By Danny Peary
FilmInk had the pleasure of meeting director Tanya Wexler way back in 2011, and we’re still wondering why this fine filmmaker hasn’t received way more acclaim and attention, particularly in light of the fine work she’s done since her excellent debut film Hysteria, which prompted our interview.
Tanya Wexler has a huge, warm, welcoming smile. The personable director also converses in an eager, open way that’s as casual as her attire, and makes you feel like you’ve been best buddies forever. But it’s her laughter that communicates that she truly appreciates your company. It’s unbridled, husky, and unapologetically powerful. Surely, Wexler, who was born in Chicago but now resides in New York’s Greenwich Village, has long used laughter to counter bad stuff – including the death of her father when she was just 22-years-old – and it is now her daily tonic and recurring leitmotif. “I met my wife, Amy, twenty years ago in college. We fell in love because we made each other laugh,” she explained to FilmInk in 2011. “We went through serious stuff, but in the end, I wanted my life to be filled with laughter.”
Other than funny movies like Some Like It Hot and classic Katharine Hepburn, what always makes her laugh? “The world is a funny place that makes me laugh,” Wexler replied. “Reality is absurd.” Indeed, reality at its most absurd – the “pelvic manipulation treatment” that male physicians actually gave “troubled” women in Victorian England to cure their anxiety and depression before the invention of the vibrator, without thinking it was a sexual act – inspired Wexler’s quirky 2011 romantic comedy, Hysteria.
But, again, the reason that she committed to the project was her own need to laugh. “When the idea came up, I’d made two little movies and four little kids,” she says. “I was happy but drained. I still loved a wide range of movies, but emotionally, there were some that I couldn’t handle. Movies can transport us, and what I liked best was to go into a dark theatre, turn off my brain, and enjoy the ride with strangers. I just wanted to laugh and hear laughter. Then my friend, Tracey Becker, said, ‘How about directing a comedy about the invention of the vibrator in Victorian England? I have a two-page treatment.’ I said, ‘Done!’ All good comedies dating back to Chaplin come from pain, and I wanted my film to have serious ouch moments, but that would make me laugh.” The result is a film that star Maggie Gyllenhaal boasts “mixes intellectual comedy with women having loud orgasms.”
Although Wexler had not made a feature in ten years, she had complete confidence, and set the tone on a set that male lead Hugh Dancy described as “serious but happy.” That’s a far cry from when, on tight budgets, she made 2001’s Ball In The House (also released as Relative Evil) about a seventeen-year-old boy trying to adjust after rehab, and her 1998 debut, Finding North, a road trip “romance” between a suicidal male and a woman who doesn’t realise that he’s gay. “I’d made two shorts before those films, and I wanted nothing more than to be on the set directing my first feature,” Wexler told FilmInk. “But I had no idea how hard it would be. I called my uncle in tears, saying, ‘I want to go home!’ He talked me off the ledge. He told me to stick close to my DP and trust myself. He said, ‘If it gets hard, just stand there until you get it right.’”
Fortunately, this sound advice came not from just any uncle, but the legendary Haskell Wexler, the Oscar-winning cinematographer, and the director of the seminal film, Medium Cool, which in 1969 broke ground with its cinema verite style, left-wing politics, and full-frontal nudity. Wexler laughs about her famous relative. “My dad was in real estate in Chicago, and when Medium Cool came out, he was joking, ‘We’ll have to pay him more money to take our names off the film, or I’ll never work in this town again!’”
Wexler’s initial three features have diverse storylines, but are bonded by gentle male protagonists, including Dancy’s Mortimer Greenville, the inventor of the vibrator, in Hysteria. Wexler acknowledges her uncle’s kind nature, but says that her father is the main reason her men are so sympathetic. “My dad is my total hero,” she said, tearing up. “I miss him every day. He was a real ‘guy’s guy’, but he’d give the biggest hugs. One time on the beach, I was telling him my crazy, big dreams. I said, ‘Dad! You’re crying!’ He said, ‘I’d never want to be a guy who can’t cry. I love that I feel stuff. I love my family and I love you.’ And he gave me this big hug, and it was the best moment of my life. The last thing that I want to do in my movies is vilify guys, because of him and my son. I’d rather make movies about how men and women aren’t so different and can work it out together.”
