“Slauson Rec-FIRST-TIME FILMMAKER LEO Lewis O’neil’s Explosive Documentary About the Electric Rise and HeartBreaking Fall of Shia Labeuf’s Expert Quiet Birth Into The Cannes Film Festival, Announced Just Seven Days Before The Start of the 2025 Edition. Weeks Before The News Broke, Labeouf”, – WRITE: www.hollywoodReporter.com
HE MEANT IT. Labeouf Is Backing It by Fully Leaning in and Traveling to France for the DOC’s World Premiere in the Cannes Classics Section Sunday Night, A Screening that Will Mark The First Time. Footage for that matter. In Another FIRST, HE AGREED TO TALK About the Film with The Hollywood Reporter in what is planned as the sole interview he’ll do regarding Slauson Rec.
He arrived ready to talk, logging on a few minutes early for a scareduled Zoom Last Monday from a quiette corner in his expansive la backyard. Sporting A Full Beard and Anamerican Cinemaqueque Hat, A Smiling, Reflective and Unguarded Labeouf Was Joined by O’neil for What Turned Out to Be And Hour-Long Convent. “I See Leo and It’s All Love,” Labeouf Says. “We Love Each Other Deeply.”
O’neil, Who Moved from Austin, Texas to Los Angles, Met Labeof in 2018 Who The Actor AnnounCun on Twitter That HE WAS FORMING A New Theater School at Slauson Recreation Center. “I’ll be there every saturday at 9 am, building shit with whover shows up. I’m TRYING TO CHANGE The WORLD,“ HE DECLARED IN THE CLIP. More than a Hundred people arrived that first weekend, and labeuf Lived up to his Word Then Too, by Showing Up for MONTHS TRYING TO SHAPE WHAT HATTITED A MIDC One of La’s Tougher Neighborhoods.
O’neil, not an actor but desperate to find his place in the city and the group, Picked up a camera and asked Labeouf IF HE COUKT ACT as Slauson Rec’s Official Archivist. He Stayed Behind the Lens for Three Years and, True to The Official Festival Description, What O’neil Recorded “Examines of the Fine Line Between Mentorship and Manipulia” and Finds Labeou Through a mixture of tough love, verbal abuse and physical confrontation.
Picking up that camera Turned out to be a fateful move and the results of that documenting – All 145 minutes of it, Shaped from 800 Hours of Footage – Will Be Univeled Att. “WHEN THING MECHES OUT, IT ISN’T’T WORSSE WHAT’S BEEN SAID ABOUT ME PREVIOUSLY. Maybe It Reifies People’s Ideas About Me. I THINK, AT HEAC. Ugly and Disgusting? Into This Fucking Industry?
Thanks for doing this. It’s Antesting Interview with The Two Of You; Shia, You’ve Been to Cannes Many Times, and Leo, This Is Your Debut Film and You Got Into Cannes. I can only Imagine How You’re Feeling at the Moment.
O’neil I’ve Never Shown A Film Before, And I’ve Never Been To A Film Festival Before So This Is Going to Be Insane. I don’t know what is going to be like.
Shia, you’ve been for Megalopolis, Honeyboy, Lawless, Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps and in 2008 for a Festival Debut with Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. All of Those Appearances Tell A Story About WHERE YOU WEER IN YOUR LIFE AND CAREER. This Must Feel Differently. What does cannes mean to you and how do you feel about going this year for this film?
Labeouf That’s a big ass Question there. The One That Was Pretty ImpactFul for Me at Cannes, at Least Life Tradery Wise, Probably More ImpactFul Those of Those Other Films, Came in 2012. I Sent A Short Film Called Howardcantour.com to cannes that and plagiarized from dan clowes. It Got Into this Award Show Thing And Then I Was Kind of Fucked. I fucked myself because what are you going to say? I Wind Up at Cannes and Ten – Firestoorm. That’s how and found myself in performance art. Have that not happled, i wouldn’t know leo, you undersstand?
