For Better of For Worse
Academy Award Nomination - 1994

For Better or For Worse is an hour-long documentary film produced and directed by my friend David Collier, Co-Producer: Elizabeth Thompson. The film came out in 1993 and was nominated for an Academy Award in 1994.

This entertaining documentary is an honest look at five culturally diverse couples married for fifty years or longer. For Better or For Worse attempts to answer questions that focus on issues of long-term commitments. In candid interviews, each couple discusses their private lives, covering the good and bad times during their relationships. In addition to how they met, each couple openly discusses sensitive topics such as their devotion to each other, sex, Alzheimer's disease, life and death. Drawing on rich storehouses of wisdom, they share stories of their journeys that range from living room jam sessions, to an off-Broadway gay theatre in New York, and the backwoods of northern California. Reflecting on the diversity and fullness of the American experience, their comments offer insight into what is one of the most rewarding undertakings in life, for better or for worse.

It had been David's idea to make a film about couples who had been together for 50 years and longer, partly as a tribute to his grandparents who had been married that long, and also in response to his own parent's divorce when he was a boy.

David and I met in 1988 because I'd been wanting to get into documentary film and David needed a writer. So off we went, spending the summer looking for couples to interview, seeing films and writing grants. The result was a huge success and when the film came out in 1993 it aired on PBS and continues to from time to time.

Tapes can be procured through David's Studio B in Berkeley, (510) 848-6026. And of course, our book, Living Happily Ever After took off where the film left off, exploring the lives of 30 couples who had been together for 30 years or longer.

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David and I continue to work together, mostly on projects revolving around sex, love and intimacy. We have this notion that we were married in a former life and we make films about people's relationships, their hopes and their dreams in an effort to resolve something very ancient between us.

Our current projects are top secret, though as we are closer to completion I will spill the beans.