What's our superpower? Our own lives. An encore conversation with Kris Evans

The Dareful Project

“Don’t ever not be curious.” That’s Kris Evans’ advice for tapping into our creative superpowers. Evans is an awarding winning makeup artist with experience in feature films, television, commercials, music videos, fashion editorial and advertising. She started her career in New York City working with Barbara Walters, Saturday Night Live, feature films and episodic television. Her film career spans more than 35 features and includes working with Bob Costas for every Olympics from 2002-2016.

Transcript:

Hey Dareful tribe—you’re listening to one of your favorite episodes as an encore with artist Kris Evans. It originally posted in 2021 so a few updates: I talked with Kris this week and she says she’s back to work now that the actor’s strike is over. Look for her work in the TV show Big Sky for Disney and Francis Ford Coppola’s new film Megalopolis. She also just finished a book, Naked Shadows…hopefully more on that in a future episode. And now, Kris Evans:

Debra Hotaling (00:04):

Hello and welcome to the Dareful Project. I'm Debra Hotaling and I'm joined today by Kris Evans. Kris has built a thriving career in Hollywood for more than 40 years in every aspect of the arts that you can imagine. Kris, you've done makeup design for film, for tv, for Broadway. You've done it all.

Kris Evans (00:25):

Yeah, I guess so. Yeah. Gosh, I lived in Paris. I did fashion. It's opera. I mean, I think I love it all. So anything that gave me the opportunity to do whatever, that would be challenging and interesting I took. So I never really said no to anything. I said yes to everything. And then once I said yes, I thought, oh my God. And then I figured it out.

Debra (00:52):

And it sounds like we were talking about the creative process and how really your superpower now is the history that you have not only in the industry, but in the arts in general, and just being a really curious woman for your whole life. And while everyone else is looking at TikTok and trying to come up with something new, you are looking at vogue from the 1960s or things that we all know. Tell me more about your creative process.

Kris (01:22):

Well, I just find that because the internet is so easy to get to by everyone, that everyone goes to the internet. So when you're thinking creatively, everyone goes to Instagram or everyone goes to TikTok or everyone goes to Facebook. I mean, let's not say everyone, but a lot of people do. And I noticed that when I am on a project or something, it's the first thing that people go to is the internet. And so for me, in order to seem fresh and not like I'm copying or not grabbing something from someone else per se, recently, I like to go back in time or in different areas where I don't think people will go. So that what I see will maybe inspire me to think of something I wouldn't have thought of had I been influenced by other people, if that makes sense.

Debra (02:16):

It totally makes sense. And I was thinking about this this morning, getting ready to chat with you that I still have in one of my little girlhood boxes where you keep all your rocks and special shells. I have pages that I tore out of Vogue and Women's Day and Better Homes and Gardens from the 1960s that someone would leave in a spare bedroom. They were so glamorous. They were so lovely. And I still go back and enjoy looking at those images.

Kris (02:47):

Well, it's so funny you say sixties and seventies because now for me, the eighties is period, and then is period for me. So when they say, oh, the eighties, I say, aha. And then I bring in a picture of me in the eighties, blonde, bleached blonde, living in Paris, and they go, wow, who's that? Yeah, that would be me.

Kris (03:13):

And they go, my God, that's amazing. That's so creative. And I'm wearing a dress from the sixties, so it's kind of funny how everything look, what people say is that fashion repeats itself every seven years or history, receipt repeats itself every seven years. So everything has always been done. It's just what we decide to grab for us to think of. I just finished a show recently that's on HBO called Generations, and these are people in high school now, and it's present day, and they're very creative and they want to really be individuals. And so to look to see, to get that influence, they didn't want a lot of makeup. They didn't want that to be, but they wanted each person to have their own personality. So in order to see where the character is, you go back and you think how they would think if they were shopping. And so it helps to kind of have a history of pulling from things that they may know. They may shop at thrift stores and they may buy a sweater or something that's from the seventies or the eighties, that's design or whatever, but it's from a thrift store. So knowing that in the back of your head, because that's what I did, brings I think a freshness. A freshness to things that wouldn't necessarily have been there if I just would've gone to say Instagram.

