Interview: Jack Hill

In 2004, I served on a panel at the San Francisco Fearless Tales Genre Fest, where the legendary director Jack Hill was also in attendance. The festival directors were kind enough to introduce us and we exchanged e-mail addresses for a brief online interview. I quickly dashed out some questions, and Mr. Hill was kind enough to respond. But since it all happened so quickly, I never had the opportunity to write up or post/publish the interview anywhere. I have often though of it over the years, and finally found the inspiration to post it here.

Born in 1933, Mr. Hill grew up in Los Angeles around the film industry. Like many others, he began working with Roger Corman, most notably on the legendary patchwork film The Terror (1963). Hill's directorial breakthrough came with Spider Baby (1964), an amazing cult classic that still has the power to fascinate today (it was revived as a midnight hit in the 1990s). After working on the atmospheric Blood Bath (1966), he took an interesting assignment: he was to direct an ailing Boris Karloff in a series of sequences that would eventually be finished in Mexico and turned into four films: House of Evil (1968), The Fear Chamber (1968), Snake People (1971), and Alien Terror (1971). The finished films were all sub-par, but it gave Hill the opportunity to work with a genuine legend.

In the early 1970s, Hill directed two landmark "women in prison" films, The Big Doll House (1970) and The Big Bird Cage (1972), both featuring up-and-coming actress Pam Grier. Following that, he continued to work with Grier, giving her memorable starring roles in Coffy (1973) and Foxy Brown (1974). His Switchblade Sisters (1975) attracted a fan in Quentin Tarantino, who re-released it in theaters in 1996. Since 1975, Hill has more or less been retired, though making occasional appearances at film festivals and in documentaries like American Grindhouse (2010).

Q: According to legend, you were one of five directors who worked on The Terror. What footage did you shoot? How did it all come together?

JH: Francis Coppola wrote additional material to flesh out what Roger Corman had shot, but unfortunately Francis neglected to tell the DP that much of it was supposed to be day-for-night, so all that footage was unusable. Roger then turned the picture over to me to write yet a new script, most of which Monte Hellman directed. Roger then shot the climactic scene on another set built for an AIP picture. I supervised the editing and put everything together with pickups and inserts and directed the dialog replacement. Nobody else directed any of the dramatic action.

Q: I read somewhere that Jack Nicholson actually directed some of the film. Is that not correct?

JH: No. He never directed anything that I was aware of.

Q: Who came up with the alternate titles for Spider Baby, i.e. "The Maddest Story Ever Told" and "The Liver Eaters"?

JH: Dave Hewitt, the original distributor, invented the title "Spider Baby." The original title was, "Cannibal Orgy, or, the Maddest Story Ever Told." Dave put the film out again with the title "The Liver Eaters," on a double bill with "The Blood Suckers."

Q: Virginia and Elizabeth are very sexual in the film, and I guess some people compared the film to Lolita. Was there alluring behavior done on purpose?

JH: Jill Banner just played Virginia that way by instinct.

Q: Was there any controversy over Jill's performance? Did anyone get up in arms the way they did over Lolita? (People in this country always get riled up over too much sexuality, especially from a woman's point of view.)

JH: No controversy, nor should there be. Any sexuality in Spider Baby is in the mind of the beholder.

Q: How was Lon Chaney Jr. when you met him? He's very sweet and warm in the film, but word has it he was not well by that time.

JH: He was an alcoholic, but otherwise a very sweet guy.

Q: How did Chaney singing the theme song come about?

JH: The composer, Ronald Stein, got the idea, presented it to Lon, and Lon loved it.

Q: Were you there when Lon recorded his song? If so, what do you remember?

JH: Yes.  I recall that he had a lot of fun doing it.

Q: How did you come to meet Sid Haig and how did he wind up acting in most of your films?

JH: My mentor at UCLA, Dorothy Arzner, was also teaching at the Pasadena Playouse, where Sid Haig was a drama student. She suggested Sid for my student film, and I used him in it. I wrote parts for Sid in most of my films after that.

Q: I didn't know Dorothy Arzner was your mentor! I know who she is but I've never seen any of her films. What do you remember about her?

JH: She was a tough cookie and taught us to be tough.  She was especially good with actresses, and I learned a great deal from her about that and many other things.

Q: Are you and Sid still friends? I saw that he had a small part in Jackie Brown as the judge...

JH: Yes, we correspond often.

Q: On Snake People and the other horror films co-directed by Juan Ibanez, who did what? Did you direct Boris Karloff, or were you the one who fleshed out his footage into four feature films? Did you ever meet Ibanez, or did you work separately?

JH: I directed all of Karloff's scenes in Hollywood, as well as the other action that took place on the same sets.  I was supposed to direct the rest of the films in Mexico, but the producer died of a heart attack and I never even knew the films had been finished until many years later.  No, I never met the Mexican director, and I was so appalled at what he did with my scripts when I first saw one of the videos that I didn't have the heart to watch them all, and still haven't, to this day.

Q: I saw Snake People recently (it came out on DVD last year) and it was just too horrible for me to watch. No offense...

JH: I couldn't watch it either.

Q: What kind of budget and shooting schedule did Corman give you on The Big Doll House? Did you shoot The Big Bird Cage at the same time?

JH: There was no budget or schedule on The Big Doll House. We simply shot until the picture was finished.  I don't recall how many days -- time goes by slowly in the Philippines. The Big Bird Cage was shot the following year, with somewhat more organization.

Q: How did you find shooting in the Philippines?

JH: Enjoyable.  Nothing was ever ready on time, so we had plenty of time to come up with new ideas and rewrite the script.

Q: How much did you direct on Women in Cages, if at all?

JH: Nothing.

Q: Larry Cohen once said that he got the job directing Black Caesar because he had been so successful "directing black actors" in his film Bone. Did your work on the women-in-prison movies lead to Coffy?

JH: Yes, in addition to other credits that I had.

Q: How much work went into perfecting Pam Grier's undercover phony accent in Coffy?

JH: Very little.  Obviously.

Q: You did such a great job of smoothing the anti-drug message into the action. As a writer how do you balance all the elements so well?

JH: Just instinct, I suppose.  Call it what you will.

Q: When writing Foxy Brown, were you obligated to stick to the formula that made Coffy work?

JH: No, other than my own personal formula, which is to keep the story moving, have plenty of humor, and when the heroine gets into jeopardy, she has to get herself out of it; there's no cavalry coming to the rescue.

Q: I love the opening scene in Foxy Brown where Antonio Fargas orders a taco and coffee (instant heartburn). Fargas is a great character actor. What did he bring to his role?

JH: His own personality and life experience.

Q: What were your thoughts when Quentin Tarantino re-released Switchblade Sisters in 1996?

JH: I was very pleased, of course, but at the same time a bit skeptical that people would pay to see an old film with no stars.  I was also a bit embarrassed that it was billed as "Jack Hill's Switchblade Sisters," because I never approved of directors taking possessive credits.

Q: What is the biggest complaint you've received during your career? Too much violence? Too much sex?

JH: There have been complaints about the violence.  Unjustified, IMHO.

Q: What happened in the late 70s that your work became more sporadic? If you could, would you be interested in making more films today?

JH: The kinds of films that I was identified with went out of style.  I have two projects coming together now, though, both getting set up in the UK.

Q: If you could change any one thing in any of your films, what would it be?

JH: Have more money to spend.

Q: If you could chage anything about the industry today, what would it be?

JH: I have no idea.

Q: You're equally talented at writing and directing; in both you're compact, clever and perfectly paced. What's your secret?

JH: Just do the best I can with what I'm given to work with.

March 14, 2004