An interview with Jessie Deeter, producer of "Who Killed the Electric Car"

Well, folks, I've finally seen my first snuff film, and the victim was one fetching bundle of cuteness:  the electric car. Who Killed the Electric Car, a documentary produced by J-school grad Jessie Deeter, is a scorching chronicle of the untimely and infuriating death of the EV1, an extremely efficient and stylish (gasp!) electric car that GM launched with fanfare in 1990, only to smother it by 2002. The film indicts a lineup of "suspects" -- car companies, government, big oil -- and it is excruciating to watch, senseless, violent, and still riveting. If you were ticked off after dosing on An Inconvenient Truth, enjoy a nice little corporate evil nightcap with Who Killed the Car that Could Have Delivered Us from this Sick Smoggy Mess.

I managed to squelch my fury just long enough to catch up with Jessie this week, so read on if you want some skinny:

ML: How intentional was it to have the film released just shortly after An Inconvenient Truth? Was there coordination between Paramount, which produced An Inconvenient Truth, and your producer, Sony, to ride the Al Gore publicity wave?

JD: There wasn't any intentional coordination between us and Gore's people -- just what I'd call a happy synergy between the two. Gore has seen and liked our film, which we feel is the perfect complement to his.

ML: I was so struck by how downright spooky, annihilistic nuclear-fallout-esque, the TV advertisements were for the EV1 -- the ones you included in the film as archival footage. Do you think that was really intentional on the part of the automakers, or just a very peculiar but innocent strategy concocted by GM's advertising gurus?

JD: I can't comment on that. We put out the ads and let the audience make the call on their own. We really tried to stay as far from conspiracy as we could.

ML: Clearly there's a lot of "star power" in the film, from Martin Sheen narrating, to a brief clip of Phyllis Diller talking about early electric cars, to Mel Gibson, Peter Horton, and Tom Hanks all raving about their EV1 experiences. Was this in the original vision of the film, or did it unfold as you did the filming and reporting?

JD: The celebrities in this film were all appropriate. When Chelsea Sexton told me Mel's story, I was the strongest advocate of getting him to talk to us, because I thought that the fact that Mel had to work so hard to lease his car basically told the story of how hard GM worked to get it out for us. Also, people complain about the celebrities in this film, like narrator Martin Sheen, but, frankly, if their presence helps us get the message out, I'm all for it. I feel that we did a very good job of getting key industry players and policy people in the movie explaining what they need to explain. Each celebrity adds to our story.

ML: One gets the sense in the film that one character led you to another, like that Peter Horton led you to Chelsea Sexton, the former EV1 sales specialist who becomes one of the primary characters in the film. What was the trail between the characters? Who did you start with, and who did you end with?

JD: I would say that it was more a web than a linear chain -- many of our characters had at least heard of many of our other characters. Often, if we would hear enough times that we should really contact so and so about such and such, that was an indicator that we probably should. That said, there were characters, like Alan Lloyd [former Chairman of the California Air Resources Board, one of the main "suspects"], who were kind of tough to get on the record, but we just knew through the story that we had to get. I would say that the story began when director Chris Paine's car was taken from him and he tried to figure out what the hell happened after that.

ML: Chelsea Sexton is such a sincere, articulate, touching figure in the film. How is she doing now, and is she still in the activist job that she took at the end of the film?

JD: She's doing very well, though she may be looking for new employment. Her "job" with Plug in America is not paid. She's a firecracker, and the auto industry is loathe to hire her after this film. It's become a bit of an issue. She was quite brave to give us what she did.

ML: In the film, almost all of the suspects -- oil companies, car companies, government, CARB, and hydrogen fuel cells are found "guilty" in the snuffing of the EV1. Do you think one party was more guilty than the rest?

JD: I think that they all share blame. I had to fight hard to get a "guilty" verdict for consumers, who some people still believe should not be guilty. I believe that during the time the EV1 was coming out, consumers wanted their gas guzzlers -- they weren't thinking of the environment or national security, for example.

ML: I heard that Tesla, the auto company out of Silcon Valley that just unveiled its first car this week, promises to have affordable electric cars on the market in three years. Do you think the company has a chance of making it?

JD: I sure hope so. I've test-driven one of their cars, and it's definitely the sexiest electric vehicle I've ever come across. I think that they have the force of Silicon Valley behind them, which really helps. They are small enough to be a very nimble, innovative company, and they're working with some of the best people in the world to make their product a viable option. Also, since they chose a high-end sports car, they can utilize all of the most cutting-edge battery technology that the other EVs can't quite yet utilize because they can't afford it.

ML: So overall are you optimistic about the near future of electric cars?

JD: Yes, especially if oil prices continue to skyrocket and the places that supply us with oil don't get any more stable over these next years and Americans finally believe warnings about global warming. The bad news in all of these areas spells good news for electric cars -- we can't afford NOT to consider them as a real option to the internal combustion engine.

ML: What have been the highs and lows since release of the film?

JD: Highs have been getting great reviews and audience response to screenings, lows have been to be too pregnant to be involved in the whole rollout process of the film. :-)

ML: Did you send a copy of Who Killed the Electric Car to the White House?

JD: Not yet...

Who Killed the Electric Car is playing now in Bay Area theaters, including the Shattuck and the Parkway.