Artist Chat with Meron Tebeje

What prompted you to make this film? Because it’s a heavy subject that I don’t think everyone necessarily signs up to do.

Technically, it was for my graduate capstone. I had a couple of topics in mind, but I grew up in a house with DV(Domestic Violence). I wanted to be close to the topic and the participant in the story. I had been organizing for about 10 years, and I had been in coalitions together with Survived and Punished, but I hadn’t directly organized with them. I would follow their cases … specifically the chapter that was working on Tracy McCarter’s case.

What initially got me interested in Tracy’s case was I had seen the news coverage as it was happening. Then, post her release and the charges being dropped, I had watched some of her interviews with news broadcast channels. I remember there was one point where she was explaining her story, and she had a lot to say and they kind of cut her off. I was curious to see where she was at now.

So I reached out to her, totally cold calling, to see if she would be interested [in doing a documentary]. I wanted to kind of give her a medium to process what had happened using her own voice. … She wasn’t able to really speak during her trial, and really speak to the press until after the charges were dropped.

People who have experienced/defended themselves from domestic violence are told not to say anything to the public by their lawyers. Because anything they say could be used against them. I think my hope was to use the film as, like, a vessel for her to process. …

A lot of times these stories come on the news, and you hear about them when they’re happening, but you don’t ever hear about what happens to the people after the dust sort of has settled. But, like, it really hasn’t settled, right? Because their life is changed forever. 

On your crew, did you have anyone that was… kind of facilitating her story? 

Yeah no, it was just me, and sometimes a friend who was doing second cam. I didn’t broach anything that she didn’t want to say, or talk about. She’s said her story publicly many times, and her story’s consistent. It’s always the same. We sat down and talked, and between two sit-down interviews, it was, like, 7-8 hours of just talking and processing. 

I tried to allow Tracy the space to also talk about her hesitation with me. She’s like, “I don’t know you.” I think there should be transparency, like being honest about how people feel. 

What was your process for cutting those interviews down?

Yeah, it was really difficult. I mean, I had, like, a really hard time with that …The framework of the film was that I would start by trying to explain a little bit of her background, like how she ended up in the relationship with this man, and then how it turned over time. Then, talking about the incident, because she’s never really talked about the incident in detail. Then talking about the organizing around her case. Then ending with where she is now, like, what she has to deal with in the aftermath of everything. Of course, it doesn’t get to everything though, like there’s so much more nuance than what this short doc can provide. 

She was part of the editing process. I was showing her my cuts. I had a really transparent relationship with her during that process.

Towards the middle of the film you’re explaining the context around Tracy’s criminal charges, and you just have text, no narration, no background music. Is there a reason why you chose text in silence?

Um, no. Actually, I edited this thing so many times, this is the first time I’ve shown the film off. Recently, I screened it with my mentor Leah Smith at Maysels Documentary Center. That was the first time I showed it to an audience, and I didn’t realize how it would look, and I realized the [lack of] sound is dramatic. I didn’t even think about it, it kind of just worked out a little bit.

The purpose of that text was because I wanted to add additional context [to] the story of her meeting Jim. The news stories didn’t tell you that they were together for several years. I mean, there were other incidents that had occurred, he had a history of … alcoholism, and he also had a history of DV. 

At the end of the film, Tracy is walking through this art installation. Did you take her there, or did she bring you there?

I took her there. It’s this big mosaic art installation, by this artist [Isaiah Zager], and I wanted to show her navigating through, like, a beautiful maze, as a metaphor of her, kind of coming through everything you know, and finding her voice in it.

Is there any meaning behind the title, “Always Tracy”? 

She once said something, like, “I’ll always be me, I’ll always be who I am,” or something, in an interview. And a lot of times, when she’s talking about herself, she’s so sure of herself, she was so confident … But, then I think, during this process, she lost herself. I mean, obviously, the process makes you question yourself. At the end of the day, one moment doesn’t define a full person um, so I just went with “Always Tracy.”

What would you recommend to anyone who’s trying to tackle similar subject matter?

In terms of being prepared this is an emotionally exhausting process. I think any story you tell is an emotionally exhausting process, but there’s something about violence…and, like, the myriad ways it shows up in this film: physical, police, etc. You need to sit, reflect, and process. Which I didn’t do. I was also in grad school, I was still doing homework, I was still doing other stuff. Having that, like, mental space to really, like, process in real time is critical. I processed everything kind of after the fact. So, I think respecting those who’ve been directly impacted, especially in the process of them telling their own stories, is really essential in telling stories like this.