Tim Gray of the WWII Foundation: Why These Stories Can't Wait

Documentary First, Episode 106. Host Josh Lindsay, Christian Taylor and Jason Rugg talk with Tim Gray, founder and president of the World War II Foundation. 51 minutes. Released March 17, 2021.

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Why would a TV sportscaster walk away from a 15-year career to make films about World War II?

For Tim Gray, it started at six years old, with his first book about the war. He spent about 15 years doing sports on the six and 11 o'clock news, in Michigan, Washington state, Florida, New York and Rhode Island, and left in 2004. His father, a former journalist, asked if he was nuts. Tim made his first film in 2006, taking five veterans back to France, and in 2011 the World War II Foundation became a nonprofit. By the time of this conversation, 27 of his films were airing on American public television.

In Episode 106 of Documentary First, from the show's early co-hosted days, host Josh Lindsay, Christian Taylor and Jason Rugg talk with Tim, who Christian called for advice when she set out to make The Girl Who Wore Freedom. His email back said he'd talk to her as long as she wasn't asking him for money. He also told her raising money would be the hardest part. It still is, he says: "I haven't heard no this often since I was dating in high school."

Tim talks about why every film starts with one rule: get to the veteran, get to the survivor, before anything else. He has lost great interviews when someone passed away two days before the shoot. He builds each film from the sound bites first so his narration stays out of the way, because, as he says, you learn "when not to get in the way of the story being told." He gives the films away free, so nothing stands between a student and the story. And he tells the story behind the film that affected him most, walking into a gas chamber at Auschwitz with survivor Izzy Arbeiter.

In this episode, you'll learn

• How 15 years in TV sports taught Tim to write on deadline
• How the foundation gets narrators like Gary Sinise, Liev Schreiber and Tom Selleck
• Why Tim looks for donors with a family tie to the war
• His advice for first-time filmmakers: find a story nobody has told
• Why he lays down the sound bites before writing a word of narration
• Why interviews come first, sometimes years before the film
• How filmmakers share footage, like the Dick Winters interview in Hang Tough
• Why the foundation gives its films away free
• How virtual reality and a cardboard viewer can put a student on Omaha Beach
• The promise Izzy Arbeiter made to his father

Questions and answers

Who is Tim Gray of the World War II Foundation?

Tim Gray is a documentary filmmaker and the founder and president of the World War II Foundation in Rhode Island. He was a TV sportscaster for about 15 years before he left in 2004. He made his first World War II film in 2006, and the foundation became a nonprofit in 2011. He writes, produces and directs the films and hires experienced crews for the technical work.

How does the World War II Foundation fund and share its films?

Tim Gray says the foundation raises all its money up front, from corporate and individual donors and sometimes grants. Then it donates the finished films to American public television and makes them free on its website for students, educators and the public. Its mission is education, he says, so it doesn't want a barrier between the viewer and the story.

How does Tim Gray raise money for World War II documentaries?

He looks for people with a personal connection, like a CEO whose father landed in Normandy or witnessed Pearl Harbor. Someone with no tie to World War II is unlikely to give, he says, so the appeal is to a family's pride in what their parents did. He hears a lot of no's. After 98 of them, the 99th might be someone like FedEx founder Fred Smith saying yes.

Why does Tim Gray interview veterans years before he makes the film?

Because that generation is passing so quickly. Tim says he has had great interviews fall through when the veteran died two days before the shoot. Now, the first step on any film is to get to the veteran or the survivor, before archival footage or anything else. At the time of this conversation he had interviews done for films he wouldn't start for two or three years.

What advice does Tim Gray give first-time documentary filmmakers?

Find something nobody else has done, he says, or find a way to do it differently. You can shoot a documentary on a smartphone today, so it doesn't have to be a Ken Burns feature. And keep going: he compares it to the soldiers on Omaha Beach, who couldn't turn back. "Just keep moving up forward and off the beach."

What is A Promise to My Father about?

A Promise to My Father follows Holocaust survivor Israel "Izzy" Arbeiter back to Poland and Germany. Tim says Izzy's parents and younger brother were killed at Treblinka. When they were separated, his father told him to remember what he saw and never forget it, and Izzy spent his life telling the story. Tim calls it probably the most impactful film the foundation has made.

Chapters

Times match the YouTube video.

• 0:00 Meet Tim Gray
• 2:35 The Girl Who Wore Freedom Update
• 4:55 From Sportscaster to WWII Filmmaker
• 6:00 Celebrity Narrators
• 12:26 Christian's Call and Raising Money
• 18:40 Advice for First-Time Filmmakers
• 20:54 Don't Get in the Way of the Story
• 23:04 Racing to Reach the Veterans
• 27:55 Amazon, Public TV and Free Films
• 31:55 Teaching One Story at a Time
• 37:50 A Museum Kids Can Touch
• 43:09 Auschwitz and A Promise to My Father
• 48:50 Elvis and the USS Arizona

Watch the film

Tim's documentaries are at the World War II Foundation, including Dick Winters: Hang Tough, narrated by Damian Lewis, and A Promise to My Father.

DocuView Deja View: This conversation has no DocuView Deja View pick. See every guest pick on the DocuView Deja View page.

About the guest

Tim Gray is the founder and president of the World War II Foundation. Before that he spent more than 15 years as a TV sports and news anchor and reporter, including weekend sports anchor at Channel 10 in Providence from 2000 to 2004. The foundation lists 47 documentaries he has written, produced and directed, and 7 Regional Emmy Awards. His narrators have included Tom Brokaw, Gary Sinise, Liev Schreiber, Tom Selleck, Dan Aykroyd, Matthew Broderick, Jim Nantz, Luke Bryan, Bill Belichick and Damian Lewis. He founded a World War II film festival in Normandy and holds a journalism degree from the University of Rhode Island. Tim's bio

Related conversations

Tim calls Ken Burns one of his mentors. Hear Ken himself in Ken Burns on Losing His Mother and The American Buffalo and Part 2. For more on building a story from the footage that survives, listen to Archival Footage: Why Use Home Movies? with Phil Maher.

