University Calendar
Films and Filmmakers Series
We will be screening THIRD MIND BLUES - please click here for more information.
William Tyler Smith is an independent fiction/documentary filmmaker, still photographer and film educator. Smith holds an MFA from the prestigious UCLA Graduate School of Theater, Film & Television. At UCLA, he was the winner of various prestigious awards and fellowships. He has directed five feature films and numerous short films across many different genres. His films have won awards at international festivals and have been broadcast, streamed and distributed on DVD all over the world.
His narrative feature, Kiss Me Again, which stars Fred Armisen, Kathryn Winnick and Darryl Hammond, premiered at the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival and is still enjoying a very successful international run. It also screened at the Zurich International Film Festival, Berkshire International Film Festival and the Moscow American Independent Film Festival.
His first feature documentary, The Third Mind, explores the artistic collaboration between Doors keyboardist and founder, Ray Manzarek and beatnik poet and author of The Beard, Michael McClure. It had a very successful premiere at the Venice International Film Festival, and also screened at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) and was broadcast on the Sundance Channel as the opening film in a series about The Beats, The Beats Go On. It was distributed on DVD by Mystic Fire and Oglio Records. Smith was also asked to be second camera on Gyula Gazdag's documentary about Alan Ginsberg, A Poet on the Lower East Side. Gazdag (Hungarian Fairy Tale) was one of Smith's most influential mentors at UCLA graduate film school. A Poet on the Lower East Side also premiered with Smith's film as part of the Sundance Channel's The Beats Go On documentary series.
The Flamin Groovies had heard about Smith and Third Mind Blues through Joel Jaffe, who also was Manzarek and Roger's sound producer/engineer. Smith met the band at the Bowery Ballroom and decided to do a test shoot the next day at Maxwell's in Hoboken. Everybody knew the chemistry was right, and a new documentary, The Incredible Flamin Groovies Movie, was born. It's a film that documents the band's history and recent comeback after having been apart for thirty years. Smith was so impressed collaborating with filmmaker and editor, Kurt Feldhun on Third Mind Blues, that he decided to bring Feldhun on board as a co-director. Smith and Feldhun followed the Groovies on tour in the United States, Canada, Europe and Japan over the span of four years. The film is currently in post-production and promises to be a modern-day, more intelligent Spinal Tap.
Smith is currently a film directing instructor held in high esteem at the New York Film Academy and Montclair State University. Many of his students have gone on to direct feature films and to have successful careers in the entertainment industries of their respective countries. He was recently named one of the "15 Most Notable Art Professors in New York City," by The Art Career Project. He is known for his "unorthodox theo-practical" approach to teaching film.