Marilyn’s Man Interview with Schani KrugMarilyn’s Man: Interview with Schani Krug
by Stuart Alson
Director, writer and producer Schani Krug was born in Wurzberg, Germany and is carving a name for himself in the United States and the domestic and international film market with his documentary film Marilyn’s Man. Marilyn’s Man features Marilyn Monroe’s first husband and friend Jim Dougherty [and he knew her only as Norma Jeane] and archive footage of Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon, Groucho Marx and Jane Russell. Also, the film features an extensive collection of rare Marilyn Monroe photographs from Sam Shaw. Schani Krug speaks with IFQ about the process of making his first feature length film, the successful results of ITN Distribution and how he started as a camera man at NBC.
IFQ: Your film Marilyn’s Man had its world premiere at the New York International Independent Film & Video Festival in New York on April 23, 2004. How did you get started in making your first film?
Schani Krug: After working in Hollywood as a camera man at NBC and different studios, I moved back East. I always had a couple of businesses in LA on the side, restoring classic cars and selling antiques to different collectors, dealers and celebrities. So I moved my whole operation back East. I was selling antiques and doing some film consulting and freelance camera work and eventually made my way up to the coast of New England. I settled in Maine. One of my customers was a clock dealer and collector. I received a call from him one day and he said, “Listen I have a bunch of Marilyn Monroe memorabilia, can you come in and appraise it for me because it looks like it could be very valuable.”
I came in and I was very impressed with what he had. He had a rare kodachrome photo of Marilyn Monroe. I said, “Where did you get that?” He said that Marilyn Monroe’s first husband Jim Dougherty came into his store about a week ago and Jim said to him, “I really like how you have my first wife’s photos displayed here. You did her justice. You really paid tribute to her.” My friend asked him who he was. And he said, “I am Jim Dougherty, Norma Jeane’s first husband.” He [my friend] almost fainted.
IFQ: Because originally this guy had Marilyn Monroe pictures up thereÉright in the clock store?
SK: Yes, Jim came back and gave him the kodachrome, which is our theme photo in the movie and on all of the posters. He said, “Jim Dougherty is having a book signing here next week on Saturday. Can you come by and meet him? He would love to meet you. He heard from me that you are a filmmaker.”
I went down to the shop that following Saturday and Jim was there and I shook his hand. He told me that a 9 million dollar movie was being made about his life with Norma Jeane by a Japanese firm and suddenly the whole deal fell apart because the Japanese production company spent the money buying a mall. They were building a mall with 9 million dollars in order to flip it and make some more money, trying to raise about 20 million dollars and the deal fell apart. Jim said to me, “Listen would you like to make my movie?” I said that I would love to. I took all the antiques and the collectibles that I had and put them in auctions and I sold them to collectors and raised 150,000 dollars to start the process. A week later we started filming.
IFQ: You sold your whole business to make this film?
SK: I sold pretty much everything I owned to raise the money.
IFQ: He still was not quite convinced, but you bought all the equipment and drove out to his house before he said yes, isn’t that true?
SK: That’s true and I showed up with all of the equipment and I had a contract in my hand and a kind of a treatment for a script and I had a bunch of questions for him. I had done a lot of copious research about Jim Dougherty and Marilyn Monroe and he was very impressed by the questions.
I said, “I am here with camera, lights and a script and I can start filming today.” He was so impressed. He said to his wife, “This is the guy.”
I went back to my truck, unloaded all the stuff and we started filming in about an hour. He said, “The first with the camera rolling wins.”
IFQ: You were half-way through it and you constantly had to raise more money and when you started this, you were the producer and then you met your co-producer Erik Baron in a pizza parlor. Tell us about that meeting.
SK: He sat there with his hat turned backwards and I walked in and talked to the owner and ordered calzone. The owner who knew me said, “How is that movie about Marilyn Monroe coming along?”
Then Erik turned around and said, “You are making a movie about Marilyn Monroe? What do you do?”
I said, “I am directing a movie about Marilyn Monroe; I am the producer of it.”
He said, “What does a producer do?”
I said, “Raise money, but it’s hard.” He said that he used to work on Wall Street and he asked how much I needed. I held my hands about five feet apart– “About that much,” I said. He said that he could do that and he could help me, so he was hired the next day.
IFQ: Once he was involved, you had the story, but you needed some pictures of Marilyn Monroe. How did you find all these pictures that you used?
