Little girls today have it easier than their foremothers did years ago. Thanks to women like Susan B. Anthony and Alice Paul women can vote, Amelia Earhart piloted a plane across the ocean by herself and Kathy Kohner Zuckerman helped make grabbing a long board and hitting the waves cool for more people. Kathy, now Kathy Kohner Zuckerman, may not be a well known name among the surf community but her nickname from when she first started to hit the surf in Malibu over 50 years ago still lives on today. Alot of girls that have paddled out has heard the name Gidget right?
Accidental Icon: The Real Gidget Story chronicles the story of how Kathy's story as a young girl learning to surf with the boys has now become legend and lingo embedded in the sport of surfing. The film features interviews with surf champions, amateur surfers, surf legends (including the original Kahuna of Malibu), the director of the original Gidget movie, Sally Fields and much more while narrated by Jorja Fox (C.S.I.'s Sara Sidle).
After the screening at the Orlando Film Festival I was able to here lots of fun fact about how this project came to be.
Kathy ended up spending lots of time at the beach when she was was child because her parents always took her. When she started to begin to surf she only lived 25 minutes from the beach in West Los Angeles so it was never a far drive in her borrowed family car. She considers the book as a big dedication to her father because without his interest in her life and listening to her there would have not been a book or the phenomenon.
Director Brian Gillogly was a surfer at age 11and surfing continued on in his life with his eventual job as a reporter for a surf magazine which is how he ended up meeting Kathy in 1981. Eighteen years later he decided to he was very much interested in creating a documentary about Kathy's story. It was funny to hear the Kathy's first response was that he "talk to my lawyer". Once Brian did get the film rolling he worked very hard for around a year getting all the pieces together. He had his first screening in 2006 but was not able to do anything with the film for over three years because the big studios didn't want to release footage and stills from their films or television series. Luckily a friend of Gillogly's heard a discussion about fair use laws on NPR and he was able to finish his film. With this new knowledge in tow Gillogy was able to get the clips, photos, posters and anything else he needed without worry. Unfortunately Paul Wendkos the director of the original Gidget film who was interviewed for the project was not able to see the finished documentary because he died November 12 of last year.
After the screening at the Orlando Film Festival I was able to here lots of fun fact about how this project came to be.
Kathy ended up spending lots of time at the beach when she was was child because her parents always took her. When she started to begin to surf she only lived 25 minutes from the beach in West Los Angeles so it was never a far drive in her borrowed family car. She considers the book as a big dedication to her father because without his interest in her life and listening to her there would have not been a book or the phenomenon.
Director Brian Gillogly was a surfer at age 11and surfing continued on in his life with his eventual job as a reporter for a surf magazine which is how he ended up meeting Kathy in 1981. Eighteen years later he decided to he was very much interested in creating a documentary about Kathy's story. It was funny to hear the Kathy's first response was that he "talk to my lawyer". Once Brian did get the film rolling he worked very hard for around a year getting all the pieces together. He had his first screening in 2006 but was not able to do anything with the film for over three years because the big studios didn't want to release footage and stills from their films or television series. Luckily a friend of Gillogly's heard a discussion about fair use laws on NPR and he was able to finish his film. With this new knowledge in tow Gillogy was able to get the clips, photos, posters and anything else he needed without worry. Unfortunately Paul Wendkos the director of the original Gidget film who was interviewed for the project was not able to see the finished documentary because he died November 12 of last year.
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