Harry Shearer's not funny ... not when he's talking hard truths about his New Orleans documentary, The Big Uneasy

We'd love to be mad about Harry. But he's mad enough already, given how the Army Corps of Engineers treated the city of New Orleans. Kimberly Gadette gets flooded with facts about how sometimes, there's nothing natural about a "natural disaster."

A part-time New Orleans resident, the actor (This is Spinal Tap, A Mighty Wind, For Your Consideration), voiceover artist (The Simpsons), author, director, satirist, musician, radio host (Le Show), playwright, screenwriter, columnist, multi-media artist and whirlwind known as Harry Shearer has put on yet another hat. Notwithstanding the white Panama number that he wears as he intermittently appears on camera throughout the film, he's expanded his resume yet again with his latest role as feature film documentarian.

His subject: the failure of the Army Corps of Engineers to appropriately protect the Big Easy. And his ongoing concern that this governmental agency, without any oversights in place, will continue to mismanage projects throughout the country.

We all know that on August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina ripped through New Orleans, breaching a multitude of levees. And that by August 31, 80% of the city was flooded. But what we don't know, and what the film conveys (through the testimony and reports of the leaders of two scientific investigation teams [Dr. Ivor van Heerden, Dr. Robert Bea] and one Army Corps whistleblower [Maria Garzino]) is the extent of the bungled operations. And the fact that $14 billion has just been spent on a new and improved system ... that won't work any better than the old one.

As for Shearer's activism, maybe his alter ego of Spinal Tap's Derek Smalls is to blame. Perhaps Shearer's portrayal of a seemingly passive, quiet fellow who skirted any sign of conflict was antithetical to his very core, and he's been speaking out loudly ever since. And yet, he was the epitome of soft-spoken courtesy during a recent interview held in the mezzanine of Portland's old-world Benson Hotel. Amid the polished walnut wood, crystal chandeliers and high bas-relief ceilings, Shearer was nattily dressed, flashing a kind, warm smile. But his cross-trainer sneakers hinted at the fact that if he had to dash out to take on a dragon here, or put out a fire there, he was ready.

IMO: I think it's shocking that the reaction to your film is akin to some scandalous cover-up, with the mainstream media staying far away. You must have found this quite surprising!

HS: I did. I found it surprising that I was in the position where I felt compelled to do this movie in the first place. I used to say to the people of New Orleans, "You know in about five years, somebody from the Washington Post or The New York Times is going to come down here, do the story and win a Pulitzer for discovering all this." I'm just saying, it's been sitting out there in plain sight.

IMO: It's not the first we've heard about the Army Corps of Engineers being less than perfect. But the idea that their faulty levees caused New Orleans to flood 80%, rather than what outside experts are stating should have been no more than 20%, is huge.

HS: Yes, that's dramatic. I became sensitized to the Army Corps when I was a kid, growing up in Los Angeles. Someone said, you know the concrete ditch that meanders through the city? That was once the LA river. The Army Corps did that. After the Los Angeles Flood of 1938, the Army Corps said "never again" ... and they turned that river into a sarcophagus.

IMO: You mention that the jumping-off point for you about deciding to make this film was when you saw President Obama address a town hall in New Orleans in October, 2009, calling the flooding a "natural disaster." And even with all the contradicting independent reports he'd been sent, he still used those words on the fifth anniversary. Has Obama's continued refusal to examine, or at the very least acknowledge, the very real cause of the flood, jaundiced your opinion of him and his presidency?

HS: Totally. Only totally. It started with the Corps saying publically in March 2009 that they were going to choose a solution called, in their verbiage, "Option #1" (a technically less-superior solution to the problem). Early on, I was making noise about this in my column at the Huffington Post. And commenters were saying, "Look, why are you bothering ranting about this? You're a celebrity, why don't you do like your friend Brad Pitt and go talk to the White House?" I thought, OK, I'll take that challenge. I focused on David Axelrod [the President's Senior Adviser for two years, until early 2011]. I left two messages. Finally, after a few weeks I got a call from an aide and I told him about my concerns about the technically non-superior solution, etc. He said, "OK, I'll have someone who really knows this material to get back to you." Who did they put in contact with me? The legislative liaison person for the Army Corps of Engineers.

