Herzog holds court at DGA

HerzogWerner Herzog likes living in Los Angeles but the German director won't become a U.S. citizen -- unless the nation does away with the death penalty. "I'm a guest in your country and not one to tell you what is right and wrong," said Herzog during Saturday morning's keynote address at the 7th annual Film Independent Forum at the Directors Guild of America headquarters. "I cannot become a citizen of a country that has capital punishment." Asked whether he would change that belief were his wife to be murdered, Herzog responded, "Under no circumstances should the state be in the position to kill anyone." The death penalty was a frequent topic during Herzog's hour-long appearance, which included clips from his documentary "Into the Abyss," centered on two men on death row for a triple homicide in Texas. IFC releases "Abyss," which premiered at the Toronto Intl. Film Festival, on Nov. 11. Herzog, who's directed over 60 films, said that because of time restrictions on the interviews with inmates, he had to be particularly straightforward in the interviews. "On Death Row, they can spot a phony a mile away," he added. Herzog assembled only 10 total hours of footage when he started editing, a process that was so stressful that he took up smoking and limited himself to five hours a day of work. He told the audience that it's crucial to edit quickly in order to stay focused, noting that he completed the editing on "The Bad Lieutentant: Port of Call, New Orleans" within two weeks after completing shooting. Herzog urged the audience to take a similar approach in filmmaking, noting that by keeping an eye on daily cash flow on "Bad Lieutenant," he discovered that costume costs were far too high due to purchases of duplicate outfits for players with only a few lines. That film, he noted, came in $2.6 million under budget and two days early. "If you do that, you're going to be taken seriously," Herzog added. In response to a question about whether he'd do anything differently, Herzog was emphatic in the negative, responding, "I accept all my errors and all my films are full of errors." He then noted that he throws away all the out-takes, adding that because it's expensive to store footage and counter-productive to do so, adding, "A carpenter does not sit on his shavings." Herzog's working on a four-part "Death Row" documentary for TV into December and will then portray a villain opposite Tom Cruise in "One Shot." "I'm always good as a debased villain on the screen," he added, evoking laughter from the audience of 200. The director also denied that he's reckless, despite his reputation, by asserting that no actor's ever been injured in any of his films. And he urged the audience to take advantage of the lower costs of filmmaking. "For my first eight films, I used a camera I'd stolen," Herzog admitted. "You now have access to high quality cameras and you can edit on a laptop. You can do a film for $10,000." As for financing, he suggested working outside of an office and being in an intense enviroment, quipping, "Be a bouncer in a sex club." Asked about his worst job, Herzog responded by recounting as an 18-year-old parking lot attendant during the Oktoberfest in Munich. "Dealing with 3,000 very drunk people at night is not fun," he noted. Herzog concluded by praising Los Angeles, noting that he'd opted to live in Southern California after concluding that San Francisco was "too chic." "I had to be in the city with the most cultural substance," he asserted. "In 15 years, everybody will be saying that about Los Angeles." Contact Dave McNary at dave.mcnary@variety.com