When Steve Starkey first read the script for “Forrest Gump,” it felt personal. In some ways, he saw himself on the page. He was a student at the University of California at Berkeley participating in the antiwar protests that Gump stumbled into in Washington, D.C., and remembered the monumental, historical moments in the mid-to-late 20th century that Gump lives through.
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Starkey, the film’s producer, thought the film would resonate with people from his generation. But the story of the remarkable life of an Alabama man would do more than just that. The 1994 film, directed by Robert Zemeckis, who would go on to be a longtime collaborator with Starkey, would become the top-grossing film in the United States that year and win several Academy Awards, including best picture and best actor for Tom Hanks, who played Gump.
In 2011, the Library of Congress selected the film for preservation in the National Film Registry as being “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant.”
But when Starkey and other members of the crew started on their journey, fighting with the studio along the way, they had no idea the staying power that the film would have even 30 years later.
Starkey, who splits his time between Fairfax and Carpinteria, will reflect on “Forrest Gump” during a screening at 7 p.m. Thursday at the Smith Rafael Film Center in San Rafael. Admission is $8.50 to $14. More information and tickets are online at rafaelfilm.cafilm.org/forrest-gump.
Book Passage will also have copies of Starkey’s book, “Stupid is as Stupid Does,” in the lobby. The title, a reference to an iconic line that Gump says in the film, offers Starkey’s perspective of creating the film, as well lines from the script and photos from the adventure.
“When I think back on the making of ‘Forrest Gump,’ my mind swirls in disbelief at what I and the film company went through to get that movie done,” Hanks writes in the foreword. “The show was relentless, but we got through it and maybe got a little bruised in the process, but, at the end of the day, we made the film we set out to make.”
Ahead of the screening, Starkey took the time to speak about his career and the impact “Forrest Gump” had on him.
Q How did you first land in Marin?
A My first book, “Breaking and Entering,” traced my career from going to school at UC Berkeley up until I got my first producing job with Robert Zemeckis. I moved up here from Southern California and ended up getting a job as a production assistant for Lucasfilm in 1978. Shortly after that, I moved into editing and worked in the editing room on “The Empire Strikes Back” and “Return of the Jedi.” I kept coming back and forth here over my career because when they started Skywalker Sound (in Nicasio), I’d always bring my movies there to be mixed, including “Forrest Gump.”
I was trying to get into film editing. Instead, I took a detour and went into associate producing, which was in my case being in charge of post-production and visual effects because I had a pretty strong background in that. I was then involved with a TV series called “Amazing Stories.” I worked in the same capacity on “Who Framed Roger Rabbit.” I did work at Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) for that year and a half on that movie. Then, on subsequent movies, when I was working as a producer, ILM was a vendor, if you will.
Q Does Marin have a special place in your heart?
A Absolutely. Marin County will always be the place that educated me and started me in the film business. While working there, in the world of Lucasfilm at that time, you received a film education while you were doing your job. A lot of them had gone to film school. I didn’t. I went to Berkeley, where they didn’t offer any film studies. I was really lucky, and I’ve always cherished that experience. I’ve carried it with me my whole career and when I work with young people, I have always tried to treat them in the same way that I was treated as a young aspiring film person.
Q How did you get involved with “Forrest Gump?”
A I ended up working with Bob Zemeckis. After working with him on “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” and the sequels to “Back to the Future,” he took time off. And when he came back, he called me and asked me to produce his next movie, which was “Death Becomes Her,” and then later “Forrest Gump.” On “Forrest Gump,” I was pretty green.
I had certainly worked on big movies, but not in the capacity of where you had to oversee a movie. “Death Becomes Her” was quite a contained movie in a sense. It was all in Los Angeles, either on location or on stage. So, when we did “Forrest Gump,” all of a sudden, I was in this gigantic world of locations and movies within movies.
Q How do you think being a part of that film shaped you?
A I’ve been emotionally moved by each of the movies that I worked on. “Forrest Gump” was just a very emotional movie putting aside any expectation or anything that you brought to the film.
It just opened people up and opened me up to what Forrest was feeling. Embedded in the film was a huge emotional journey by this innocent character that for us brought out feelings that I think are very universal. It resonated in everyone. People started coming to the movie not just to experience those years that I grew up in, but also to experience the feelings and the emotions of Forrest himself. In that way, it had a profound effect on me, one that was much bigger than I expected. As far as working on the movie, the education of working on “Forrest,” particularly for someone like myself, was huge because there were so many unknowns. Like, where’s Forrest’s home? And how do you contain it so the budget doesn’t completely explode in your face?
Q You write in the book how it felt like the “story of your life.” Did you feel that during production?
A While making the movie, it became personal, in particular, when we went to Washington, D.C., and Forrest was involved in the antiwar rally unbeknownst to him, like the rallies that I took part in, and it brought back the feelings of what your belief system is and doing what you thought was right. And also just the feeling of what it was like to be among all these likeminded people who are fighting for a cause. I felt personally vested and wanted it to be as real as possible.
The production designer and set decorator were all Berkeley alums and all had the same feelings that I did. So we could not only reminisce about those things, but we could make doubly sure that everything was going to be historically accurate.
One day, I started the day where I was doing the scene where the leg braces break away from young Forrest’s legs, and he’s able to run freely for the first time. I started my day doing these mechanical little effects, trying to get these braces to pop right when the camera’s there. And then I go up to this other set. Everybody’s quiet. And there’s little tears out of these big men that are pushing dollies and things. And I’m going, wow, what’s going on here? I’m standing there and they do another take and all of a sudden there’s tears coming out of my eyes listening to Forrest. That’s the way the movie is.
Q Did you imagine 30 years ago that the film would have the timelessness and staying power that it does?
A No one could have imagined the staying power that it’s had. None of us had any idea that the movie was going to be as well-received as it was when we released it. But, all the themes in the movie are not themes that live and die today. They resonate over time. I think for that reason, the movie lives on. The story about a guy finding out about his value and what his place is in this world, how important he is to other people and how loved he is, that story never dies. This guy who loved his mama and this girl, Jenny, more than anything in the whole world and had no bad bones in his body, who altered the course of history as we know it and a person who had to grieve over the loss of important people in his life, these things live on forever.
It’s a beautiful film to look at, and it’s emotional even for me — and I know what’s coming next.