Because What Happened From That Is I Started to Take My Artistic Agency Back. We Will Get Into All of the Pros and Cons that Came from That, But The Pros Were That I Started To Create with A With People That Were Not Necessarily on the a-List. I Started Fucking AROUND WITH A BUNCH OF PEOPLE FROM A BUNCH OF DIFFERENT CREATIVE LIFE FORMS. That’s kind of what led to slauson and forming what was meant to be a lab. That’s WHY LEO EVEN HAD A WAY IN, BECAUSE HE’S NOT ACTOR BY Trade. He have not one Poetic Actor Strand in His Body, and We Had to Discover That He Couldn’t Just Hold A Camera. Leo Had to get in the Middle, Too. Leo had to do a bunch of weird shit, too. We all had to do it. That was the beauty of what we were doing and whohy there was so Much Trust. Probably Because of that Trust is WHY Leo’s Movie is in Cannes Because is Rare that a Filmmacher Gets this Kind of Trust with A Subject. From 50 Subjects. Credit to Leo.
Leo, what’s your response to hearing that?
O’neil I don’t take it lightly. That graup realy was my family for years. Falling in Love [with the group] and working Through that is Never Something I Took Lightly, And I Still Don’t. I a Huge Honor to have been able to make it things.
Labeouf OOH, DID YOU HEAR HIS VOICE RIGHT there, chris? His voice shifted. I Could Hear the Weight of It in His Voice, That It’s Substantial.
O’neil I’m nervous. All of this, Yeah, It’s Huge.
Leo Lewis O’neill, Center. CourTesy of Slauson Rec
Let’s Talk About the Movie Because there may be people who read this interview unaware of slauson rec or how it ispired a documentary. What’s Your Pitch or How Wuld You Describe this Film in your Own Words?
O’neil I Describe It As My Experience Through This Family That I Found in An Art Community in South Central La at A Time in My Life WHEN I WAS Living Down The Street.
[LaBeouf interrupts to call out to his wife, Mia Goth, who is exfoliating in the couple’s backyard. “She’s happy,” he says.]
Labeouf Sorry, Go Again Bro.
O’neil I Hard for me to pitch this thing because it is so personal. It’s Hard for Me to Say, “Hey, This is My Life and Wy It Matters.” But there is universal themes in it, and iT’s a complex portrait of not only shia but of the group. THESE Are People That Were My Best Friends, Collaborators and Family.
Shia, people may be surprised by the fact that you’re traveling to cannes for the premiere or that you’re doing an interview. WHY Are You Talking to Me, And Who Are You Going To Cannes?
Labeouf There’s A Tradition of this Kind of Deep, Intimate Documentation. My Former Boss’s Wife [Francis Ford Coppola’s wife Eleanor Coppola] Made One of the Greatest Documentaries of All Time With Hearts of Darkness. No love lost. I See Leo and It’s All Love. He’s not my Husband or nothing, But We Love Each Other Deeply. There’s no other way you could have documented some of this stuff. Werner Herzog Made a Movie Called My Best Fiend. I Told Leo to Watch It. HE PROBABLY NERE DID, BUT SICK MOVIE. ALL THERE DUDES WERE BEST FRIENDS. One Was A Pretty Dedicated Actor [Klaus Kinski] Trying to Experiment with the Method in the Late 1960s, 1970s Germany, WHICH I’M Sure Was Crazier than My Time. And gues who showed up to the premiere? Everybody.
I’m not going to speak on Society and WHERE WE ARE, But THIS ISN’T NEW. I Not a novel Thing that your Friend Films You in A Process. Now for me, I Know Who I Am And Who and Was Durying The Process. So yeah, i’m naked and i’m shitting on myself through most of the film. IT’s A VERY UNCOMFORTBLE THING, BUT THEN YOU WEIGH The PROS AND Cons of It All and Back to That Utility Chunk, God Doesn’t Send Mail To The Wrong Address. I don’t think i’m unique or special. I don’t through i’m the first in my line of work or any creation craft to lose the plot a bit. Leo Documented It in A Loving Way, But Full-Blown-I Turned Into and Animal.