In other words: I call to report a burglary, and they connect me with the burglar's PR person. That's this White House.

[Note: the story is detailed in full by Mr. Shearer's Huffington Post article, "Playing the Inside Game"]

IMO: The film states that as of June 2009, neither the White House nor Congress had responded to the Office of Special Counsel's findings that back up the whistleblower's reports about how the faulty new pumps are destined to fail. To date, is that silence still in effect?

HS: Yep. Silence is golden at the White House.

IMO: Given the fact that up to one hundred other cities could be impacted, it seems incredible that urban centers in danger aren't more concerned.

HS: I don't wish bad things on anybody, but the Corps, internally, is making fairly unpleasant predictions about Sacramento. They have a levee system there that even they regard as problematic. Worse, the city is facing run-off of a record snow pack in the Sierras. If that goes the wrong way it will affect not only Sacramento, but since Sacramento sits atop the California water system, it may have an impact on Los Angeles, San Diego, etc. But that may be what it takes. Look, if this disaster had happened in New York rather than in New Orleans, you know how much the national media would have cared.

IMO: Was it difficult to get the film's three experts to appear on camera?

HS: No, not at all. I had interviewed all of them on my radio show, and I think I treated them fairly and they thought so, too -- that was the easy part of the process. The only person who was problematic to get on film was Karen Durham-Aguilera (Army Corp Senior Executive and Director of Task Force Hope).

IMO: But you did get her in front of the camera, even though she appeared quite defiant, looking for all the world like a "hostile witness."

HS: It was a two-month effort. I finally convinced her through a mutual friend. I did it mainly, though it sounds odd to say, for her agency's own good. The "Green Suits" (which is what they call the military officials inside the Corps) rotate in and out so quickly, saying things like "Well, I wasn't there long enough," or "That was before my time," etc., that I thought OK, you guys need someone with some institutional memory who can actually stand up and answer these questions. I said to her, "There are serious allegations being made about your agency ... you need to respond to them." I thought it was important for the viewers. But as it turns out, her position, as well as the Corps' position, is that they don't talk about the past.

But let's be fair. That comes from the top. That's what President Obama said regarding torture, water boarding, etc.: "We're only looking forward ..." He sets the tone.

IMO: I notice that you had to work around another expert, Raymond Seed, who has some powerful testimony on record. Was there a reason why he wasn't in your film?

HS: He did not wish to appear.

IMO: No reason?

HS: There was a reason, but I'm not at liberty to make that call. But I can say that when the film came out, he sent me an email stating that he felt good about being represented in the film.

IMO: I thought you did it really well; he may not have appeared, but he did appear, given that you used his written quotes, and that his testimony that was available from public record.

HS: It was crucial that the experts deserved a fuller representation.

IMO: It seems that these experts have all gone through some tough times. Dr. Ivor Van Heerden lost his job; Dr. Robert Bea lost his voice; and Corps whistleblower Maria Garzino is struggling with health problems. Do you get the sense that this documentary might act as a kind of redemption for them?

HS: With Ivor and Maria, I think there is vindication. They've been fighting lonely battles. Somebody comes along and shines a light ... and the roaches scatter for awhile.

IMO: In the film, Dr. Bea relates a conversation he had with an old-timer at the Army Corps of Engineers, who states, "We have taken the engineering out of the Corps of Engineers." Where have all the top engineers gone ... and why no attempt to replace them with equally good talent?

HS: This was a reform that I believe started in the Reagan Administration. I think it had something to do with reforming, of all things, procurement policies in the Dept. of Defense. But the effect of it was to privatize a lot of what the Corps does, to put the actual engineering in the hands of private contractors with whom the Corps does business. As he says, "We're now the Corps of Contract Administrators." We've seen this in other parts of the government lately. In some places it may be OK, in some places it's problematic. I think citizens may have realized a little late in the game that privatizing and outsourcing a lot of the activities of an army at war is not necessarily the wisest idea, especially in terms of having control over how people behave. And it doesn't ultimately save money, which is the advertised reason for doing it in the first place.