SK: Actually, Jim gave me a lot of photographs and then I was watching Good Morning America and I saw a news piece about Sam Shaw [Marilyn’s favorite photographer] and his son Larry Shaw. I called Erik and I said that we had to contact this guy. We got on the Internet and found his website. Erik and I called Larry Shaw [Sam Shaw’s son] in New York and we talked about an hour to him. We said that we were doing a wonderful film about Jim Dougherty [and Marilyn Monroe] and that we loved his dad’s work and it supposed to be an ideal complement for the film. We went down the following Saturday with contract in hand and cut a deal with Larry Shaw for the Shaw archives with all these unknown photos of Marilyn that had never been seen before. Sam was her favorite photographer. In the collection of archives, there are over 500 photos of Marilyn Monroe, very beautifully done, 200 which have never been seen. They are on contact sheets.
IFQ: And those photos are in the film?
SK: Yes, they are in the movie.
IFQ: The next step was getting into the New York International Independent Film & Video Festival.
SK: That’s correct.
IFQ: From being involved with the New York International Independent Film & Video Festival, you were selected for distribution with ITN Distribution. You went to AFM with them and then you sold some territories. What sales did ITN make?
SK: ITN took it to the next level and signed-up major territories of North America through BCI and then they signed Japan with Art Port and Australia, New Zealand with Peacock. They did a marvelous job for us. I was elated that there was an independent film distribution company that could handle this project.
IFQ: When you were younger, how did you become a camera man on the major studio lots in Hollywood?
SK: Well, I worked briefly for about one year in a workshop as a PA and they wrote me a really nice testimonial letter which I had pocket in hand when I went out to LA. After getting my degree from Hampton University, I thought that maybe I would get luckyÑBut everyone had Master degrees and they still could not get into the business unless through connections. So I went to every studioÉFox, Universal, etc. I went to Burbank Studios and Warner Bros. and they had these guard gates and I watched people as they went through the guard gates and walked right on through like everybody knew them. I thought that I could do the same thing. I put on a hat, some rough blue jeans and put on some yellow, red, green, black and grey duct tape with a rope around it and went in there like a grip. And they kept turning me away and they said, “Who are you?”
I said that I worked there.
They said, “No you don’t.”
I even had a lunch pail that had “MGM” on it (laughs). They weren’t buying it. I thought, how the hell could I get in thereÉI needed to meet some people, I could make some contacts.
I remember a story from a friend of mine who wanted to be a stunt man and he told me that he went up to an office building and he scaled down the side of the wall and he crashed through the window fifteen stories up and he got a job (laughs). I thought let me do a lower version of that! I went to a place called Pips Printing in Burbank and I took a copy of the TV Guide logo and turned it into a press pass. I took my 35mm camera and put it around my neck and I walked up to the gate and I said that I was doing a story about Freddie Prinze. They asked me if I had an appointment. I said that I had been waiting for them. He got on the phone and I said, “Look by the time you call them, I will need to be there.”
So he said, “Okay go on in.”
I went in there and found the stage at Studio 3 where they were. I ran to Freddie Prinze and started interviewing him. I took some pictures and had my notes and I was just trying to get in to meet people. I did the interviews and Freddie Prinze asked me when the article was coming out in TV Guide. I said, “Well, I am a freelance guy, I am a stringer. I hope that maybe in two weeksÉthree weeks.” I walked out of the studio, shook hands with everyone and went down to Studio 1.
Scatman Crothers stood near the bathroom as I walked by and he said, “Hey man, you ain’t a reporter. I am a reporter and you ain’t a reporter, man. What are you doing here?” He was a great character. I always admired him; he was in The Shining and he was the co-star of Chico and the Man. And he said, “You are looking for a job, aren’t you man?”
I said, “Yeah, man. Hook me up.”
He took me all over the studios and introduced me to all kinds of people. I met someone who was impressed at my innovative way of getting in and he said that they had a job opening at NBC called camera relief. Meanwhile, I had a job doing the same thing over at Universal as a grip. I decided to take the job at NBC because it was steady.
To make a long story short, 3 months later [this was in 1976], I was pulling cables on The Gong Show and a friend, co-worker, went on a break across the street and got drunk and never came back. He was doing Camera 2 and the opening show with Chuck Barris and we waited for him to come back. He never showed up so Gene Schwartz, the TD on the show, said, “Schani, you have done a little camera before.” I said that I have done a little work, freelance stuff here and thereÉ35mm and that I did some camera in New York. He said, “You are on Camera 2.” I got on Camera 2 and I was petrified that they put me on Camera 2. You know that you cannot make a mistake in this businessÑif you go out of focus you are dead! And they permanently hired me the next week and I started working on different shows after that.
IFQ: Well, you are definitely in focus with your new film Marilyn’s Man.
by Stuart Alson