Today we’d like to introduce you to Zach Siegel.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Zach. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
I made my first movie when I was nine. It was called “The Attack of E.T.” in which a 3-foot plush E.T. doll that I got from Universal Studios stop-motion-stalks into my sister’s room and kills her, and, upon hearing her screams, another toy–-a fluffy emu-like marionette I named Froozo–-seeks revenge. I was late to Hebrew School that night, but something inside me ignited. I had been obsessed with theater since I could remember, but something about this clicked in a different way.
For my next birthday, my parents got me the Steven Spielberg Lego Movie Maker Set and it blew my mind. I spent hours at a time (that probably added up to years) making little movies–the basement my soundstage, the humidifier my fog machine.
I eventually expanded to include humans, making shorts with my friends, asking my teachers if I could turn in video essays instead of written ones (they said no), and guerilla-filming on trains, in bookstores, outside Panera, and all over South Jersey.
Then I was fortunate enough to attend USC Film School, where I found my tribe–people who spoke the same language and shared the same nerdy passions for dumb things like codecs and aspect ratios and the perfect dolly zoom. At school, I kept making shorts with my friends, asking professors if I could turn in video essays instead of written ones (some said yes!) and learning the proper way to get permission to film places.
I graduated and began working as a freelance director and editor, and have since directed plays, music videos, shorts, web series, and have edited TV shows, commercials, and enough branded content to make my eyes bleed. I feel so freakin’ lucky that I get to do what I love with people who I love every day. When I pay for boring things like rent or my Trader Joe’s wrap, sometimes I’ll still giggle to myself that I’m paying for it with art. (Indirectly, I mean, I still pay with money–okay you get it)
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
From the outside, I think it looks like it’s been a smooth road. I’m a white man, I grew up in a middle-class family, had everything I could ever need (and a lot of stuff I didn’t, e.g., 3-foot plush E.T. doll) and have never been out of a job for too long. On the inside, though, it’s been a fucking maelstrom.
I suffer from crippling self-doubt, bouts of depression, and constant anxiety. For every step I take forward, the board room of goblins in my head tell me all the ways I’m unworthy, how no one would ever want to watch my stuff, that everyone’s lying to me, or placating me, or humoring me, that I’m delusional, that I’m bad at what I do, I have nothing to fall back on, and that deep down, I’m actually just a lazy, morose, selfish poopface who uses people and it’s only a matter of time before everyone finds out and leaves me. Luckily, I have friends, family, and a therapist who haven’t left yet, assure me they’re not going to, and tell me that the goblins in my head are just scared. And, increasingly more often, I’m choosing to believe the people around me.
Also, when I was 20, I finally came to terms with the fact that I’m gay (which came as a fun little surprise to my then-girlfriend). Growing up when and where I did, it was very clear to me that being gay was not okay. Or if it was okay, it was okay in theory, just not in practice. On the playground, in the halls of school, I’d hear an endless chorus of “that’s so gay” “don’t be gay” “cocksucker” “fudgepacker” and on rare occasion “faggot”. And even subtler messaging, not necessarily anti-gay, just assumed straightness: “Which girl do you like?” “When you have a wife one day…”, not to mention the default straightness of every piece of media I consumed: every book, every movie, every TV show–and if there was a gay character, he was a joke or a punchline or was dying of AIDS. In order to survive, I learned to pass as straight and worked tirelessly to convince people I was. I changed how I stood, I tried to cap off how high my voice was allowed to go, I pretended to understand what makes boobs so fascinating.
I remember one Superbowl I had snuck down to the basement to watch Dreamgirls and my friend messaged me on AIM asking if I saw the half-time show. I played it cool because boys are supposed to watch sports, and I typed, “yeah, I thought it was ok. u?” It was the year of Janet Jackson’s wardrobe malfunction and it was instantly clear I was not, in fact, watching the Superbowl, and I was terrified that I was found out, that maybe my friend could even hear me belt “And I Am Telling You” through the computer screen. It was a charade, a shield, and learning to put that shield down and accept myself for who I am no matter the fallout felt like a near-impossible task. I didn’t come out of the closet gracefully—I don’t know if anyone does—but I stumbled, awkwardly, and hurt people. And I still have to fight the old instincts to change how I’m standing and talking, that at any moment, I’m “too gay” and making people uncomfortable.
I also had a really, really miserable unpaid internship that led me absolutely nowhere, but I feel like that’s par for the course.
We’d love to hear more about your work and what you are currently focused on. What else should we know?
As a freelance director and editor, I get to bop around to vastly different projects and work with incredible people, and every few months, I’m in a different world. Last year I went from directing a queer music video for the enormously talented Maddie Ross to directing the stage musical More Guns! (which is still running every Saturday at Second City Hollywood if you’re curious). I’m currently editing an incredible pilot for FX, based on the Sundance-darling Quarter Life Poetry shorts, and am writing/developing a few features.
There’s no one project I’m most proud of; they’re all my children, and seeing the finished product always reduces me to a puddle of pride and giggles and tears. I think the thing I’m most proud of (the goblins are going crazy right now) is my ability to lose myself in a project. I have a penchant for comedy, musicals, queerness, and fantasy, and gravitate towards those projects, but I always get tripped up when people ask me about my vision or my style or whatever because it doesn’t feel like I have one–it’s all whatever’s right for the project like the project is some little bird that lands on my shoulder and indicates if I’m on the right path. When I was younger, I thought being a director meant talking and controlling–but it’s all about listening and guiding. The most magical experiences have been pure collaboration, where you’re all in the soup listening and figuring it out together, and everyone can claim ownership. And I’ve found it’s only through bringing together the right combination of artists that I can do the project-bird justice.
Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
My favorite memory from childhood was more of a tradition, and it went like this: I’d be in my room playing or reading, and I’d hear my dad call my name from downstairs. In my head, I’d go through what it must be–I forgot to wash a plate or left a light on or something–until I’d see the entire downstairs was completely dark.
And then a red plastic lightsaber would flash on, my dad making the accompanying “vvvvvvvvvvvv” sound. I’d race up to my room and grab my green lightsaber and dash downstairs and we’d battle: I’d leap off the couch and somersault to avoid a fatal hit; he’d tell me he was my father and I’d pretend it was a huge plot twist. Eventually, we’d tire ourselves out and I’d go to bed thinking of new Jedi moves to try out next time and how cool my dad was.
Contact Info:
- Website: zachsiegel.com
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/a_kodzach_moment/
Image Credit:
Dennis Noack, Arturo Perez Jr., Maddie Ross
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