About Documentary First

Documentary First is a weekly podcast about the people behind documentaries and how the work changed them. Host Christian Taylor, director of the award-winning The Girl Who Wore Freedom, talks with filmmakers, distributors, entertainment lawyers, actors and more, from Ken Burns and PBS American Masters creator Susan Lacy to first-timers, across nearly 300 conversations. Each week brings one of two formats: a long-form conversation with the people behind films for HBO, Netflix, PBS and independent film, or The Deep Dive, where Christian takes one insight from a recent conversation and follows it wherever it leads. Listen Notes ranks the show in the top 5% of all podcasts worldwide. New episodes every week.

Follow the show | Support on Patreon

Full transcript

Transcribed from the episode audio. Where the recording doesn't make clear which of the show's co-hosts is speaking, the line is labeled Host.

Josh: Welcome to Documentary First, an inside look at a first-time filmmaker's journey. I'm your host, Josh Lindsay from the Movie Proposal Podcast. And with us is our first-time filmmaker, Christian Taylor. Hi, Christian. How are you?

Christian: Hello there! Good, thank you.

Josh: Sporting the The Girl Who Wore Freedom t shirt. Can we get those online some

Christian: You can get that th you can get those in The Girl Who Wore Freedom shop, thegirlwhoworefreedom.com.

Host: Fantastic. And with us, as always, is our trusty dusty research extraordinaire button pushing guy, Jason Rugg. Hey there. Jason, I'm later you're gonna have to tell me what camera you got because I I think I might invest in that camera. So it's it's about three thousand dollars. So never mind, never mind. Used to use it to make short films and things, and now it's just a webcam. Most expensive webcam ever. Also is Also with us is our producer of First Time Filmmaker Podcast, Documentary First, Brad. Brad, thanks for being here. Hello. Hey. And we have a World War II filmmaker extraordinaire guest today. Let's welcome our guest, Tim Gray. Tim, thanks for being here.

Tim Gray: Thank you for having me. I'm admiring Brad's a dishwasher in the background.

Host: Yes, it's pretty great dishwasher. It stands out mightily Looks like a turbo boost one or something in Like your green you know, door in the back. Listen, if you're just listening to this podcast, we're so sorry. You should check us out on YouTube sometime because it really is fun to see everybody interact. If if if Jason's gonna spend three thousand dollars on a camera, you all need to come see this. So please watch him. Normally I'm recording in a c in a c literally a closet in our guest room. So what you normally see is our guest room. but today I decided to show our our trusty green door. Nice. I don't know why, it was just a different decision. I think you made a good decision.

Christian: Tim, we are just so excited to have you here. I it's wonderful to see your face. I was commenting earlier. I haven't ever talked to you long enough to know you had a wonderful sense of humor. So I'm excited to learn that.

Tim Gray: The case, but thank you.

Host: so we have so much to talk to you about. you know, but we're gonna dive in for a second and put a conversation with you on pause because we do have some fun things to talk about this week. Christian. What is new with the The Girl Who Wore Freedom? Are we we still have a distribution deal, yes?

Christian: We do still have a distribution deal. That's super exciting. And we are we have now uploaded our you know, film and our trailers to the distributors post house. It's now going through quality control, otherwise known as QC. We're really crossing our fingers and saying our prayers that there are no problems that we have to fix. we feel pretty good about it, and so we are just waiting for them to give us that QC report to find out if there's anything else we need to do. We are still working on filling out our rights Bible. we have some shots we're still trying to track down. Most all of them are in the in NARA, which is the National Archives. And it's been very tricky because it is they're basically shut down. They're all working remotely. It's very difficult to to deal with them right now. And so and and they don't have a good database online, Tim, as I'm sure you have discovered. you really have to go in there when you're trying to get footage or photos. So that's been our challenge this week is trying to you know, show everything that we have the rights to use. And I did I one thing I can't remember, did we announce the Julien Dubuque Iowa Film Festival last week?

Host: Yep. You did because you mentioned the American pickers and and all.

Christian: All that's in Iowa. So so we have had no new acceptances this week. However, we have launched at the Iowa Film Festival. So people can watch our film through the Iowa Film Festival. And there is a QA with me afterwards, which I actually was really fun to do. And I think we have some new stories in that QA. So people can check that out. So that's really about it this week. No other awards. We're still topping out at 14. I know. It's so disappointing. So

Host: So disappointing.

Christian: But hopefully I don't know, we'll see how things go in the Omaha Film Festival. So that's it for my update this week.

Host: Let's let's jump into our discussion with Tim. Tim is another World War Two filmmaker. And I don't know if if that's what you call yourself, but you've definitely made a lot. You are not a first time filmmaker. You've made over what did you say? Twenty eight films and seven working on

Tim Gray: Number twenty eight right now, yeah.

Host: Okay. Before we jump into that, because I'd like to learn more about how you got interested in World War Two, you obviously have a passion for it, but prior to all this, I read you were a sportscaster, is that right?

Tim Gray: I was. I was a T V sportscaster for about fifteen years, working, doing like the six and eleven o'clock news around the country in Michigan, Washington State, Florida, New York, Rhode Island and got out of that in two thousand four.

Host: Why why well fifteen years, that seems like a good career. Why why did you get out?

Tim Gray: it was just time. I think, you know, you recognize the fact that you've had a run it was time to do something else. And it was just it had been enough. You know, I got to do a lot of great things and cover a lot of great teams and interview a lot of great people and stuff. But there's always something kind of more that you wanted to accomplish and that kind of led down to to what we do now.

Host: So is what you do now like full time is is is make World War Two films?

