The unusual bond between the three musicians is the focus of a new documentary Without Getting Killed or Caught, a story of romance, creativity and tragedy
When director Tamara Saviano decided to make a film about the Americana songwriter Guy Clark, she knew she couldn’t tell his story without covering the lives of two other creative souls – his wife, the songwriter and painter Susanna Clark, and his best friend, the fellow Americana star, Townes Van Zandt. “They influenced him so much, and he influenced them too,” said Saviano to the Guardian. “You can’t separate them.”
At the same time, their entwined lives endured deep fractures and brutal hurts. The story Saviano tells in the new documentary Without Getting Killed or Caught, named after a lyric from one of Clark’s best-known songs, LA Freeway, traces a wide arc of personal traumas and creative triumphs. It involves a violent suicide,...
When director Tamara Saviano decided to make a film about the Americana songwriter Guy Clark, she knew she couldn’t tell his story without covering the lives of two other creative souls – his wife, the songwriter and painter Susanna Clark, and his best friend, the fellow Americana star, Townes Van Zandt. “They influenced him so much, and he influenced them too,” said Saviano to the Guardian. “You can’t separate them.”
At the same time, their entwined lives endured deep fractures and brutal hurts. The story Saviano tells in the new documentary Without Getting Killed or Caught, named after a lyric from one of Clark’s best-known songs, LA Freeway, traces a wide arc of personal traumas and creative triumphs. It involves a violent suicide,...
- 11/8/2021
- by Jim Farber
- The Guardian - Film News
This year’s South by Southwest Film Festival has showcased several documentaries about successful musicians, including Tom Petty, Charli Xcx and Sparks. But you could argue that they haven’t had one about a better songwriter than “Without Getting Killed or Caught,” Tamara Saviano and Paul Whitfield’s affectionate and lyrical film about Texas-born songwriter Guy Clark, which finally premiered at SXSW last week, a year after being booked for the canceled 2020 edition of the festival.
A plainspoken poet whose first album, 1975’s “Old No. 1,” contained more classic songs than most people can muster in an entire career, Clark racked up hits for people like Jerry Jeff Walker, Ricky Skaggs, Vince Gill and the Highwaymen, but rarely showed up on the charts himself until they started measuring the Americana genre, which he pretty much epitomized. He was a songwriters’ songwriter, the mentor to many and the focal point of a...
A plainspoken poet whose first album, 1975’s “Old No. 1,” contained more classic songs than most people can muster in an entire career, Clark racked up hits for people like Jerry Jeff Walker, Ricky Skaggs, Vince Gill and the Highwaymen, but rarely showed up on the charts himself until they started measuring the Americana genre, which he pretty much epitomized. He was a songwriters’ songwriter, the mentor to many and the focal point of a...
- 3/22/2021
- by Steve Pond
- The Wrap
Audience Awards to be announced on March 23.
The Fallout and Lily Topples The World have triumphed at the 2021 SXSW jury awards presented on Friday (March 19).
Megan Park’s The Fallout won the narrative feature competition prize and follows a high-school student as she navigates life in the wake of a school tragedy.
Special jury recognition for multi-hyphenate storyteller went to directors Kelley Kali and Angelique Molina, and there was special jury recognition for Rogelio Balagtas’ breakthrough performance in Islands.
In the documentary feature competition, Jeremy Workman prevailed for Lily Topples The World, a coming-of-age story about 20-year-old Lily Hevesh, the...
The Fallout and Lily Topples The World have triumphed at the 2021 SXSW jury awards presented on Friday (March 19).
Megan Park’s The Fallout won the narrative feature competition prize and follows a high-school student as she navigates life in the wake of a school tragedy.
Special jury recognition for multi-hyphenate storyteller went to directors Kelley Kali and Angelique Molina, and there was special jury recognition for Rogelio Balagtas’ breakthrough performance in Islands.
In the documentary feature competition, Jeremy Workman prevailed for Lily Topples The World, a coming-of-age story about 20-year-old Lily Hevesh, the...
- 3/19/2021
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
“Well, this may seem like déjà vu…” wrote filmmaker Tamara Saviano on her Facebook page this week, alerting friends that her documentary about musician Guy Clark, “Without Getting Killed or Caught” was being announced Thursday as premiering at this year’s South By Southwest Film Festival… just as it was announced for last year. The good news is, this year’s SXSW, being virtual, can’t get canceled (at least short of dire societal circumstances even worse than a pandemic), so the doc is virtually certain to meet its premiere date this time.
Saviano made the tough decision last March to wait it out a year and submit it again in hopes that the festival screening committee wouldn’t have a change of heart. If a film about some of the most celebrated singer-songwriters to ever come out of Texas — Townes Van Zandt also being a primary subject — couldn’t premiere at SXSW,...