Debra (04:36):

Where else do you go for inspiration?

Kris (04:39):

You know what? I hate to sound so glib, but just really everywhere. I mean, I'm always looking at artists. I'm always going to collections. I'm always, there's an artist at the LACMA right now that's kind of like a Hello Kitty, Ms. Kitty, that kind of Japan-y kind of bright colors. And so I'm looking at that. I look at, I loved Hemingway. I mean, believe it or not, there's a thing on Hemmingway now. I watched that and I watched the fashions of when it was in Cuba in the twenties and the thirties and the forties, and looking at him and how he dressed and just that period and the feel of it. And just anywhere I go outside flowers, colors, birds, I really love. I have a hummingbird feeder outside and I love to see the hummingbirds come and I look at the colors on their wings. I mean, I know this sounds crazy, but anywhere and everywhere I see things or different, I'm hooked on this one painter. I just discovered from an article in the Sunday New York Times. I go to the Wall Street Journal on Saturdays. They have an incredible fashion, a magazine, I think one of the best in the business. And so I'm flipping through that with what's current now. But then they're doing a thing on Halston, which is now going to be, I think on Netflix or Amazon. I did his makeup in the eighties. Oh,

Debra (06:12):

Okay. Because Ian McGregor is playing Halston.

Kris (06:17):

Yes. So to read about him and Liza Minnelli in Studio 54, hello. I was not there with Liza and Halston, but I was at Studio 54. I was there when they opened Limelight Grace Jones. I mean, these are things that I think personally, someone my age brings to the table where if you're working on Halston, and I did his JCPenney ads on the Intrepid back in the eighties in New York City. So that's history.

Debra (06:47):

Wait, we need to talk more about this. I mean, first of all, Halston, I love the documentary. If folks haven't seen that, it's great. That's great. When we used to do airplane rides, remember back in the day where you'd be able to watch movies. That was my favorite and his attention to detail of women's bodies, how he loved how everything just kind of hung and how beautiful he could make everyone. Tell us more about working.

Kris (07:14):

Well, I mean, listen, I only did his makeup for a press junket for photos. So I never did his shows. I did other shows. I did Calvin Klein and I did Perry Ellis, and I did, I never got to do Halston, unfortunately. But I worked with the models that he worked with Pat Cleveland and those guys. He was just so elegant. His office was incredible. I mean a showroom, it was next to the St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York City and on a high floor, and it was all white and just huge. And he was so elegant, and I remember was dressed all in white or he'd be dressed all in black, and he always had these beautiful long fingers and smoking cigarettes and just so elegant. And it was so lovely. It was so nice. And so then when I did the JC Pennies, that was a thing that everybody thought, oh my God, how dare he do this?

Kris (08:08):

Meanwhile, he was one of the first ones to kind of sell his name to go. And then everybody else started jumping on the bandwagon to where they started then selling eyeglasses and Tom Ford and all these guys started doing all this other, Holston was one of the first, but he was kind criticized for unquote selling himself to JC Penney's, but it was a whole commercial with the stuff that he had designed on the Intrepid. So it was this wild shoot, and he was there, not a lot, but he was there. There was an advertising agency and so forth and so on. But I just remember him being really kind and very elegant. And of course, his clothes. I mean, look at Diane Von Furstenberg. Her dresses are coming back in style now. The rap dresses that made her so fat, so famous. Look at Norma Kamali. I did some stuff for her in New York City when she did all the sweatshirt dresses, and now that's all coming back. So they're all doing these interviews with Diane von Furstenberg or Norma Kamali. They're the new fashion icons now, and they were big in the eighties.

Debra (09:14):

No, and it's lovely to see these things coming back. First of all, to have these women entrepreneurs being properly recognized for the trailblazers that they are, right. And they're just so beautiful, the weight of their dresses, I can still feel how they felt on and how wonderful you felt in those clothes.