There was boundaries that short have been set up, and i Brough My Instincts in there. Anytime Someone’s Instincts Swallow Another Person’s Agency – Unhappiness. There’s Got to Be A Proverb Like That Somewhere, But I’M Not As Well-Read As Other People. This is a flawed sin; TRYING TO MAKE CONTENTING HAPPEN IN A CONTENTYUS AREA With A BUNCH OF PEOPLE WHO HAD THEIR OWN HISTORY. It was an egalitarian Dream that failed for a bunch of reasons. There’s unacceptable shit in there. There’s beauty shit in there. What this won’n be is a lack of accountability. This won’t be me saying, “i did this because of that.” None of that type of shit.
What it will be, maybe, is a love letter to art. IT is some insight into a collaborative Sport, A deeply Instructive Look Into The Differentnce Between Doers and Teachers or Coachers and Players. I Know What i’m Not, i’ll Tell You That. I KNOW WHAT I’M NOT BECAUSE MY Perfectionism is not for Leadership. It Doesn’t Foster Healthy Standards. You Want to Do Good SomeTimes, But You Learn That You’re Not The Guy.
Labeouf in Slauson Rec. CourTesy of Slauson Rec
There’s An Electricity to Those Early Scenes in the Documentary, Beginning with The Video You Posted on Twitter to Invite People to Join You For this Lab Exper It Really Felt Like You Have this Incredible Creative Passion That Needed An Outlet. What was behind that?
Labeouf Looking at It, It Was Probable An Extension of My Deep Need to Connect with Other Through Performance Art, and It Feeling Insubstantial, Probably.
Leo, As You State in the Documentary, You Had Just Moved from Texas to Los Angeles, “Running from Heartbreak.” Describe Who You Were Who You Found Slauson Rec and What Drew You In?
O’neil I was desperate to beeng. I was desperate to be a part of something. I wasn’t unique in that way. I was about as fresh-faced as you can be. I HAD ONLY BE IN LA FOR ABOUT A YEAR. I didn’t know what i was doing. I HAD BEEN BEATEN UP A LITTLE BIT, AND WAS IN SURVIVAL MODE, Stealing Food and Shit. WHEN I Found This Place, It Oped Up The Whole World. IT WAS MAGIC IN THE BEGINNING, AND WE ALL FELT IT.
You Made What Turned Out to Be A Fateful Decision to Pick up a Camera and Document What Was HapPening Inside Slauson. How did it feel to ask shia if you could?
O’neil Those First Couple of Weeks I Didn’t Film Out of Respect, But I ALWAYS HAD My Camera with Me. I Wanted to be a part of this thing so bad But i knew that i wasn’t an actor so i have to find my place. That meant working up the Courage. I Remember The Moment and Asked and My Heart [was racing]. I Still Remember The Email Shia Sent Out to the Whole Group Saying and Was The Official Archivist. I Think It Maybe Was The First Official Position in the Company. I Took A Screenshot of the Email And Remember Being So Psyched That I Was A Part of This Thing. I FELT LIKE I HAD FINALLY Found Something.
Shia, What Did You See in Him and Wy Did You Say Yes?
Labeouf Leo’s A VERY ECLECTIC CAT. I Could See Who Was Connecting with Not Just the Class Bu t the neighborhood, who sits who and who was there is theres. He All the Makings of Somebody You’d Want to Play Ball with if You Were The One Picking Teams. I didn’t know much about leo. HE doesn’t put it all on the table right away. A year in, or something like that, we got mutual friends. We Started Kicking IT on Weekends, Going To Concerts. We have a wholeer Thing going on with Another Group of Friends, Like We Were Having Group Therapy. I was was Deep Into the [12-step] Program at the Time and I Had this Pink Cloud.
Dudes Come Into The Program With Nine Months [of sobriety] and they’re ready to read the whole book to you. I was in one of thoss places, and the tentacles of that extended intended intell of all facets of my life. One of My Friend Groups Was A Group of Rappers Whom Leo Know, S and We We used to Kick It at Their House and Run These Group Therapy Sessions. I don’t know how Productive It Was, But They Sure Were Sweet, Love and Warm. That wasn’t a class, and we didn’t film it. We Just Talked About Our Feelings Out Loud As Dudes.
