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Documentary Filmmaker Has WIU Connection

February 27, 2015

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MACOMB, IL – When the documentary film, "Movie Star: The Secret Lives of Jean Seberg," is screened at Western Illinois University at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, March 4, it will be the culmination of a 25-year project between a professor and his student.

The film, to be screened in the University Union's Sandburg Theatre, was born during one of WIU Professor Richard Ness's film classes when then-student Garry McGee became interested in the life of actress Jean Seberg after seeing a screening of the French New Wave film, "Breathless." At the time, Ness was a professor at Iowa State University.

Seberg grew up in Marshalltown, IA, and her movie career began when she was selected after a nationwide search to appear as Joan of Arc in Otto Preminger's "Saint Joan." Seberg became an international star after appearing in Jean-Luc Godard's "Breathless" but became a target of the FBI as a result of her activism in the 1960s. The campaign launched against her contributed to her tragic death at the age of 40.

McGee began to research Seberg's life and conducted interviews with a number of people in Iowa who knew her, including members of the Seberg family and the high school drama teacher who encouraged her to try out for the Preminger film. The filmmaker proposed doing a documentary for an independent study project.

Ness said it was when McGee told him he was ordering Seberg's FBI files through a Freedom of Information Act request that he realized this was turning into a serious project.

Although McGee completed an hour-long version of the documentary while he was a student, he still felt there was more to tell. After McGee graduated, he and Ness continued to correspond. McGee completed two books on Seberg and co-authored another dealing with her films, while continuing to work on the documentary.

Ness says he hadn't been in touch with his former student for a while, but a few years ago he got an email from McGee saying he had teamed up with award-winning filmmakers Kelly and Tammy Rundle, and they were going to complete the Seberg film. The filmmakers then came to Macomb to interview Ness for the documentary, and the first cut of the film premiered at the Jean Seberg International Film Festival in 2013 in Marshalltown, IA.

All three filmmakers will be at Western for the screening and discussion of the official release version of the film. The event is open free to the public and the screening will be followed by a discussion and a reception.

The screening and related events are co-sponsored by the WIU Department of Broadcasting, the Film Studies program, the Visiting Lecture Committee and the Council on Student Activities Funds.

A trailer for the film is available at jeansebergmovie.com.

Posted By: University Communications (U-Communications@wiu.edu)
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