Kris (09:42):

And I will say really quickly, I remember walking down, it never made it to the New York Times, but there was a very famous photographer named Bill Cunningham, and he always rode around the streets of New York on his bike in his little jacket, his little Chinese jacket that he was, and his beret. It was always kind of an outfit. And he lived a very frugal life in Carnegie Hall. They had apartments there, and he lived among his file cabinets and a mattress on top of one of the file cabinets. Anyway, I had a Norma Kamala dress on with a sweater, and the Norma Kamala dress had horses on it, and it was flannel, and this was in the eighties, and I had a sweater on that had horses and jewelry, and I was walking down Madison Avenue, and this guy jumped off his bike and ran up to me and said, can I take your picture? I had no idea who he was. Sure. So he took my picture and he says, okay, bye.

Kris (10:25):

And realized later that it was Bill Cunningham, and he would go and take just pictures of the streets of New York, which to me is kind of a lost art. Now, there's a wonderful book of Bill Cunningham that, again, sometimes I flip through when I want to be creative and I want to see his photographs. Masterclass has this amazing thing on tv. Now, Annie Liebowitz, a whole thing that I worked with her for Vanity Fair. We did a shooting together to watch her work to page through her books. I mean, listen, I could spend weeks talking about Sarah Al talking about just talking about so many artists, makeup artists and painters and sculptors. I mean, rod and the colors that Van Gogh does and the impressionist. I mean, I could just go on and on and on, and that's where I get my creative ideas for what I want to do if I'm doing a show or a movie. It also depends on the director and who's with you and the creative things that you do together. Even commercials, I mean, anything you pull from anything,

Debra (11:38):

What you're saying. Now, also, the back and forth of that creative process reminds me of a story I heard about Ian McGregor and the Halston movie that he did for Netflix. And the person who, and I'm not remembering her name, who did all the clothing design, was also coaching him on how you would hold scissors, how you would pin garments, how you would drape. And he took it so to heart that during the early days of the pandemic, I hope I'm getting this story, he sewed a pair of trousers, which we know is really hard to do, first of all. And he just took her. I loved how he took her artistic spirit, her creativity, and he took it to heart and learned that task and that the work that's behind being creative that way and created this thing himself. And so I imagine as you're describing your creative life, that there's a lot of back and forth about the work ethic and learning from others as well.

Kris (12:45):

Oh, let me tell you, it is so important to be aware and to have a relationship with the costume designer. When you're working or when you're working, you're doing a photo shoot or something. The art director, I will tell you a really quick story. I did Once Upon A Time, the TV show. I did three seasons on that, and we did a whole thing of carnies, which were really bizarre. And Eduardo Castro was a costume designer for the first six seasons. His work is ridiculous. It's so beautiful. And we were talking one time and I said, carnies, they're so bizarre. I said, I don't want to do 'em like clowns. I want to do them. I want to have an idea. So he started showing me some of his designs, and we both looked at each other and I said, the film The Clowns Fellini.

Kris (13:35):

He goes, oh my God, yes. Oh my God, how great is that? Let's look at that. And the whole thing started from Fellini, the clowns. So we did all the hair and the makeup and the clothes to that, and I can't even tell you, they kept opening up on this one particular guy who had such an incredible face with a makeup I did that was this really surreal clown. And the wardrobe that Eduardo did that would've never, I think even don't even think of would've happened had we not gone Wait, what about that? Let's look at this. My point is, is that the experience that you bring with you, that you're constantly watching and constantly observing in certain things, that when you start your work, something sparks that in you and you mention it, and someone like Eduardo, who is also experienced and also understands it, jumps at it and goes, oh my gosh, that would be amazing.

Kris (14:33):

And then it's a team, and then you're excited. And so that every single project is new and different. I was doing the American cast for Phantom of the Opera, and they had of course done it in England, but when they came to the United States, they had the American cast. And so they had three originals there. But the whole cast, I went in and helped design for the makeup and so forth. And I was sitting at the preview and well, a gentleman came over and said, Kris, can I sit with you? We were kind of, they had us cut to the side and I looked over. It was one of the students I had had at the University of Cincinnati when I taught fashion design. And this guy had no idea how to sew. He couldn't even thread a needle cut to he's there, he comes and sits with me. He is now working for one of the top shops in New York City, and he has sewn two of the costumes for the opening of masquerade.

