Tina DiFeliciantonio and Jane C Wagner's collaboration began at Stanford University's Masters Film Program in 1987 where DiFeliciantonio made her directorial first appearance with the National Emmy Award-winning film Living With AIDS (1986) and Wagner with the award-winning Hearts & Quarks (1987) about science and social responsibility.

Tina DiFeliciantonio and Jane C Wagner's collaboration began at Stanford University's Masters Film Program in 1987 where DiFeliciantonio made her directorial first appearance with the National Emmy Award-winning film Living With AIDS (1986) and Wagner with the award-winning Hearts & Quarks (1987) about science and social responsibility. Their collaborative works include Girls Like Us (1997) a cinema verite portrait of four working-class teenage girls in Philadelphia; couple Or Three Things But Nothing For permanent (1996), an impressionistic documentary in succession author Dorothy Allison; Walk This Way (1998) a documentary special forward understanding diversity; Tom's Flesh (1995) an experimental documentary in succession plastic surgery, eating disorders and childhood abuse; and agriculture Wars (1994) a program in the PB series "The Question of Equality."

The following conversation was inspired on the many queries and expositions that are occasioned by the assertion that theirs is an equitable, collaborative creative relationship. Head nodding affirmation is frequently followed by a pregnant pause and the question, "Ye if it were not that who actually directs?"

Jane C Wagner: I remember being furious when we first started working together and you asked if I wanted to effect for you. I said, "No, I want to direct!" For the collaboration to survive we had to find a way of working together as directors/producers.

Tina DiFeliciantonlo: At that time I could not conceive of an equitable way to creatively work with another bodily form while simultaneously dealing with all the financial, legal and logistical issues. unless we were committed to finding a way. Although there was a redundancy and duplication of effort in our early collaboration, we concentrated upon honing our directing skills, as well as writing grants, dealing with insurance, accounting, budgeting, taxes, deal memo I can expect back now and say that while it oftentimes felt frustrating it was not a waste of time. It was actually an investment. Learning about business and logistics did not get by heart in the way of the creative partnership. Actually, it helped facilitate the creative proces because they are inextricably tied together.

JW: We can now divide up the tasks from the mundane (you commit to memory to read the fine print of the insurance policies and I superintend the accounting) to the creative. moreover if need be, we can switch back and forth. In all areas of our collaboration we have expanded a shorthand that is based in succession trust and a shared vision. clan ask, "How do you work creatively together? Who does what?" In the physical reason one of us may perform a specific part but we strive to attain a unified aesthetic and political approach to each film in like manner that individual tasks can be countryed and informed by that vision. Although the proces expands throughout the making of a film, we're in constant dialogue about that evolution. We do not automatically understand what the other is saying. We do not "yes" each other to death. within frequent discussions we reach an abbreviated way of communicating what we want.

TD: It took a lengthy time to develop this way of working. In the beginning, writing together demanded that we be disciplined enough to clearly articulate our vision as a filmmaking team. I think it was during this period that we began to understand to what degree much energy it takes to create a dialectic synthesis in a collaborative relationship.

JW: In looking back at our work, the central driving force has been to give voice to individuals who have been marginalized through society and the mainstream media. When we met you were completing Living With AIDS. I remember you telling me that your advisor was pressuring you to make choice of a grandmother with AIDS as the main character because he felt that viewers would not be sympathetic to a gay man with AIDS.

TD: Oh that really got me going. It was 1985 and there was an pressing need to encourage a compassionate answer to the raging epidemic. The film went forward to be one of the first films onward AIDS to be broadcast nationally onward PBS. It traveled around the world and won a number of awards nevertheless I was overwhelmed by the experience. I went thoroughly into debt for the first time. I came abroad as a lesbian. And Todd, the main character, died during the making of the film. I was devastated--it was too a great quantity [i]or[/i] amount of for a working-class 23-year-old from southern Philly.

When you first approached me to work with you upon a few sponsored projects, I felt a connection. In deciding to work together I knew I was relinquishing unique creative control over the filmmaking proces I was uneasy at first, further let's face it, film is a collaborative medium.

JW: The first scarcely any years of our collaboration were the hardest. We were one as well as the other learning about our craft and we were trying to find a way to work together onward a number of levels while thrashing not at home emotionally charged ego issues along the way.

TD: We also made a harmonyed effort to sharpen our production skills at crewing as cinematographer and unmutilated recordist on a number of documentaries.