{"id":690758,"date":"2025-09-18T22:11:49","date_gmt":"2025-09-18T19:11:49","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2025-09-18T22:11:49","modified_gmt":"2025-09-18T19:11:49","slug":"euzhan-palcy-how-robert-redford-changed-my-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/euzhan-palcy-how-robert-redford-changed-my-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Euzhan Palcy: How Robert Redford Changed My Life"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\tWhen people ask how I, as a young woman from Martinique, ended up in Hollywood, I smile and think of Robert Redford. Without Bob, my life and career would have taken an entirely different path.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn 1985, Robert Redford hand-picked me among 10 young French filmmakers and invited me to the Sundance Directors Lab in Park City, Utah. It was only my second trip<\/a> to the United States. At Sundance, I was surrounded by giants \u2014 Paul Newman, Mike Nichols, Karl Malden, Waldo Salt and Bob himself \u2014 who watched me direct, offered notes and treated me as a peer. I was inspired, supported and free to create.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhat made Sundance extraordinary was not just the caliber of people, but the setting. We were in the middle of nature, among the mountains, breathing clean air, thinking only about art and storytelling. The Sundance community felt like family: open and welcoming, without prejudice. Even Bob\u2019s dog seemed to embrace me. Sometimes the pooch would follow me, and I started directing him, giving commands as if he were an actor. To everyone\u2019s delight, he actually seemed to listen. It was hilarious but also revealing. I felt completely at home, and in my element.<\/p>\n

\n\tI came to know Robert Redford quite well and also his daughter Amy. She and I have been close friends ever since. He was far more than a movie star and brilliant actor. He was a man of action, an activist, someone whose convictions matched my own. We sensed that in each other immedia<\/a>tely. That is why I trusted him and took his guidance. Alongside Fran\u00e7ois Truffaut and Aim\u00e9 C\u00e9saire, former president of Martinique, he truly became my godfather.<\/p>\n

\n\tAt Sundance, I worked on my adaptation of Andr\u00e9 Brink\u2019s novel\u00a0A Dry White Season<\/em>, a story of conscience<\/a> and resistance set in apartheid South Africa. It was a story I felt destined to tell; I once told my parents I would rather die than not make that film. <\/p>\n

\n\tAfter the Lab, I was scheduled to return to Paris, but Bob had a different plan: He encouraged me to go to Los Angeles to meet Lucy Fisher, then an executive at Warner Bros., who had reached out to me several times. She had seen my first feature,\u00a0Sugar Cane Alley<\/em>, which had created quite a buzz. Like Robert, she recognized something in that film. Bob, man of action that he was, called his assistant Cindy to book my flight and set everything up.<\/p>\n

\n\tI told him, \u201cHollywood? Life is too short. I won\u2019t fit in!\u201d\u00a0But Bob insisted. He looked at me and said simply, \u201cTrust yourself.\u201d\u00a0And I did. That changed everything.<\/p>\n

\n\tLucy offered me various projects \u2014 including\u00a0Malcolm X<\/em>, which I declined, believing it wasn\u2019t my story to tell when there were very talented African American filmmakers for whom it was (Spike Lee later famously made that film). Instead, I placed a copy of\u00a0A Dry White Season<\/em> on her desk.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhat followed was pure Hollywood, full of twists and turns. Ultimately, MGM with Paula Weinstein produced\u00a0A Dry White Season<\/em>, making me the first Black female filmmaker ever entrusted with a major studio production. That was in 1989. History was made, and Robert Redford opened the door for that. He truly saw me and my unique way of storytelling and respected my voice and vision. Without him, I would never have gone to Hollywood, and who knows if that film would have ever been made.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Lab was also a lot of fun. I love the above picture with Paul Newman and Bob \u2014 we joked constantly, and Bob and Paul treated me like their little sister, even teasing me about my French accent. They made me feel at home in a world I had thought was closed to me. I like to imagine them together now, laughing somewhere beyond, perhaps even with Sim\u00e9on, the spirit of music and the lead character from one of my films.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhen I received my honorary Oscar in 2022 \u2014 also in recognition of being the first Black woman directing a Hollywood studio film, a milestone I truly owe to Robert Redford \u2014 I asked Bob to be one of the presenters. He was too ill to travel, but his daughter Amy read a beautiful message on his behalf. That gesture, like so many others over the years, reminded me of his generosity, his belief in artists and his commitment.<\/p>\n

\n\tRobert Redford changed my life, and he helped plant a seed for change in Hollywood. For that, I will always carry him in my heart \u2014 with love, gratitude and reverence.<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>

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\t\t\t\t\tRobert Redford and Euzhan Palcy<\/span><\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tEuzhan Palcy<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When people ask how I, as a young woman from Martinique, ended up in Hollywood, I smile and think of Robert Redford. Without Bob, my life and career would have taken an entirely different path. In 1985, Robert Redford hand-picked me among 10 young French filmmakers and invited me to the Sundance Directors Lab in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-690758","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-social-mediaa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/690758","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=690758"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/690758\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=690758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=690758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=690758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}