Tim Gray: Yeah, full time, believe it or not. It's we did our first film in two thousand six and then we became a nonprofit foundation in two thousand and eleven. So we've we've done twenty-seven that are airing nationally right now on American public television and around the world, and we're working on our twenty-eighth. And what we do is we have celebrities narrate all the films. So we've had Tom Selleck do a film, we've had Dan Aykroyd, we've had Gary Sinise do two, he's doing another one for us, Liev Schreiber. we just had Luke Bryan, the country singer, do one. Jim Nantz from CBS, Tom Brokaw, Dan Rather, Matthew Broderick. You know, just a just a cross section of people, even Bill Belichick, who hardly says anything at any time, narrated a Normandy film for us and he was tremendous. So yeah, so we do these films, we shoot them on location all over the world, and then we have these celebrities narrate them and it just has worked out really well. All right.

Host: Hit the pause button right there. How is it because of your experience in media as a sportscaster that you're able to connect with all of these celebrities? Or how does one do that?

Tim Gray: You know, it's not an easy process. We we kind of identify somebody that we think would be a good voice for a particular film and then and then we start the reach out process, which is generally going through their agents and the representative. I mean, there are a lot of people who have said no and that's fine. I mean, I try try get Steve Perry from Journey to do one of my films just because I love Journey. You know, I grew up in the eighties with my band stuff, and and I said, Wouldn't it be cool to be on the phone with Steve Perry talking about Journey? But there are a lot of them who just, you know, because of their busy schedules, just don't have the time to do it. But so it's a constant outreach in terms of people we want to have the films. I mean, Liev Schreiber is the gold standard along with Gary Sinise in terms of being able to narrate our films. So fortunately we have good relationships with them. So one generally leads to another. but it's not an easy process. I mean, it's anytime you're dealing with anybody in the entertainment world, there's layers that you have to go through and it's it's difficult. But We've been really blessed and fortunate.

Host: So start at the beginning, you you were doing sports casting. Was there an was there an overlap of the World War Two interest? or did you just like quit and then said, I'm gonna start a World War Two company?

Tim Gray: Yeah, that's basically what my my father said. He was like, What are you nuts? He's How are you gonna make how are you gonna make a living doing you know, this is kind of a niche thing, and he's a former journalist as well. I just always been interested in the topic since probably I was six years old. World War II has always been something since I picked up my first book. And so I've always read, I always have a World War II book with me. I'm always watching a documentary, I'm always watching a feature film. So that was from, you know, age six. So then being a journalist for 15 years, it teaches you how to write and to work under deadlines. I mean, we had two or three deadlines a day, you know, in television. If you don't make the deadline, then the story doesn't make error or you look like an idiot. So, you know, the writing is something I always really enjoy. That's why I got into TV sports, because I love to write and I love to do interviews. So then after having that run, I'm like, well, what's next? What else do I love where I can put that practice, my journalism degree that my parents paid for, put that towards My other passion, which is World War Two. So it's basically just taking the writing and the interviewing and everything else and just switching it all over from, you know, Tiger Woods and Shaquille O'Neal to Omaha Beach D Day veteran or Peleliu veteran in the Pacific or Guadalcanal or whatever it is. So but it's definitely been just totally rewarding in terms of the people we've met, people we've been able to interview and the films we've been able to do.

Host: So you have an extensive knowledge of World War Two. You have a passion for it. You're you're good at writing, but where where do the filmmaking skills come in? Did you hire other people or did you do it everything yourself? What's your background in that?

Tim Gray: I'm smart enough to hire other people to handle all the technical stuff. Like my wife likes to say, you know, stay away from an electric toothbrush, you're gonna stab yourself in the eye. So fortunately, I worked with some really good people in television who were photographers, videographers, and editors. Then when I started to do this, I reached out to them again, guys I'd worked with in other markets and said, This is what I'm doing, are you interested? And then all of a sudden they become my my My videographers, my editors, my sound people. So I handle the writing, the producing and and the directing of all the films, but I leave that up to the people who are really good at doing that. So it's like I said, it's just surrounding yourself with really good people. And that that that's the key to making any film, as you guys know. It's just surround yourself with people who are really good at what they do and let them do what they do best.

Host: Christian is really good at that. She's really good at rounding up people. She she's so good. They will do stuff for her. And

Tim Gray: her for free. I don't get that anymore. The first film is like, I'll give you a discount, but when you get to like fifteen and sixteen, they're like, mmm.

Christian: I'm sure it's absolutely gonna be the same in my situation, but I have to tell you, after this one where we did this collaborative effort and everybody is working volunteer, I don't ever want to do that again. I actually really want to pay people anyway. Yeah. people have worked so hard and the success of this film has been because of their blood, sweat and tears, and I do feel an obligation to, you know, compensate them for that anyway.

Tim Gray: Yeah, no, I understand. I mean, that that we have people, the people who work with us go above and beyond. I'd love to pay them more than I pay them now. And they certainly, because of the topic, take a discount because we're trying to preserve these stories for future generations. They take a discount. So narrators, a lot of the times, recognize as a nonprofit what we're trying to do. So Liev Schreiber, who would charge HBO tens of thousands of dollars to do some kind of program on their network doesn't when he when he's working with us. So what we're doing is important, but you you do want to to pay people because that's how they survive as well.

Host: Speaking of paying people, h if you're a non for profit, how how are you raising money? That seems to be one of the biggest challenges in the w world of filmmaking, period, but especially documentary filmmaking.

Christian: But can I interrupt before you answer that?

Tim Gray: 'Cause I'm just about to answer that question. Go ahead. It's your show.