Saviano made the tough decision last March to wait it out a year and submit it again in hopes that the festival screening committee wouldn’t have a change of heart. If a film about some of the most celebrated singer-songwriters to ever come out of Texas — Townes Van Zandt also being a primary subject — couldn’t premiere at SXSW,...
- 2/12/2021
- by Chris Willman
- Variety Film + TV
When most major stars with a music career retire, proper announcements are in order, if not farewell tours or tribute shows. But when Kris Kristofferson made the decision to retire last year, there were no such fireworks set off, and the public didn’t learn about it until it was tucked deep into a press release Wednesday about a management change, as if everyone already long since knew or assumed it. That may speak to Kristofferson’s unassuming nature: He really didn’t think that his withdrawal from public performance and recordings was the stuff of headlines.
“It wasn’t any big stake in the ground, like ‘I’m retiring! I’m not doing this anymore!,” says Tamara Saviano, Kristofferson’s longtime manager. “It was an evolution, and it just felt very organic. There was no big change — it was this sort of slow ‘What should we do now? What’s next?...
“It wasn’t any big stake in the ground, like ‘I’m retiring! I’m not doing this anymore!,” says Tamara Saviano, Kristofferson’s longtime manager. “It was an evolution, and it just felt very organic. There was no big change — it was this sort of slow ‘What should we do now? What’s next?...
- 1/28/2021
- by Chris Willman
- Variety Film + TV
Antebellum
The thriller’s trailer clocks in at only 42 seconds, but despite its brevity, it’s enough time for reality to seriously blur. Veronica (portrayed by Janelle Monáe) is a successful, 21st-century author. Until she’s also a pre-Civil War era slave. How these two realities reconcile remains a mystery, but the clip suggests Veronica is trapped by destiny. Between glimpses of the alternating time periods, a message flashes: “What if fate chose you to save us from our past?” She will soon find out. (April 24th)
Atlanta’s Missing...
The thriller’s trailer clocks in at only 42 seconds, but despite its brevity, it’s enough time for reality to seriously blur. Veronica (portrayed by Janelle Monáe) is a successful, 21st-century author. Until she’s also a pre-Civil War era slave. How these two realities reconcile remains a mystery, but the clip suggests Veronica is trapped by destiny. Between glimpses of the alternating time periods, a message flashes: “What if fate chose you to save us from our past?” She will soon find out. (April 24th)
Atlanta’s Missing...
- 3/7/2020
- by Natalli Amato
- Rollingstone.com
Actress Sissy Spacek steps into the role of Susanna Clark in the newly released trailer for Without Getting Killed or Caught, a documentary centering on the life and music of singer-songwriter Guy Clark. The film is set to premiere next week during SXSW.
Produced and directed by Tamara Saviano (who also wrote Clark’s biography) and Paul Whitfield, Without Getting Killed or Caught was based on Saviano’s reporting for the book, as well as Susanna Clark’s store of personal diaries and recordings. In the trailer, Spacek narrates the...
Produced and directed by Tamara Saviano (who also wrote Clark’s biography) and Paul Whitfield, Without Getting Killed or Caught was based on Saviano’s reporting for the book, as well as Susanna Clark’s store of personal diaries and recordings. In the trailer, Spacek narrates the...
- 3/3/2020
- by Jon Freeman
- Rollingstone.com
The latest episode of the long-running live-music series Austin City Limits includes a loving tribute to the songs of the late, great Guy Clark, who died in 2016. Hosted by Steve Earle, and featuring his band the Dukes, the hour-long episode includes Clark and Earle’s fellow Texans, Rodney Crowell, Joe Ely, and Terry and Jo Harvey Allen.
Kicking off the episode is Earle’s stirring performance of Clark’s wistful “Dublin Blues” — the title cut off the songwriter’s 1995 album — which opens with the sweetly prophetic line, “I wish I was in Austin.
Kicking off the episode is Earle’s stirring performance of Clark’s wistful “Dublin Blues” — the title cut off the songwriter’s 1995 album — which opens with the sweetly prophetic line, “I wish I was in Austin.
- 10/18/2019
- by Stephen L. Betts
- Rollingstone.com
Just ahead of the September 15th premiere of the eight-part PBS documentary Country Music – A Film By Ken Burns, Legacy Recordings will unveil musical highlights from the 16-and-a-half-hour series with a deluxe five-cd set spanning the history of the genre.
The impressive track list represents artists featured in each of the series’ episodes, from the first stars of the genre, such as the Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers, to influential acts from the latter half of the 20th century, including Randy Travis and the Judds. The set will be released Friday,...
The impressive track list represents artists featured in each of the series’ episodes, from the first stars of the genre, such as the Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers, to influential acts from the latter half of the 20th century, including Randy Travis and the Judds. The set will be released Friday,...
- 6/13/2019
- by Stephen L. Betts
- Rollingstone.com
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