The Sweet Spot

What does tennis have to do with filmmaking?

My first real passion in life was tennis. It was 1975 and tennis was just starting to hit its stride in the United States. I was 13 years old. I started by hitting a ball against this mammoth concrete wall at the park a few blocks away from our apartment. Then I started playing daily with my friend John. We’d play for hours. Never keeping track of points. Never talking while we played. For me and I think John too, it was Zen. I had no idea what Zen was at the time but I know that’s what it was.

I don’t remember when I first heard the term “sweet spot”. I was describing to someone the feeling when your feet moved the way they should, your body was perfectly positioned, your swing was fluid and effortless and there was a feeling when you hit the ball; it’s almost like you didn’t feel the ball on the racquet. They said, that’s the sweet spot!

That became the point for me when I played. Finding that sweet spot. It was rapturous when I found it. I played almost like an addict looking for their next fix.

I played tennis for almost ten years. Then one day it all ended. I was in college and we were practicing for an upcoming match. Out of nowhere the ball began to jump then disappear. I couldn’t hit it. I stood there dazed then thought to put my hand over my left eye. It was like I was looking through a coke bottle. I can’t describe what I felt at the time. I guess I was in shock. Eventually I was told I had chorioretinitis. A fancy way of saying that a blood vessel had burst behind my eye and flooded it. The best they could do at the time was crude laser surgery where they basically burned the center of my eye, the macula, to restore some vision. It helped. I had peripheral vision but the central vision was gone forever. I had virtually no depth perception. Made it kind of hard to hit something moving over 60 mph.

So what does this all have to do with filmmaking? Simply put, filmmaking has become my second passion in life. I’ve only been at it for about 8 months, making my first film, a documentary with my kid Ray. But soon after I started my film I felt that same energy and excitement as when I first started playing tennis 50 (oh my god!) years ago.

Of course, there’s a lot more going on making a film than standing in front of a net with another person on the other side. Our last shoot we had 8 people on set. 2 fixed cameras on the interviewee, 1 taking b roll, another shooting BTS that wasn’t part of our crew but was shooting to do a possible segment on us for his docuseries on PBS(Not sure how that’s going to go now that NJPBS is officially closed for business.), 1 shooting BTS of the BTS, our editor and our composer and me doing the interview. It was in the person’s home. A very small home. We were jammed into his living room, with my friend from PBS shooting in the doorway leading to the dining room and our BTS set up on the stairs overlooking the living room.

Despite all this when I sat down in front of the interviewee and he began to answer my questions, as I’m finding in all of my interviews, there’s a point, usually many of them, where I feel that sweet spot.

But now, it’s even sweeter! Now Ray is there with me. When I feel it I glance over at them and see they feel it too. Now that’s really THE SWEET SPOT! Making this film together is a series of sweet spots. Ray getting the shot that just captures my vision, their editing sensibilities, often seeing things I don’t and always so perfectly serving the story.

I’m lucky having my kid film with me. I also feel lucky to have found and be accepted by this #FilmStack community. I’m truly grateful.

Let’s keep finding that sweet spot together!