I drove out to see Stephen Marino at his garage in Queens, where he’s rebuilding his second antique motorcycle – this time a 1960’s Triumph (his first was his father’s old ’69 BSA Thunderbolt). He collected the scrap Triumph from a man in Bumblefuck, MA and has stripped the frame completely to assess the new job. Old motorcycles are a recent “Me time” comfort for Steve, when he’s got time to get off the hustle.
Steve Marino is a professional videographer and has been paying the bills for three years by freelance film jobs. He filmed, directed, and produced his first feature film Black Water and spends most of his time working with renowned companies and skaters. From Torres to the Birdman, he’s worked with them all.
Steve and I grew up skateboarding together and have worked together on various projects for years now. I wanted to interview him about what’s been happening in New York City these days, his recent endeavors, and what lies ahead. Steve’s been hiding behind a beard since his three-month cross-country trip over the summer, looking more like a trucker than a videographer. We took two cold-ones out of the sixer, popped off the caps, and got down to business.
WILLY, ANDREW AND ME: A WESTERN MIGRATION from MARINO on Vimeo.
So Marino, how do you feel about the rise of new NYC skate-parks, and what have they done for skateboarding here?
They’ve made everyone else lazy, that’s what they did! They made me lazy. I don’t want to skate on the street anymore. I just want to go to the smooth-ass skate-park.
What about the new kids?
It’s cool, but it depends on which side of the street you’re talking about. Are you trying to be a professional skateboarder and get busy on the street and film actual skateboard tricks, or are you trying to have fun?
Either way it brings a lot of people from the city into one place, which is good but also bad. There’s been four events at the LES skate-park that just opened in June – events from major companies and shit – it’s like huge.
What has Hurricane Sandy taught you?
That I like gasoline a lot more than I thought I did. If there’s a will there’s a way. Did you see that photo of Rodney doing a Tre-Flip off that A-frame sidewalk over a fallen tree?
Did you see that Instagram of Mark (Our good friend in Bushwick) skateboarding down the road with a cardboard sail?
I did. I also saw that photo a shark on someone’s front lawn in Jersey. That was pretty sick.
Any footage about the Hurricane?
I shot an episode for a web channel about the events that unfolded here with Hurricane Sandy in Long Beach, LI. It was based on what the surfers did to help out their community, the one story I remember was a surfer with a jet ski, who was being towed in when the waves were really big.
Mhmm… During that day, he saw the waves pushed through the boardwalk and he knew we were supposed to get a high tide later on. He got on the horn and tried to phone all the people he knew that lived in basement apartments trying to evacuate them. He was going down the street in his jet ski—you know, five feet of water—moving his folks and his friends to safety. I went to explore two days after the Hurricane and walked through two feet of sand covering the streets.
A couple weeks later, when we began shooting, they started cleaning up the place. They were depositing the sand all in one place— it ended up being a three-story mound.
Everyone’s life was on their front lawn, everyone’s car was fucked. We saw a bunch of cars on two-feet mounds of sand with busted out windows and open gas-tanks — busted open because people were siphoning gas.
Have you worked on any other crazy things recently?
I just edited a Jason Jesse commercial for Converse…a bunch of pool skating and motorcycle burn-outs and shit.
Jason Jessee – Engineered For Destruction from MARINO on Vimeo.
That’s pretty cool, I need another beer—keep talking.
[Laughs] He made a rear-motorcycle tire out of Chuck Taylors, I think it came out good—Converse was stoked.
Have you ever been star struck?
Yeah I guess I have. It happens, and I just sit back and watch for a while. When I was at KCDC skate shop probably three or four years ago, before I knew the dude—I was like, ‘Whoa, look at the dude skate the ramp!’ It was Joey Pepper.
Got any new projects you’re trying to make?
My friend John and I were talking. He’s a surfer, I’m a skater, and we both like motorcycles. We were like, ‘Let’s do something on the East Coast.’
He said ‘Let’s go to Canada, I hear it’s real nice in Nova Scotia.’
‘Cool, I’ve never even been there, never even been to Canada. Let’s do it!’ I was thinking about doing some work on my Jeep: lifting it, getting bigger tires, putting a motorcycle rack in the back for two dirt bikes, and a surfboard on the roof.
It’s kinda snowballing, every time I have a couple beers here and there and think about it. I call someone else, I get a ton of ideas. I’ll shoot it all in 16mm and then put it in some kind of adventure film.
Let’s talk gear.
Usually I use a Panasonic HVX-200 with an extreme fish-eye lens and a rod system. And then I have a Canon 60-D with a bunch of lenses and an intervalometer time-lapses. I have a 16mm Bolex, which is my favorite camera of all. I have a Minolta Super8 XL-401. The Panasonic’s and SLR’s are for work; everything else is just pleasure I guess.
What advice do you have for kids trying to get up as a videographer?
Just be a good person. That’s what a lot of people don’t get — a good personality goes a long way. Skill does too, but nobody wants to work with someone who’s difficult. Everyone thinks, ‘Oh I shoot good photos, I film good stuff!’ They think they’ll get ahead. But lot of people get blacklisted because nobody wants to deal with them.
Work within your means. Do what you gotta do. Don’t step on anyone’s toes and don’t burn any bridges.
Any advice for the kids trying to be prospective skateboard professionals?
Have fun. Don’t go into it thinking, ‘Oh I gotta do my kickflips.’ Nobody gets into it to make money, everyone gets into it because they purely love skateboarding. And if you’re doing it for money, you’ll find out there’s no money in it. You could make some, but you don’t make as much as a hedge fund executive. Just do what you love, that’s all it is. That’s the way to live life.
New York or Cali?
It’s bittersweet — California is good for getting to where you want on such a bigger scale. The weather’s perfect –and the beach – but it’s so spread out, and the companies are spread all along the coast. There’s a bigger industry there, because it started there, whereas, New York is the industry head for the East Coast—small, but growing exponentially. Everyone is cool with each other, even though they come from many different areas…so New York. Yeah, for now.
Article by Timothy Robbins
Photo by Brad Westcott
Follow Stephen on Twitter @stephenmmarino