Todd and I are a husband-and-husband team. We live together, we work together, we write together, we produce together, you name it, we’ve done it, together. Wearing different hats for each other as needed, sometimes I produce for Todd and he directs, and sometimes he produces for me and I direct. In the last few years, we’ve focused in on documentaries. We’ve had some good success but nothing prepared us for the surprise of our careers.

“This may be the gayest phone call I’ve ever made to you,” said our agent of 13 years, “but I think you’re gonna need to talk to Cher.” Apparently, Cher’s manager Risa Shapiro was helping her client find documentary filmmakers for a special project. According to our agent, Cher herself watched our last film, “Hit So Hard,” about the tumultuous life of Patty Schemel (the drummer of Courtney Love’s band Hole), and she wanted to talk to us about the possibility of working with her to make a documentary about Georgia Holt, aka Cher’s mom. It was a little hard to picture so we asked, “You mean, Cher, THE Cher, was just sitting in her mansion in Malibu, watching our movie?” Yep. And she wanted to talk to us.

First things first, Risa Shapiro called us to fill us in. As it happened, we were on vacation in Palm Springs, but Risa is a Hollywood legend in her own right, and so that’s a call you gladly take, no matter where you are! Long story short: For Georgia’s 85th birthday, Cher made a video present for her family, telling parts of her mom’s life story – kind of a Superstar’s version of a home movie – and now Lifetime was willing to buy North American rights if it were a proper documentary. Risa wanted us to watch the Birthday Video and then have a conference call with Cher (!!) to tell her what we thought we could do. Talk about one degree of separation.

Long story getting longer: we watched the video, had a million ideas and came up with what we thought was a great approach. Our agent’s office called Cher’s manager’s office. Phone call scheduled. 1pm, Wednesday.

(PDE)