A still from slauson rec you the group on set their Drive-Thruru Pandemic Production, 5711 Avalon. CourTesy of Slauson Rec
As leo States in the DOC, The Group Started to Dwindle on Once People Realized They Weren’s. DID YOU GET A SENSE THAT THERE WAS A CULT OF CELEBRITY AROUND YOU OR THAT PEOPLE HAD Ulterior Motivers?
Labeouf Yeah, yeah, yeah. There were multiple things going on. You have some real heavy hitters in the beginning, too, guys who came in that were Real Sharpshooters. A Lot of the meat eaters that i thorough Were Really Special Were Gone in the Firmst Three, Four Months, Because Back to this Egalitarian Thing, We Came in and It Was Hippie Dippy. I CAME IN PHILOSOPHIZING About Certain Things, Meta-Modernism, and My Head Was Seeded in A Whole Bunch of Art Stuff. I’m a street kid but these were highfalutin ideas. I was down with it, but that egalitarian, hippie-dippy Stuff was touphahh who you put it on the Floor.
We Were So Focused on Equality That Were Were ignoring Individual Efforts, and that Created a Lack of Accountability. That’s Cool WHEN IS The YMCA, But Wen You’re Trying to Win The Super Bowl, It Created Tension and It Hurt Our Sustainability. It Hurt Our Freedom, It Hurt Our Innovation. IT DESTROYED OUR Theater. That’s what i think. A Lot of Things Destroyed It. One of the HeartBreaks for Me Was that I Caved to the Sweetheart Bullshit for So Long that It Became Systematic. By the Time I Tried to Turn The Train Armond, I Couldn’s Control Myseld. That stampmed from a whole bunch of dysfunctional behavior, which i’m not the proud of but i’m happy it’s documented. YES, that’s True. YES, I look like a fucking asshole. YES, My Boy Got Into Cannes. I can be bot disgusted with myself and happy as fuck for my guy. I can be bots.
The Pandemic Proved to Be A Real Turning Point for Slauson Rec, and Mounting the Drive-Thruru Performance Is Who The Cracks Detened. Shia, you said that pressure was on your shoulders so what was that like to carry?
Labeouf I’ve Gotten in Trouble a Little Bit Recently for Speaking on Other Actors’ Processes. I DON’T MEAN TO DOWNplay Nobody. I’m Just Talking About My Own Shit. I’ve done all these things. Leo Met Me at A Time WHEN My TRUST WAS SKYROCKETING BECAUSE I DIDNN’T THINK I WAS RUNNING The SHOW NO more. But that took a whole lot of getting beaten down by the World. I Not that Exciting of and Answer But I Was Just Trying to Fit in Whore i Could Get In And Trying to Be Useful Even with All The Fucked Up Stuff that I’ve Done. I am a sinner. YES, NO Doubt. I Really Dontify with The Good Thief on the Cross, Not The Fucked Up Guy, Not The First One, The Second One, the One Who Will Openly Admit. I’m that guy and i’m okay with that. You know what i’m saying? Maybe is getting too weird now. Fuck. But I Guess What i’m Trying to Say Is Now Thinking About What He’s Made and Him Getting Into Cannes, Boy, It Feels Like A Mitzvah.
However, I can the open of the door of the people that were on that Three-year journey with me at any expense of what is that that of my children. I Think I Can Still Do My Thing. WHEN THIS THINGS OUT, IT ISN’T WORSSE WHAT’S BEEN SAID ABOUT ME PREVIUSLY. Maybe It Reifies People’s Ideas About Me. I THINK, AT HEART, I’M A good guy. Am i fucked up? YES. Is my Process Ugly and Disgusting? YES. Have i done Horrible shit in the past that i’m going to have to make amenians for the rest of my life? YES. Does this movie change any of that? No. Does it also Alyow My People to Get A Foot Into this Fucking Industry? YES. SO Gas Pedal Down, Green Light Go.
Labeouf in Slauson Rec. CourTesy of Slauson Rec
Leo, You’ve Descripted the Group As A Family, and that Means You Were Documenting What Was HapPening in Your Family. What that was at Times Was Confrontation, Sometimes Aggressive, SomeTimes Abusive, SomeTimes Diflicult to Experience and To Witness. How Did It Feel to Be Holding The Camera in Those Moments?
