Award-winning filmmaker Atom Egoyan is all set to head up the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) platform jury this year — 40 years after he presented his debut film Next of Kin at the film festival, starring his wife, actor Arsinée Khanijian. Here he shares their very untraditional first kiss and first date.
How they met
We met in 1984 while I was shooting Next of Kin. It’s the classic case of a director falling in love with their star, but in this case it’s lasted 40 years. I think we must be the only couple in history that have their first kiss recorded on tape — I was playing a twisted therapist who makes a move on their patient and Arsinée was auditioning for the role. A friend recorded the audition in my uncle’s basement in Montreal and now we have that “first kiss” preserved. I guess that was also a bizarre first date.
The relationship
Our dating experience basically happened while we were making this first film. It was very intense because there was a strong, mutual attraction, but we tried to hide it as best we could, especially since Arsinée was married at the time. The strange thing was that it was her then husband who insisted that she should audition for this extremely low-budget film shooting around Kensington.
The proposal
The “formal” proposal was figuring out the best date we could have a civil marriage down at city hall, as we were preparing to shoot my sixth film, Exotica, in the summer of 1993. By that point Arsinée was pregnant with our son Arshile and we both agreed that we should be formally married.
The honeymoon
Our honeymoon happened during our first trip to Paris together shortly after we met in 1984. We both fell in love with the city and dreamed of making films that might play in all the very cool cinemas we saw there. We were both completely intoxicated by the French love of cinema and we dreamed that we could find a part in that particular culture. That happened when our second feature was released in France and we started to get regularly invited to the Cannes Film Festival.
The kids
Our son Arshile is finishing his MFA at the American Film Conservatory in Los Angeles, and we are very excited that his second film, Before They Joined Us, will be playing at TIFF.
The secret to success
I don’t know if there’s any particular secret to our relationship, but we have shared a lot of common dreams and always kept an open line of communication, even when things got complex. When you’re a couple working in the film industry, things can get very complex, but we try and keep a sense of humour and genuinely enjoy showing our work to audiences.
The past and future
This year will be forty years since we presented Next of Kin at TIFF, and we are also showing a newly restored version of The Sweet Hereafter from 1997. But we’re most excited to see Arshile’s film with a live audience. We are both thrilled that he is finding his creative voice and are here to support him in any way we can.
When I look at this picture [pictured above], taken when Exotica won Best Canadian Film at TIFF in 1994, I am so grateful that we have been able to make so many films together. And there’s Arshile as a baby — now presenting his own film at TIFF. So much of our life together has been about making films and it’s gratifying to think of this next generation of young Canadians creating new movies in this brave new world.