Christian: I have to inter I have to interject because this intersects with how I met Tim and I absolutely love this. I learned about him when I went to Normandy for the 2015 anniversary and I saw advertisements for the World War II film festival. This was before I was a filmmaker, before I ever wanted to be a filmmaker, but all I wanted to do was go to that film festival because they had Band of Brothers actors there. And World War II veterans. That's kind of the thing. You can go and meet these people. And so in 2015, I was just I didn't even know anybody there and wasn't, you know, didn't go. But in 2018, that became my goal. When I knew I was gonna do a film, the one film I wanted festival I wanted to be in was his. That remains true to this day, is that I really want to be there. And but I knew he had done this. I knew he was like one of the preeminent World War II. filmmakers out there. And so I really wanted to know where to start. So I gave him a call. He was willing to talk to me. and but his email was, I'll talk to you as long as you're not asking me for money. And I was like, I am totally fine with that. I just need to you to point me in the right direction, tell me a few things. And so that was our first conversation. Cause I think what you shared to me, and I remember you saying this vividly, that Ra money raising part will be the hardest thing you ever do. That's what you told me.

Tim Gray: Yeah, it is. It still is. We've done twenty-seven of these and it's just a grind. It's not for for people who are who have creative minds, asking other people for money is a very difficult thing. My background was journalism, so I never had to ask anybody for money. I mean, I got a paycheck every every two weeks in direct deposit, but I never, besides you asking your parents for twenty bucks here or there, you know. It's not a comfortable feeling, but for some people it is. Some people are just total sales and want to make the sale and everything. It's not a comfortable thing. it it's just very uncomfortable for people with creative minds because they want to create. They don't want the stress of having to have the other resource that provides for you to create. and it's still very difficult. You have to make connections.

Host: It looks like you've become a a now that's become your job, I would assume, because not only are you making films, but you have a foundation that is doing very big things. You've you've made statues to memorialize people and events and things like that. And none of that is possible without raising money. So somehow you got comfortable with that.

Tim Gray: You make your peace with it and realize it's kind of a necessary thing. But but I always felt as though when we raise money, we have to get to the right people. We need to find that CEO whose dad landed in Normandy, or we need to find that CEO whose dad witnessed Pearl Harbor or was a Marine in the Pacific. this is something you need to make a personal connection. And that that's how we've been able to raise our money is is have these people involved like Fred Smith at FedEx, who was a Marine. who was very interested in helped bring the World War II memorial to Washington, D.C. We, you know, we we try to find people who understand our mission. If I were to go to somebody who had no idea about World War II, the chances are that corporate or that individual person is not going to give us any money. But we always said if we're going to do this, we have to, we have to appeal to someone's passion that they're proud of what their parents did during that time. And we've been very fortunate, not only the narrators that we've had, who all seem to have a World War II connection, But to the sponsors that we have who are either interested in World War Two or had a family member caught up in World War Two. So that's how we've been able to do, you know, and sell everything that we've been able to do. And we've been very blessed with the people that we've been able to find because knock on knock on wood and everything, they've come back year after year because they believe in our mission. But yeah, fundraising is not I haven't heard no this often since I was dating in high school. I mean, it's just kind of like You just get used to it, you know, you just become you get that thousand yard stare and you know, being in combat, you just okay, they said no, let's move on to the next one. Okay, they said no, let's move on to the next one. And you get ninety-eight no's and then the ninety-ninth, you get a Fred Smith at FedEx who says, I I believe in what you're doing. Here's some money for this project. So you hear a lot of no's, but you just have to believe in what you're doing and be persistent.

Christian: When Ken Burns said in the the only class I ever took about how making a film, which was his documentary class, when he said he keeps two binders of rejections on his desk, I was like, Ken Burns gets rejections for his project? Seriously? I was like, clearly that's just a thing.

Tim Gray: It is. It's a it's something you have to go through. It's like it's something you have to go through. Ken Ken Burns, to me, I've met him a couple of times. I mean, he's one of my mentors in the way he tells a story. It's straightforward. There's not a lot of computer graphics, there's not a lot of crazy music. I mean, it's really just visuals and it's strong writing and it's storytelling. But yeah, when he first started out, people were probably like, I don't know who Ken Burns is and why would I give you money? And then all of a sudden he does a series on Civil War and all of a sudden he's got some cachet and then he does something on baseball and it just goes from there. But yeah, I mean, people don't know, you know, anything about you. They're they're less likely to to give money, but you know, it's like er anything else. Anyone's achieved anything, they've all they've all been rejected at some point by somebody. I mean, Dean Smith, you know, kept Michael Jordan under twenty points a game at North Carolina, and he's the only one who's ever held Michael Jordan under twenty points a game because he was his coach and he just wouldn't let Michael become who Michael became. And so there's always something that you have to get past to to become who you are. And I think, you know, that's that's just it the same for filmmakers or or golfers or mechanics or who whatever field you're in.

Host: So good piece of advice, that's for sure. So we have a a lot of first time filmmakers who listen to this podcast. And so what what advice would you give going back to the beginning? understanding not everyone has a a background like yours and knows, you know, other cameramen and producers and things like that. What what advice would you give a first time filmmaker?

Tim Gray: My advice would be if you're going to do something, find something that nobody else has done before and do a story on that. Because you don't want to be lumped into that group that's done 150 documentaries on yoga. You wanna you wanna look at something and say, Boy, you know, no one's ever really done anything on this topic. I think I can be kind of groundbreaking in that regard, even though I don't have all the bells and whistles. So anytime we do a film, we always say, has this been done? If it's been done, how do we do it differently? And that's the first thing we always ask in any film that we do is how do we do it differently? How do we incorporate new interviews or or find new footage or or take it in a way it's never been taken before, whether that be with a storyline or a narrator or something. So everything we do, we try to to just make sure it's not been done in the same vein. And for any filmmaker, I would say you you can shoot a documentary with a with a smartphone these days with editing software and everything else. So it doesn't have to be a Ken Burns feature, but but find something out there that separates you from everybody else in terms of you know how how you present it, how you write it, how the story is told, and then that gets your foot in the in the door. And not every band is supposed to to sound alike. When Queen came out, they had such a unique sound. People didn't know what to do with it, but it was their sound and it was unique. And Freddie Mercury was, you know, an amazing talent and and they didn't know what to do with it because no one else was doing anything like Queen was doing, for example. but then it slowly progressed to Bohemian Rhapsody and and and everything else. So just do it a different way. That's the best advice.

