Napa Valley Film Festival

Jesse Zigelstein

Toronto native Jesse Zigelstein's debut film Nose to Tail (2019) screened at the 9th annual Napa Valley Film Festival. Nose to Tail stars Aaron Abrams (HANNIBAL, BLINDSPOT) as a talented but abrasive chef struggling mightily with his personal demons and the relentless pressures of running a high-end restaurant. Over the course of one increasingly frantic day and night, he faces a rash of private trials and professional tribulations in a desperate bid to beat the odds and save the business that he's sacrificed virtually everything in his life to build. Jesse lives in Los Angeles. He studied film at York University and UCLA. Nose to Tail is his first feature as writer and director. 

How long from writing the script to finishing the film did it take you?

I wrote the script during the spring and summer of 2017 and continued to make (mostly minor) revisions up through pre-production. We shot the film in April 2018 and finished post-production later that fall — the film premiered shortly thereafter in early winter 2018. So it was roughly about 18 months from writing to completion. Pretty fast, all things considered!

Was the film based on real events and how did you come about the story?

The film is entirely fictional rather than based on actual events. That said, it’s certainly informed by what I know about the restaurant business and the lives of the people who work both the front and back of house, which I hope lends the film a degree of authenticity, or at least some plausible details and textures. I’ve been interested in food and wine for a long time and have always believed this world was ripe for dramatic treatment — also that it might be a good setting for an efficient low-budget film if I could compress the story as much as possible in space and time, which I tried to do by limiting it to one location over one day and night. Of course there have been other films focused on this subject matter, so I wanted to differentiate mine by depicting the protagonist (played by Aaron Abrams) in such a way that his toxic and self-destructive tendencies don’t allow for any ultimate redemption or sense of reconciliation. If there was a specific impetus, it was to make a very realistic, of-the-moment restaurant movie about a difficult and desperate chef who just refuses to compromise and suffers the consequences for his stubbornness.

Was it difficult to get financed and how did you go about financing?

It wasn’t easy to finance, but because the budget was relatively low we were able to raise the funds privately and secure a great cast and crew, all of whom worked for a fraction of their standard rates because they believed in the material.

How did you go about casting the film?

We cast (and shot) the film in Toronto, essentially through conventional industry channels. The main roles were filled by contacting talent agents, and we held auditions for most of the supporting parts. We didn’t use a casting director but got some invaluable help from some casting insiders who wanted to support the project. It was a very short and fast process — we didn’t have the luxury to look far and wide. All performers were members of the union, which in Canada is ACTRA — and luckily for us they have an incredibly deep and diverse pool of talent to draw from.

Why do you suppose star chefs are a new super hero of daily life these days?

Well, I’m not a sociologist or a cultural historian, but I would suppose it has something to do with media and technology. It seems like the rise of celebrity chefs coincided with the increased prominence of food shows on both cable and network television, which kind of proved that programs about cooking and/or eating aren’t just strictly niche phenomena but actually appeal to a fairly large mass audience. The elevation of certain personalities to star status is essentially what TV does, so it makes sense that some chefs became celebrities at the same time that general interest in and awareness of many other different aspects of food culture also became more heightened and widespread. Most well-known chefs have their own distinctive shtick and aggressively promote their individual “brand,” but they almost all project an air of mastery, autonomy, and creativity — enviable qualities that people tend to value highly and to consider in some way heroic. They’re perceived as cool, doing their own thing, being successful at making products that we all consume and give us a great deal of pleasure. The proliferation of social media has of course only served to augment this exposure exponentially. Needless to say, the romantic mystique associated with the culinary profession is based perhaps more on glossy representations than on workaday realities, which incidentally my film makes some small amount of effort to point out.

Who will distribute the film?

The film is set for a very limited theatrical release in Canada in early 2020 before it becomes available on the Crave cable network and streaming service. Distribution plans for the U.S. and international territories have not yet been confirmed.

How important is it for filmmakers to attend international film festivals?

Festivals are crucial, whether domestic or international. Given that the majority of independent films receive scant (if any) theatrical play in this era of digital platforms, festival screenings become the filmmaker’s best opportunity to present his or her work in a traditional moviegoing venue. The experience of seeing one’s film with an engaged audience, of getting immediate feedback both during a screening and from the Q&A afterwards, is at the very least educational and can often be exhilarating. Because of the regrettable state of the theatrical marketplace, festivals effectively function as an alternative distribution system for films that will likely never be released in commercial cinemas. Of course festivals are also useful for meeting press and industry types or getting your film on their radar. But in my experience most of the socializing occurs with other filmmakers and doesn’t really have an ulterior (business) motive. The parties are a lot of fun!

How was your experience at NVFF?

My experience at NVFF was outstanding. This is among the best-run festivals I’ve attended, everything is extremely well-organized and the filmmakers are treated very graciously. Festivals in small towns or resort areas tend to have a strong feeling of local community support, and NVFF epitomizes that spirit — it really feels like the whole region has been galvanized by the festival and everyone (staff, sponsors, volunteers, and passholders) is exceedingly welcoming. Plus the quantity, quality, and variety of wine and food events is staggeringly good, as might be expected in Napa.

How have audiences reacted to the film?

My film can be a little polarizing, since it features a somewhat abrasive main character and deals a lot with the darker end of the emotional spectrum. But it seems to be playing well for most audiences. Anybody who's worked in the restaurant business definitely gets it. And there’s always a small core of people who approach me after the screening, they want to talk more about the film or just let me know that they’ve been especially moved. That’s obviously very gratifying.

What will you be directing next?

I have a couple of projects in development, but nothing ready to direct just yet. Right now I’m still mainly focused on getting Nose to Tail out into the world. We’ll see what comes next.

Interview by Vanessa mcMahon