Television
Behind the Seams of Eleven Minutes
By Molly Sullivan |
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 Jay McCarroll hopes that Eleven Minutes will give his designs the press that they missed out on during Fashion Week. He also hopes to do the work that he wants and have the career that he wants…but that doesn’t necessarily mean being like Michael Kors.
“I don’t think I really want to do that again,” McCarroll said about putting together his first independent runway show in Bryant Park.
Getting a slot at the end of New York’s Fashion Week didn’t help spark much interest in McCarroll’s designs, but the new documentary Eleven Minutes has helped get McCarroll a bit of press...and will hopefully continue to do so now that it’s released. However, the film isn’t supposed to be all about the “Project Runway” winner.
“[It’s] more about the process of making clothes and all the things that go into it,” McCarroll explained.
 With Eleven Minutes, McCarroll wanted to show audiences what it takes to get clothes on people and where styles come from. As for the parts that are about him, he hopes viewers see “the business side of [him]” and not the reality show side. Viewers all know McCarroll as the somewhat bitchy, “out there” designer from “Project Runway,” but this film isn’t just a “Project Runway” extension.
Co-director Michael Selditch agreed, “our process of making the documentary [was transparent]…The process that Jay was going through was similar to the process that we were going through.” He also wanted to show the process in a different way, asking, “When do you see on ‘Project Runway’ a needle going through a piece of fabric?”
For Selditch, Eleven Minutes isn’t about the finished product.
“To see all the stuff that went up to that is usually, in my opinion, more interesting than seeing the end result,” he stated.
 He also didn’t want to show a reality television process, but a clean documentary.
“With a documentary, it’s happening whether you’re shooting it or not,” he explained.
When Selditch and Eleven Minutes’ co-director Robert Tate found out that McCarroll was creating his own line for Fashion Week, they immediately jumped on-board to document the process. Having worked with him on “Project Jay,” they knew McCarroll would be himself and keep the documentary honest.
“We didn’t do anything that you saw to make it more dramatic or less dramatic,” Selditch explained.
From the drama with People’s Revolution and the shoemaker, the directors got lucky and caught some perfect moments. And they would never dream of changing McCarroll.
 “He doesn’t temper himself for the camera,” Selditch said. “He didn’t get really involved in the edit.”
And there are definitely a couple things that Selditch and Tate left in Eleven Minutes that McCarroll would rather not have in the finished feature.
As far as where McCarroll sees himself next, “I’d love to design for dance or even write my own film. There are other things I want to do.” But that doesn’t mean he is giving up on design; McCarroll has his own line at JayMcCarroll.com and he has a line of fabric through Westminster Fibers.
While he feels like he is done watching the film and has “lived it once” (and that’s enough for him), he does like that Eleven Minutes shows, “a lot about art versus commerce…struggling artists and breaking down the misconceptions of reality television.”
 Simply put, Jay is a designer--not just a reality star.
Eleven Minutes is now playing at the Laemmle Sunset 5 and on HERE! Networks.
For more information, visit elevenminutes-jaymccarroll.com.
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