Peyton Reed is a local of Raleigh, North Carolina and graduate of the University Of North Carolina. He began his career at Zaloom-Mayfield Productions, where he served as an editor, and made several music videos for his pals, who happened to be the underground punk bands Superchunk and The Connells. He then moved into behind-the-scenes work, with his very successful documentaries Secrets Of The Back To The Future Trilogy, Through The Eyes Of Forrest Gump and CBS ' The Honeymooner's Anniversary Special.

Reed moved into feature production when Walt Disney took a liking to his work, drafting him to direct the television comedies The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes and The Love Bug for The Wonderful World of Disney Television Series. Reed has also done several other television works including Comedy Central's Upright Citizen's Brigade, HBO's Mr. Show and The Weird Al Show, before the box office success of his first feature film, Bring It On.

DVDFILE: So, are you hard at work promoting the Bring It On DVD?

Peyton Reed : Actually we're really just getting started. But, man, I'm so excited, to have it come out on DVD!

DF: Are you a DVD buff?

PR: Yeah, I'm a huge DVD buff and before that I was a laserdisc buff. So, the idea of actually having my own movie come out on DVD is like "Aw, Man!" It so surreal!

DF: The Bring It On DVD is great. There is so much stuff on there. Did you think that your movie would ever get such a super special fandangled collector's edition release?

PR: Well, not really. It was interesting because there were certain things, before we closed up shop in the editing room, that the editors and I had pulled. There was a bunch of stuff that we wanted to present and try to have a bunch of extras. But that's before the movie came out and you know, because the movie could have come out and tanked. And we'd have been like, "But, we have all this collector's stuff..." So, yeah, I went in and tried to be as involved as I could in the DVD. I wanted to put as much stuff as possible without effecting the quality of the movie itself. I was really please with how cooperative Universal was.

You know, it's not an effects driven movie, it's not the kind of movie that you would generally think of as being something laden with all these extras. But we had some deleted scenes and then we had the various things like the wardrobe and make up tests. Then we thought about actually doing all this insane stuff, that we just simply didn't have time to do. We were going to shoot some Super8 footage and fake it like it was a Super8 movie I made when I was 12. (laughing) That featured cheerleaders and it had always been my great passion to make a cheerleader movie. But we didn't have time to do all that stuff.

Anyway, I was really pleased with the quality of the disc because Shawn Maurer, who's the director of photography, and I went to do the transfer. They transferred it in High-Def, which is amazing. Watching the final color corrected transfer on High-Def looked better than I had seen the movie in any theatrical screening situation, including the premier of the movie. It 's amazing. It 's come a long way, though I think it is sort of unfashionable for a filmmaker to really embrace the digital revolution in terms of digital projection and the like. But man, this thing looked amazing. I mean I was really, really pleased.

DF: With all this extra stuff on the disc and you being a DVD fan, are there specific types of extras or supplemental things that you'd like to see more of?

PR: Yeah. I've been a big collector of discs and stuff and going back to the laserdisc world I was always into all the Scorsese things and those John Sturges films like Bad Day At Black Rock and The Great Escape. All of these things that are just great, and this is nothing new when people say "Oh, skip film school and rent DVDs!"

But man, I agree with that sentiment because some of the DVD stuff, it's so educational. I love extra stuff, like, I'm dying for this new Superman DVD. I loved that movie as a kid and to know that there is all this extra stuff that I haven't seen before, it 's amazing. I mean, I think it 's great! But, I love the idea because I came from the behind-the-scenes world, and I did a bunch of stuff for the Back To The Future movies and Forrest Gump. And it 's interesting because those were a blast and there really fun, but at the end of the day they are just promotional films more than they are documentaries.

I found it really interesting like on the Magnolia DVD how you have a whole separate disc with all this behind-the-scenes stuff shot on digital video. It really went beyond what you'd normally see in a promotional video. Because it shows people not only like "Aw, we're having fun making this movie!" but also shows the other side, like "Oh, shit man! We're never gonna make the day! And we're way over budget" That's the best stuff. I mean that's what you want to see.

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