In the Studio: Shoeshine Caddie
The Documentary Podcast
BBC
4.3 • 2.7K Ratings
🗓️ 29 January 2024
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The search is on to find new ways to document the lives of the homeless – nowhere is this more true than in America, with increasing numbers of people sleeping rough. Sue Mitchell talks to filmmaker, Leonard Manzella, who has risen to the challenge with his award-winning film, Shoeshine Caddie.
The film follows a year in the life of 61-year-old African American, Adrian Spears. He certainly stands out in the sleepy Californian town where he makes a living shining shoes: dancing around with his bowler hat, starched shirt and bright red uniform. The film opens as he folds up the cardboard sheets he sleeps on at night and makes his way to the storage unit where he keeps clothes and an iron. Everything he owns is immaculately pressed, and it was partly his quiet dignity which drew Leonard to Adrian, and which resonates throughout the movie.
Leonard had thought his days in the movies business were over: he gave up his Hollywood career 30 years ago to retrain as a family therapist and through Adrian’s story he has reclaimed his passion.
The BBC Producer, Sue Mitchell, came across Leonard’s film whilst recording with a homeless man living just a few miles away. She was intrigued and began exploring the background to the film and examining why it was proving so popular with audiences.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Bring the world closer with podcasts from the BBC World Service. |
| 0:05.0 | Unmissible stories from around the globe. |
| 0:08.0 | Wow. |
| 0:09.0 | Search for the documentary, Lives Less Ordinary, |
| 0:12.0 | and Amazing Sport Stories, wherever you get your BBC |
| 0:15.2 | podcasts. You better be ready because we're gonna bring it to you. |
| 0:20.3 | Welcome to the documentary in the studio from the BBC World Service, the program |
| 0:29.2 | that explores the creative process. I'm Sue Mitchell and in this program I'll be finding out |
| 0:36.0 | what it's like as a filmmaker to cover the issue of homelessness in one of the |
| 0:40.8 | wealthiest parts of the world. |
| 0:43.0 | How do people find new ways of documenting a problem |
| 0:47.0 | that only seems to be getting worse? |
| 0:50.0 | It's a question that was on my mind |
| 0:52.0 | when I started recording a 10-part series for the BBC in the American state of California. |
| 0:58.0 | There are more homeless people in California than anywhere else in America. around 200,000 people, many of them living |
| 1:06.3 | intense, cars or on the streets. |
| 1:10.3 | And that series I mentioned is called Intrigue Million Dollar Lover. |
| 1:17.0 | Recording it took me to some of the most deprived wastelands imaginable. |
| 1:22.0 | And it also made me curious about how others are covering |
| 1:25.7 | what's happening here. My recordings gave glimpses of the struggles the |
| 1:30.5 | homeless face but these were set aside an intriguing love story. |
| 1:35.2 | The filmmaker Leonard Manzella has attempted something altogether different |
... |
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