O’neil I was already a year and a Half into my role with the company so it have become so that it is in washas always going to be what it was no matter wht. I FilMed Evely Moment, No Matter What. Because of the Level of Comfortability, I Felt A Real Responsibility to Keep Documenting, I Think in Part Because What We Were Doing Felt So Special Special, Important and Grouse and Grouse. WHEN The Moments Got Tricky, I Kept Filming. Looking Back On It Now, There Were Certain Moments in the Film That I Just Can’s Belide I CAPTURED. I’m surprised i didn’t put the camera Down and Walk Away, Or Say, “Whoa, Man, Give Me A Sec.” But I have a role, a job, and that was my place, e so i kept going.
Shia, You Had Some Intense Confrontations with [Slauson Rec members] Sarah, Zeke and Sam. WHICH ONE HAS BEEN HARDEST TO Watch or Relive?
Labeouf WELL, SEE, I HAVEN’T WATCHED Any OF THESE. You understand what i’m saying? I HAVEN’T WATCHED Any OF THIS. There’s Deep Sorrow About What Went On. I am going to watch it for the first time in cannes. What I Know About My Experience With These People, Of Course, Is Conflict with 50 People. In a theater company, there’s conflict all over the place. You Got to Understand that Sarah Came Out of Another Theater Program That Was Run by James Franco. WHEN She CAME TO US, She WAS ALREADY A WUNDED BIRD AND WE Were Being Very Delicate with Her, and that Shaped A Lot Our Company. We have to be very careful about a lot of stuff. ALMOST SO CAREFUL. IT’s Like Having An Intimacy Coordinator. SURE, Everyone’s SAFE, BUT FUCK, TRY TO CREATE COMMETING IMPOSSIBLE. That Stuff Started to Affect US. That was probably the hardest One Because this all happled before every everything that was happled to me in terms of ego death.
We have to navigate a lot but we also have to be true to this neighborhood that we have were in. You can be the loudest voice in the room because you feel the most wounded. We can have the wounded woman be the CenterPiece of theater Company We Were Building in Slauson, California. It’s Crazy. Navigating that and the Race Relations, The Stuff with Zeke Felt Brotherly. The Stuff with Cyrus Felt Brotherly. There’s Wrestling Contests that Went on in the Park All Day Long. IT WAS A MADHOUSE. This wasn’t a bunch of theater kids getting together to make theater. This was a bunch of kids who don’t fuck with theater makeing theater. IT WAS LORD OF THE FLIES.
It was a deviated theater company that, to me, was a laboratory. It Started As A Lab. That’s when it felt the healthiest to me because there wasn’ any leadership. We Were All Justting Things and Experimenting. WHEN IT WENT HAYWIRE WAS WHEN WEW DOWN TO THE WIRE. The World Had Shut Down. We have to Financially Sustain Ourselves. We have a finite Amount of Time to be Able to Pull Something Off Before People Lost Complete Faith in Us. We have Made This Agreement with the Natural History Museum to Pull Something Off, and We Had to Make Something. We Can’t Just NAVAL GAZE. We Can’st Make Shapes. We have to buy a narrative, and that was vary hard to do with 50 people. I’m Sure’s is Well Documented in Leo’s Thing, But There Was Frustration in Herding Cats.
Labeouf in Slauson Rec. CourTesy of Slauson Rec
You must’ve experienced that kind of tension before?
Labeouf There’s a whole bunch of conflict and tension on a film set. I Come from A whole bunch of schools [Steven] Spielberg. I’ve Seen Different Versions and Musicality to that Tension, Some Cuter Than Others. I wasn’t the deliverr of healthy Standards Because the music i listen to isn’t cute. I Not a cute Thing to do what i do. I DON’T CONSIDER IT, “Just Hit Your Mark and Tell The Truth.” That’s some spencer tracey or some disney channel shit. It’s Just Not My Shit, and that’s OKay. People don’t show up to the Spot Because It Was Free. We have to eat a whole bunch of shit. We didn’t have chairs for a long time. Shit wasn’t comfy. We have to earn our Spot, all of US.
