I wanted to make sure. Man,
I want to make sure I was damn ready.

Speaker 1 (57:37):
So I just like just like in sports, I did
my training, I did my research, I practiced. I would
go to camera rental houses, I would check out cameras.
I would pick people's brains on how to light things
and how to make things look good, how to document things.
And I would ask grutching questions, how do I get
you know, this camera balanced? And how do I get

(57:57):
this long lench shot really stetty when I'm on the
end of it, and just constantly wanting to learn. I
think my insecurities in that moment I use in the
future to propel me to do better because I care
and I want to do a good job.

Speaker 2 (58:14):
You mentioned Gretchen there, Grehen being Gretchen Walter aka Lady
Camri guy who introduced me to you. Thank you gretchenoo again,
this speaks to the camaraderie in the business, Terresa. You,
you and Gretchen particularly are all about elevating other women
in the business, yep, and continue to do that and

(58:38):
will hire women whenever you can. I know that shoot
that we referenced earlier that was all all women crew.
You will, you know, deliberately find women to elevate them
in the business. So I'm wondering then kind of hurdles
you had in terms of the sexism that was apparent
in the business and how you overcame that because you

(58:59):
were seemingly confident and most definitely determined to make your
own pathway.

Speaker 1 (59:06):
Yeah, definitely, big shout out to Gresham more than for
linking this up. I really appreciate it. She's one of
my very dear friends and mentor as well, which I'm
really lucky to say. Really good question.

Speaker 3 (59:19):
I mean, I think.

Speaker 1 (59:23):
I just try to be me, and I try to
stay true to myself, and I try to keep the
hard working attitude and effort, positive attitude, hardworking effort to
overcome some of the sexism. But I definitely have dealt
with it. We all have, unfortunately, and I think no

(59:48):
matter how bad it has gotten, I've always picked myself
up and do it again the next day, you know.

Speaker 3 (59:58):
I think the way.

Speaker 1 (59:59):
That I'm able to get over it is I've created
a small niche in a network.

Speaker 3 (01:00:05):
Of my little pack. I like to call it my
wolf pack.

Speaker 1 (01:00:08):
If you will of other badass female cinematographers who have
my back. I have their back for sickness and in health,
no matter what. You know, good days, bad days. You know,
Correction's in that wolf pack for sure. Jen Morton is
in that wolf pack. Our other dear friend Megan Stockhemer
is too, and Tach Cummings was as well. You know,

(01:00:30):
we're there for each other. Good days are bad days, advice,
no advice, venting, right, We're there for each other.

Speaker 3 (01:00:38):
And I think from there, from that wolf pack, I've
extended it.

Speaker 1 (01:00:42):
Outward to women and multiple people that I've worked with
in the past twenty one years, to having hard conversations
with men who I'm friends with and saying, hey, you know,
this is how you can support me, this is how
we can support women on set. And it's all received,
you know, having those hard conversations about things, or I

(01:01:05):
post something about women and I get a negative comment back,
having that hard conversation with that person, right with that
gentleman who didn't like that post that I had all
females on my crew, right, and trying to educate people
because I think they don't understand because they're not educated
about it, right, And they've never been the only person

(01:01:26):
in the room. I think I can countless times have
been the only woman in the room countless countless times.
So I think we work together, the women in my group,
the women that are all my friends and my colleagues,
we stick together and we try to lift each other up,
as opposed to making it that we're in competition, right,

(01:01:47):
because I think sometimes people might think, oh, well, you
guys are in competition because you're both directors of photographies,
But it's like, absolutely not. I mean, on the project
I did two weeks ago, I called Gretchen and I said, hey,
will you come be my b cam?

Speaker 3 (01:02:00):
You're pretty, pretty, pretty please, You're.

