At the beginning of the lockdown for covid in 2020, Italian director/writer/artist Cecilia Miniucchi asked Bob Odenkirk in the middle of a forced break from the shooting of Better Call Saul’s last season, “Bob Odenkirk, how about we do something while locked up in our respective homes?”

Odenkirk accepted the offer without hesitation and that was how Worlds Apart was born, a feature film shot entirely remotely, each member of the cast, the sparse crew and the director working from their Los Angeles home. Something unprecedented.

 

Rome-born Miniucchi, who has been living in Los Angeles since the 1980s, wrote a screenplay in just three weeks centered on three couples against the backdrop of the art world in Los Angeles during the pandemic. All the characters were forced to ‘shelter in place,’ and work via Zoom.

Co-starring with Odenkirk, who plays an art gallery owner caught in a professional and marital crisis, are Danny Huston, a wealthy professor debating whether to buy a painting that could solve every problem for the anxious gallery owner, and Australian actress Radha Mitchell in the role of Huston’s former student, now a professor of political science and Odenkirk’s lover.

“It’s a kind of dramedy,” explains Miniucchi. “I always try to do dramas, but when people see my films, they laugh. They think they are comedies! It something that keeps happening to me for some reason.”

Except for the opening and final scenes shot in the art gallery (with long and sinuous tracking shots and no cuts), the film was shot entirely from a distance: all the actors and the director at home. Miniucchi sat in her home office at her desk behind various monitors directing the actors in their home, who used iPhone, iPod, Bluetooth microphones for sound and a few other means to shoot the film.

It is selected by the Venice Film Festival for the Giornate degli Autori where it will have its world premiere on September 1. Odenkirk will participate – via Zoom, of course – in a Q&A with the audience following the screening.

 

Miniucchi is known for films such as Expired (2007) and Normality, and is the creator of numerous music videos, documentaries and photographic exhibits. As a young filmmaker, she was assistant director to the likes of Federico Fellini and Lina Wertmuller before moving to the States for an internship at the Zoetrope Studios of Francis Ford Coppola and Fred Roos.

Since then, Roos has been her producer, including on Worlds Apart, a very international co-production. Other producers of this film include Jeffrey Coulter (also the composer), Miniucchi’s husband Carl Berg (owner of the gallery where those two choral scenes in the film were shot), Jason Rose, and Paolo Rossi Pisu’s Italian Genoma Film. Some of the music is by Andy Summers of the Police, Carlo Siliotto and Matteo De Santis, among the many other contributors to this curious melange of entertainment and experimental film. Lastly, it must be noted that this is the first post-Saul project for Odenkirk, which will certainly increase the anticipation for Miniucchi’s film.

We talked to Miniucchi in Los Angeles about the film.

Could  you tell us the genesis of this project?

Before the lockdown, I was about to start shooting a movie called Rome by Night,

unfortunately suspended at the last moment. Then everything suddenly stopped due to the pandemic, as we all know, life stopped, I felt like I was going crazy. I have to do something, I said to myself. I came up with the idea for Worlds Apart. I know pretty well the art world here in LA and I talked about it with Bob Odenkirk, whom I wanted badly for Expired, 15 years or so ago,  I adored him as an actor and comedian since then. Unfortunately, it was not possible to work together on that film, but we stayed friends ever since. So, Bob immediately said yes, without even a script! Then Danny Huston and Radha Mitchell joined us, and we were off immediately. We shot the film in three weeks in April 2020, then we shot those art gallery scenes, with many characters, as soon as it was possible by the anti-Covid regulations. I want to add that this is not a film about Covid. It’s about time and distance, the distance that can exist between two people who live together, and the distance among others that we cannot be with.

So this film that is entirely shot remotely is a first?

As far as I know, yes. Of course, the remote part was the point and the challenge of my idea, and I enjoyed its execution very much. I would immediately do another film remotely. They call it “smart working” not by coincidence. It’s really smart. And budget-wise, you can’t go any lower than that! One of the producers, Carl Berg, who’s also my husband, came up with a system gluing three devices to use for filming in the actors’ homes — to be able to use an iPhone, an iPad and microphones at the same time. The producers brought these things to the actors, some of whom got the help of their spouses. As in the case of Danny and his wife Rosie Fellner who’s also an actress in the film in the role, of course, of his wife. Or with some little outside help as in the case of Radha, whose character is at home alone. Bob Odenkirk obviously proved to be the most skilled with technology. He knows everything. He’s wonderful as an actor and as a person.

In addition to directing the actors, were you also the director of remote photography?

Not exactly. There was no real DP. Let’s say the actors were their own DPs. I established the look and the stylistic structure. For this film I got very inspired by the work of Japanese director Yazujiro Ozu and his directing style, especially his films in the 30s and 40s.

Can you elaborate?

Ozu came up with this style of having the camera at a lower angle than the eye line, thus breaking with the canons of the traditional framing. Lower angle and steady camera. A style which lent itself well to the intimate look of his films, about family relationships with its mixture of drama and comedy. I consider Worlds Apart a “dramedy.” And shooting in the homes of the actors themselves inevitably led to an intimate look into the narrative dynamics.

Was there any moment of confusion or frenzy during production, given the  distance and these technologies?

Not at all, also because we shot in sequence, respecting the continuity of the story line, which helped a lot. And then we shot in our free time, whenever that was. The actors were free and willing to do it, including  nighttime.  Obviously, there was a lot of free time, since no one at that time had much to do! The film takes place over seven days, from Monday to Sunday, and we have respected this time frame. Which made everything easier. The original title was in fact Seven Days In, but after the Roe/Wade fiasco, the producers convinced me to avoid any possible reference to pregnancy, if you catch my drift.

How and to what extent did a star like Odenkirk contribute to this project?

Bob is great. Sure, he’s a superstar now. But first of all, he is an exceptional human being, always available and very supportive at a creative, psychological, professional level. He was generous with his ideas and his time. This is certainly the smallest thing he has done in at least 30 years, yet he did it with great respect. The same goes for the two other great actors like Danny Huston and Radha Mitchell, who gave everything for this little thing.

Did the filming take place before Odenkirk suffered his heart attack?

Yeah, he was totally fine then. He got sick months later, on the set of Better Call Saul, once its production resumed. Now he’s doing great, he’s totally recovered,  thank God. In the meantime, he has also published a very well-written book, “Comedy, Comedy, Comedy, Drama!” As it weren’t enough, Bob is also a good writer.

Worlds Apart was  also produced and financed remotely, right?

Exactly. Post-production was done all over the place. The composer was in England, the ADR was done in Australia and Paris. The editing room was in Holland, and I followed it all via Zoom.  I literally have never been next to anyone throughout the making of the film, pre or post!

 

Will it have a theatrical release?

I hope so. But we are also in talks with streaming platforms such as Netflix, Paramount Plus, Amazon, the usual suspects.

Next projects for you?

I’m in the middle of writing a script for a new movie. And I’m developing a TV documentary series about art and celebrities. I’ve shot three episodes so far, with Jack Black, John Lithgow and Kathryn Hahn. Conan O’Brien and Jerry Seinfeld will also take part, and many others. It’s called Off the Walls. Each episode sees a celebrity interacting with an artist, it’s a cross between PBS’ Art 21 and Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. We talk about art and culture without the snotty attitude typical of the intellectual world of art. There is music, conversation, laughter, in my true typical style.