With “The Assassination of Richard Nixon,” co-writer/director Niels Mueller didn’t want to change the world. He did, however, want to return to a style of character-driven filmmaking he grew up loving as a young burgeoning filmmaker. It was a four-year journey, starting with a script completed in 1999 and involving the life of a little-known would-be assassin whom history has relegated to nothing more than a footnote. With Sean Penn on board to star, things should have been easy.

Then 9/11 happened, and everything got harder. But through perseverance and the help of friends like “Sideways” director Alexander Payne and “Y Tu Mamá También” director Alfonso Cuarón, as well as continued support from Penn, funding finally came through and Mueller was able to shoot his debut film exactly the way he wanted. Now, with Oscar talk hovering around Penn, I was able to spend a few moments speaking with the freshman filmmaker via phone about both response to and the trails involved in bringing “The Assassination of Richard Nixon” to the screen.

While he wasn’t exactly at a loss for words, Mueller was unfortunately suffering from a decided lack of sleep. But then, traveling back and forth across the country to promote a low-budget indie will certainly do that to you.

[Some plot points are discussed. A few spoilers may follow.]

Niels Mueller: I’ve been getting such great responses from audiences it’s exhilarating, but then you end up staying up talking to people who want to discuss it and then your start with the press the next morning so you don’t get a lot of sleep.

You know, look it, I’m not complaining; it’s been a really gratifying response.

Sara Michelle: And that’s good to hear because it is a good movie.

NM: Thank you.

SM: I just watched it again last night.

NM: See something new the second time through?

SM: I actually liked it a bit more. The first time through I felt distanced from it, for me it was really hard to get used to Sean Penn’s character, to get used to Bicke. But, the second time through I just got wrapped up in the tragedy of him, the way he completely falls apart. I think it was a much fuller, richer experience on second viewing.

NM: Did you watch it both times at home or did you watch it in a theater at all?

SM: Unfortunately I watched it both times at home. There is a screening on Wednesday, though, and as there is nothing else I think I am going to go see it again.

NM: Oh good! There are some films I feel work equally well in theater and at home but I feel like this is a film that if there is a way for somebody to see it [in a theater] it’s a different experience. That said, look it, especially in your profession there is just no way you’re going to be able to go out and see all of these movies. There have been plenty of people who have watched it on screeners and been able to respond and get in to it. Still, I always think I do much better with a film like this if I go into a theater and just enter the dark cave of the cinema.

Director Niels Mueller - Photo © Copyright ThinkFilm

SM: You might be right on this one for there were a few moments; the second time in the restaurant with his wife, the meeting with his brother near the end; where it was almost too much, almost like I had to turn it off and look away. In a theater you can’t do that.

NM: Yeah, it is a film that I’ve watched people come out of the theater with their brows furrowed and, you know, the muscled in their forehead all together because this film has made an impact, seems to be usually in a good way, but it can definitely be exhausting emotionally.

SM: But isn’t that sometimes the mark of a very good movie? It forces you to take notice of it, it forces you to have an opinion, and I like that about your film.

NM: There are films that you go and your experience with the film is for the two hours you are watching it you’re laughing and that’s a great memory you have of that film. And it can be a great film, but what you’re going to take from it is that two hours of laughter or two hours of exhilaration.  But then there are other films which we’re making fewer and fewer of, at least Hollywood doesn’t make many of them, where the experience goes beyond the 95-minutes of watching the film but you take something with it and you think about it for a while. For me, that’s always been the kind of film I’ve been attracted to. I like the ones that stay with me, that resonate in some ways; sometimes I can’t even figure out why, like “2001” when I first saw that I was a kid and I didn’t really understand it but it made me want to see it again and again and again to try and figure it out. Honestly, I still don’t know if I have.

SM: I know that feeling.

Let talk a little bit about how difficult was it to get this film made? You’re right; it is completely against most of the movies that come out of studios, so obviously you had to go the Independent route. How hard was it for you to get the financing, to get the funding, to actually make this movie?

NM: Well, it was difficult. Any film is hard to find financing for. But this film certainly had some unique challenges especially for people at some of the studios who loved the idea of making a film with Sean Penn but shied away from the subject matter, the content. While my writing partner Kevin Kennedy and I finished the script in 1999, I had people say very directly to me after 9/11 that we approached for financing, “Guys, look, we love the script, love the idea of making it with Sean, but can’t make a film with an ending like that.”

Okay, thanks for being straight-forward, I appreciate that go to the next company and they say, “Love the script, will you change the ending?” Well, you can’t change it. It’s a little known story that if I had had to change the mode of assassination [financially viable]; shooting in an airport can be expensive and difficult; before 9/11 I probably could have changed it but I can’t now. It would be a whitewash. The fact that something based on truth has become more relevant means you can’t ignore the relevance. We made sure we were very accurate to the whole ending sequence, which is the very public part of the story, because it had become so relevant.

SM: That’s good to hear, because as I was watching it I was worried you were going to maybe shy away from that ending in light of 9/11.