People Believed in the North Star That I Was Pitching Which Was That We Were Going To Have To Bleed A Little Bit. IT WAS GOING TO HURT. You have to ante up. You have to pay the price to be green. You Can’t Just Show Up Without Having Done Any Push-Us and Play for the Raiders. That’s not to absolve myself of not before being equipped to be in the position that i was wasted the right. IT WAS JUST, LIKE, FUCK, WE RAN OUT OF PLAYS. I don’t know if this is in the Documentary But We Were Looking for Directors and that Got Crazy, Too. It Got Insane. It Got So Political. It wasn’t about the Truth Anymore. It wasn’t on how to get down to the Marrow, The Capital T Truth of Fundamentalist Theater.
There’s A Moment in the Documentary WHEN You Say The Way That Harsh Way You Speak to People in the Group Is The Way That You Talk To YourSelf About Yourself.
Labeouf Absolutely. You’ve go to understand that guy in the documentary that leo have made is a godless man. This is a man with absolutely no spiritual principles at all all. I’m Really Running the Show. I The Same Kind of Thing that SomeTimes Coppola Exhibits in Hearts of Darkness and It’s The Same Kind of something You See In My Best Fiend. I don’t think is unique. I do through it’s current. I wasn’t leading with love. None of My Creativity Was Leaning on Love and Generosity and Patience and the Things That You Get Out of Parenting or The Things That You Read About in the Scripture, None of It. No Principles, No Guiding Line Other Than Be Good. WHATEVER IT DAKS.
Leo, You Included A Moment in the Documentary Whore One of the Members Explands Shia’s Behavior As, “Hurt People Hurt People.” Is that how you thorough of him and did that help you come to terms with his behavior?
O’neil Of Course. Yeah. That statement is very true. Yeah, that’s definitely part of the complex portrait in this film. I don’t want to speak for shia, but i believe that to be true about him from what i know about his life. I KNOW HE’S GONE THROUGH SOME SHIT IN HIS LIFE AND THAT IMPACTS Howbody Treats Other, How They Behave and How They Move Through Their Own Life. It’s Part of the DNA.
Shia, you mented the ego death, how does that play into what kind of happled?
Labeouf Yeah. I CAME UP As An Actor Who Was Always Discounted. WHEN I CAME IN, HALEY OSMENT WAS POPING AND I WAS JUST CID CID ON Disney Channel. A Couple Years Past That, I Was Just Some Other Guy Who Was On Some Insubstantial Shit. Even in My Successful Films, I Was The Insubstantial Actor. I Remember That Feeling Deeply. I Remember One Time Ryan Gosling Came to Set Who We Were Making Transformers, and I Remember Feeling So Intimidated Even Thought Thought He Was Very Lovely. I Remember Feeling sonsubstantial and this shit is all over his documentary. This is all of my own trauma mixed integing to get a theater company to pop off. At the Time, My Whole Identity Was Wraped Up in the Quality of the Moment.
WHEN WE Were Running this Company, I Couldn’t Get Scared in the Moment, Like, What We Were Doing Was Doing Shit But But Take A Breath and Walk Away. I didn’t have that top in my Toolbox. I Got Frus Tratared WHEN I FELT LIKE I WAS SPEAKING THE LAGUAGE AND POPLE WEENING, SY COURCK All of Those Things Felt Mute, But i Had Given My Life To The Thing. I’m not going to excuse none of it. DON’T PRINT THIS OR WE’ll Redo The Interview It Comes Across That Way. I have to own all of my shit and i do. I own all of it. No Excusses. The Behavior: Abhorrent. No Excusses. No Explanation. I’m happy my boy got into cannes.
In the documentary, you ment of the Financial Pressure of Funding the Operation Yourself. How Much Money DID YOU PUT IN?