While Wexler feels affection for Mortimer, she relates more to the politically progressive woman he falls for, Gyllenhaal’s firebrand reformer, Charlotte. “We didn’t develop her as an Everywoman or someone similar to modern-day women because her politics aren’t advanced today,” the director explained. “I just wanted to see who I would have liked to have been back then!” It’s no coincidence that Charlotte, too, is funny and, as serious as her commitment to social issues is, always enjoys a good laugh.
Wexler followed up Hysteria with some episodic TV work (Girlfriends Guide To Divorce, The Arrangement) before returning to the big screen in 2019 with Buffaloed, which continued the director’s predilection for comedy. Smart and snappy, but with a dark, serious heart, Buffaloed follows the aggressively ambitious Peg Dahl (the superb Zoey Deutch), a money-obsessed hustler who’ll pull all manner of scams to make a buck, and almost plays out like a female Jordan Belfort.
“I love that Peg was an unapologetic female character,” Wexler told F2Media of Buffaloed’s wild female lead. “I think everybody’s been perfect and usually particularly women and particularly female characters are always apologizing for it and saying, I’m sorry, I’m ambitious or I’m sorry, I’m not this or I’m sorry, I’m so tough or I’m sorry. She didn’t at all. She was just like, I feel I want, I’m going for it, you’re gonna get it. It was really refreshing and fun. I wish I was that empowered. She isn’t perfect. She didn’t always make the most moral or ethical choices but she learned a lot by the end. She is just so damn fun to watch.”
Wexler’s next film marked something of a departure for the director. Boasting a big star lead in Kate Beckinsale, the action comedy Jolt tracks the impressive British actress’s unhinged bouncer (who keeps her serious anger management issues in check with an electrode-lined vest!), who goes on a furious quest for revenge when her new lover is murdered. Though less well received than Wexler’s previous efforts, Jolt nevertheless again showcases the director’s facility for comedy, while also suggesting a possible career helming larger scale action flicks.
Like so many other talented female Unsung Auteurs, we wish that Tanya Wexler had been afforded the well-deserved opportunity to direct way more than five films in her twenty-plus-year career…
If you liked this story, check out our features on other unsung auteurs Clio Barnard, Robert Aldrich, Maya Forbes, Steven Kastrissios, Talya Lavie, Michael Rowe, Rebecca Cremona, Stephen Hopkins, Tony Bill, Sarah Gavron, Martin Davidson, Fran Rubel Kuzui, Elliot Silverstein, Liz Garbus, Victor Fleming, Barbara Peeters, Robert Benton, Lynn Shelton, Tom Gries, Randa Haines, Leslie H. Martinson, Nancy Kelly, Paul Newman, Brett Haley, Lynne Ramsay, Vernon Zimmerman, Lisa Cholodenko, Robert Greenwald, Phyllida Lloyd, Milton Katselas, Karyn Kusama, Seijun Suzuki, Albert Pyun, Cherie Nowlan, Steve Binder, Jack Cardiff, Anne Fletcher, Bobcat Goldthwait, Donna Deitch, Frank Pierson, Ann Turner, Jerry Schatzberg, Antonia Bird, Jack Smight, Marielle Heller, James Glickenhaus, Euzhan Palcy, Bill L. Norton, Larysa Kondracki, Mel Stuart, Nanette Burstein, George Armitage, Mary Lambert, James Foley, Lewis John Carlino, Debra Granik, Taylor Sheridan, Laurie Collyer, Jay Roach, Barbara Kopple, John D. Hancock, Sara Colangelo, Michael Lindsay-Hogg, Joyce Chopra, Mike Newell, Gina Prince-Bythewood, John Lee Hancock, Allison Anders, Daniel Petrie Sr., Katt Shea, Frank Perry, Amy Holden Jones, Stuart Rosenberg, Penelope Spheeris, Charles B. Pierce, Tamra Davis, Norman Taurog, Jennifer Lee, Paul Wendkos, Marisa Silver, John Mackenzie, Ida Lupino, John V. Soto, Martha Coolidge, Peter Hyams, Tim Hunter, Stephanie Rothman, Betty Thomas, John Flynn, Lizzie Borden, Lionel Jeffries, Lexi Alexander, Alkinos Tsilimidos, Stewart Raffill, Lamont Johnson, Maggie Greenwald and Tamara Jenkins.