NM: It’s the opposite.  The ending didn’t change from the script until we shot it because we had always kept the very public part of Sam Bicke’s story as accurate as we could while having to dramatize things and characters around Sam. But, this very public part of the story we had written it pretty close to the truth and it became extremely important to keep it as close to the truth as possible especially after 9/11. It had taken on a new level of significance.

SM: When you were researching this script, figuring out how to flesh out this story, how hard was it to balance what was known and what you had to fictionalize to create the characters, to create the world they lived in?

NM: We had the great benefit of having these actual tapes Sam had sent to Leonard Bernstein, as well as other prominent Americans – in the film it is distilled down to Bernstein, so it was essentially this voice from the grave. The film is very much told from Sam’s perspective and point of view. It is as singular a point of view film you’re apt to have seen in the last few years, actually.

SM: Yes, that’s very true.

NM: And that’s by design. That’s the way I wanted to tell the story. But, you know, I had this voice from the grave, really, that are this first-person. “This is what I’m thinking.” “This is why I’m doing what I’m doing.” “This is what I feel sad about.” So I had all of [this] that allowed me to capture the spirit of this man because he informed the whole writing process. When you read the tapes there is real sadness you feel when reading them.

There is this humor that runs through the first half or two-two third. When I’ve watched the film with audiences the laughter stops when it should and it gets very quiet and intense, but there is this undercurrent of humor to the film and you can sense that when you read the tapes. If you didn’t know how tragic the story ends up there is sometimes this element of humor that comes out of the pathos of the character. People have talked about Willy Loman and Ralph Cramden, specifically Cramden, especially when talking about the whole loan idea. You mentioned there is almost this uncomfortable feeling you get at time while watching the film and I think it comes from that. That you’re watching this very sad story and yet sometimes you want to laugh. It’s a complex character and I hope it is an involving experience if you let yourself get taken by this character.

SM: I was struck by how funny this movie really was. Did you worry that there were times you might have been pushing the humor too much?

NM: I don’t think I ever worried I was pushing humor because I never felt we were pushing it. We all tried – we meaning me and the cast and Kevin Kennedy – to really go for the truth and the character and let the humor emerge on its own. I can’t say I ever worried about it.

SM: What about giving your audience 90-minutes with essentially a guy that is mentally decomposing right in front of them and telling everything from his point of view? Did you worry sometimes you were going to lose your audience by forcing them to see everything from that particular point of view?

NM: No. I didn’t worry about that either. Those are the kinds of films I’ve always liked. [Chuckling] You can make your decisions about me but this is what I’ve always been attracted to. As a kid I used to always wonder what it would be like to inhabit somebody else’s body; would green still be green, would orange still be orange through another set of eyes. Or capers. I didn’t like capers as a kid, although I’ve sort of developed a taste for them now, and I could never figure out how anybody could eat [them] they taste disgusting. Then I thought, maybe somebody else’s taste buds register differently and they taste like chocolate.

So for me, the one thing I love about film is that, while there aren’t a lot of films that go in the direction I have with [this one], I’ve always wondered why not? Film gets you as close to that experience [of experiencing things through another person’s eyes] as you can get. You really can see it differently. And that’s what this requires of an audience member, and I think if you can watch this film either in a theater or turn off your phone and really allow yourself to be taken with it – which I know a lot of people aren’t willing to do, you want to sit back and watch a film from a distance. But if you do that, the film might doesn’t go over, it might not work for you. It is meant to work on a number of levels – certainly an emotional level – but if you approach this film purely intellectually you’re going to miss the more important layers of it.

That’s the kind of experience I’ve always gone towards in film. Really singular point of view films have really intrigued me and resonated with me, where I can see the world through another set of eyes, so I never worried about losing people because I don’t think I’m alone in that kind of interest. Some of the great films are from pretty singular points of view.

SM: That’s true. Let’s talk about Sean for a second. When you approached him with your script, what did you think realistically were your chances of getting him for your film? Was he always your fist choice to play Bicke?

NM: Well, once we talked about actors to play Sam, Sean was the first person we went to. That said, I never, ever would have allowed myself to think Sean would play the role as I was writing it. I don’t think it is a great idea for writers to get locked on somebody. You can imagine – for good reason – are writing scripts around the world they would love Sean Penn to do but he is only going to be able to make so many films in this lifetime. I don’t think you should ever write with one actor in mind, I write for the character. I start with [that] and create the character in my head and don’t think of an actor.

I thought when the first producer who originally got the script to Sean; he knew that was the person we loved; I hoped we wouldn’t wait more than five months to find out Sean was too busy to read the script of co-writers and a director he never heard of. But, as it happened, the script was sent to Sean on a Wednesday, he got it Thursday and then called Friday and said he wanted to meet the director. I flew out from New York to San Francisco the following Monday and within the first half an hour he said let’s make the film. From that point forward Sean was unwavering in his commitment to making the film and the film got made because of his commitment. But that’s Sean Penn, he’s a rare man of his word and I will always be grateful towards him for it.

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