Host: So if you had to look back at your career, I I think one of the first things you did was in two thousand six. so that's like fifteen years ago. If you look back over the course of your time as a filmmaker, what mistakes did you make that you learn from along the way that have made you better?

Tim Gray: That's a good question. I mean the first film is always That was a real financial like scratch it out. Our budgets are much bigger these days than they were for that first film. So that was like, let's get one under our belt as cheaply as possible. So we got to take six veterans back to France or five veterans back to France. And how do we make it look good on a budget of not that that much? And how do we not go in the hole on our first film? anything else, it's just repetition. It's the writing I think has gotten better. And you learn and you learn as a filmmaker when not to get in the way of the story being told. So sometimes what we'll do is for our films is I want my writing, I want the people in the film to be featured more than I want my writing to be. So what we do sometimes is we'll put all our sound bites into a timeline first, not even any narration or anything. I'll pick out all the sound bites I want and the order I want them to go in and the order I think the story's going to be told. And that forces me to then after all the sound bites are in and everything is Is tightened up and everything, it forces me to write really tight. So the emphasis is always on the stories because there's no way you want to take a Auschwitz survivor back to Auschwitz and get in the way of him not being able to tell you what he saw and experienced. And that to me is my greatest fear is that get in the way of a veteran telling a story, but with too much narration or too many other things that we add to a film. So to me, the most important thing is. let that person who was there and witnessed it tell their story and I can I can fill in around that. But you have to really, you know, I think that's something that we've learned over the years is is really reinforcing the fact that you let the people in the events become the focus and then whatever you need to do after becomes secondary or or third in the priority list.

Host: I love that window into your process. If you had to take us back a little further and give us a a you know, sort of the workflow of your process, can you do that? So you start with some story, an idea, and where does it go from there?

Tim Gray: It you know, we're we're working like we have we're working, we just finished one film, we're working on another, but I'm already in post-production on seven others. So what I mean by that is while I'm writing this new film, we're doing a film on Elvis in the USS Arizona Memorial, collecting interviews for a film I'm going to do next year on the Seabees for the 80th anniversary of the Seabees that Dan Rather's gonna narrate for us. So there's always that, because that generation's passing away so quickly that you you have to be bringing in resources while you're working on so you're multitasking all over the place. So I'm setting up shoots in California and Idaho, you know, this week and we had one in the UK last week. These are films I'm not going to be doing for two or three years. So it's just the juggling of recognizing what's in front of you and what you need two years out while also working on what you're working on now. And that's always juggling what what we do. And that's that's that's difficult. But That that goes into the learning process as well. We've had some great interviews die two days before we went to get them. veteran will pass away two days before we went to to to shoot them. So anytime we identify a film now, the first thing is get to the veteran, get to the survivor. You know, don't worry about anything else, no archival footage, anything else to get to that person, because once they're gone, it makes the interview a hell of a lot more difficult. So we do that. We identify a film. So I've got all my interviews for the Seabee film done and we're still we're not gonna get to that for another year and a half. I got interviews for a film on Merrill's Marauders done. We're not gonna get to that till next year. So I've got interviews for a film that on a French resistance that we won't get to for three years. I got all done because you need to get those done right now.

Host: I noticed that with Dick Winters because the film you know, came out in two thousand twelve, but I know he died in two thousand eleven. So you must have shot that, you know, in two thousand ten or something like that.

Tim Gray: Are you asking me to leave? Are you opening the door for me to leave or

Host: No, I was opening the door for my dog to come in, who's sitting there quietly scratching at the door driving Quiet dog. I've na you know, our dogs are like, you know

Tim Gray: Well, I mean we we sometimes we partner with other organizations. if we know like Dick Winters, someone has done an interview with Dick Winters, we'll go to the other organization and say, Listen, we we've got this film on Dick Winters coming up and and you did this great interview with Dick Winters. Do you mind if we have some of your footage? And most of the time filmmakers are in a in a in a pretty tight fraternity or sorority in a lot in some cases. They will share things with you. So we actually got Winters' interview Adam Makos and his family. Adam's written a bunch of New York Times bestselling books, but they were very tight with the band of brothers. So we got that interview from them while also conducting interviews with the guys who were alive at the time, like Bill Guarnere and Babe Heffron and and Buck Compton. So it's it's really a puzzle. It's just putting all the pieces together.

Christian: Yeah, and I would really encourage people to watch that. it it's called Dick Winters Hang Tough. And I have to tell you, I was just stunned by watching it 'cause I only just watched it for this and I'd not seen it before. So I was stunned how much your footage looked like mine. Yeah.

Tim Gray: It's similar, especially with with Charles. And you got some great stuff that I wish I had that in two thousand twelve I didn't know existed. So I'm really mad at you. and jealous. Alice and you know, I've kicked a few walls and I even talk in my sleep and my wife's like, Why are you mad at her? I'm like, Well, she's got this footage of Michel de Vallavieille that I should have had for my film and I didn't know existed and I'm pissed. But yeah, I mean it's just you know, that that that to me was talking with Charles who owns Brécourt Manor, who knew Dick Winters, and that those are the moments that make films.

Christian: Yeah, it's so interesting because and and Damian Lewis narrated that one. That was another celebrity actor that you got to narrate, that that was a great intersection. So you can find that on Amazon Prime. what was so incredibly interesting, you know, I told you in our own personal email that Charles had given me one of the coins that his father had made. And in doing so, he told me the story about Dick Winters that he told in your film. You know, it was just so for me that was an overwhelming moment. you know, that he gave me this challenge coin, that I will always cherish. But he's an amazing man, you guys he is an amazing man. get a chance to watch that. You can watch all of Tim's films on Amazon Prime, I think. Is that true?