Debra (15:31):

Oh my gosh.

Kris (15:32):

And he sat with me, this was my student, and said, I can't even tell you how much I thank you for what you inspired in me to do this. I, and I don't say this to say, oh, we have no idea how we influence people's lives, because sometimes you never know. But that moment for me was one of the biggest highlights of my career, one of the biggest highlights of my career.

Debra (15:59):

That's amazing.

Kris (16:01):

Isn't that incredible? I mean, of all the things, and I still to this day, gosh, it's been 30 something years and we still are in contact. I'm still in contact with my students. I taught in 1978 and now they're designers. And one woman is this incredible costumer, and she does all the crazy wacko stuff for Conan. I mean, these are people I've known for years that are also so incredibly creative. I mean, she did all the crazy costumes of the Flintstones.

Kris (16:33):

I mean, this is the life that for me as an artist, my sister is an incredible artist. I come from a background where three out of the four kids were artists. My brother's a painter. My father's a graphic designer. My sister's an artist. She had a full scholarship. She had a master's degree in film. And so we are really lucky that I was surrounded by it. But we've always done that. I mean, as kids, my mom sent us to the art museum, do drawing and painting, and I think it's so important. I think we're losing it in our schools and we really need to keep it because I think especially in the Pandemic, if you think about how popular all this was, the arts were and the things that we were ordering and looking at and seeing where the arts were music and were paintings and were things that kept us going and kept us alive. So that's the creative part, I think is vital in life, regardless of what age you are.

Debra (17:37):

And I think as you say that I have, it feels like hunger to go to the LA County Museum of Art or the Getty, and not only look at Art Live, but would be with other people. I did not know how much I would miss just standing in a gallery with other people, whether or not we talked, but just being there physically.

Kris (18:01):

Well, LACMA just opened, and I'm a member of LACMA. I just opened. So I ordered tickets and we went there, and of course you have to do all the stuff in order to get there, but going in and they're renovating. So the old part of the museum is gone, but next to it is the, because I'm a member of the academy. The academy, so that museum is going to be opening September 30th, 2021. So that is going to be mind blowing what they're doing in that museum. And I agree with you. I mean, it is so important for us to keep connected. And so yes, those museums, to feel that energy to go and to see other people enjoying it is vital. But it's also the internet. Thank God we have that. But we also have books and we can't forget about books. The actual people laugh at me. I get the Wall Street Journal newspaper edition

Kris (19:03):

Still delivered to my house, and I cut out articles. I know that sounds crazy, but you forget about them on the internet. They go into some cyberspace or something. But I have files that I like to keep, and everybody laughs at me, but these magazines and these books that I get, I love them. Coffee table books. When Rosalie has a sale, it's deadly for me because these are the books, the Michelangelo and the Bill Cunningham, the one I got and stuff that I get. I just love the smell of them. I love, I don't know, that's just maybe me.

Debra (19:42):

No, no, I'm totally with you. And the Wall Street Journal, I am in solidarity with you. I also get the paper edition because I love wandering and as much as it's sort of laid out, and I read on my phone all the time too, I love cracking open the paper on Saturday and suddenly getting sucked into a book review that I had no idea I would want to read.

Kris (20:06):

Well, and the Sunday New York Times, I also get, and the thing is, what's really interesting is that when you get the style section, they don't online, you don't see the ads. But when I'm paging through the style section of the Sunday New York Times, and I see the ads for Prada or whatever, yes, you see them at other things, but when you see that in print or you see it in a magazine, I can't tell you how many tear sheets I've pulled. When I was first doing a TV show that I did, I went in and I took three characters that I thought of, and I pulled tear sheets for each one of those characters. And they were actual tear sheet tear sheets. And I came in and I talked to each one of the actresses. One of them opened it up and she looked at the tear sheet.