Speaker 1 (01:02:02):
So lucky to have you And she said, yes, you know,
and here I am deeping my beat cams, my mentor
how lucky am I? And if she called me tomorrow,
I would do it for her in a heartbeat, and
I have. So I think it's sticking together. I think
it's educating the people who are giving you backlash, right

(01:02:24):
and doing it in a nice way and saying, hey, look,
I'm not coming from away where we're going to argue.
I'm coming from a place where I just want you
to hear, where I'm coming right. I think we all
just want to be related to and so I try
to make it relatable. And if they have a daughter,
that's easy peasy, right, Like, wouldn't you want your daughter

(01:02:44):
to have other women on her crew? Pretty sure you would, right,
So having a wolf pack, Chris to answer your question,
having people to bounce things off of having the heart conversations,
and then by all means, when I've gotten the opportunity.

Speaker 3 (01:02:59):
To be the director of photography, to be the boss,
I try to bring on as many women as I can.

Speaker 2 (01:03:06):
You've mentioned so many of the people on your team,
from your family to friends to mentors, so we're leaving
the most important to the last. We've also talked about
your son, Baron, but we're leaving the most important your wife, Heidi, Heidi.
This is for a reason because we want to know
how you guys met and now you're married. So there's

(01:03:30):
a story right there.

Speaker 1 (01:03:31):
Did Bradua tell you about this story?

Speaker 3 (01:03:34):
Yes?

Speaker 1 (01:03:35):
That happy is Yes, you know I'm thinking right now, Christian,
I'm like, well, i haven't mentioned my wife, so I'm
going to get this dropping quick. So thank you for
that segue. I appreciate that you know the Heidia story
is definitely one for the record books.

Speaker 3 (01:03:49):
I'll still go to setain people tell me, he tell
us the story about you. An Hedy met Okay.

Speaker 1 (01:03:55):
So I was actually living in New York at the time,
and a friend of mine had called me to come
back out to LA to do a show and work
with her, and I accepted the show.

Speaker 3 (01:04:06):
So I came out to California.

Speaker 1 (01:04:08):
I stayed in one of my friend's places, and we
did a first season show, a little show you may
have heard her called Botched. It's one and long story short.
Heidi works with one of the doctors on Botched, and
so I met her when we were filming on Watched.

(01:04:28):
We would go to her office and we would work.
We would actually film them and their surgeries, and we
definitely not break. There was no fratinizing, There was no
on set romance, none of that kind of good stuff.
But as soon as it wrapped, we kept in touch
and I went on the road simultaneously with that first

(01:04:48):
director of photography, gig you. So you notice this pattern's
Chris right, Like everything kind of happens at the same
time for me. So I go through the show and
Atlanta first DP show and Heidi came out and met
and we had our first date out in Atlanta.

Speaker 3 (01:05:02):
We weren't even.

Speaker 1 (01:05:03):
Like in any of the cities we lived in, and
the rest is kind of history.

Speaker 3 (01:05:08):
We hit it off, and I think the.

Speaker 1 (01:05:12):
Amazing part about eighty's job in my job is that
since we filmed in her facility, she knows what I do,
and since I filmed there, I know what she does.

Speaker 3 (01:05:21):
And she is.

Speaker 1 (01:05:22):
Also another awesome female. It's super strong, she's a surgical technician.
She works her butt off, and we just we just
get along. We have a really good relationship. She is
so extremely supportive of me and everything I do, whether
I have to travel and be on the road for
three months at a time, which I try not to

(01:05:43):
do anymore, especially with the kid or not. She's one
of my biggest fans and she has been since the
moment I met her. So I'm really lucky. And we
have a nice little fun story there, but not a showman's.

Speaker 2 (01:05:58):
Just want to let everybody go there, Okay, put those
pieces together. What year was it that you met and
what year did you get married?

Speaker 1 (01:06:05):
Okay, So we met in twenty thirteen. We had our
first date in twenty fourteen, which at the same time
my first director photography. And then we got married in
twenty seventeen, three years later, and we got married in
Palm Springs.

Speaker 3 (01:06:23):
So we had an awesome, like fun gay wedding.