IMO: Speaking of advertising, not only has NPR (National Public Radio) ignored your film, but they changed the language of the paid ads you were running. They rewrote your original "the documentary about why New Orleans flooded" to "the documentary about New Orleans and Hurricane Katrina." You've since referred to them as "National Petrified Radio." Any theories on why they have seemingly become so fainthearted?

HS: I had a discussion with a producer in the News Division a few years ago. I said to him: "I used to be an avid NPR listener, but I haven't listened to your news broadcasts since the run-up to the Iraq War because you guys were as credulous and as gullible as the New York Times and the Washington Post ... but since then, the Times and the Post have apologized." His response was twofold. First, NPR's news director had covered the Gulf War as a reporter, and his only question when war clouds started gathering, was, OK, who do we send, how do we cover it? It was all logistical – he was in it. Second, we've been aware that we have this reputation as the Bush-bashing network. And I think we now bend over backwards to avoid giving any more oxygen to that reputation.

I said, "Great, thousands of people died, well done."

NPR boasts that they're the best radio journalism in America. Well, yeah ... who else is doing it? Everybody else runs three-minute headlines. They've kind of got the field to themselves ...

IMO: Like when I tell my mom, she's the best mother I've ever had.

HS: Exactly! As Lyndon Baines Johnson used to say, "I'm the only president you've got."

IMO: You're not shy about casting the Army Corps as the villain of this piece ...

HS: I didn't do it ... they did!

IMO: That said, certain documentarians such as Michael Moore get shunned for their one-sided views, and end up alienating potential audiences. Were you concerned about walking that same path?

HS: Very much. Especially since I come from this other world of comedy, and doubly especially because I'd fooled around with the documentary form, I really felt constrained to be ultra-careful, ultra-serious. And ultra-determined to have the Army Corps say its piece, make its response. Not to play games with them, not to play fast and loose with the footage, not to edit people to make them look bad, not to tell people what to think, not to draw the viewers' conclusions for them. I don't ever tell you in the film anything except who these people are. I thought that was the only job that I was qualified for, and to exceed my boundaries in that way would redound to the negative credibility of everybody else in the film.

I mean, I'm as big a ham an anybody in show business ...

IMO: I've heard that ...

HS: In the first iteration of the film, I wasn't even in it.

IMO: Really?

HS: My producer was saying all along, "You have to ..., you have to ..., you have to ...," and after the first couple of showings of the first cut, it was determined that we needed a kind of host.

IMO: Under the heading of "small world," I note that your DP Arlene Nelson worked with Spike Lee early in her career. Which leads me to ask: given that Mr. Lee had made two four-hour HBO documentaries about the continuing struggles of New Orleans, did you approach him about yours? Was he supportive, did act as a resource, did you talk to him, anything?

HS: No. I had seen his first four hours before I did my movie ... and I felt that he did probably as good a job with the subject as a New Yorker could do. But I thought that the city needed its own voice.

IMO: Even though you've been met with resistance from the mainstream media (all clinging to the fact that it was "the hurricane's fault") and that the Corps has a rare blanket immunity from their actions (hearkening back to the 1928 Flood Control Act), let's say that The Big Uneasy is viewed in record numbers, and people push for a sweeping change. In the Harry Shearer vision of a perfect world, what would be the best that could happen?

HS: I wrote in the Huffington Post what I thought President Obama should have said last August. It boils down to, "Thanks to the Army Corps for two centuries of distinguished service. Now can I please have the keys back?" Basically, we're in a century where climate change is going to meet the increasing problems of too much water vs. not enough water, and we're dealing with a 21st century problem in a 19th century way. Ideally, we would have a new agency with a mandate which is a) to seek out the best minds from around the world, including the Dutch who don't need to reinvent the wheel. That agency would have the twin objectives of mimicking nature in what we do to the greatest extent possible, while exercising mindfulness about the unintended, environmental consequences. These are things that the Army Corps has proven itself incapable of doing. But the realist in me says the very structure that we depict in the film, the iron triangle of "Corps-Contractors-Congress" says that's dream time. So I've been meeting with people on Capital Hill from the two different sides of the ideological fence, all who agree that the Army Corps needs to be reined in and redirected, and feel that the vehicle for that should be the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA), which sets priorities and mandates for water policy. But we'd need the executive branch to sign on as well.