Kris (20:52):

She goes, yep, love that. Yeah, love that. Yeah, that's good. Now, these are physical tear sheets, right? Tear sheets from the magazine into the actual paper. Yeah, that's good. That's good. Can I take this over to this person and show this person right now? So they take over the file. Yep. Love that. Love that. So I would take these photographs that I pulled and we'd do these feel, and these looks for this, and I put it up on the mirror. So what they come in, that photograph was up on the mirror for them to look at, to get a feel of what they saw. It's not the same as with a computer.

Kris (21:26):

And so it inspired them as well to put themselves, I'm always, in fact, sometimes I'll text one of the characters that I worked with, one of the actors I worked on generation, he's great. And I'll say to him, oh, the Wall Street Journal men's section is out this Saturday. And he'll go, oh, great. I'll go get it. He's in his, I think late twenties, but I've got him hooked on this magazine of, and he's a total techie. So I just think that the younger and the quote unquote, I call them, the more mature generation, have so much to learn from each other that we really need to embrace what each other knows they teach me, but I teach them. And that's what I love about it, is the communication between the two of us. And I think sometimes now what happens is the more mature ideas are dismissed as old fashioned. But I think what we're finding, especially in this past year, that sometimes we can embrace that and that can make us feel more secure.

Debra (22:34):

I think also, I think that we take ourselves for granted a little bit our history. Sometimes I'll think, oh my God, you didn't live in 1983 when everyone was wearing funny little headbands or just whatever that thing is. I always assume that everyone has lived my life and remembers everything. And when you go back and talk about, well, here's what we used to do, or this is what we wore, or my gosh, look at this thing. I'm always sort of surprised that I have this knowledge.

Kris (23:07):

And here's the thing too is with the knowledge, my master's degree is in costume design. So everyone said to me, why didn't you go into costume design? You know what I felt like I wanted to have more hands on. I mean, costume designers are amazing, and they sketch and they do, but you hand it off to someone else. And I really love the kind of, because a painter, and I'm a sculptor, so I love the actual physical thing of doing the face and painting the face and doing the hair and styling. It was a hands-on thing. But I will tell you, and I taught costume history and costume design for eight years in universities design. And so in that knowledge of then going on, and for instance, like my friend Eduardo or Julian Markowski who does all the Marvel movies now, she's a friend of mine.

Kris (23:54):

I've done two or three movies with her. She's another one. Fantastic. Because of my knowledge in the history of costume, when they see a period of clothing to me, I know exactly what they're talking about. So we cut. It's like the Cliff Notes, if anybody remembers what Cliff Notes are, we cut to all the other stuff and we're on the same page very quickly. And they feel that you understand. And so immediately there's a relationship that you may not have if you didn't know that. They also know that they feel that you're in their corner and that you're working with them as a collaboration, that it's not a we'll do hair or we'll do makeup or we'll do wardrobe or costumes. But it is truly a combination, which as you well know in a movie is vital. I mean, look at Halston. If you didn't have the hair, you didn't have the makeup, you didn't have the wardrobe, you had one but not the other. That's not Halston. I mean, we could go on and on with all the different styles. And there's a TV show called Euphoria, which is the latest hottest thing now where the makeup is incredible and all that. But if you took that away, would it be the same show? No. And so that's how people relate to it. So all of this is a really visual thing.

Kris (25:17):

I can't wait to go into the movie theaters again and see the films on the big screen. I mean, to judge, because I judge for the Oscars, obviously, because in the academy, so to try to see these films on, I try to get as big a computer screen as I can, but it's still a computer. It's not the movie theater with the sound. I mean things like Mulan, which was a beautiful film. I mean even Nomad Land. To see that scope, even as simple as it was to see it Minne, just to see the lovely scope of it. Pinocchio, which is one of the most spectacular films in years, that Italian film, that it is actually live action. And the man who did all of the effects, makeup effects, which are out of this world, very little, CGI, which is the computer generated, most of it was prosthetic work, which is just mind blowing. And he talked about what they did and the artists that they saw and how they talked to each other and how they talked to director and the collaboration. And it's so vital. And what's exciting about it is that teamwork that where you feel like you're kind of a part of it, it's kind of nice to watch a movie that you're part of.