Speaker 1 (01:06:27):
It was three days of fun and our son Baron
got to be in the wedding. All of our families
came out. It was kind of like a destination. Eighty
of our closest friends and family were there and it's
to this day my favorite days of my whole life,
my whole life.

Speaker 2 (01:06:42):
Well, congratulations, so it's a wonderful love story. I want
to just get my arms around your career. When I
look at him, we will link to your IMD page
page and to your website and people can see your
resume for themselves. But when you look at Theresa, what
stands out to you as being big Korea changing productions

(01:07:07):
in themselves? But what you're most proud of?

Speaker 3 (01:07:12):
One am I most proud of?

Speaker 1 (01:07:14):
That's tough, you know, I'm probably especially more recently, I'm
really proud of the women's sports.

Speaker 3 (01:07:27):
That I've done.

Speaker 1 (01:07:30):
I got to do a lot of the startup stuff
with the Together Company.

Speaker 3 (01:07:34):
Which is super Alex Morgan Simone and Chloe Kim's company.

Speaker 1 (01:07:42):
Very early starts, and I really love their multi media page.
They're the ones that made the t shirts that say
everybody watches women's sports. I did a three XBA documentary
which was awesome on the three three basketball women's program
and the team that they're starting with three XBA, and

(01:08:03):
then getting to do the sports documentary that I was
just working on a couple of weeks ago. I think
I'm really proud of wanting to do more women's sports,
wanting to create in that space, wanting to document and
follow and give the I mean, I just feel like

(01:08:23):
it's underrepresented and it's underfunded, and the fact that I
can contribute even a smidge to some success for them
makes me so happy.

Speaker 3 (01:08:33):
It makes me so fulfilled.

Speaker 1 (01:08:35):
It makes the little fourteen year old inside of me
scream like, yes, you know, but I can't. I have
to tell you that the shows that I've done, I think,
especially the challenging ones and the ones that were really
tough and really pushed me, helped give me that the

(01:08:56):
grind and the grit you know that I have. And
I've done a bunch of competition shows, you know, twelve
cameras sometimes even more a jib steady all of that
stuff and being able to work with that many talented
people to come together to make one beautiful show.

Speaker 3 (01:09:16):
I'm just I'm really lucky, you know.

Speaker 1 (01:09:18):
I really I had a blast doing the project Runways
in the America's.

Speaker 3 (01:09:22):
Next Top Models because those are the classics, you know.

Speaker 1 (01:09:27):
I really, I really loved doing the Barbie Dreamhouse Challenge,
which was super fun with Ashley Grant and we just
like redid this entire house in like little to no time,
so like nobody slept, everybody was just working, and then
that led to more shows because people were like, I
want to work with her.

Speaker 3 (01:09:46):
That was really cool. You know.

Speaker 1 (01:09:50):
I love doing the home edit and being able to
drop into civilian houses and also celebrity homes and being
able to invade their space and shooting claw because that
was super challenging for me.

Speaker 3 (01:10:02):
You know, I how am I going to shoot this closet?

Speaker 1 (01:10:04):
I got to make this work, So, I mean, I
don't know, I think it's hard to just do the feature.
One thing that I'm super proud of, I think I'm
super proud that I feel like I give one hundred
and ten percent to every project that I have done.

Speaker 3 (01:10:18):
You know, and I'm excited to do each project that
I get to do, and I think they're all different.

Speaker 1 (01:10:27):
And that's the fun thing about our business, right is
that for me, I don't think I could do a
nine to five, right. I no shame in anybody else
that does that. I give you kudos in credit, But
I think.

Speaker 3 (01:10:38):
Me changing up every day where I'm.

Speaker 1 (01:10:40):
Going to be, every location, what's going to be happening,
the order of the day, the travel, all of the
chaos that I've got to be able to pivot and
to make work. I think that's part of a huge
part of what I love about the job, you know.