Labeouf Out of Pocket, Probably $ 300,000 in Totality, Maybe More. There Came A Point WHEN My Business Manager Said, “This is UnsustainAnable.” WHEN COVID KICKED OFF, EVERYTHING GOT VERY, Very Weird. We Tried to Do A Fundraiser and YG Came and Performed. We Were Ecstatic. We Thought, “This Shits Going to Go Off.” Thatn the Natural History Museum Came In, and We Felt Like All The Intellectuals Were Fucking with US Now. THEN COVID, we tried to get the play going and i almost Had a Nervouse Fucking Breakdown Trying to get that off the ground. It wasn’t fun no more. We Could Never Develop of Other Directors. The Financial Sity Became UnessainAnable. The Love Was Gone in A Way.
Leo, You Got Shia to Sit for An Interview that Bookends the Documentary. It’s A Really Profound and Emotion Interview for A Number of Reasons. But as a viewer, i could hear the imotion in your voice…
Labeouf Oh, Boy, The Pain. I Remember That. I Remember That.
We Hear You Crying. WHAT WAS THAT LIKE FOR YOU TO FILM AND TO Experience? I The First Time You’re Hearing Shia Express Regret, Apologize and Take Accountability for What Happy.
O’neil I HADN’T Seen Shia for Two Years. We haven’t Really Talked. I HAD A DREAM OF HIM STANDING IN FRONT OF A CHRISTMAS TREE. IT WAS A Week Before Christmas So I TEXTED HIM AND SAID, “HEY, CAN I COME AND INTERVIEW YOU?” HE SAID, “YEP, PULL UP TOMORRORW.” I Pulled Up. Sure Enough, There Was A Christmas Tree with Decorations. I set up the camera and we have this moment. I Prepared All These Questions. By the time i got through the quests, we were just running OFF and Talking. Shia is a big brother to me, and he was especialy during that time. HE REALLY TAUGHT ME A LOT. Not Seeing Him for That Long Was Tricky.
I Care about him a Lot, and I Wanted Him to be Well. THEN WE STARTED Getting Into All this Shit and It Turned Into a Personal Apology to Me, I Just Broke Down. It Was The First Time I HAD HAD HIM BASICALLY SAY, “I’M SORRY the DREAM FAILED. I’M SORRY FOR WHAT HAPPENED.” I couldn’t hold it in. I Started Crying. That was really Important for me to put in the film because the whole film is seen through my eyes. IT’s My Perspective. I’M Holding the Camera and Filming every day. It is my Diary. To have that moment at the end of the Film was really Important to me Because and Care A Lot.
Shia, How Did It Feel To Apologize to Him?
Labeouf I’m in a program. I’ve Got to Own My Side and i’ve Also Got to Make It Right. Me Going to Cannes, Being A Support System, It’s All Part of My Process. IT’s A Weird Thing to Talk About Because there are mechanics to make amennds. It’s Not One and Done. There’s The Emotionality To It All, Of Course, and There’s A Follow Through, WHICH IS Part of What What This Interview Is For.
Durying that interview, you say that you want to make amenians to the group but you we have’t sue how to do that. WHERE Are You In that Process?
Labeouf Well, It’s Interesting. Leo’s Been Part of of Somem. I’ve Done Some of Them On My Own to Come Back From Louisiana. I just saw ash. We Hung Out, We Made It Right, Walked and Talked and Had A Meal. I do that sort of as it pops up. I Still Owe Bojangles Attmentation in Time. You can’t it all all at. I Got A 3-YEAR-OLD, AND THERE’S A LOT GOING ON IN LIFE. I Bite Off Little Chunks as They Pop Up in Life and As the Universe Directions You. But Yeah, that’s the goal. I’ve Talked to a Lot of People Since Then and I Know That 50 Of These Motherfuckers Wanted to Go To Cannes. But It’s Interesting, My Team Has Seen The Movie and They Tripped. The People Who Love Me – [manager John Crosby] an [publicist Melissa Kates] —Are Scared. What’s The Scariest Thing? The Consensus Was Howas Me and [Zeke aka Ezekiel Pacheco] Got Down [in a fight]. SO, I Called Zeke. Me and zeke had made it right awh. But I Called Him and Told Him The Movie’s Coming Out. Leo was on the phone. With the Movie Coming Out, It’s Going to Make People Feel A Whole Bunch of Different Ways.