Tim Gray: On there, you know what's what's interesting when you talk about filmmakers, Amazon has just come up with a new policy since we're talking about Amazon where they're not taking documentaries anymore. So a lot of people who have done documentaries in the past and have looked to Amazon Prime to host their documentaries so they can make money back for the money that they put into making those films. Amazon's got a new policy where they're not taking any more long format documentaries. And and that's a huge, huge blow to to filmmakers. You can you can Google that and read about their new policy and it took everybody by surprise and there are just a lot of emerging filmmakers out there who are doing such great stuff and and they have and they're able to make some of that money back and now they don't even have that opportunity. So I don't know where it goes from here. it's

Host: Interestingly enough, the the guest we have coming next week, his name is Alex Maier. He did a film, a documentary film on his journey kind of in you know, learning how to ski in the mountains. And he released it on Amazon and like, you know, in one month he made eight thousand dollars or something. I mean he was, you know, another month, a hundred, but you know, it still it was an outlet for him to recoup some of those costs. So that is a huge loss. D are they saying Do they take documentary series? Is it only just features or

Tim Gray: But they're just looking internally now for their own production and then that's the way Netflix is now, and and they've taken less from from the filmmaking community. And it's just the way a lot of them are. They're coming up with their own original programming and investing a lot of money in that, Apple too and others. So but this this this to me was just a huge blow because I know a lot of filmmakers who are were hoping to get their their stuff on. Amazon Prime and hoping to make something back of the money, their own money that they put in. It's it's too bad because there's so many great documentary filmmakers around the world who don't have this big outlet now to do this. And I hope they change their policy. I really do.

Host: Well, so speaking of distribution, it it looks like as best I can tell, your your model has been you make a movie, you write, produce, and direct it, does keep your budgets low, I'm assuming. and then you give it away. Yeah. So so talk to me about that financial model and that distribution model. They kind of go hand in hand. But tell me what your thinking is about that and how that has worked for you over the last twenty eight year, you know, films.

Tim Gray: Yeah, it's as a nonprofit, our mission has always been education. So what we do for our films, our model has been is that we raise all our money on the front end of the film to pay for everything that goes into the production of a documentary. and ours are not cheap because we're traveling back to the Philippines, we're traveling to Japan, we're going to Guadalcanal, we're going to Poland and Germany, and we go to Normandy every year and and other places. So the budgets not small budgets. for what we do. So we raise all our money on the front end through corporate and individual donations and sometimes grants. And on back end we make it available all for free by donating all of our films to American public television. Then they air nationally all over on public television and PBS stations around the country. So yeah, it's it's an interesting model, but our whole mission is education. So we don't want to bury or put a barrier up between the view and the content. So we also make all of our films available for free on our website. So every film that we've done is on our website, available to students and educators and the public. So it's a unique model, but as a nonprofit, it seems to be the model that works best for us for attracting corporate and individual donors because we all nonprofit. And on the back end, we are making this available for free as a resource. So you know, we're not a dot com. We're not looking to make money off these films. We're looking for people to to to get something out of them where they want to go and learn more about these men and women and and World War Two. So it's just a model that's worked for us.

Host: Can you speak to I on your website, Tim, you mentioned that you don't just make films, you you make them in a way that's geared towards educating students, like based on how students learn. Can you speak to that?

Tim Gray: We we try because students learn visually, we try as a conduit to hook them on World War Two with one personal story. It may be the personal story of Dick Winters, it may be the personal story of of the survivor we took back to Auschwitz and and Poland and Germany. The whole goal is to introduce the student or the educator to one story, then let them take it from there. We're not the be all end all. We're not the history channel. We're not American, you know, heroes channel. We're not some of these bigger, you know, networks. Our goal is to give them an introduction, a story that will hook their interest, so they'll want to go and learn more about D Day or Pearl Harbor. again, just being that conduit to learning more. The way students learn, as I said, visual, so now we're starting to do virtual reality films, half hour films where you can Have a cardboard viewer. I've got here actually. You've got this cardboard viewer, and you slip your smartphone into this cardboard viewer and you put it in here. And then you look through here. You go to YouTube. YouTube has its own virtual reality channel. It's got about 3.4 million subscribers. And you can watch the virtual reality film of what it's like to be standing on Omaha Beach in Normandy. While you're watching, standing among the waves and on the beach, you're hearing the veterans talk about their experience of landing there, and you're seeing archival footage of 1944. So you've got this immersive experience. Like Smithsonian has a video on here. If you put this on and you went to Smithsonian on YouTube, it's like you're diving with a shark, a great white shark in a shark cage. And when we give these to teenagers, the first thing they say is whack. And it's because they're in a 3D experience without those expensive Oculus Quest, you know, head headsets that cost seven hundred dollars. So we're trying to ramp it up with this new technology. So not only providing the films, now we're providing a VR experience. So we shot one of those in Normandy that's almost edited, and then one at Pearl Harbor on the Arizona Memorial and around Fort Island there. So we're trying to bring that now as our next step in the evolution of documentary filmmaking.

Host: What did somebody else have a question? Jason, was that you? No. When you shoot that, tell me how you shoot those films. What camera do you use? How do you shoot differently?

Tim Gray: I have no idea.

Host: You're the writer guy.