Speaker 3 (01:10:55):
So I got to say, Chris, it's a tough question.
I mean, I think I want to say all of it,
all of it. Yeah, I really love all of it. Yeah?
Is that crazy?

Speaker 2 (01:11:07):
I mean, no, I love it now. I was getting
a sense that as you were going through those different
credits that it really was all of it that has
brought you to where you were now. But as we know,
life is unscripted, and you were thrown at a curveball,
as we say, in terms of your own health not

(01:11:27):
too long ago, that you overcame.

Speaker 1 (01:11:31):
Yes, Chris, and I appreciate you letting me share this
aspect I guess as part of my story.

Speaker 3 (01:11:37):
In November November.

Speaker 1 (01:11:39):
Twenty second, twenty twenty three, I had kidney cancer. I
had my left kidney removed. I had two notes removed,
and in typical me, I say the go big or
go home fashion. It was a pretty big, tumorous five
point eight centimeters. It was pretty aggressive, very very very lucky.

(01:12:02):
They caught it early, so I didn't need any chemo
or radiation, so really lucky in that aspect.

Speaker 3 (01:12:10):
I've had to have a couple.

Speaker 1 (01:12:11):
Of follow up surgeries to fix some minor complications, but
I got really lucky, and I think because that.

Speaker 3 (01:12:23):
Happened to me so early.

Speaker 1 (01:12:25):
I found out when I was forty and within four
weeks of finding out that I had the cancer, I
was having surgery. So technically I beat it before forty
one because I turned forty one on the twenty sixth
of November that year, So that happened really quick. It
happened fast and furious, as most things I feel like

(01:12:45):
I've been telling you today have happened to me, and
I with the support of my wife and my mom,
my dad, my sister, my brother, and my best friends.
I worked my butt off to try to find a
doctor that I really trusted and cared about, and he
cared about me and I had a major surgery. Is

(01:13:07):
hard telling my kid that I can't ser at forty
but I'm doing it okay. Now I'm lucky. And it
gave me another perspective on my life that you can't
take it for granted. You know that our lives are fragile,

(01:13:27):
and one day your biggest problem is run out of media,
and then you know in the next day you're getting
CT scans and then you're going in for a major surgery.
So you know, it's definitely changed me. I can honestly
say I don't know if I'll ever be exactly the same.

Speaker 3 (01:13:46):
It's also propelled me to want to.

Speaker 1 (01:13:47):
Push more, to do things that scare me, things that
challenge me, and things that I'm passionate about. One would
you know the challenge would be me doing this podcast
because I was a little nervous, but to do more
of the passion projects that I really I really want
to do and.

Speaker 3 (01:14:05):
That I really care about.

Speaker 1 (01:14:07):
So I urge anybody that's listening that you know life
is short and you never know when you're going to
get the call. I thought maybe my card was going
to be my cancer card was going to be sixty
sixty five. If I was lucky and my card turned
at forty. You know, you never know what it's going
to happen. So take the risk, take the shot, and

(01:14:29):
go for it.

Speaker 3 (01:14:30):
Whatever it is you want to do.

Speaker 1 (01:14:31):
If it's if it's camera, if it's lighting. I know
it's creative art, it could be anything.

Speaker 3 (01:14:35):
Make up. Take the risk and take the challenge because
you never know when your life could be changed, and
you don't want to wait, and you don't want to
say it's too late. You know.

Speaker 2 (01:14:46):
Sounds like you have a wonderful team behind you to
raise it and not least of all your loosen prop hiding.

Speaker 3 (01:14:53):
Well, I'm the loosead, Chris, She's the I d If
I call her the hooker, that's really going to be
a problem.

Speaker 2 (01:15:00):
Yeah, now we'll be in trouble. Okay, we're getting into
the rugu meticals. I'm wondering what's next that you can
talk about or goals even you know.

Speaker 3 (01:15:11):
I really am excited because I have to mention this.
I'm really proud of my son.