Debra (26:36):

Do you think that theaters are going to survive? Please say yes.

Kris (26:40):

Yeah, I think they will. And I'll tell you why. I think people are longing to get back together again, regardless of whether they're eating popcorn or you think, oh God, please, all the stuff that we used to make us crazy when you go to movie theaters, right? I was lucky I would go to the academy where there's no popcorn allowed and the beautiful movie screen in the gorgeous Academy theater where everybody just watched the movie. But I think, I mean, I jokingly say that, but I think everyone going to the movies, I think the laughter that you hear when people laugh or when you hear the collective brings more of a visceral feel to what you're watching when you're watching it with other people than when you're watching it in your house. If you pause it or you don't get the same kind of flow, it's not the same kind of experience, I think. But then again, I've been in that business for 40 years, so I'm such a theater geek and such a film geek. I mean, listen, I bought tickets to Hamilton three times and they were canceled three times because of the pandemic.

Debra (27:48):

Oh my gosh.

Kris (27:49):

And I'm still determined to see Hamilton on stage because there's nothing like it. There's nothing like live theater. There's nothing like

Debra (27:58):

Music Man, Hugh Jackman. It's got to happen.

Kris (28:01):

God. It's Sutton Foster,

Debra (28:03):

Right?

Kris (28:04):

Oh my God. In fact, I did a pilot called God Hollywood that was so great about the 1970s Hollywood, and it was written and produced Ted Griffith by Sutton Foster's husband. I said to him, I'm such a groupie about your wife. And he just looked at me because a lot of people that are in film that don't do Broadway, don't really know the kind of Broadway people, but I'm such a Broadway person. I mean, I also did Miss Saigon on Broadway.

Debra (28:30):

Oh my gosh.

Kris (28:31):

And Leah Solano, what a voice. And then 30 years later worked with Jonathan Price who won the Tony for Ms. Saigon, who played the engineer. And so talking to him about it again, I brought in programs from it, and he's paging through. He's very funny. He's a very funny guy. And so I don't know if everyone knows Jonathan Price was nominated, I think last year with Anthony Hopkins for the Pope. He was one of the popes. He's an incredible actor stage as well as screen. And he was paging through the booklet I was bringing. Oh yes, I went to college with him and oh, yes I did. It's just that kind of connection when you work with them and the stories that you have, it's just a beautiful creatively collection to bring to the table when you're doing your work. So I mean, it was such a lovely experience for me to work with him again.

Debra (29:27):

Well, building out on what we're talking about, what you're talking about here, you've had enormous success. And there was something you said to me that really resonated. And I've been thinking a lot about, you said, success isn't what you've done in the past. It's what you're doing now. And you get to a certain point in your life and in your career, and you know what success feels like and it feels good, and it's sometimes hard to try again, something new or be a beginner because we don't want the bad feelings. We only want the good feelings. And so there's a way that we can hibernate in our past success and not try something new and fail because we just love to wrap ourselves in that fluffy blanket of past success. And you're not allowing yourself to do that. Talk a little, teach me about courage and creativity.

Kris (30:20):

Well, I think the number one, for me personally in getting older, a thing that I always have to be aware of is fear, afraid of failing. Because especially now, everything is so upfront. It's instantaneous on the computer, it's instantaneous on the web. So if you mess up, it's fast. It's a Facebook, it's an Instagram people there. So everyone's afraid to push forward for fear of failing and then being talked about and then your career. And so I think for me personally, I always want to be challenged. And there's certain things that I can do and I'm very comfortable with because I've done them for a long time. I will say I'm lucky in what I do is because every job I do is different. It may be the same, for instance, if I'm doing a film or TV show or something, yes, in running the show is kind of the same if you department head, there's certain things that you do.

