Interview: “The Visionary” (Kickstarter Project)

In 1977, George Atkinson had a crazy idea: what if you had a store where people could rent movies instead of buying them? That idea blossomed into The Video Station, a video store chain that grew to over 500 locations across North America. Akinson’s life is an incredible story of incredible success and crushing failure, filled with celebrities, mobsters and the Supreme Court. Now, independent filmmaker Pony Gayle is making a documentary about Atkinson called “The Visionary” and is raising money with a Kickstarter campaign. I had the please of talking with Gayle about her personal connection to the story, and what her plans for the film are once she’s raised the funds.

How did you know George Atkinson and his family?

I grew up with one of his daughters. We met in summer camp when I was 12 and she was 13. And we’ve been friends ever since. So I actually knew the whole family and George.

What are your favorite memories of VHS and video stores?

Well I remember like when we got our first VCR, it was like a big deal. I remember some guy had to come wherever we bought it from, I don’t remember, Sears or JC Penney. They came and hooked it up and told us how to use it. And I think it was like $500 at the time, which was a lot of money, because years later you could buy ’em for like 50 bucks or less. But I remember in the first video I got, and I think it was at The Video Station because I had a lifelong membership because I was Maureen’s friend, she gave me a lifelong membership, God, I don’t remember the name of the video, but Sting was in it and it was like a thriller.

And I was a huge Sting fan, I loved The Police, the band. And that was the first, and I remember it was so cool, putting in a VCR and I was so excited. I got to watch a movie at home. And I remember I was home alone. Nobody was around. And I like made dinner and watched this movie and it was just like this whole experience. But I just remember it was like so fun and it just felt really cool cuz I, it was something like I’d never done before. Because back then, you only saw movies at the theater, and then as far as TV, there were only a certain limited amount of channels. And then I remember I just loved going to the video store to pick out movies because I love browsing around and finding unique movies I’d never heard of, reading the back and going, oh, I wanna check this out.

And I really kind of miss that because now with streaming, you know, now that there’s so many platforms and so much material, it’s hard to find stuff cuz they only advertise, they’ll put the 10 top picks up. And I’ve had friends tell me, oh, have you seen such and such? And I’m like, no, I’ve never heard it. So you have to do a search to try to find something else. And it’s really hard, it’s harder to find things that aren’t in the top 10 kind of thing, where back in the day with video stores, you could just kind of browse around and look at all kinds of stuff.

So when did the idea of making this documentary first come about?

Right before the Pandemic, George’s daughters came to me and asked me if I’d be interested in producing his life story. And I just said, of course. Oh my God, it’s something close to my heart. Somebody had asked them years ago if they wanted to do his life story. And at the time they said no, they weren’t ready. And I remember, cuz I’ve been a filmmaker for, I worked at HBO for 16 years, but I’ve always been an independent filmmaker. And at the time it didn’t even cross my mind about me doing it, but I just said to Maureen, I just said, you know, when you’re ready, this is a story that needs to be told. It’s something you should think about doing.

So they came to me right before the pandemic. I was really busy cuz I also have a docu-series on Amazon that we’re shooting season five right now. And so she goes, I know you’re really busy. And I go, yeah, of course. So during the pandemic, it actually gave me more time to develop it, to work on it, but also because of the pandemic, everything was closed down so we couldn’t really shoot it. We did interviews and things via Zoom and recorded them. And then my editor cut it together with B-roll to do a sizzle reel. So that’s why now we’re doing the Kickstarter to raise money to actually shoot, go on location and shoot it. Um, we did have another production company during Covid, um, that was interested, but they wanted all the rights, they wanted 70% off the back end and we’d get 30%. So needless to say, when they wouldn’t budge, we passed.

Why does this story need to be told in a film?

Because this is the guy that created home entertainment. If it wasn’t for George, we wouldn’t be able to rent movies. He’s the one that fought the studios all the way to the Supreme Court and you know, the studios wanted people to buy movies not rent and he did it anyway and he won. Right of first sale, you buy it, you own it, you can rent it, you can resell it, you can destroy it, you just can’t duplicate it or project it. And so it was kind of a David and Goliath. So it’s really kind of like a slice of history that most people don’t know about. And that’s why I feel it’s an important story to be told.

And it’s just kind of, and his story’s so fun too. It’s such a wild ride. And, and I remember when everything happened, when it was huge and all of a sudden he’s making millions and his daughter’s had condos in Santa Monica, and then I remember when it all came crashing down and they lost the condos, and George the lost his house and the cars and the business. But you know, the industry he created lives on.

And there still is one Video Station open, right?

Yeah, in Taylor, Texas, it’s been open 39 years in counting. I spoke the owner, and he’s the original owner and he flew out here in 1983 to meet George and he purchased the affiliate from George, and he’s got an amazing collection of DVDs. And he said part of how he stays open, he does duplications, he sells CBD oil, all kinds of stuff. So that’s another place we definitely want to go shoot. And then he has a longtime employee and friend that lives in Texas, Charles Allen who was a good friend and worked in the business, he was his right hand man and head of security. George was the best man at his wedding. So we will do those two at the same time, although I’ve never been to Texas, I’ve heard it’s pretty big.

And that’s why this Kickstarter is important, to fund all of this filming.

Yeah, exactly. So far, the development of the project and everything in the last couple years, I’ve just been paying for everything out of pocket. So hopefully this will help raise funds to shoot cuz I can’t afford to, you know, do all of it.

What we’re hoping for is that’ll help raise funds to shoot, to go on location to travel, I have to pay my DP, my camera person has a day rate, and then the equipment rate, and all of that, plus airfare, hotels, renting a car, food. And then hopefully with the footage, and luckily Sandra lives in Baja, California now, which isn’t far. And she’s lovely.

This money will go to shooting it and then hopefully from there it’s easier to get, once you have footage then it’s easier to get more money for post-production and so on to finish it. My series on Amazon, Outrageous, I started seven, eight years ago with an Indiegogo campaign. I’m in it to win it. I’m used to doing this stuff and making it happen. It’s a lot of work. I forgot how much cuz it was so many years ago. But I’m like, let’s just try to do this independently.