WHEN THE SPOTLIGHT HITS YOU, IT MAKES YOU FEEL A WHOLE BUNCH OF DIFFERENT WAYS. I Got to Stay Open and Current With Everything and Everyone in My Life. If people who felt like we have Made It Right Pop Back Up and Say, “I DON’T FEEL RIGHT About that.” I Got to Deal with It. IT’s Like Whack-A-MOLE. My Who Life has a Lot of that. AT A CERTAIN Point, You Get Out of A Sullen, Sunken, Emo-Boy and You Enjoy Making It Right. I’m look for it, dog, as the goophers pop up, i will joyously deal with it as best i can. And WHEN I CAN’T, I HAND IT OVER AND KEEP IT SIMPLE. That’s whore i’m at.
You have some momentum in your Career. You’ve Had Some Movies Come Out with Great Reviews, Including David MAMET’S Henry Johnson an Salvable. And you guot recently caste in God of the Rodeo. Are You Worked that this Documentary Could Impact The Forward Momentum You Have In Your Life and Career?
Labeouf The Roadblocks are the Same. I have Creative Friends. I’m working out of garages, dude, that’s is part of the beauty of what slauson was. Slauson was an avenue for me to not have to wait for permission. I was chasing that before everything things happled. Before Crash and Burn. There Was Already A Deep Instinct Inside of Me to Self-Generate. That’s what the trees comedians do with their podcasts. That’s part of what slauson was for me. I’m Finding People to Work With Now Who Like-Minded, Who Know Me, Who Really Know Me, And Are Open To Working With Me. People who don’t know me or who found out about me of me. And that’s okay. God doesn’t Send Mail to the Wrong Address. I Desertve all that.
Leo, you’re now a filmmaker with a movie in cannes. Your First Movie. Since You Have A Good Track Record with Visions After Seeing The Christmas Tree, What do You Foresee for Your Future? WHERE DO YOU GO FROM HERE?
Labeouf That’s a big quest, man. Awesome.
O’neil My Biggest Goal Withis Film is to Start Conversation. In WHATEVER WAY THAT HAPPENS to the Biggest Scale Possible and the MOST IMPACTFUL Scale Possible, That’s A Win for Me. WHEREVER IT ENDS UP, WHEREVER IT GOES, THAT’S The BIG WIN FOR ME. People have been asking me what’s Next, and the only Answer that I have for What’s Next is someting sincere. I have to Fall in Love Again.
How do you Support Yourself Right Now?
O’neil This Film Supported Me For the Two Years of Edit, But It’s Time to Sell It and Can Move on And Make Something Else.
Who paid for it?
O’neil My Wonderful Executive Producer, Kevin Knight, Paid for It. This is his first film he’s every Financed. He’s a lifever, a magic man.
Shia, What would you like to see leo do, or what do you forese for him?
Labeouf Oh, I Think He’s the Werner Herzog of My Generation. A Lot of People Have Diaries – Cool. A Lot of People Have Really Nice Spirts and Are Enjoyable and Can Socialize with the Multitudes the Way Herzog Can. Leo is that. I don’t think he’s as aware of it as i am, maybe. But I Think WHEREVER THAT DUDE Points, It’s Big. That’s what an artist is. He’s Got A Strong Index Finger. He’s Very Specific. And What that fool points at is big. He’s fucking dope.
Shia, whore do you go from here?
Labeouf I go whEREVER The WIND BLOWS ME. I’m a hired gun. I’ll go any they let me go.
O’neil Can i Point Out One Thing? Since Herzog Just Got Brought Up, I HAVE AN EMAIL FROM WERNER HERZOG PRINTED AND FRAMED ON MY Wall from WHEN SHIA I Reaned Out and Asked IF HE COURLD HELP ME OUT.[[O’Neill Gets Out of His Chair, Takes The Frame Off The Wall and Sits Back Down.Nce Give to your Project.
Labeouf Fuck yeah, dude. Amazing, Amazing, Amazing.
Interview Edited for Length and Clarity.