Speaker 1 (01:15:16):
I actually bought him his first five d last year
and he's taking phototogrash. He's taking a photography class next year, photojournalism,
And I'm so.

Speaker 3 (01:15:25):
Excited for him. And I didn't even help him do it.
He just picked it out. He wants to do it.

Speaker 1 (01:15:30):
So we've been working on like composition and how to
do frames and all that kind of good stuff.

Speaker 3 (01:15:35):
And we're going to Italy this summer.

Speaker 1 (01:15:37):
So I really excited for him to take the camera
and take photos and just be excited.

Speaker 3 (01:15:42):
He's super talented.

Speaker 1 (01:15:43):
He actually had a really good eye, probably better than
I did at his age, to be honest, but.

Speaker 3 (01:15:47):
We're not going to tell him that, you know. But
he's really fun and he sees things. He sees things
really well.

Speaker 1 (01:15:53):
We went to New York and we went to the
nine to eleven Memorial, which I had never been to,
I hadn't been back to, and I went with him
and he took some photo blew my mind, you know,
absolutely blew my mind. So I'm really excited about that.
I'm excited about passing it the torch forward. I'm excited
about doing that with him and seeing that through his lens.

Speaker 3 (01:16:11):
You know what am I doing?

Speaker 1 (01:16:14):
I mean, I'm hopefully going to be doing more with
the women's sports documentary Realm. I'm super obviously passionate about that,
really excited. I just got done being the director of
photography for The Getaways and the Hometowns for Love Is.

Speaker 3 (01:16:29):
Blind, which I'm really proud to announce.

Speaker 1 (01:16:32):
We just did season ten, and I'm really excited because
I did this season before and we broke records on
Netflix for people view for views three billion. A lot
a lot of people are watching that show. And it
was my first time being the director of photography for
that portion of the show, and I was really happy
to do it, and there was some awesome challenges, but

(01:16:53):
I had a really good time, So I guess I'm
just no surprise to anybody. I'm excited for the future.
I can't wait, and I'm looking forward to it.

Speaker 2 (01:17:06):
You still sound like that little girl in the camera
room going through the gear there kid at Christmas?

Speaker 3 (01:17:13):
Yes, absolutely, Teresa.

Speaker 2 (01:17:16):
Life is fun. I'm glad that you have overcome that
medical challenge and obviously lots to look forward to in
the future. So congratulations on that and to everything that
you've done. We look forward to what else might be
in the future, because even with your son getting into
the business. There might be a butally production company in
the future. Look Out, look Out, Well the best of

(01:17:40):
up with everything that you're doing, and thank you so
much for taking time to come on the podcast.

Speaker 3 (01:17:45):
Thank you, Chris.

Speaker 1 (01:17:46):
I appreciate you having me on and I cannot leave
without saying thank you for what you're doing to promote
women in all aspects of the life and the business.
And you're doing, as they say, God's work. So thank
you so very much for highlighting women with your podcast.

Speaker 2 (01:18:00):
And a reminder to hop over to our YouTube channel
to watch some bonus content in what we're now calling
the after After Show, where you'll get to see our
guests and some extended conversation from this podcast. So did
join us on the art podcast That's Art with two
A's on our YouTube channel. You can also follow us

(01:18:21):
on Instagram at the Art Podcast Don't Forget That's Art
with two a's again. If you want to reach us
via email with any suggestions for guests, any comments about
the show, we would love to hear from you. Our
email address is the Art Podcast at gmail dot com.
Don't forget the two as in art Again, And if
you know anyone who you think might enjoy the show.

(01:18:43):
We would love it if you would share this with them.
And if you're listening on Spotify or Apple podcasts, we
would love it if you would leave us a five
star rating and a review, because that increases our visibility
and therefore helps others find the show amongst the thousands
and thirdsds of podcasts out there. I'll be back in
two weeks time with another talented guest from around the

(01:19:06):
world of visual arts, so I do hope you'll join
me then

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