David Konow: Do you think if John is free to do his thing in his next movie, "The Battle of Red Cliff," he’ll be back on top?

Steven Kemper: For John’s sake, I worry that there’s an issue in America where studios have gotten to know the kind of work that he does, and because things went south for him at the box office, I don’t know if they’ll ever recover from something like that. But I do personally believe that being left to his own resources and his own devices that that movie probably is going to be very good. My hope is that it might be good enough where a studio might give him another crack back at it. But I still think it’s going to be the same problem. I still think they’re going to try to put square peg in a round hole, and it’s not going to happen. It’s very tricky, but I’m hopeful. If he does have the liberty that I’m hoping he’ll have on his current film [sic], and I’m hoping that by being able to do it independently that he’ll have a lot more control over doing it his way. I’m certain that his mentality is going to shine where it didn’t necessarily or always shine particularly in "Windtalkers." That was just a movie that the studio got involved with and made a mess of, and they didn’t really care too much about what John was trying to do with it. They just tried to re-cut it, make it a releasable length, and have a little bit more stuff about the Navajo Indians in it that they thought was lacking, which was a script issue. That’s something the studio really should have addressed before John was involved. I do think in a way that the clash of cultures hurt John with the American studios, but I also think left to his own devices he’s going be okay.

"Windtalkers" bombed, possibly as a result of a conflict in style between Woo and Hollywood.

David Konow: Ultimately, what was it like working with John Woo as an artist and as a man?

Steven Kemper: There have been a number of things that come back to me...how much fun I had, what a likeable guy he is, with a great sense of humor. He is, by far and away, the director I respected working with most, and who really respected me in return. And as far as being an artist, he took what he was doing very, very seriously. He was very, very dedicated to his fans and giving them what they wanted, and what he thought they expected. I really felt that we weren’t just making a film, that there was something bigger to it. I felt like working with John there was something to protect, and something to nurture about his style and about his type of film. With John there was stuff that was expected and I didn’t want to squash that. I remember I used to have fights with studios about it, and even people coming up, saying, "You gotta get rid of this." And I said, "No, that’s John Woo, you can’t get rid of that."

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