Blondie
Written, Produced and Directed by Jason Goodman
I loved Blondie as a teenager. I knew their music and their story and I also knew that Debbie Harry and her longtime collaborator, Chris Stein, had a reputation for being difficult with the press. In many ways that was still true when I did Blondie – Behind The Music, and combined with long-running feuds within the band, I had to traverse some minefields to get this episode done.
It turned out that Chris lived around the corner from me in Tribeca, and we got acquainted in his rambling ground floor apartment (now the Tribeca Spa of Tranqulity). Chris told me Blondie was getting back together because he owed over a million dollars to the IRS, and Debbie had agreed to don her Blondie personae one more time so he could get out of debt once and for all. Now that is a great ex-lover.
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Behind The Music: Blondie • My Favorite Act • Written and Produced by Jason Goodman
I interviewed Debbie and Chris in a little Soho bar close to where Chris and I lived. It went well – except for the fact that Chris and I created an interview shot for him that was an homage to the back cover of The Beatles’ A Hard Days Night and VH1 apparently didn’t appreciate the reference. There was much hand wringing, and it was ultimately decided Chris’ interview would have to be reshot. We did but a lot of it felt like Chris was trying too hard to give the right answers. As you’ll see in this act dealing with Chris serious health crisis – most of the bites I ended up using were from the first interview, which even the network had to concede were better.
Debbie Harry’s interview from that first shoot which was really amazing – also ended up in the trash bin. By the time we shot Chris 2nd interview months later at Moomba, Debbie had had some cosmetic upgrades, so the decision was made to do her interview over again as well. So much for spontaneity.
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Behind The Music: Blondie • Written and Produced by Jason Goodman
My favorite moment was the day we did a b-roll shoot at 7 AM in a secluded spot at the back of Pier 40 by the Hudson River. It seemed like an unusual time for rock stars to be out, but it turned out that Debbie and Chris met for a walk at that hour virtually every morning. Debbie showed up with a six-foot bullwhip, and all I can say is that she’s really really good at cracking it.
Blondie’s Behind The Music ended up getting released on DVD as part of the Blondie No Exit reunion CD and tour. Led by the single, Maria, which went to #1 on the UK charts, getting back together did everything Debbie and Chris had hoped it would it made millions. Chris paid off the IRS, got married and moved upstate. I still see Debbie on occasion at strange events all over New York City.