Tim Gray: I hire a film crew who has expertise in doing this. we hired one out of New York City. They bring these really cool cameras on tripods that look nothing like cameras. It almost looks like you put it down, it's got like a a rotating head on it that captures this VR technology. They do it with drones now. You can do VR with drones. there's this emerging technology, but I tell them exactly what I want and then they technically on their end go and do it, which I think is great. You know, there's a great line from the movie Kelly's Heroes or Donald Sutherland's character, you know, crap game lying in the sun, asking why are you not fixing the tank? He's like, I just drive I don't know what makes them work. That's the way I am. It's like I have no idea how all this works, but I know when it's done and the professionals who do it, it is spectacular. So I tell them what I want, and then they go and but I have some knowledge of the technology, but and the cameras look a lot different than a regular 4K camera and everything else. But when I see it completed, I'm my God. I mean, this is just like an immersive, you're almost standing on the beach. You're there in Norman. That'll get a student to go again, Google Normandy, or someday actually want to go and stand in the American Cemetery in Normandy and understand these 9,386 stars of David and White Crosses, why they're there. Because they've looked at it and said, wow, you know, I've seen this in VR. I'd really like to go see the actual place. So that's our goal. That's the next step in what we're doing. But again, it's surrounding yourself with the best, talented people, just talented people who do this for a living, whether you're writer, a a photographer, an audio person. I just work with some really, really great people and and let them do what they what they do and they always deliver somehow.

Christian: Well, and I feel like ha you know, it also helps not only to surround yourself with the good people that have excellent esc expertise in their field, but that are passionate about the subject matter. And that's what I really try to focus on. You know, f finding like-minded people who feel the way that I feel. And and your mission is very similar to mine. I have a passion to educate. I taught school for 10 years. I really know that children are our future, and if we can expi you know, inspire them. to think about things in a more expanded way. you know, looking back at our history and learning from that, we will be better off in the future. And so I just know that bringing along others who share that same vision is crucial to making a a film that is full of heart and that is well done for sure. And I see that in your work. I love your mission and how your passion for this has extended far beyond filmmaking. I mean Talk a little bit about your education center because you've taken that same mentality into this foundation. I haven't been to the building. You're in New Kingstown, right or South Kingstown in Rhode Island.

Tim Gray: So yeah, which is the southern part of Rhode Island down by the water. my wife was ha happy because everywhere I went, I'd bring back these artifacts and they'd end up in our finished basement. And after a while, we couldn't take people down to our finished basement because there was so much stuff down here. And I'm like, Hey, I think I should start a museum. And she's like, Yes, our museum. Start it tomorrow. So she had the she had the basement refinished when I got my last German helmet out of here. And so we have about 4,000 artifacts in in this education center that the kids can actually touch and hold air. And we have a cinema that seats about 40 and a library, about 600 books that kids can check out. So we had a lot of school kids coming in from all over Rhode Island and Southern New England until COVID hit. That stopped. So we've been doing a lot of it virtually, but the education center to me is a place where teachers will bring their students, and it's really the only exposure that class will get to World War II that year, because it's just not taught that much in schools anymore. If they do teach it, it's it's it's in a day or a half day or something like that. So the teachers find that their students get a lot more by coming to our place and having us give a tour and having seeing all these artifacts in color up close and everything else than they ever would get watching something in a classroom. for a half hour. So it's a very tactile experience which I think kids need. Yeah, so that the the center is really before COVID the center had really taken off. And we've got two storage units full of stuff that we can't fit in the building that we're in now, including a hundred and five millimeter howitzer, which is a very large field artillery gun.

Host: Looks like you're looking for a new space.

Tim Gray: Yeah, we're gonna have to get a new space eventually. Yeah. But it's been And that and that's become our office too. And we've had a lot of veterans come through there, but we've had a couple thousand students through, not one of them has ever been bored, which is great, which is makes me happy.

Host: That's exciting.

Christian: That's wonderful. I can't wait to visit there.

Tim Gray: Anytime, absolutely.

Christian: So Jason, Bradley, Josh, you guys have any other questions? I feel like I've been hogging a lot of the time.

Host: You have, Christian. You have. It's not surprising. Thank you for admitting it. I I I do want to before anyone forgets to ask what's the website people can go to to watch your films?

Tim Gray: Sure, it's easy. It's WWII, like World War II, WWII foundation dot org O R G.

Host: See, it's not easy. You confuse me right away. No, because right away I'm like, no, there's three W's. It's www dot

Tim Gray: Well yeah, if you want to put those in. I was trying to

Host: You did two W's and like W since when is there only two W?

Tim Gray: I'm gonna have to I'm gonna have to write this down. Let me go through the whole thing. It's www.i foundation.org. Or if we wanna not too many w's, it's just the www foundation.

Host: Yeah. yeah, so we're gonna put that in our show notes. Is there anything else you I mean, how can people support you, Tim, and the work that you do?

Tim Gray: Just go to the website and just check it out. And we really encourage students to visit and educators to visit. And just check it out and what we're up to and what we're doing. There are lesson plans with each of our films. We have lesson plans that go along for each film that the teachers can download. We've got a quizzes, we've got essay questions. So we make it so teachers can log in and become part of the the whole the whole website and then down after their students have watched the film, they can give them a quiz based on what we recommend and everything. So we've created this educational portal and we'll continue to move forward with the VR stuff and everything else. But I would just say, you know, for anybody out there who's a filmmaker, don't don't take no for an answer and understand that the beginning is always a challenge, but you can, you know, get to where we are by just a lot of passion and a lot of hard work. And And just as the soldiers did on Omaha Beach, I tell anybody, I said, you know, if you watch Saving Private Ryan, you know, Tom Hanks' character, Captain John Miller, didn't turn around and get back on the boat. You know, they were getting decimated. All you can do is move forward. And there'll be a lot of challenges and everything, but just keep moving off the beach. Put your head down, strap your helmet on tight, and just keep moving up forward and off the beach. And those guys ended up in who landed on D-Day, they ended up in in Germany and the war was over. So if you keep moving forward, you'll accomplish what You set out to do.

