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Photographer documents entertainer's spirited fans
By SCOTT STEEPLETON
NEWS-PRESS ASSISTANT METRO EDITOR
As digital color cameras, some masquerading as cell phones, captured the scene outside the Michael Jackson trial on Friday, one man in the crowd toiled with equipment from a time when pictures came in black and white.
Sparky Greene, an Academy Award-nominated documentary film producer from Malibu, stood out in the crowd of Jackson fans and war protesters -- not just for wielding a Linhof 4-by-5 camera that dwarfed the rest, but because its Polaroid-type images take a minute or two to develop.
That's the difference between a snapshot and a piece of art, and since the images will ultimately end up in documentary form, art is what Mr. Greene is after.
"It's not really about Michael Jackson. It's about the phenomena of fans, and this is only a small part of what the project is," said Mr. Greene, 56. "Ultimately it'll be comic book fans and all sorts of other kinds of fans."
The cameras Mr. Greene typically works with are considered medium- and large-format, which means the negative is measured in inches instead of millimeters.
"I shoot 4 by 5, 5 by 7, 8 by 10. It's the medium of choice for photography."
Friday marked the first day of Mr. Greene's latest project -- and the fans didn't disappoint. Aside from cheering their idol on, Jackson supporters:
shouted down the antiwar crowd;
argued the finer points of credibility with members of the media;
had to be moved back by police after roughing up two women campaigning on behalf of abused children;
and were pushed back by officers after whacking a comedian and his TV crew with their signs.
Throughout it all, Mr. Greene clicked away while his son Jake, 17, worked a video camera nearby.
In 1976, Mr. Greene received an Oscar nomination for his documentary short "American Shoeshine," about black shoeshine artists. While rarely shown these days, the film screened in April to glowing reviews as part of an Academic Film Archive of North America show.
On the AFA Web site, the group's director, Geoff Alexander, described "American Shoeshine" as a "profoundly deep and entertaining introduction to the world of the black shoeshine artist (in which) a dozen or so shoe shiners are featured, armed with hot-poppin' rags and street-corner philosophy."
"This tribute to the rhythm and poetry of an important element of American life," he continued, "is one of the more important films documenting the life of the black worker in the U.S."
Mr. Greene's upcoming projects include a documentary on child soldiers in Africa and a graphic novel, which he described as a 200-page comic book.
As for the fascination with fans, he said there's something interesting about people who are devoted to something other than themselves.
"Typically people think about their own lives and their own situations," Mr. Greene said gesturing to the crowd.
"These people are devoted to something completely different. It could be Michael Jackson. It could be the Hulk."
e-mail: ssteepleton@newspress.com
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