Kris (31:30):

However, because of the pandemic, everything has changed. And let me tell you, technically just doing the paperwork is now all online where it used to be paper. So if you're not savvy in that, the fear of coming in and not knowing that, where then they will view you as being a dinosaur because you don't know technically how to go online and do your paperwork and go online and do your timecard. All these little things that you don't think about is challenging, and you don't want to appear to look like you are not up to stuff snuff for right now. So that, but also creatively, you don't want them to think of you as being in the past. So you have to be careful that when you use your creativity of the past, you're bringing it to the present and possibly the future that it may look like this.

Kris (32:21):

Which brings me back to I am an information junkie. It keeps my mind fresh. I'm constantly reading. I get subscriptions to a lot of things. And I'm lucky because then I get the Hollywood reporter and I get the variety and I get all of those things which page through, and I can read all of that within the film business. But I also get, like I said, the Wall Street Journal, and I get the New York Sunday Times and I read them, and I find a lot of things going on in the world which keeps me fresh and current so that when a writer talks to me about something or there is a present day of what's happening now, the TikTok and you kind of know the background of TikTok and it's a Chinese company. And when Trump did he, it's all that kind of silly stuff that is conversation that you're part of the conversation in the present with everyone you're working with.

Kris (33:19):

So they don't think of you as the past. They think of you as right now, regardless of what you look like or how old you are. Now, I will also say it is very important to keep yourself healthy. I've done yoga 40 years, 40 years, and I am in good shape. And there's certain things that happen. They just happen. It's how it is. But as far as where I am and how I keep myself and how I dress coming to work, because on a film set, you can be kind of comfortable. I come to work every day. I'm going to work. I am the department head, and I come to work knowing that I'm the head. So I don't come in sweatpants and I don't come in schleppy clothes. I come dressed to work. That's a mindset. And I think that it's important regardless of what age you are or where you are in your life or your business, that your mindset has to be there and that you have to constantly aware, be aware of moment to moment to moment. And I think the moment we lose that is when we start unquote getting older, if that makes sense.

Debra (34:39):

It does make sense. It feels so soft and cozy to go back into the things that we're good at.

Kris (34:45):

Sure.

Debra (34:46):

We really have to decide that we're going to do something hard and we're going to fail and that, and we're just going to be present even in those feelings of inadequacy and painful learning.

Kris (34:58):

Well, and also what happens is, is that because let's really be blunt here, there are a lot of people losing their jobs who are older, fifties, sixties, where they thought this was going to be their life, and now it's not that they're being hired, they're being retired to bring in the younger set who for whatever reason, either they didn't keep up with technology or they did, but now the younger is less expensive because it's a business, let's face it, that we really even more so have to be aware and we have to keep up with what is current. And it's not easy to learn all that stuff technically. And to be honest with you, as an artist, I'm not interested in learning all that computerized stuff, but I have to because that's part of the job now. And if you want to stay current in where you are in the job, you have to embrace what's happening now, whether you like it or not. And again, the fear you have to embrace. Now, I'm not saying this is easy, and I'm not saying it gets easier as you get older it, it gets more challenging, but it also to me is more, I find more exciting when I know that I'm still able to step up to the plate and pull it off.

Debra (36:30):

That's right.

Kris (36:32):

And I'll say very proudly, I am 66 years old, and I was working with actors and actresses that were in their twenties and their thirties. They were amazing. And I learned from them and they learned from me, and I kept up with them every moment. And I made sure that I was on the same page all the time because it was important to me. And I adored them. They were so wonderful and so smart and funny, and they gave me that feeling of youth, and I gave them the feeling of experience. And there was one of the actors that I work with come in and go, what about this? And I go, okay, yeah, we can do that, but I'm just telling you from experience, blah, blah, blah. And they would stop and go, oh yeah, you're right. I didn't think about that. Okay, let's try this. So we can embrace each other. We don't need to think that each person is either too young or over the hill. I think we have to be really careful on that because we're losing so much if we don't listen.

Debra (37:40):

And I wonder also if a lot of that's inside our own heads.