Host: Great words of wisdom for sure. Well, we really love having you on here. I'd love to have you back because I wouldn't wanna talk no nuts and bolts of distribution and all these other film nerd questions. I have so many

Tim Gray: To put people to sleep, yeah, all that other stuff.

Host: Yep. All right. Well Brad or Jason, anything else before we wrap up? I want a question from Brad. All right, Brad, up to you.

Brad: So I've been I the only question I have is and every time I ask this question I always get almost the same answer of they're all different, but do you have did you have a film when you've set out that you definitely was like, This is the film that I want to make, or do you have a favorite one that you you have made that maybe you had to wait a few to get your chops before you started it? But is there a favorite one that you've done?

Tim Gray: Well, Brad, they're all different. I love them all. I love them all. All of them equally they're yeah. They're all my children. I think any time you go back to a place like Auschwitz with a survivor who witnessed what happened there, I've been on a been to a lot of places. A lot of weird, you know, Japanese caves on Peleliu and Guadalcanal and and weird places and jungle and all kinds of things. The only time I've ever had a physical reaction was walking into a gas chamber. at Auschwitz, at the Auschwitz, there were three Auschwitz camps. And the first one is Auschwitz number one. And you walk into this room, and you walk into this room where there's a wooden table and a chair, and then you make a left into this chamber. And that's where the people would gather and they would be gassed. And then there was a room next to that room where the ovens were, where the survivors were the where they're were once survivors, where the dead were cremated right there. Walking into that gas chamber, I actually got lightheaded and I felt like for the first time in my life that I was having a reaction to a place where we were. When you walk into this chamber and you see fingernail marks on the concrete walls inside the chamber, people who are trying to claw their way out of these concrete, you know, concrete and s structures with no chance of ever getting out, but to see the fingernail marks, to me But that was such an impactful film because of the horrors that went there what took place there. I mean, I walked the same path that tens of thousands of of people walked who had no idea that they were about to die. They thought they were gonna be taking a shower and they would get their clothes back and get their jewelry back and and they would they would survive all this, but they didn't. Walking that same route was probably the most impactful and the most eerily God, thinking of the word. it just was such an impactful feeling. and if you don't believe in ghosts at that point, you never will. but to go back with somebody whose family was was killed and who survived Auschwitz and who had the job of going around the camp every day on the same route, he would take this wagon around. And he would pass all these families that were in this waiting area in the woods, and he knew it was going to happen to them. He knew they were all going to be gassed and cremated, but he couldn't stop and tell them that they were all about to die. This is when you don't get in the way as a filmmaker of a story. You let that person who saw it, experienced it, lived it, smelled it, tasted it, felt it. You let him explain to you what he saw, because that's as close as you will ever get to the reality and message. in a story. And the things he saw were just so horrific that to me that's probably the most impactful film that we've ever done. So not all are the same. It's called A Promise to My Father.

Host: And what's the title of that one?

Tim Gray: Izzy Arbeiter is the is the is the guy who survived. His parents and a younger brother were gassed and cremated at a at the death camp called Treblinka. He's married to a fellow Auschwitz survivor, so they're the only couple I know who both have tattoos on their forearms from Auschwitz. And he survived You know, he went on to to survive because of a promise he made to his father who was put in one line and Izzy was put in another line and Izzy survived and his parents didn't. And his father told Izzy when he was put in the other line, Izzy wanted to go with his parents, and he said, You his father knew what was going to happen, and his father told Izzy, he said, Just remember what you saw here today and never forget this. And Izzy didn't. He went on to live his life and always talked about the Holocaust. And so there is there is a probably a most impactful film that we've done. But I encourage anybody anybody to go back to to some of these camps like Auschwitz or Dachau and and just if you don't if you don't get lightheaded or get get a sick feeling in your stomach then then something's wrong.

Christian: Well, I appreciate you telling us about that. We all will need to go and watch that. I I wanna give a little plug for the Omaha Film Festival right now because there is a film in that film festival called An Inconvenient Time. And it is a a s a World War II Auschwitz survivor. she may have been in Treblinka talking about her experience. She was two and a half when she had to watch her best friend and the family be hanged in front of her eyes and she remembers it. So it is very powerful when you hear those survivors recount their tales. And so you can watch that. there is a link on thegirlwhoworefreedom.com slash festivals for the Omaha Film Festival. It says watch now and you can go there, you'll find our film and this inconvenient time film. well so Tim, what what can we look from you next? What's coming next?

Tim Gray: we're working on this Elvis and the USS Arizona film, which is a story about how Elvis Presley helped get the USS Arizona Memorial built. the effort to raise money for the memorial was struggling until Colonel Tom Parker, his manager, read an article that that about it, that it was struggling and asked Elvis if he would do a benefit concert at Pearl Harbor to help raise money for the memorial. So on March twenty-fifth of nineteen sixty-one, Elvis played at Pearl Harbor. And helped raise over $65,000 and really brought a lot of attention to the memorial to help it get over the finish line. And it's just a great story about how that came to be. We interviewed a lot of people who went to the actual concert, some of whom had witnessed Pearl Harbor happening as young kids. It's just one of those stories that, you know, it's got Elvis in it, which is great, and it's got World War II in it, which is great. And we hope it attracts an audience that'll again want to learn more about the Arizona Memorial. So we're excited that's gonna be out Veterans Day and it'll be shown at Pearl Harbor as part of the eightieth anniversary ceremonies as well.

Host: That's so exciting. Congratulations on that.

Tim Gray: With Elvis in it is like, you know, if I can tie Elvis to World War Two somehow, my day is mate.

Host: For sure, for sure. That's gonna be a big hit, no question about that. Tim, thank you so much for the

Tim Gray: Thank you guys. I really enjoyed it.

Host: Yeah, it's been great. And everyone listening, thank you to listening to Documentary First, where we believe everyone has a story to tell, and you can be the one to tell it.

Christian: Yes you can. Bye everybody.