Meet Zinzi Gugu Johnson | Director and Mom

We had the good fortune of connecting with Zinzi Gugu Johnson and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Zinzi Gugu, any advice for those thinking about whether to keep going or to give up?
The question of how to know whether to give up or keep going is a fascinating one. I have known my fair share of cataclysmic failures both personally and professionally. Most recently, I was an unsung hero in the making of a now Grammy winning star. The heartbreak of being forgotten or erased from many years of heart driven labor did keep me in bed for a time, but my tenacious and work-driven spirit keeps expanding. I think recognizing one’s own worth and stardom, over and over, whether others can see it or not, is a crucial ingredient to survival. One of my heros, Dolly Parton, says you can wallow for three days, but that’s it. I am working on that.

I am extremely proud of myself, whether I exist in the margins or not. As an artist and filmmaker (director) who depends (sometimes unhealthily) upon other people to make the work, I can honestly say that there is no ‘giving up’ because to give up is to die. Without art making, there is no living. Period. End of story/beginning of the next story. Having children has trapped me alive in the best possible way. I have no choice but to…just keep swimming. With every professional disappointment, fabulous new idea buds come through to the rescue. As my friend the artist Georgina Treviño says, if you’re lost, make work. And the work will show you where to go. My current body of work is called “Feelings” and it is a series of short films (on film) built to teach America how to feel. The mechanics and nuance of feeling has been subdued by our culture machine and it’s been really fun to chart the major feelings filmically for my own benefit. Cello star Andrew Yee’s extraordinary soundscaping really supports the audience in embodying the feelings I am dissecting. I think the cello is one of the best instruments to express matters of the soul.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
I like to say my work is to feel no matter what. I have played around in many formal mediums and it was a long road to get ‘here’. You see, my primary life’s mission was not to be an entertainer or artist, but a diplomat.

When I didn’t get into the Woodrow Wilson School of International Relations at Princeton, despite my uncle’s notable financial devotion to the school and my being ‘good enough’ to go there, I fell deep into the liminal space. I came up for air at Northwestern University, a very norm core institution that boiled down us weirdos into a small group of inter-age artists. The classical music school at Northwestern is one of the best in the world and I started photographing my extraordinary friends. It was here that I discovered that music was all that I cared about. Then I dropped out and got married at 19 years old. Fast forward to San Francisco, I left my handsome young husband for an aspiring rockabilly frontman and with my devotion and his momentum he almost broke through. It was a house of cards, though, and I lost my nerve. Many worlds slipped through my fingers at this time.

Next, while working in the sound department for some of the greatest filmmakers on the planet I realized that the heft of traditional Hollywood filmmaking was not for me. I decided I wanted to tell stories with fewer resources, due to environmental concern. I started directing Death of a Groupie during my off hours, a rambling, scrappy saga about people as animals. This project fell into void for many years – turns out you need significant resources to complete television shows. I’m pleased to say that Zaria Gunn, chat GPT, and I are currently cruising through 12 episodes. In fact, when I learned about chat GPT I got down on the ground and wept big tears of gratitude. The series needed to marinade. After San Francisco I moved to Paris and then to Los Angeles where I founded my women-led production company Piece Orange Productions. I spent at least a decade enmeshed with musicians. I did a lot of work that I ended up not having the rights to. I made a lot of music videos and it was really fun and creative but also undervalued. I have outgrown the format. My biggest advice to filmmakers is to make work you have control over because there’s worse than getting to the finish line and realizing your work is not yours. Get good contracts.

Somewhere in that codependent decade I had 2 beautiful children and got married to another incredible artist who also went to the San Francisco Art Institute. Right now I am in a very adult and well informed moment of my career. I have a wonderful feature length film under my belt waiting for her debut. Currently, my producer Naimah Holmes is working on the business side of my first mainstream gesture as an unattached director and the project is called Horse Tour. Along with horse wrangler Abby Apple, I’ve been developing this documentary series for about a year and a half and I hope soon it will require no explanation. Right now, I am not at liberty to discuss in detail. I can say, however, that our project supports the sisterhood, the environment, and music without the fanfare or waste generated by standard touring.

This week I am shooting the third iteration of Feelings, called Fears. Tyler Weinberger is my DP and we are shooting on black and white film. There will also be a live alligator on set.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
OMG fun question. I live in Ojai which is a little paradise about an hour and a half away from LA. I would take my friend to the hot springs at Ecotopia which are for locals only at this time. We would eat oysters at Rory’s and go to the Dutchess for Burmese food. We would go to Light and Space for Ecstatic Dance on Thursday night. We would hike up Cozy Dell and watch the Pink Moment descend over the mountains (when the mountains turn bright pink at sundown). We would visit Theresa’s orchard and pick fruit! We would play with my kids and sit in my beautiful yard.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?

I’d like to thank my artist husband, David Otis Johnson, for allowing me to swim along the bottom of existence, my parents Sharon and Amos Miller (also artists), my children Olive and Lovie (also artists), my manager Anthony Erickson and mentor Heidi Johnson for giving my confidence a kick in the ass. Friends and hype people Jaime Rodriguez, Dianna Cohen, the iconic Leticia Lessmin, Yancy Schwartz and Lonnie Graham. I’d like to thank Rabbi Susan and Zadik Zadikian for ‘seeing me’. Also I’d like to thank my children’s G-dmother country music star Sierra Ferrell for inspiring me to take up space and keep going no matter what heartbreak I face. G-d also helps. I believe strongly in higher purpose and calling and I try to get curious when things don’t go ‘my way’, because I know something better is coming along. Faith is such a gift. Lastly, I’d like to acknowledge David Lynch who inspires me endlessly. Both his insistence upon creating dark work from a healthy place and his pictures themselves have pulled me back to center time and again. I see in his passing an opportunity to grab his message and carry it forward. His recent passing while fires raged in Los Angeles was so iconic it gives me the chills every time I think about it. What an absolute legend.

Make dark work from a happy place, and never give up.

Website: www.pieceorangeproductions.com

Instagram: @zinzigugujohnson

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dnt-wqwg8Ws

Image Credits
Legend Henry Diltz did my headshot with the kids.

Becky Bunz shot the portrait of me from behind.

Craig and Mallory in captured me in their talk show Midnight Across America talking about Crying

The black and white stills are from my film Tears starring Ozzie Juarez and Sierra Ferrell, shot by Tyler Weinberger and scored by Andrew Yee.