Kris (37:44):

Absolutely. With out the monkey mind, which is why meditation now, again, I am not a great meditator. I meditate, but I'm not good because my mind never stops. I have one of those monkey minds that just continues and continues. I have a hard time sleeping. I do okay. In the film business, the hours are always crazy. So you're always going to work at five in the morning on a Monday and wrapping at 6:00 AM on a Saturday. I mean, it's just so your body kind of is all over the place. That's the way it is now. So that can be challenging, but I also know that it's very important for me to keep my mind sharp. And it becomes more and more difficult sometimes. And it's easy, like you say, to kind of settle back to what's comfortable. But right now, what's comfortable, it's not happening right now.

Kris (38:47):

The world is changing and it is changing at a very rapid pace. And so I'm not saying all of this is easy, but the payoff is pretty great because you are still aware, and I love these, I love Grandma Moses who started painting at 77. I think that's pretty incredible. And we could go on with the artists, we can go on with the artists who are older or whatever, and they started, or actresses or actors who became famous or designers or whatever, and they brought stuff to the page that we didn't think about that we thought were old fashioned, that are now in style that feels so fresh. So again,

Debra (39:36):

So before we leave each other, this is a two part question, which is what advice would you give your past self and what advice will your future self give you today?

Kris (39:50):

Well, it's really easy to give advice to your past self because it's past. Someone once said to me, be careful to constantly look in the rear view mirror of life because it's behind you, and if you're going to get anywhere, you really do have to look forward. So my past self, I just wish I would've believed in myself more. I wish I wouldn't have listened to so many people tell me how it should be, that I would've really listened to the voice inside me and to my gut every time I didn't listen to my gut. Now, there were times in my past life that were out of my control, but I lingered too long in it being out of my control, and I should have realized, okay, for whatever reason, you need to move on. And so that may have helped me. I have to say though, I feel really lucky because I am from Ohio, so what I've seen and what I did, I'm pretty proud of myself.

Kris (41:00):

I really have to say, and I don't say that in any kind of dismissive way or egotistical way. I worked really hard and I've been around the world, so I've been really lucky. My future self is to just keep moving and to constantly learn and to not stop. Sometimes I'll take the break and I'll take a breath and some things will slow me down, but I don't want to ever not be curious. I don't want to ever stop learning and enjoying, and if I see something beautiful, it makes me cry. Just thinking about it now, I never want to lose that vulnerability because to me, that's life. That's what keeps you creative, and that's what keeps you alive. The moment you don't have that is the moment. Yeah, it's time. I think that's just me,

Debra (41:53):

And I think I would love to share in the show notes, I have this reading list now from just our discussion. I want everyone of our tribe here to be looking at Bill Cunningham, if you don't already know his beautiful work and his life, and we'll put our heads together on some other things that we'd like to share.

Kris (42:14):

I could give you a list that would, I mean, forget about it years. You could. I mean, I am such a book junkie. I have so many great, beautiful books that I could recommend. Definitely.

Debra (42:23):

Perfect. Well, we will do that. Well, Kris, thank you so much for joining today. We're going to have to come back and do 2.0 of this because it seems like we have a lot more to cover, and in the show notes, we'll get it started and maybe we can have a bigger conversation about, we'll start a reading assignments.

Kris (42:42):

You know what, I would love that just because look at all these book clubs that people get together and they discuss things and just, I did a webinar really quickly and they said, read 20 pages a day, just 20 pages a day. You'll learn, you'll read 30 books a year, 20 pages a day, even to just browse through them. So there you go. Okay. Thanks so much. Such a pleasure and such an honor. Thank you so much for asking

Debra (43:11):

Me. Thank you so much. So much fun today.

Kris (43:15):

Okay. Thank you. Take care.

Debra (43:18):

Thank you for listening to the Dareful Project. It really helps us grow our tribe. When you like and share and subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or Audible or wherever you enjoy podcasts, that really helps us to be able to grow what we're doing here. You can also visit us at the dareful website, the dareful project.com. There you can sign up for our weekly newsletter, and that's another way where we can keep you posted on upcoming podcasts and adventures that we're going to be curating over the coming months. And always, I would love it if you would talk to me. I'm Debra Hotaling, and you can reach me at Debra at Dareful one. That's D-E-B-R-A at dareful. Then the number one.com. Thanks for listening.