A man with an eye for a fascinating character and untold stories, filmmaker Paul Duane’s work has included Happy, a documentary short about artist and dandy Sebastian Horsely, and he once also approached Brooke Magnanti – more commonly known as Belle Du Jour – seeking the rights to turn her blog about life as a prostitute into a television show. The result was the hugely successful Secret Diary Of A Call Girl, starring Billie Piper. “The show was a lot more mainstream than how I’d envisioned it,” admits Duane, “but it did give me the financial freedom to work on my other projects.”
His “other projects” include what he’s half-jokingly referred to as ‘The Geezer Trilogy’; a triumvirate of documentaries about extraordinary and infamous men. The first instalments include The Making Of Rocky Road To Dublin about filmmaker Peter Lennon, while Barbaric Genius examined the career of scandalised virtuoso and The Grass Arena author John Healy. It was during the arduous editing process of Barbaric Genius that Duane was approached to make a film about ex-con and musician Jerry McGill.
“I had hit such a brick wall with the John Healy film that I thought I’d never finish it, and then got a message from Jerry McGill saying that he had lung cancer and was going into the studio to record a follow-up to his only other release which was 50 years before, in 1959. I just thought, ‘Yeah, that sounds like a good idea for a movie and I better go do something’, because I was driving myself crazy.”
But if Duane was looking for sanity, he picked the wrong man. Endlessly shocking, Duane’s documentary shows the rarely-seen softer side of the infamous musician, as a frail-looking McGill breaks down in tears speaking of the lung cancer ravaging his body. But as the documentary continues, it becomes clear that neither McGill’s hedonistic ways nor his love of performing have waned in his old age, and the dangerously unpredictable character begins to play up in front of the cameras.
As the 70-year-old ex-con steals everything in sight, brandishes fire-arms, shoots up speed on camera and violently attacks his wife as she’s driving a car with both himself and Duane inside, the feeling of appreciation for the brilliant gonzo energy of the documentary is overshadowed by a genuine fear that Duane – never mind McGill – mightn’t survive the film.
“It was extraordinary,” Duane admits, laughing slightly at the understatement. “We thought it would be fun to film, but it just turned out to be dangerous. One of the frequent conversations we had during filming was whether Jerry was just trying to commit suicide by cop, was he looking to get shot in a confrontation with the police? That was in my mind when he was driving the car at the end, was he looking to die? And that was terrifying, knowing you’re in the company of someone who really doesn’t have a lot to live for.”
The documentary takes an interesting turn as Duane begins to question his role and responsibility as a filmmaker. Admitting that McGill was playing up to the cameras by performing increasingly outrageous and dangerous stunts, Duane asks: when you point a camera at a man who will do anything for notoriety, how responsible are you when he goes too far?
“Of course when you see someone abusing themselves that badly, your human instinct is to stop them or protect them, but as a filmmaker you’re there to document. It’s a balancing act between the two and it’s hard, because every time Jerry takes you somewhere crazy and does these crazy things, you’re thinking, ‘This is great, this will make for a great film.’ But then you cross a line and think, ‘Is this actually harmful?’”
Duane isn’t seen on-screen, but his presence, narration and interaction with McGill play a huge role in the film, both contextualising and humanising the character. But unlike John Healy, who Duane obviously has a great deal of affection for, the director admits – both off and on camera – that it was very difficult to like and be around McGill.
“I don’t think he’s a psychopath, but he has a psychopathic personality. There’s a dangerous ego there, and he’s a born performer, and just takes it to extremes. Record producer Jim Dickinson said that McGill was the man Mick Jagger always wanted to be, he’s the guy Charles Bronson wanted to be. And he’s just a bit too much to take because of that.”
Though you can hardly doubt his commitment to the filmmaking process, Duane admits that documentary filmmaking, particularly in Ireland, is an increasingly tough gig.
“It’s fine as long as you don’t need to eat! I spent 25 grand of my own money on Barbaric Genius, and though this film was funded by the Film Board neither myself nor producer Robert Gordon got paid. I’d despair if I was a young filmmaker starting now. It’s a tough landscape out there.”