IMO: Since this is your first feature documentary, did you enjoy it? Is this what you thought the role of a documentary filmmaker would be like?

HS: I'd made films before, I'd been in journalism. I felt that I wasn't going into an area that was so foreign.

IMO: And you had no fear, no hesitance whatsoever?

HS: None. I never thought about it. It was an instantaneous decision when I heard President Obama's speech calling the flooding a "natural disaster." I did, however, worry about the public perception of me, and how I shouldn't be in the film, and I made stylistic choices that I thought would buttress the film's credibility. For example, I had people talk directly to the camera ... given the dense material, I thought it would be all the more powerful.

IMO: You may be the first renaissance man I've ever interviewed, having done so much, and so well. Looking at all your accomplishments, it seems that there's very little, other than maybe dentistry, that you haven't done. Is there anything left on your personal bucket list?

HS: I have a stage musical that I wrote with a partner some time back that I'm determined to get made.

IMO: In earlier interviews, you've referenced your musical take on J. Edgar Hoover ... I assume this is the project?

HS: Yes. Unfortunately, it's taken so long, I don't know if the original stars are still up for it, but I really feel committed to that project.

IMO: Back to your current project of The Big Uneasy, maybe there's an upside to all these current reality TV shows ... perhaps the public is becoming more accepting of documentary films, more willing to spend time and money to watch intelligently-crafted reality.

HS: I think it scares people to say "intelligent." I try to emphasize "this is what was done with your money when you weren't watching." I feel that's more motivational to people. And also, the thought that you've seen the people suffering as a result of this ... this is the other part of the story as to why, and how it didn't have to happen.

IMO: On a lighter note, because no one should do a Harry Shearer interview without including a few questions about the 1984 hit film This is Spinal Tap: whose idea was it to have the three string men of Spinal Tap all play bass in the song "Big Bottom" ... making it a very Big Bottom indeed?

HS: When we started doing "Big Bottom," we just thought the name of the song dictated how it should be played, thinking "Let's just carry it out." That was all of us reaching into that moment simultaneously.

IMO: This is Spinal Tap is often referred to as the forebear of the mockumentary. But Orson Welles did it via radio in 1938, as well as his 1973 film F is for Fake ...

HS: Don't forget a little film called Citizen Kane, also done in the form of the mockumentary.

IMO: Of course! There's also 1964's Hard Day's Night and Woody Allen's 1969 Take the Money and Run. Do you correct the mistaken assertion or, by this late date, do you simply let it pass?

HS: This is Spinal Tap isn't first mockumentary I was associated with. My first was 1979's Reel Life (a satire of what a lot of reality shows have developed into). But I don't think any of them have spawned as much in the way of emulation directly as This is Spinal Tap did. When Christopher Guest and I met Ricky Gervais, he said unabashedly "I'm a fan of Tap, I wanted The Office to be like that." High praise indeed, because I'm a huge fan of the British Office. Other people have said, there's nothing like it. So both things are true: it's not the first but it's probably the most influential.

IMO: A question for all the bass players out there: if there were a disaster, natural or not, and you could only take one of your basses, which one would you choose?

HS: (taking a pause, uncharacteristically stymied) Hmmm. I have three upright basses ... the electrics wouldn't be in the picture. I'm between the upright I have in New Orleans and the one I have in London. The one in London is newer, probably more easily replaceable, so I'll take the one in New Orleans, a 100-plus-year-old German bass.

IMO: And does it have a name? Not the brand, but an actual moniker?

HS: Yes, I've named all my basses. The one in New Orleans is Marlene ("Mar-LAY-na"), German, of course, after the singer.

IMO: Anything else you want to add?

HS: I think that what we document in this film, I wish it was just restricted to the Army Corps of Engineers. This kind of highhanded behavior, buttressed by a hubris that is not justified by the work, is something we see right now: in Japan, on Wall Street ... it's a paradigm for our times. How often are we going to have to see this behavior blow up literally in our faces before we say, "we're running things wrong here, folks." Somehow we're letting the beguiling nature of "It's your fault, no it's your fault," take up all the oxygen ... and meanwhile calamities keep occurring, blowing up all around us.

[This interview was edited and condensed.]

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