In which Chris Robinson asks animators profound and inane questions that have little to do with animation. This week's guest is Chicago animator and Chrissie Hynde fan, Chris Sullivan.
Chris Sullivan is… well, what isnt’ he… a teacher, filmmaker, performance artist, actor, musician, lover, father, and fan of American football (which is not nearly as good as Canadian football, but we forgive him cause U.S. Americans (America, is a continent, there are Canadian Americans, American Americans, Mexican Americans. You get the point) are going through a rough time right now. Chris reluctantly agreed to meet with me in section 511, row LL, seats 24 and 23 at Heinz Field in the North Shore district of Pittsburgh. I wore my Ottawa Red Blacks toque in protest.
I get the greatest pleasure from....being in love, and actualizing that in all ways, emotional, physical, intellectual. This of course includes feeling loved as part of the bundle.
My children are also a source of great pleasure and have been now for 23 and 25 years respectively.
If I could have a nom de plume it would be.... Bela I think, I wanted to name my son that, but fate denied me a male heir.
He would have hated me for giving him a sissy name, and we would argue as I tell him about Bartok, and Lugosi.
The sport I do or would like to play is... American football, but I have not played in quite a while.
I am a hopeless Steelers fan. They play like European football, they get really close a lot but rarely score.
The [Montreal] Alouettes is the sissiest name for a football team I have ever heard, must be a bunch of Belas, Camarons and Renés.
A (non-family member) person I idolize is....Joe Frank, radio artist – Chrissie Hynde, musician
These two folks really shaped the way I think about my work narratively
Super powerful people to me. Joe Frank came to see Consuming Spirts in L.A.
Was the highlight of the life of the film? Chrissie Hynde, I think, has not.
Her Akro roots, and my Pittsburgh ones, make a lot of connections between Landscape and
the lost figure.
The song that makes me tingle is....“Don’t let the tear drops touch your shiny heart” by Everything but The Girl.
I sing this one to make me feel good and bad at the same time.
The funniest thing that happened to me….
This is hard… I guess my life is not as funny as I thought.
Many hilarious parenting moments, but all sworn to secrecy.
A well-known figure in the world of independent animation, writer, author & curator Chris Robinson is the Artistic Director of the Ottawa International Animation Festival.
