Damian Pettigrew

Biography

Pettigrew's mother was a child psychologist who trained with Anna Freud at the Hampstead Child Therapy Course in 1947. His father, Dr. J.F. Pettigrew, was the first Canadian surgeon to diagnose the heart condition known as aortic coarctation in 1953.

After reading English, French and Italian Literature at the universities of Bishop's, Oxford, and Glasgow (where he discovered the work of Scottish film director Bill Douglas), Pettigrew studied cinema at IDHEC in Paris. At the Cinémathèque Française, he met Brion Gysin and Steve Lacy and began frequenting their artists' circle. If his work is influenced by Gysin's celebrated cut-up technique, the profound and lasting effect on his life was his friendship with Samuel Beckett.

In 1983, Pettigrew launched a remake of Film (film) (1965) starring Klaus Kinski, with Beckett as consultant and Raoul Coutard as cameraman. Kinski’s scheduling, however, proved intractable. Beckett next proposed Jack Lemmon for the role but the project was abandoned when Lemmon explained he was incapable of competing with Buster Keaton (who first played the roles of O and E in 1965). With Beckett and Pettigrew in 1984, the actor David Warrilow initiated Take 2, a tentative sequel to Film, but the project remained unfinished at the playwright's death in 1989. In 1990, Pettigrew settled in Paris to devote himself to filmmaking.

In 1999, he co-founded Portrait et Compagnie with French producer Olivier Gal. He spends a short part of each year on Lake Memphremagog in the Eastern Townships of Quebec.

Work

A recognized authority on Federico Fellini, his portrait of the maestro, Fellini: I'm a Born Liar, won the prestigious Rockie Award at the 2002 Banff World Television Festival, receiving excellent reviews in The New Yorker, The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Newsweek International, Le Monde, Corriere della Sera, l'Unità, The Herald, The Telegraph (London), and newspapers throughout Europe, Brazil, Australia and Japan. Nominated for Best Documentary at the European Film Awards, Europe's equivalent of the Oscars, the film established his reputation as a director of "extraordinarily controlled" feature documentaries. The interview transcripts were published in 2003 as I'm a Born Liar: A Fellini Lexicon with 125 illustrations and a preface by Fellini biographer Tullio Kezich. The Italian director pays particular homage to Tullio Pinelli, his co-scriptwriter on such classics as I Vitelloni, La Strada, and La Dolce Vita.

Other films include portraits of Eugène Ionesco, Italo Calvino, and Jean Giraud. His Balthus Through the Looking Glass, a study of the controversial French painter, was filmed in Super 16 over a 12-month period in Switzerland, Italy, France and the Moors of England. Esteemed by Guy Davenport, it was honored in a cycle of film classics by Jean Renoir, Marcel Carné, and Jean Vigo at the Museum Ludwig (Cologne, Germany) in September 2007.

In 2010, Pettigrew directed MetaMoebius, a cinematic essay on French graphic designer Moebius aka Jean Giraud for the Fondation Cartier pour l'Art Contemporain and CinéCinéma Classic. His documentary, The Irene Hilda Story, based on the European cabaret tradition during the Second World War as experienced by French stars Irene and Bernard Hilda, Micheline Presle and Henri Salvador, was broadcast in France and Germany by ARTE France that same year.

A retrospective of his work in film was held at the Centre des Arts d'Enghien-les-Bains from 5 October 2011 to 28 March 2012. His informal discussion with Ingmar Bergman (conducted in the fall of 2003 at Fårö Island) on the Swedish director's affinities with Samuel Beckett's work was published in L’Âge d’or du cinéma européen in 2011.

In 2012, he completed Inside Italo (Lo specchio di Calvino), a feature-length study of Italo Calvino for ARTE France in co-production with Italy’s Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali and the National Film Board of Canada. Starring Italian actor Neri Marcorè and distinguished literary critic Pietro Citati, the docu-fiction uses in-depth conversations filmed at the writer's Rome penthouse a year before his death in 1985 and rare footage from RAI, BBC, and INA (Institut national de l'audiovisuel) television archives. ARTE and SKY ARTE (Italy) broadcast the 52-minute version on 19 December 2012 and 14 October 2013, respectively.

Pettigrew is currently directing the first feature-length documentary on Carolyn Carlson, the France-based American dancer and choreographer. Begun in January 2012, the 3D film focuses on the creation of several major works by Carlson including Synchronicity (2012), Dialogue with Rothko (2013) and Woman in a Room with Diana Vishneva, principal dancer with the Mariinsky Ballet and the American Ballet Theatre.

In development

In development are two feature films: Darkness Visible starring Tim Roth and Eriq Ebouaney, and Beckett, based on the director's experience working with Samuel Beckett.

Writer-Director

Producer

Screenplays

Video art

Selected publications

Essays on cinema

Interviews online

Awards and festivals

UNESCO Grand Prize - Best Documentary

Best Photography Prize - Lausanne International Festival of Art Films

Official Selection - 8th Marseille International Film Festival (Vue sur les docs)

Official Selection - 56th Edinburgh International Film Festival

Nomination Prix Arte for Best Documentary - European Film Awards

Coup de Cœur Award - 13th Marseille International Film Festival (Vue sur les docs)

Rockie Award for Best Arts Documentary - Banff World Television Festival

Homage to Fellini 1993-2003 - Cannes International Film Festival, Cinémathèque Française and Rimini Fellini Foundation

Official Selection - 1st Cairo Panorama of European Film

Official Selection - Toronto Jewish Film Festival (selected in 10 international festivals)

Official Selection - 14th Blue Metropolis

Italo Calvino Centenary 1923-2013 - Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia

Member, The Society of Multimedia Authors of France (SCAM), The Society of Authors of France (SGDL), and ONE Campaign